Reincarnated as an Elf Prince

"You think you're mastering the shadows," she continued. "But it's not you carrying the void, it's the void carrying you. Every time you step, it digs into you. Eats you. How much of you will be left when you stand before the Sword Saint again? A man… or just an echo of the shadows?"

His jaw tightened. He pressed the blade closer, not to cut her, but to silence the tremor in his own hands.

"An echo strong enough to kill him is good enough for me."

—

Her eyes narrowed. For the first time, she struck not to spar but to hurt.

A surge of darkness exploded outward, blasting him back across the chamber. He slammed into the far wall, stone cracking beneath the impact, his breath ripped from his lungs.

Nysha stood, crimson eyes burning.

"You want a spar?" Her voice shook with fury. "Then I'll teach you what it means to lose yourself to the dark."

Shadows swarmed her form, cloaking her body, until she stood not as a woman but as a silhouette of living night. The chamber shook with her presence.

Ashwing screeched, wings snapping open, claws scraping stone.

Lindarion dragged himself upright, blood streaking his face. His grin never faded.

"Good," he said hoarsely. "Show me everything. Make me crawl. That's the only way I'll learn."

—

They collided.

Not with steps this time, with fury.

Darkness lashed out in a storm, blades and whips and claws tearing at the chamber, slicing stone into dust. Lindarion stepped through it, appearing and vanishing, his sword flashing arcs of silver-black as he cut again and again.

Every step burned him. Every flicker through the void left more blood dripping from his mouth, his eyes, his nose. But he kept going.

Nysha hammered him with blasts of shadow, each one rattling his bones, but he pressed closer each time, grinning like a madman.

Until finally, he vanished one last time, and reappeared with Zerathis pressing against her chest.

His body flickered violently, unstable, half-torn between realms. His voice was a broken whisper.

"Dead… if I wanted."

Nysha didn't flinch.

She lifted her hand, and pressed her palm flat against the blade's edge, letting it bite into her skin.

"Then what are you now, Lindarion?" she asked softly. "A victor… or a shadow that doesn't know it's already dead?"

The question hung in the chamber, heavier than any blow.

Ashwing's hiss filled the silence.

—

The world didn't return all at once.

It bled in slowly, fragment by fragment, like pieces of shattered glass being shoved into a frame they no longer fit.

Stone beneath him. His own heartbeat hammering far too fast. The wet heat of blood streaming from his nose, down into his mouth. The acrid taste of iron.

And above it all, Nysha's voice, raw, shaking, too loud against the ringing in his skull.

"—damn it, Lindarion, stop! Stop moving, you'll tear yourself apart—"

He tried to laugh. Tried to tell her he wasn't done. But the sound came out as a gurgle, blood bubbling between his teeth.

Ashwing was there, too. The dragon's small lizard body pressed against his ribs, claws digging shallowly into his skin as though trying to anchor him in place.

He could feel the tremors running through the little creature's frame, the barely-contained fury of an apex predator forced to watch its bonded human destroy himself.

He blinked, vision stuttering in and out, Nysha's face snapping into focus and then blurring again. Her crimson eyes glared down at him, her dark hair plastered to her cheeks with sweat.

Her hands glowed faintly with darkness, not an attack this time, but a crude attempt at mending.

"You idiot," she hissed. Her voice cracked, betraying the anger wasn't pure anger.

Her palms pressed against his chest, shadows threading into him. The sensation was unbearable, like ice water being forced into his veins, burning as it tried to knit the gaps where his body had nearly come apart.

Lindarion's lips twitched. "You're… crying."

"I'm not," she spat instantly, blinking furiously as though that proved her right. "You're just bleeding so much I can't see straight."

He tried to grin, but his jaw ached. His vision flickered again, threatening to drag him back into the nothingness he'd stepped through.

—

Every shadowstep had left its mark. He could feel them all.

Dozens of rents carved into his flesh and spirit, where the void had slipped inside and tried to keep him there. His arms were trembling, his legs barely obeying. His chest ached with every ragged breath, as though some invisible hand still clutched his heart.

But worse than the pain was the echo.

He could still hear it. The whisper of the void, pressing against the edges of his thoughts. Promising power if he'd just let go. Promising relief from the agony of a body that couldn't endure what he demanded.

Nysha's grip tightened on him as though she sensed it too.

"Don't listen," she said, voice hoarse. "That's not yours. The shadow isn't yours. It only pretends."

His eyes cracked open, locking on her face.

"Then why… do you use it?"

Her jaw clenched.

"Because I was born to. Because I don't get to choose. But you—" her voice cracked again, and she shoved more shadows into his body, her hands shaking from the strain "—you're not like us. You weren't made to carry this. You keep forcing yourself through, and one day you won't come back."

His breathing hitched. Pain lanced through his ribs with every word. Still, his grin, faint, broken, but real, curved his lips.

"Then I'll… step one more time than it takes to kill him."

Her palm struck his chest, not hard enough to hurt but sharp enough to make his vision flare white.

"Do you hear yourself?" she snapped. "Is that all you are now? A sword and a shadow? Nothing else?"

—

Ashwing hissed, tail whipping, eyes glowing faintly gold in the dim light. The little dragon's head darted forward, snapping at Lindarion's shoulder as though trying to shake sense into him.

Lindarion turned his head weakly toward his companion.

"What, you too?"

Ashwing growled low, a sound far too deep for its lizard form, before curling tighter against Lindarion's chest.

The warmth of its scaled body pressed firmly against him, grounding him, dragging him back from the whispering void.

For the first time since the fight began, Lindarion let his head fall back against the stone and closed his eyes.

His body screamed at him to move. To stand. To prove he could still fight. But Ashwing's weight, Nysha's trembling hands, the dull ache of mana saturation, they pinned him in place.

For now.