As a human being, with a functioning mind, a spine full of fear, and something precious to lose, my first instinct when facing the Wraith wasn't heroic.
It was survival.
Run.
Just run.
Turn and sprint in the opposite direction with every shred of strength in my bones.
At first, I thought I was surrounded. Multiple Wraiths, circling like wolves in the dark—phantoms pressing in on all sides. That illusion alone had anchored my feet, made me plant my stance instead of retreating. I couldn't show my back. Not when I didn't know where the next blade crafted out of shadow might come from.
But then I realised—it was just one.
Just one enemy.
One entity, silently gliding through the mist, yet powerful enough to mimic the presence of many. Its sheer aura distorted the senses. Manipulated fear. But now that I knew... I had a choice.
Run—or stay.
Retreat—or confront it.
Reveal its secret.
Uncover its purpose.
Find its weakness.
Because this thing—this Wraith—was proof of our failure. It had crossed into the heart of our territory. Undetected. Unchallenged. Without sounding a single alarm. And the upper brass of Varis? Still deluded. Still calling these things "imaginary" manifestations. Hallucinations. Ghost stories.
No, this was real.
Too real.
I had a second chance to retreat. I was just about to take it—because I've already made one fatal mistake tonight, and I couldn't afford another.
But that one second of hesitation—that split-moment of doubt?
That's all it needed.
It was there.
A blur on my side. No warning. No sound. No flash of movement. Just there.
Too fast for my senses.
And from that moment on, I was trapped.
In a dance I couldn't control.
A battle I couldn't avoid.
A life-or-death struggle against a being that should've never laid eyes on someone like me—not yet, not now.
The Wraith moved like a shadow—through shadows—every time I so much as tried to break free. Every direction I turned, it was already there. Cutting me off. Forcing me to fight.
My senses strained, trying to keep up, stretched to their limit just to anticipate its next emergence. It was exhausting. Overwhelming.
Absolute Zero?
Useless. I needed to avoid its line of sight, and I couldn't, not consistently.
Telekinesis?
Only worked on physical objects. Tangible things. And this... this thing wasn't physical. Not in any normal sense.
'I should've listened to her.'
Sia's voice rang in my head—her gentle worry, which now sounded like an actual warning. Her godman instincts.
As always, I ignored them.
And now, I was being toyed with.
The Wraith was toying with me, like a cat playing with a dying mouse. And worse, it knew I had nothing in my arsenal that could hurt it. No silver bullet. No holy arrow. Just steel, grit, and a brain on the verge of snapping.
But it's a little game?
It had a side effect.
It gave me time.
Time for my mana core to replenish—slowly but surely. Time for my rotation and telekinetic networks to sync again, thanks to the resonance I'd developed when I absorbed the Guardian Alpha's core.
Now, both forces pulsed together—mana and thought—refilling, rebuilding.
I steadied myself.
Breath. Blade. Focus.
Survive.
It struck again.
From the front this time.
No wind. No displacement. Not even a flicker of reflected light. Just a scythe cleaving through the shadow of a tree that was meters away... The Wraith had extended its reach, its frail-looking arm somehow. I realised.
But I was ready.
I brought Snowhite up in time, my grip firm, my stance braced. The blow landed with a dull, crushing clang—absorbed fully by the blade and redirected through my shoulders, down my spine.
I held.
It didn't move me.
Didn't stagger me enough to tip me off.
And that—that was wrong.
Something about it felt… off.
My eyes blinked.
Mid-blink—mid-motion—I felt it.
A ripple.
Not in the air. Not from in front.
From behind.
From my own shadow, from my own darkness cast on the earth beneath.
My instincts exploded.
Reflexes fired.
Too late.
A spike, long, sharp, and obsidian, was rising from the ground. Not from beneath the terrain, but from the shadow I had cast under me. Dozens of them. Each deadly. Each perfectly angled to pierce my spine, my heart, my mana core, or at least one of them, if I somehow managed to evade...
There was no escape.
I was fast.
But not that fast.
The world slowed down.
As if time itself pitied me, stretching the moment so I could watch my own death.
Helpless. Trapped.
My dominant arm loosened. My fingers slipped from Snowhite's hilt. My body accepted it—braced for pain, for death, for nothingness. For the pathetic, poetic ending of someone who tried but failed, I gave up, my body gave up, the mana around me gave up.
'This is it," I thought. "Dying young, without meaning. Without legacy. Without—'
NO. I immediately conjured as something within me, refusing my own death, not yet, not today, no way.
My eyes blew open.
My heart raced. Faster than should be humanly possible. Burning like wildfire in my chest.
I won't die here.
Not like this. Not yet.
Without me… who's going to protect Sia?
Who's going to fulfil the dreams Sara shared under the same roof?
Who's going to fight for the people I love—the only ones I care about?
I could already feel the tips of those cursed spikes piercing the first layers of my cloak, and the scraping metal of my armour, curling toward flesh.
But suddenly—
Clarity exploded within me, within my mind perhaps.
Wait.
These spikes weren't illusions.
They were real. Manifested. Tangible. Formed from shadow-elemental mana.
And that made them fair game.
If my guess was right, if this wasn't just instinct but truth, a law...
RESTRAIN!
My command wasn't shouted. It wasn't cast.
It was willed.
The mana in the mist reacted—surged—as if waiting for permission. Waiting for my intent.
The spikes slowed.
Not much. But just enough, then, entirely.
I sidestepped—hard. My body was moving faster than my mind could narrate. And as I turned, my eyes witnessed it.
The impossible.
I had caught the shadow spikes.
Telekinesis gripped them—solid and sure.
And with a flick of my fingers—
Crack.
They shattered.
Exploded into shards of blackened mana and drifting mist.
I stood there, panting, snow rising in eddies around my boots. A flicker of mana trailed from my fingers, the remnants of resistance hanging in the air.
I had reigned over shadow.
I had bent a legendary affinity to my will.
For the first time in this entire fight—
I smiled.
The very reason I hadn't summoned Crimson Ultima was simple—its nature and size weren't suited for this kind of fight. Not here. Not now.
This was a tight-range, cloak-and-dagger ambush arena. A hellhole of shadow bursts and blind corners. Ultima's flames would've lit up the entire area, but not in a good way. The Wraith's shadow affinity would've smothered those flames before they even kissed its figure. And the drain? Don't even get me started. I'd burn through my reserves faster than I could swing, leaving myself wide open and weaponless.
No. Crimson Ultima stayed sheathed.
But now—
Now I had something better.
I knew how to hurt it.
Telekinesis worked.
And that discovery was a one-way ticket—straight back to whatever shadow realm this damn thing crawled out from.
The Wraith reappeared behind me—classic. Back to basics, huh?
"Unoriginal," I muttered, my mind catching up faster than my words.
Before its scythe could crash down and cleave me open, I spun, left foot pivoting as I poured mana into the air.
RESTRAIN!
My telekinesis lashed out like an invisible limb, snagging the scythe mid-swing and shoving it backwards. The weapon recoiled, and the Wraith staggered slightly in mid-air, clearly not expecting resistance.
"Yeah," I exhaled, stepping forward. "It works."
And I was done playing defence.
Mana surged. It howled through me.
No more hesitation.
I charged.
Snowhite in hand. Body low. Steps silent.
The Wraith blinked—metaphorically. It couldn't even process what had just happened. Confusion twisted its movements, and that half-second of stunned delay? That was all I needed.
It snapped back to reflex.
A gigantic, curved shadow arc erupted from its scythe, twice the size of the last one. The air around it twisted, pulsing with dark energy.
But I felt it before it even fully formed.
I slid—knees grinding against dirt and darkened-frozen roots—my body flat, my head tilted as the arc screamed past me, barely a breath above my skull. I could feel it rip open the air.
But that wasn't the kill shot. That was bait.
The real strike came from above.
I was still on my knees when it tried to bring its scythe down, full force, vertical deathblow straight to my skull, and my back, as the strike turned the very colour of my eyes.
Not this time.
I reached out again.
This time, not just with raw telekinesis, but with refined control, something I hadn't used in real combat since that encounter against the Guardian Alpha.
Two things happened simultaneously: First, I gripped its scythe again, but tighter, firmer, pushing the trajectory sideways.
Second—I channelled my mana into Snowhite, not just through the core, but across the entire blade—layered it with shimmering bands of telekinetic mana pressure which orbited around the ice-white blade, refined so thin they blurred space around the metal.
The blade—my blade—became a razor of pure will.
The mist around us split as I rose upwards.
Snowhite's tip carved through the fog like it was air—and then something more. It felt as if the very fabric of space bent around it. The mist hissed. The air cracked.
Even the Wraith felt it.
What was it? The dread? That spine-prickling, core-shaking sensation? That wasn't fear.
That was the instinct to flee, which I felt more times than I would've cared to admit.
And now the tables had turned.
I slashed—horizontal. Clean. Sharp. With everything behind it.
The air folded.
The fog tore.
The Wraith flinched—jerked backwards on instinct—because even it didn't want to find out what that blade could do.
Not anymore.
And for the first time since this fight started—
It was my attack that forced it to retreat.