The shadow did not move.
Its smile stayed wide, inhuman, its cold finger pressed against Yan Zhi's chest.
Then—a sudden force struck.
Yan Zhi was hurled backward, crashing into the fractured ground as black dust exploded around him. Hands of smoke erupted from the cracks, clawing at his body, dragging him downward as though the earth itself wished to consume him.
With a surge of the Shadow Vein, blades of darkness cut through the grasping hands. But every severed limb multiplied, growing back stronger, faster.
"You cannot fight me with a sword," the shadow's voice echoed, layered with his own. "Every strike you make… only wounds yourself."
Yan Zhi forced himself to rise, breath ragged, eyes burning.
"If you are truly me… then you also know I won't stop."
The shadow laughed, fractured and jagged, reverberating from every direction.
It mirrored Yan Zhi, forming an identical blade in its own hand—same shape, same glow, same source.
Two figures faced each other.
Two blades lifted.
When they clashed, the Veil itself trembled.
Shadows erupted in a violent blast, shattering the ground, toppling black spires in the distance. Faces formed in the fractures—people Yan Zhi once knew, all laughing, all mocking.
The pressure was suffocating—not only his body, but his mind.
This was no enemy.
This was his scar, given flesh. His fear, made whole.
The shadow attacked, movements sharp, merciless. Each strike tore into Yan Zhi—not only wounding flesh, but scarring his soul.
"I know your hesitation. I know your fear. I know… every weakness."
Yan Zhi staggered, blood seeping from his shoulder. The blade's wound burned deeper than flesh, a pain rooted in memory itself.
Voices whispered inside his head:
"You failed them."
"You cannot be trusted."
"Every betrayal began with you."
Yan Zhi clenched his teeth. His gaze hardened.
"If you know all my weaknesses… then you know this too. I don't stop. I don't fall. I don't need light to fight you. I only need… to keep standing."
Driving his blade into the ground, he unleashed a storm of shadow. The writhing hands were swept aside in a violent surge. The shadow staggered but rose again—its grin wider than before.
"Interesting… You think you can live by rejecting me? You forget, Yan Zhi… I am you. The more you resist, the more I exist."
Their blades clashed again and again—steel and whispers, violence and laughter, every strike a war between body and soul. The shadow mirrored his every move, yet Yan Zhi began to notice… cracks.
It was not perfect.
Sometimes too fast, sometimes too slow. A breath's hesitation, a sliver of imperfection.
Yan Zhi shifted his rhythm—delaying by a fraction, striking when the reflection faltered.
And for the first time, his blade broke through.
The shadow's body split, black mist pouring out, screaming like a living wound.
The smile faltered.
Its voice dropped, heavy and deep:
"So… you wish to kill yourself?"
Yan Zhi raised his blade once more, his eyes cold as stone.
"If that is the price to go deeper… then I will not hesitate."
The world trembled.
The battle was far from over.
But now, Yan Zhi knew—
The shadow could bleed.
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