The void was silent again.
Alex lay sprawled across the fractured ground of Nyx's inner world, his chest rising and falling in ragged breaths. Sweat and blood mixed across his body, steaming faintly in the shadowed atmosphere. His hand clenched tightly around the dagger still stained with that wisp of shadow-mist—the proof that he had struck her once.
That moment replayed in his head over and over. The feel of the blade cutting through her defenses, the sight of her sleeve tearing, then her shoulder misting. It was real. He had broken through Nyx's impenetrable guard.
Yet, even as the joy burned within him, the weight of truth pressed harder. That strike had been shallow. A scratch. Something that would never matter in a real fight. If Nyx had been trying—if she had wanted to end it—he would have been dead a thousand times already.
He pushed himself up to his knees, his chest heaving.
"One scratch… isn't enough," he muttered, his voice hoarse but burning with resolve.
