Sliding across the marble floor as he was being pushed back by a merciless onslaught of unhurried, but lethal attacks, Sunny was carefully observing Neph's movements.

'Why can‘t I make sense of it?‘

He shifted his weight, deflected the silver blade to the side, and used the long hilt of the odachi as a lever to spin its blade at an inconceivable speed. Nephis easily partied it with the crossguard of her sword, but Sunny was already transitioning from a downward slash into a rising stab.

Every movement flowed into anotherI forming a torrent of deadly steel.

'How strange.'

Nephis was the first person Sunny had ever shadowed. After years of training together and fighting side by side, he knew her better than anyone else. Therefore, it should have been easy to glimpse the true essence of her transcendent battle art, or at least start to unravel it.

And indeed, Sunny sensed the heart of her intent. Just like how Nephis could read his intentions through her sublime mastery of combat, he could predict her actions through Shadow Dance. But his perception was oddly shallow... he could guess what would happen, but not why it would happen.

Almost like those initiates who had only mastered the body, but not the mind.

Nephis evaded his stab by turning and leaning sideways, took a graceful step to shift her balance, and pulled her blade out of the bind. A split second later, it lashed out, almost striking his thigh. If Sunny was a beat too late, he would have had to receive her blow.

The Onyx Mantle was akin to a Transcendent armor, while the mirror sword was a strange hybrid between a Transcendent and a Supreme weapon that he himself had created. Considering that offense usually trampled defense in the ruthless world of the Nightmare Spell, a single strike was all it would take for him to lose the duel.

The silver blade might not break his armor immediately, but leaving a scratch on its onyx surface would be easy.

He disengaged and stared at Nephis impassively for a moment.

Apart from manifesting this avatar, Sunny was not using his Aspect. She had not promised to do the same, technically, but was still following suit. Whether it was out of respect for the Lord of Shadows or simply because Neph was just as starved for a good opponent as he was, Sunny did not know.

That was a part of the problem.

A transcendent battle art was tailored to a single user, seamlessly incorporating their unique traits and abilities. So, since Nephis was not using any of her Aspect Abilities, what Sunny was witnessing was not the true extent of her battle style, but rather a partial version of it.

Of course, he had hoped to extrapolate the missing pieces by experiencing the foundational technique, but it was not going well.

'Should I try to deduce what's missing?‘

Sunny had plenty of experience constructing his own battle art, so it was not impossible for him to guess what Nephis would have created.

'Let's see...‘

The basic principle of elevating a battle style to a transcendent battle art was universal... at least it was supposed to be. Sunny had not consulted any Saints on how they built their personal techniques, so he did not know if everyone followed what he perceived to be common sense.

The first step was to create a comprehensive essence technique. By infusing one's body with essence, one was capable of greatly enhancing their physical prowess. Awakened could not control essence with finesse, so their way of going about things was crude and rudimentary, mostly consisting of flooding the entirety of their bodies with essence. Masters were much more skilled in that regard. Their control of essence was rather intricate, as was their understanding of the human body. By selectively infusing various areas, muscle groups, and organs with essence at just the right time, they were able to not only increase its efficacy, but also drastically reduce its consumption, thus raising efficiency.

But Saints could control soul essence as naturally as they were breathing, and with truly incredible finesse. They could more or less selectively enhance each muscle fiber, nerve cluster, or tendon in their body — not only that, but due to better control, the range and manner of these enhancements were broader than those of a Master, and could be consciously altered.

In short, Saints could explosively increase their already stunningly formidable strength, speed, agility, and resilience if they were smart about using their essence, and had trained themselves to do it instinctively... like Sunny had in the past four years.

Each time he took a step or delivered a strike, the complex machine of his body performed numerous actions. His heart pumped blood through his veins, electrical impulses traveled along his nerves, various muscles relaxed or contracted, and so on. To perform a proper strike, a warrior had to possess great control of his body and know how to use it well.

Of course, no one consciously willed all these minute processes to happen. If trained properly, the body itself would remember how to act to the best of its ability.

An essence technique, therefore, was like an additional layer on top of physical training, designed to augment every motion in the most effective and efficient way, as well as tailored to the unique personal battle style of the individual. Designing such a technique demanded immense insight into the functions of the body, the laws of combat, and one's own self.

At first, including his soul in the movements of his body was a conscious process, and one that demanded an inconceivable amount of concentration, at that. But by now, it was like an instinct to Sunny — luckily, he had possessed a rich foundation of going through countless battles as an Awakened and a Master to build upon, so mastering his essence technique had not been too hard.

There had been the Soul Serpent and Soul Weave to assist him, as well.

...Similarly, Nephis had designed an essence technique of her own. Sunny could perceive her radiant, pure soul essence flowing through her body with a strange and almost hypnotic elegance, moving in perfect harmony with the fluid grace of her sword dance.

Her technique seemed even more intricate and precise than his own... was it simply because Neph's swordsmanship had a different personality than his, or because she had spent more time to thoroughly comprehend the science behind the biology of her body and the physics of her sword?

After all, Sunny had mostly taught himself through practical experience and intuition, spending less time on theory.

In any case, this shallow layer of Neph's battle art was not a mystery. Sunny had enough ability to perceive it, enough insight to dismantle it, and enough experience to reassemble it... even emulating it was not a problem, given enough time.

But that was what an essence technique represented — the most shallow and basic layer of a battle art.

The true essence hid much deeper, having to do with Aspect and Attributes. That was what Sunny had to deduce in order to remove the strange interference that prevented him from comprehending Neph's elevated battle style.

There was another sonic boom, and the two of them were momentarily thrown away from each other. Sunny increased the weight of his body and slid several meters back, swiftly coming to a halt. Nephis pivoted on one leg and performed an effortless pirouette, regaining her balance almost immediately.

The Fire Keepers scrambled to get even further back, seemingly stunned by how long the duel was lasting.

Sunny smirked behind the mask and rushed forward.

'lf I compare our Aspects…‘