Levi calmly perched up a tree, looking at the two Eclipsed searching for him.

Well... calmly wasn't exactly the word since even he couldn't deny that he was extremely nervous.

Especially when he thought about the fact that he was facing two tier 3s.

Yes, according to the watch, they were no higher than tier 3, maybe even a bit weaker, but that didn't mean that this fight was going to be any easier.

Especially considering the fact that these creatures could deform their bodies into any shape they liked.

But he couldn't back down, he had to figure out a way to take them down and return to help Nox with the main one, since that's the only way he'd be able to get back to his sister.

'But how?' he mentally thought to himself.

Levi's only advantage right now was the fact that they couldn't spot him when he went invisible.

But the moment he got close enough or tried to power another solar tech, they'll immediately know where he is and in sync, they'd attack.

As a member of the stealth division, their best tactic was to be like assassins, isolate the enemies and pick them up apart at a time, but not for these two.

They moved like a unit...which they were, but Levi couldn't think of a way to get them apart since fighting both was no different from fighting the main body.

Except....

Levi watched closely as the two shadows searched the treetops for him. No matter where they went, they seemed to be completely attached to a specific shadow following them everywhere.

This meant that even though they were this far, they were still under the control of the Fiend's main body, which meant they couldn't move past a certain distance, all he had to do was figure how far that distance was.

Levi hopped down the tree, silently landing, though that changed nothing, because the moment he touched the forest floor, they snapped their heads towards him.

But that was exactly what he wanted.

To find out how far, the creature's range was, he had to bait them and to do that, he had to reveal himself.

Without waiting for him to settle into a proper stance before they launched themselves at him, but he expected the attack.

He teleported away just in time for one of the shadows to crash into a tree, completely disintegrating before going through the tree and reforming again.

The second shadow's head snapped toward Levi again, but this time, instead of waiting for their attack, he sprinted deeper into the forest.

The two Eclipsed watched him run for a second before they bolted after him.

Their forms seemed to shift a little as they went from bipedal to quadrupeds increasing their speed, quickly catching up to him.

One of them soon launched itself into the air, shifting its form midair as it quickly approached its prey and for his head.

Levi teleported forwards which allowed him to just narrowly avoiding a blade-like arm that cut clean through a tree where he previously was.

He reappeared atop another branch which high, narrow, and angled in a way that gave him a clear line of sight as the shadows skidded to a halt just beneath him.

The shadows tried extending their hands forward, but as if something was forcing them back, it snapped back with blinding speeds.

The more they tried pushing forwards, in attempt to capture their prey, the more a certain force pulled them back, keeping them in place.

The Eclipsed let out a screech as they looked at their target up the tree but Levi just gave them a small smile.

'Got you.'

According to his calculations, the Fiend couldn't send its shadows over a distance of thirty meters.

Though, that still didn't solve the fact that if he tried going all the way around and aiding Nox, the Fiend could just summon them to it again.

'It should have a limit,' he placed a hand on his chin, ' to both how many it can summon and how long it can maintain them.'

He was right, even solar knights had limits to how much SE they used. Their cores held different amounts of SE depending on their ranks and once that emptied, they'd have to wait for their cores to refill itself with lost SE.

Though, everyone's core was upgradable, unlike the temporary cores assigned to them during the entrance test.

Though the cores were created to hold only a certain amount of SE, if you absorbed past that threshold...and survived, your core's size and threshold will increase, putting you in the next rank.

The key word was, if you survived.

If your SE pathways were not ready for a sudden upgrade, you'd just explode from within...which was not a pretty sight.

Hence the reason Solar Knights only try to rank up when they were completely sure that their pathways were ready to handle more SE.

And according to professor Sirius Quinn, the same applied to Eclipsed.

Levi was sure that Eclipsed had limits on the abilities they could use based on the amount of umbra energy they had.

All he had to do was destroy and let these shadows reform until the Fiend could create them no more as it completely ran out of umbra.

And that was exactly what he was going to do.

He hopped down the tree and tossed a small orbs at the creature which exploded as soon as they made contact.

He momentarily shielded his face due to the sudden flash of light but when he moved his hand, he could see the creatures already reforming themselves again.

With a smile, he took out multiple small orbs from his inventory as he tossed them one at a time at the creatures.

***

It took a long while, but the two shadows slowly stopped regenerating and soon enough, the long shadow always connected to them receded.

'Finally,' Levi thought.

He was getting a bit worried since the longer he stayed here, the more danger his team was in, so he was glad that the creatures didn't regenerate any longer.

But to be safe, he went invisible again and teleported from tree to tree.

***

It took him a few minutes but Levi's eyes widened at the scene before him.

Nox was restrained to the ground, with multiple shadow hands keeping him in place meanwhile Elias.....Elias was impaled on what looked like a scythe, his body hanging limp on it.

There was a second scythe headed for Nox and without thinking Levi teleported in its path in hopes of blocking it.

But the moment he appeared his vision seemed to flip upside down as he felt himself floating before falling.

The last thing he saw was his body still protectively standing before Nox's restrained self before everything faded to black.

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