The battlefield never truly settled after Wave Eight. Smoke still clung low over the shattered courtyard, drifting through broken stone and the bodies nobody had the strength to move. Blood had dried in some places and remained slick in others, leaving the entire campus smelling of iron, ash, and exhausted magic. Fifteen survivors stood or knelt wherever the last fight had left them, leaning against weapons, walls, and one another while they waited for the final Speed Round to begin. Nobody celebrated surviving the Hunger Constructs. There wasn't enough energy left for relief. Dorian wiped blood from his mouth and immediately regretted the movement when pain flared behind his eyes. Predator's Focus had shut down, but not completely.
Faint motion trails still followed people whenever they shifted, and the corners of his vision twitched with phantom threat markers his mind had not yet learned to ignore. His cursed arm burned steadily beneath the darkened skin, the discoloration now creeping beyond his shoulder toward his neck. Every breath felt borrowed. Jenn stood nearby with her halberd planted against the ground and both hands resting on the haft. Her golden wings had dimmed considerably, their edges flickering instead of burning with the impossible radiance Dorian had seen when they first returned from the forest.
Even she looked exhausted. Evan gave a short, brittle laugh. "We lived." Nobody answered him. The silence stretched until Dorian felt the atmosphere tighten around them. Pressure rolled through the courtyard without wind, making the curse in his arm pulse painfully. Something about the approaching wave felt different before the System said a word. Then the notification appeared.
[ADAPTIVE ENEMIES DEPLOYING]
APEX ECHOES INITIALIZING
[GOOD LUCK FIGHTING YOURSELF.]
The message remained long enough for Dorian to read it twice. "What does that mean?" someone shouted from the opposite side of the courtyard. The System offered no explanation. White light swallowed everything. There was no explosion or heat, only absolute brightness followed by the sensation of Dorian's body being pulled apart and reconstructed in the same instant. His feet left the ground. Sound collapsed into a single piercing tone. "Helena!" he shouted, but he never heard the word leave his mouth. Reality snapped back around him. Dorian stumbled across broken concrete with the Fang already in his hand and lightning crawling along its edge. He spun, searching for Helena's blonde hair, Jenn's golden wings, Evan's broad frame, Lena, Wilhelm, anyone. He was alone.
The place surrounding him resembled the university courtyard, but only in the way a memory resembled the real thing. Buildings existed around the perimeter in unfinished fragments, walls ending abruptly before dissolving into shadow. The ground looked familiar until his eyes tried to follow cracks too far and discovered they led nowhere. Above him hung a featureless gray sky without clouds or sunlight. His interface remained visible, but the party indicators were gone. No minimap appeared. "Helena?" His voice returned to him half a second late, distorted by an echo that had no reason to exist. Predator's Focus activated automatically.
[AMBIENT THREAT ANALYSIS]
HOSTILE PRESENCE: UNCONFIRMED
SPATIAL DISTORTION: DETECTED
MOVEMENT PROBABILITY: ELEVATED
The lightning came before he finished reading. A bolt struck the place where he had been standing. Dorian threw himself sideways as electricity detonated through the pavement, splitting stone and leaving a blackened trench across the courtyard. He rolled and came up with the Fang raised. Someone stood opposite him. Dorian stared at himself. The figure shared his height, build, and posture down to the slight forward angle of his shoulders when preparing to fight. Lightning traveled across its body in continuous currents, brighter and more violent than anything Dorian could produce.
Its eyes burned electric violet and left afterimages whenever it moved. There was no expression on the face. No hesitation. The Echo attacked. It crossed the distance faster than Dorian expected even with Predator's Focus active. A lightning-wreathed weapon struck toward his neck, changed angle midway through the attack, then followed his attempted dodge before he finished making it. Dorian blocked with the Fang. The impact sent electricity through his entire arm and drove him backward. Another strike followed immediately. Then another. Each attack targeted where Dorian intended to move rather than where his body currently stood. He barely caught the fourth, sparks exploding between the weapons as his wrist screamed under the force. Dorian countered with a slash aimed across the Echo's ribs. The creature vanished from the attack path before he completed the swing and appeared behind him.
A blade descended toward the base of his skull. Dorian ducked. Heat tore across his back as the edge barely missed flesh, and he twisted away before the follow-up could reach him. His heartbeat accelerated. The Echo knew him. Not simply his skills or attributes. It understood the habits beneath them. Every time Dorian relied on speed, it moved first. When he committed to aggression, it anticipated the angle. Predator's Focus produced warnings that arrived fractions too late because the opponent already knew which reactions the skill encouraged. This thing was everything Slayer rewarded without any of the hesitation Dorian still carried. Efficiency without doubt. Predation stripped of humanity. Dorian attacked again, sending lightning outward with enough force to overwhelm instead of outmaneuver.
The Echo met him directly. Their electricity collided in a violent detonation that threw Dorian across the courtyard. He slammed into the base of a broken column and hit the ground hard. Pain spread through his ribs while the curse in his arm pulsed in response to the stress. Across the courtyard, the Echo merely tilted its head. Assessment. It began walking toward him. There was no anger in its movement and no excitement from gaining the advantage. It approached like a weapon following instructions. Dorian forced himself to breathe. If he kept fighting the way he always had, he would lose. The Echo was faster because it had no uncertainty to overcome. It knew every instinct he relied upon because those instincts had been used to build it. This wasn't a strength test. The System had constructed the perfect predator for Dorian Black by removing everything from Dorian Black except the parts useful for killing.
Lightning exploded across his vision. The bolt struck his shoulder and dropped him to one knee. Electricity locked the muscles in his arm, and the Fang slipped from his fingers before clattering several feet away. Dorian sucked in a breath through clenched teeth while the taste of blood filled his mouth. The Echo was already moving. Its blade drove toward him with brutal precision. Dorian twisted, but the damage from the lightning slowed him enough that he couldn't clear the attack. Steel entered his side between two ribs. The first sensation was pressure. Heat followed, then an expanding cold that made his legs weaken. Dorian screamed as lightning poured through the weapon into his body. He didn't retreat. He stepped closer.
The decision produced the first reaction he had seen from the Echo. Its head shifted slightly as if the behavior did not fit the prediction it had been built to follow. Dorian wrapped one hand around the wrist holding the weapon. Electricity burned his palm and climbed his forearm. Predator's Focus flooded him with warnings that he ignored. "Got you." Darkness answered. Shadows erupted from the courtyard, the broken buildings, and Dorian's own body. They condensed into jagged spears and drove toward the Echo from every angle. The creature tried to move, but its weapon remained buried inside Dorian and his hand locked around its wrist.
Black blades punched through lightning and flesh simultaneously, striking shoulders, legs, torso, and back before driving the Echo against the ground. Its scream came distorted, doubled by the broken space around them. Electricity discharged wildly as the creature struggled beneath the shadow restraints. For the first time, its movements became inefficient. Dorian released the wrist and stumbled backward. The blade pulled free from his side, and blood immediately ran beneath his armor. His legs threatened to collapse, but he forced himself toward the Fang. Fingers slick with blood closed around the handle. The Echo strained against the shadows, its muscles tightening while lightning surged hard enough to destroy several of the weaker bindings.
It was still stronger. Still faster. The difference was that speed no longer mattered while it was pinned. Dorian crossed the distance in three uneven steps and brought the Fang down through the creature's arm just above the elbow. Lightning burst across the courtyard when the blade struck. Bone resisted for a fraction of a second before giving way. The severed arm hit the ground in a spray of sparks and dark fluid. The Echo convulsed. Its electrical aura weakened. Then Dorian felt warmth flow through the Fang and into his hand. Lifeforce. Not much, but enough to steady his breathing and stop his knees from collapsing beneath him. The Echo looked toward the missing limb. Then at Dorian. Something changed in its face. The expression was subtle enough that anyone without Predator's Focus might have missed it. Its remaining eye widened slightly. The muscles around its mouth tightened. Fear. Dorian stood over the creature with blood running between his fingers while shadows writhed around them. He finally understood why everything he had tried before had failed. He had approached the Echo as though defeating himself required becoming faster, more aggressive, and more lethal than his reflection. That was exactly the contest the System wanted. The Echo was built to win it. Dorian tightened his grip around the Fang and smiled. Control was the part of him the System had underestimated.