Cedric stepped onto his Vice and gestured to pull his Virtue close. He didn’t have much in the way of attack power, but with all the chaos overtaking Dyllan’s mindscape, it was clear his healing abilities would be needed very soon.

Quickly and cautiously, Cedric rode his Cunning throughout the rubble of the mindscape to scan for Andie and Dyllan. He didn’t find them. This supported his theory that his friends were currently inside Dyllan’s Nightmare.

Wait, something was moving - lots of something. The shadowy hate pouring out of the mindscape had started to stir, spinning slowly out to the outskirts of the mindscape - where it steadily gained momentum until it became a veritable tornado surrounding the mindscape. Strange. Such an oppressive force should have given Cedric a feeling of dread… but something wasn’t right. When readying an attack, hate didn’t scatter or spread. It condensed and sharpened. It gathered when angered, and only dispersed when it was… afraid.

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This was how shadows behaved when they were defeated, but not yet destroyed - when they ran for the cracks and hidden corners to hide and bide their time.

Cedric glanced below him, scanning the shattered mindscape. There were no cracks right now - no places to hide. The darkness had been ripped from the structures it hid within and corrupted - left vulnerable. The power balance of the mindscape was shifting, and its Nightmare was desperately posturing - making itself as big and loud as possible, pretending it was still the one in control. Fear was the only thing it had left.

Cedric still didn’t know what Andie’s plan was… but he was growing confident that it was working.