[The Month Before the Tournament - From Aetron's Perspective]
The next day, in the clan's training area, we were swinging our wooden swords with the other youths. We repeated basic stances, blocks, attack forms. Aetron's memories said these movements were in my muscle memory. But Epsilon's soul found every step foreign. Sometimes I performed a movement wrong, sometimes when I was about to say "sorry" to a youth beside me, their name wouldn't come to mind. These small mistakes fed the feeling of fraud inside me. I need to accept this, I thought to myself. This is my life now.
"Aetron," Lyra said, pausing in the middle of training. Her eyes were examining me carefully. "Your stance has completely changed. You look much more... mature than three days ago."
"Of course he looks mature. I'm inside him," Null's voice whispered in my mind with a proud tone.
"Your humility is as impressive as always, love," I replied in my mind, trying to hide my smile.
"Pair up with Kaelan," Lyra said. "Let's see how Resonance level has affected your fighting?"
Kaelan. The name tore a piece from Aetron's memories in my mind. A month ago. In the training area, Kaelan's wooden sword had knocked Aetron's sword from his hand, knocked him to the ground. "Your father may be clan leader but you're just a disappointment," he'd said dismissively. The shame and anger that moment brought echoed for a moment in Epsilon's soul too.
But the Kaelan standing across from me was no longer looking dismissively. On the contrary, there was a serious expression in his eyes. The news that I'd reached Resonance level after my three-day disappearance had apparently spread quickly through the clan. Now standing before him wasn't the 'disappointment' he'd easily beaten a month ago, but an opponent who had mysteriously grown stronger. "I won't give you an advantage this time," he said, taking his guard. "You won't win."
"Is this child threatening us?" Null asked. Her voice was amused but underneath was a slight, sarcastic tone.
"I think so." In my mind, I reached for Null's presence, as if holding her hand. "Ready?"
"Always."
When the fight began, I released the Edgium inside me. Energy began flowing through my veins like an electrical current. I was no longer just seeing with my eyes. I could feel the tension in Kaelan's muscles, the vibrations in his wooden sword, his intent as he prepared his next move... all of it.
"He's leaving his left arm too open," Null's voice said in my mind, analytical and sharp.
"I see it. Also his foot position is unbalanced."
I didn't wait for Kaelan's attack. Null's analysis and my instincts merged. Edgium energy sharpened my reflexes. Before Kaelan's sword reached me, I slid to the side, taking advantage of his imbalance to deliver a kick to his leg while simultaneously striking his wrist with my sword's hilt. The wooden sword flew from his hand and fell to the ground.
Everything had taken less than five seconds.
While Kaelan looked at his wrist in shock, Lyra and the others remained silent.
"Incredible," Lyra finally said, breaking the silence. She began to clap. "This isn't just Resonance level. You... you've become like a completely different warrior."
"Of course," Null called out in my mind with a sarcastic tone. "There's someone who thinks logically inside."
"Don't forget we're working as a team, love," I replied, savoring the victory.
The following month was a difficult but meaningful process of trying to adapt to this new balance. During the days I trained with the clan's youths, at night I tested the limits of Resonance level with Null in the shelter in my mind.
During one training session I was facing Lyra. Her movements were fast but thanks to Null's analyses in my mind, I could predict her every step. "Coming from the right," Null's voice said. I ducked, slid under her sword and moved toward her leg to break her balance. Right then, Lyra's shocked expression triggered another memory in my mind: Epsilon's father's disappointed expression over a single low grade on his report card. My body froze momentarily. That old, familiar fear tightened my throat.
"Aetron, focus!" Null's voice warned, sharper this time. "He's not here. Only you and I exist." Her logic was like a knife stabbing through the fog of fear. I came to myself and disarmed Lyra, slipping away from her next move.
"Wow," Lyra said, breathless. "I thought you spaced out for a moment." I smiled but it was a fake smile.
Moments with my family were even harder. One evening, sitting by the fire, Thera had curled up in my lap, listening to an old legend Niyara was telling. Her small hand rested against my chest. The pure love and sense of belonging I felt in that moment was so intense it hurt. Because this moment, this warmth, this little girl's love... didn't belong to me. I was a fraud. When I raised my head I saw Kadros watching me. On his face was that soft expression of a father proud of his son. I looked away.
"You'll get used to it," Null's voice said from the depths of my mind. "This is your reality too."
Over time, it happened as Null said. Kadros's proud looks, Niyara's affectionate touches, and Thera's unconditional love, while not completely silencing the "fraud" voice inside me, had at least begun to turn it into a whisper.
That night, in the shelter in my mind, I sat in that perfect wooden chair we'd created before. Null's mental avatar, as always, was examining data screens floating in the air.
"A month has passed," I whispered in my mind. "Do you think... am I ready?"
Null paused the data flow momentarily and turned to me. Her avatar's face was expressionless but I could receive the feeling emanating from her: Careful analysis.
"Your physical data is at optimal level. Your strategic analysis... is improving. But that's not the real question, Aetron."
"What is then?"
Her eyes looked as if into the deepest parts of my soul.
"The real question is, who will you fight as when you enter the arena? Epsilon trying to survive? Or Aetron trying to protect his family?"
This question echoed in my mind for a moment. I looked at my hands. They were now a 14-year-old child's hands. But the soul inside carried the weight of two lives.
"I don't know," I answered honestly. "Maybe I'm neither. Maybe... we are us."
An almost imperceptible smile appeared on Null's avatar's lips and instantly disappeared.
"Logically, this is a contradiction. But... an acceptable hypothesis," she said. "Now rest. Tomorrow, we'll see if you're truly ready."