Shadow Slave

The seven suns that illuminated the Great River were fashioned from the soul cores of the Stone Titan — an Unholy Titan the Demon of Dread had once slain. The suns were gone now, and Sunny was standing on the fragment of one of them.

The crystalline island was dead and lightless, utterly devoid of the luminous radiance that had illuminated this world once.

Sunny glanced around, mildly stunned. It was not every day that one walked on the surface of a sun, even if this one had been artificial.

‘It’s empty.’

He meant that there was no essence left in the shard of the sun… which itself had been a soul shard once. Either the light that had been contained within it dissipated when the sun was destroyed, or someone had absorbed it, like humans absorbed soul fragments by crushing shards in their fists.

‘Was the Thieving Bird very hungry?’

Imagining that the odious bird had consumed the suns instead of simply stealing them made Sunny shiver.

What if the damn thing was an Unholy Terror now, not a Cursed One?

If that was the case… there was no point in trying to fight it. Sunny had defeated numerous creatures of a higher Rank than his in the past, but he was not arrogant enough to believe that he had a chance in a battle against an Unholy Abomination. He was not ready to face those horrors yet, not by a long shot.

Nephis glanced around. The small flame dancing above her palm suddenly turned into a roaring plume of white fire, chasing away the darkness.

In the dead silence that surrounded them, her even voice sounded almost unbearably loud:

“Let’s explore.”

They meticulously searched the entire island, hoping to find something — anything — to help them understand what had happened in the Tomb of Ariel. However, after an entire hour of fruitless exploration, they found nothing. No clues, no traces, no great mysteries hidden under the indestructible surface of divine crystal…

All in all, the fragment of a broken sun was utterly dull.

There was nothing exciting about it, only the vast expanse of jagged edges and uneven slopes.

“Do you think the River had gone shallow because the fragments of the sun fell into it?”

Nephis hesitated before responding.

“I am not sure. We do not know what sorcery Ariel had used to suspend the Great River in the air and make it flow endlessly, so we can’t know what broke it.”

She sighed and added in an uncertain tone:

“Maybe it happened because of this fragment. Or perhaps the River is simply dying because something stopped its current. In any case, we might encounter more of such shallows… it is good that both of us can fly.”

Sunny nodded.

They rested on the fragment of a shattered sun for a while, then left it behind and continued on their way to Aletheia’s Island. Nephis had been right. As they traveled across the Great River, they encountered more of the shallows — none had shards of the broken sun floating in their center, though. There was just emptiness… a vast and quiet emptiness permeated by eternal darkness.

Sunny carried them forward as the Onyx Serpent when the waters were deep. When the waters turned shallow and collapsed into pools of emptiness, they flew.

Just like that, a few days passed.

Sunny was in a much better shape by now, and the Shadow Legion was almost entirely restored. However, he felt worse than he had before.

It was the silence… the silence was getting to him.

Sunny and Nephis were not made for this kind of quiet. They had been born into a world at war, and spent most of their adult lives under the crushing pressure of conflict and strife. They were used to combat and battle, always fighting against impossible odds.

So, peculiarly enough, the deathly tranquility of the Tomb of Ariel was more tiresome than the harrowing peril of the war-torn Hell.

‘I almost want something to happen…’

Sunny knew better than to think such thoughts aloud, but could not help himself. He would gladly take a battle against some kind of horrible Abomination over this dark, peaceful stillness.

But no Abomination appeared.

And so, they made it to Aletheia’s Island undeterred.

The thick mist that had surrounded it once was gone. The colossal whirlpool was gone, as well, and instead of floating in the air above it, the island was simply resting on the water.

The enormous sea serpent with scales as black as onyx slithered onto the shore of Aletheia’s Island and turned into a man with porcelain skin and onyx eyes, his gaze dark and somber.

A moment later, a malevolent obsidian dragon landed heavily on the sand, turning into a slender woman who seemed to be woven from darkness, shrouded in a mantle of ghostly smoke. A graceful knight wearing a suit of fearsome black armor walked out of the shadows, two ruby flames burning behind the visor of her helmet.

Finally, a woman who was like a radiant goddess landed softly on the shore, her silver hair dancing in the wind.

Sunny glanced around the familiar landscape, feeling deeply uncomfortable. His stay on Aletheia’s Island had been up there with the worst experiences of his life, so being here again did not feel great.

Nephis was her usual self, though, as if returning to this harrowing place did not bother her at all.

“This was where we killed Undying Slaughter.”

Nephis lingered for a moment, then added in a wistful tone:

“I only ever spent a single day here. But it felt like eternity.”

She was recovering, as well, and her emotions were slowly returning.

Heading toward the towering cliffs, where treacherous steps were carved into the stone, she said in a neutral tone:

“In any case, the loop seems to have been broken. So, we do not need to worry about spending an eternity here… I think.”

Sunny smiled weakly.

“Well, as long as you’re sure.”

There was no Sin of Solace whispering into his ear anymore, so he would probably not even remember being in a loop again. Or perhaps his Will would pierce the revolutions of time… Sunny did not know, and was determined not to find out.

“We’d better be careful. There were a lot of powerful Nightmare Creatures on this island in the past.”

He nodded to acknowledge Neph’s warning, even if he knew about the abominations of Aletheia’s Island far more than she did. He had been killed by most of them at least once, after all.

“Let’s go.”

They ascended the stone steps and entered the forest. Neph’s flame drowned a wide circle around them in bright light, but beyond it, darkness reigned… naturally, Sunny’s eyes could pierce through it, and his shadow sense had already enveloped the entire island.

Because of that, he could already tell that there were no Nightmare Creatures here anymore. The soulless Nightmare Butterfly was gone. The Harvester — a nebulous horror that had dwelled in the sky above the island — was gone, as well. So was the grotesque leopard that had stalked the forest, and all the rest of them.

Only old bones remained.

The forest itself was ravaged and largely destroyed, innumerable trees shattered or toppled by some awful force. The Bone Graveyard had been washed away by the waves. The carnivorous lake stood empty, and the tunnels dug deep under the surface had collapsed.

As for Aletheia’s Tower itself…

As Sunny and Nephis crested the hill, he froze for a moment.

The tower was there, right in front of them. What was left of it, at least.

It had been almost entirely destroyed, turning into a forlorn ruin. All the upper floors were gone, and the lower ones were buried under the rubble. The very top of the tower seemed to have been thrown into the air and rolled to the base of the hill, then far into the forest, shattering in the process. From the look of how the stone debris fell… someone had dealt the tower a terrible blow, obliterating it completely.

Sunny exhaled slowly.

“What the hell happened here?”

He did not mean Aletheia’s Island. He meant the Tomb of Ariel… the Great River.

Sunny did not know what the first loop of his Third Nightmare had looked like, but even if there were millions of challengers and the phantom of the Serpent King there, it had still been a Nightmare meant for Masters to conquer. Granted, the odds of overcoming that particular trial had been infernally low, unless, naturally, you were Nephis of the Immortal Flame clan.

And even Nephis had died back then, in the first loop of the Nightmare — and during countless loops after that.

But this… this level of destruction — the things they had seen in Weave, in the empty waters where Fallen Grace had been, in the shallows on the way to Aletheia’s Island, on the island itself — were far beyond what he had expected. It was not something that any Master was meant to face, let alone conquer.

Nephis shrugged.

“The most obvious answer is that a Cursed Terror escaped from a Nightmare and descended upon the Great River like a calamity that its Rank and Class entail.”

She lingered for a moment, then added:

“Naturally, just because an answer is obvious doesn’t mean that it’s correct.”

Turning away from the ruins of Aletheia’s Tower, she sighed.

“In any case, we won’t find anything of use here, just like we failed to find it in Weave and Fallen Grace. There’s no point in searching anymore. Our next stop will be Verge… and from there, the Estuary.”

Nephis smiled faintly.

“Who knows? The First Seeker might still be alive. If so, I might be able to kill it again.”

They went about making camp.

Soon, Nephis closed her eyes to sleep while Sunny kept watch in front of a fire. The small island of warmth and light was surrounded by boundless darkness — Sunny glanced into the darkness and listened to the silence that reigned over the still expanse of the Great River, shadows dancing on his somber face.

…At the same time, another incarnation of him was making its way to the ruins of Aletheia’s Tower.

Climbing carefully over the rubble, he reached the side of the hill that was relatively free of debris — that was because the blow that destroyed the tower had come from that direction, sending the debris flying the other way.

There, in the darkness, he found what he had sensed hours before, but kept to himself.

It was not that he wanted to hide something from Nephis — it was just that he couldn’t explain it to her without speaking about his past, which she could never remember. What Sunny had found… was a humble grave.

There was no inscription on the tombstone, and no way of knowing if someone was actually buried under the raised soil. However, a scattering of lovely flowers was growing on the grave and around it, creating a gorgeous meadow in the middle of the ruin.

Sunny could not see their color in the darkness, but knew that the petals were of a vibrant azure hue…

Just like the flower Wind Flower had given him once in a dream — the last dream she ever saw.

Sitting down in front of the grave, Sunny pulled a bottle of wine from the folds of his nebulous mantle, uncorked it, and poured some onto the ground.

“Is that you, Wind Flower?”

He remained silent for a long while, then glanced down.

“If so… l am sorry. I broke the promise I gave you. Like all the other promises I gave, and then broke. You wanted to die by the hand of a person who would conquer the Nightmare, but in the end, I abandoned my cohort to pursue selfish goals. I wasn’t even there when they destroyed the First Seeker.”

He glanced away, smiling bitterly, and took a sip of the wine.

“I really hoped to meet you again, you know?”

Sunny took a deep breath, staring into the darkness with a distant expression.

“Your phantom asked me to relay a message should I ever meet the real you. She wanted me to tell you that she had done her best. That they all had. But I guess that’s not an option now, is it?”

Sunny pursed his lips.

“Because you are gone, and their best was not enough.”

He remained silent for a long time, and then drank the wine once more.

“But I just wanted you to know… that I used your gift well. It helped me a lot to get to where I am. Thank you for that. You were the first person to ever give me flowers, so… please, accept this gift from me, as well.”

Raising a hand, he called upon the shadows and manifested a black flower out of them — the most gorgeous flower he could think of and create.

Planting it gently on the nameless grave, Sunny sighed heavily and stood up.

“Nobody remembers me anymore, and because I was the only one who met you, no one remembers you either. Seems unfair, doesn’t it? But don’t worry… even though I broke my promise, I have come back now to set things right. Just wait a little longer. Soon, everyone will tell the tales about you. About Wind Flower of the Twilight Sea.”

He watched the grave silently for a while longer, then took a step back and dissolved into the shadows, leaving only the black flower behind.

Far away, on the shore of Aletheia’s Island, Sunny was staring into the dancing flames. A shadow crept across the sand and wrapped itself around him, careful not to disturb Neph’s sleep.

Sunny remained silent for a long time, then sighed lightly.

“To Verge, then.”

And to the Estuary from there.

The goal of their harrowing journey was drawing near.