“It looks like they’ve noticed…” Claud looked at Schwarz and the others through his Second Shadow, before handing them the small card that he had prepared earlier. There was no way a shadow could speak, so he could at most just pick up something and write on it.

“How’s it going?” Lily asked.

“They’re reading it now and nodding like little birds pecking on grain,” Claud replied, before scribbling the name of their current location onto the piece of paper. “They seem surprised, but we can’t hear what they’re saying. Let’s see…”

He removed the Second Shadow’s controller from his head and passed it to Lily. “Here!”

“Hmm…” Lily looked at him and leaned forward to the point that their noses were touching. “You don’t like the sensation when you use the Second Shadow, huh?”

“How did you—”

“I guessed, of course!” Lily’s eyes twinkled. “You told me once before that one of your greatest fears was being vulnerable, remember? Tied up and powerless to resist. That’s what you said long ago. And it so happens that there’s a faint sense of being restricted and unable to resist when you’re using the Second Shadow. You are far clumsier there, far weaker…”

Claud looked at his soulmate, and then nodded. “I suppose I can’t hide anything from you, huh. Yeah. That’s…probably one of the few things that can make me reckless.”

His face scrunched up as Lily rubbed his cheeks, but he didn’t say anything. For one, he liked the sensation of being pampered once in a while, and secondly…he was indeed a bit scared of something like this. Being trapped or rendered powerless was not something he could deal with at a drop of a hat.

“Well then, you should start to build up resistance against that, then.” Lily squished his cheeks once more. “The Trial of Aeons and the Third Tutorial…who’s to say there won’t come a time when you’ll be stuck in such conditions? And besides, you’re still quite capable of using the Second Shadow normally. You just need to increase your use of it.”

“Ugh.”

“And I’ll make sure to place some distance between you and me too,” Lily added. “I’m sure I won’t be there for the real deal…or rather, we have to be prepared for the event that you’ll be isolated and restrained.”

“Can we not?” Claud mumbled sadly.

“Nuh-uh. It’s a crippling weakness of yours. We need to get rid of it,” Lily replied, before pulling out another Second Shadow. “We’ll train together with this.”

“But…uh, I need to unravel the secrets of my Mana Locus skill, remember?” Claud asked, grasping for the first thing that came to mind. “I can’t do both at the same time!”

“We’ll devote equal time to each. You keep talking about being prepared, right? This is one such instance where you need to be prepared,” Lily replied. “Now, let’s get started once more. We’ll just play a few games of Moon Phase while using the Second Shadow to ease you into it, and then we’ll spend an hour tied up in our Second Shadows.”

She thought for a moment. “That’s a good starting point, I suppose? I mean, we can’t exactly walk around in Vacuos with the Second Shadows…I mean, we can, but still. Now, any objections?”

Claud took one look at her gentle expression and shook his head. Her maternal tone was one that brooked no resistance, and Claud found himself putting on the Second Shadow. Once again, the weird headpiece closed around his eyes and ears, and a feeling of being restricted and weighed down flooded his veins.

He took a deep breath. Back then, in Celestia, he was capable of using the Second Shadow to do more absurd things, but the situation was different back then. In that case…what really mattered was the state of mind, right? However, the point of today’s training was not about tricking himself and dodging the real issue. What really mattered was his ability to withstand fear itself.

With how things were unfolding, it was very possible that there would come a time when he was completely restrained and powerless. Rather than wasting whatever strength, mental and physical, on struggling and everything, Claud knew that the logical course would be to stay calm. However, this deep fear within him would be an obstacle to that, and…

A small tendril of panic climbed up his back as he attempted to move. The Second Shadow he was inhabiting right now was quite unresponsive, as a rule of thumb, and all his senses were muted. If he was given enough time to move and get used to it, it wouldn’t be that much of a problem, but right now…

The shadow that Lily was operating right now sat down on the floor and laid out Moon Phase pieces. It paused a moment later, and Lily, who was lying beside Claud, said, “Now, no moving too much. We need to ease you into accepting the idea of being powerless, and we can start with sitting down for a game.”

Claud nodded — or rather, his shadow did — and the two of them began to play. At the same time, Claud focused on his clenched fist, which was what was allowing him to control the Second Shadow.

With his movements reserved and small, Claud could keenly feel the relative weakness of the Second Shadow. By no means was it a suitable entity to attack or defend against an enemy; Claud even felt that having it just walk around would be a fairly draining task on the part of the user. Wearing it was akin to wearing multiple layers of armour — without acclimatisation through constant movement, using the thing to move around too much was incredibly draining and imprecise.

The two of them moved their pieces ponderously, like huge animals that hadn’t developed their fine muscle control at all. After a few moves, the gameboard had developed, with most of the hidden pieces now revealed, but more than once, Claud and Lily nearly accidentally swept away a few pieces with movements that were too heavy-handed.

This would take some time getting used to.

After a few rounds of victories and losses — neither of them were in the right state of mind to be playing strategically, although that was probably another direction that Claud could work in — Lily’s shadow kept the pieces and then laid down on the floor directly.

“Alright,” Lily’s voice sounded in his ear, from what seemed like a good distance away. “We’ll now just lie down here and just not move in particular. You need to get used to being weakened…maybe I’ll tie you up?”

“Can we leave that for another day?” Claud unclenched his fist and asked.

Her reply was a lot clearer. “Well, if you really want to, I suppose we can do it on another day once we move on to Lacuna. We should be heading there anyway, just to make sure that our story checks out.”

Claud paused. “Right.”

Letting out a small sigh, Claud clenched his fist again and laid down. This time, under the condition of absolute stillness, he could feel his fear bubble up. It was still within a controllable level, though, and Claud examined himself in silence as he laid down in what was a weakened state. His body was weighing him down, like some dreams when the blanket and Lily prevented him from moving much, and a sense of helplessness soon rose within him.

Once more, there was no point in fighting this feeling of being trapped and unable to do anything else. He could trick himself, but…what good would that do?

He forced himself to keep his eyes open, rather then having them shut. While it would be easier to keep his eyes closed at all times, to do so was to truly give oneself to helplessness. Even if he was captured, his eyes had to remain open the whole time, lest an opportunity passed him.

Besides, keeping his eyes open here, when there was absolutely not a single threat, was something even he could do.

Before long, a weird tranquillity flooded his mind. Was it the peace of the grave? Or his mind resigned to captivity? Or just…silence? Claud wasn’t sure. Right now, although he was stimulating his captivity, Claud knew that this was just a simulation. If he desired it, he could just sit up anytime or unclench his fist.

Nonetheless…

It was indeed a good way to get eased into dealing with the fear of captivity.

Time drifted by in a blur, and Claud grew at ease with being chained down by this heavy body he was currently occupying. Was this a good sign? It was hard to say. On one end, being comfortable with captivity was definitely not a good idea, but on the other hand...

“I’ll chalk this down as improvement, I suppose.” Claud unclenched his fist and got up from the bed. To his side, Lily was also subjecting herself to the same thing, just for his sake.

To be honest, it would be better if she was watching over him, but it would go against the main point of this training in the first place.

“You’re done?” Lily got up, and then pouted. “I wanted to be the one to wake you up!”

“Well, I think sleeping isn’t exactly the thing I should be doing,” Claud replied. “And I had gotten comfortable with the whole thing after a while, so that means I’ve gotten acclimatised to being restrained in this manner. In that case, we should get moving or something.”

“Right, we should head over to Lacuna now,” Lily muttered. “I forgot about that five minutes into the makeshift captive thing…it was quite comfortable.”

“You’re surprisingly good with things like this for some reason…”