Shadow Slave

Here in the Realm of Shadows, Sunny was at home. It was a dire and perilous home, but a home nonetheless. Not only was his body and Aspect empowered by being here, but there was also a torrent of spirit essence flowing into his soul.

That was why his ability to manifest shadows had become more powerful than it had ever been, and why he was able to summon such an enormous Shell.

The vast Shell was formless, lacking a structure. But that was also a reason why he could build it, and make it span hundreds of meters — not at all inferior to the great expanse of the appalling Darkness Creature. Better yet, there was no risk of losing himself, since he was not delving into the essence of a foreign existence.

Instead, he was simply adhering to the shapelessness that was inherent to all shadows. And as a shadow himself, Sunny was no stranger to that shapelessness himself.

It was just a shame that his largest Shell yet was dwarfed by most of what he had encountered in the Shadow Realm, almost making him feel like he had been robbed of an accomplishment.

’Damnation...’

Of course, Sunny had no time to feel such frivolous emotions, since mere moments after forming the Shell, he clashed with the Vulture in a harrowing display of primal fury.

The rippling mass of darkness descended like a flood of hungry tendrils, and the seething mass of shadow rose to meet it midway. Their clash was both awesome and terrifying, bathed in the silver radiance of the river of essence, but seemingly devouring the light instead of being illuminated by it.

They rolled across the vertical slope of Condemnation’s torso, clinging to it with dozens of tendrils and tentacles, and at the same time tearing into each other with countless more.

Hundreds of hungry maws opened on the rippling body of the Vulture, biting into the mass of seething shadows. In response, the shadows bit into the body of the dark drifter with thousands of bestial fangs, tearing it ferociously.

Torrents of darkness rained down like blood.

Even as his Shell was being ripped apart and pierced by slithering tendrils, Sunny grinned darkly in its tumultuous depths.

’Ah, this is not good…’

There was one thing he had realized in the very first moment of his clash with the Vulture… it was that the creature of darkness was an ancient evil — and much, much more powerful than him.

The gruesome damage it dealt to the formless mass of shadows was incomparably more dire than the damage the shadows were dealing to it, and just as Sunny was savaging the eerie creature with abandon, the creature was savaging him much more.

However…

Sunny was in his natural element. Every wound he dealt to the Vulture harmed the Dark One, while the Dark One was only damaging his Shell. For as long as Sunny had essence, he could freely mend and rebuild his great and formless, horrifying body.

He just had to make sure that the tendrils of darkness did not reach his actual self, and maybe… maybe, he would be able to destroy this harrowing abomination, after all.

...Or maybe he would be swallowed by one of the tendrils — hopefully dying in the process, instead of feeling the agony of his body and soul being slowly digested in the depths of the harrowing darkness first.

’No. I’ll definitely kill this fiend.’

But why stop there?

Smiling crookedly, Sunny allowed a part of his Shell to be torn apart, then used the momentary lull in the onslaught of dark tendrils created by that sacrifice to launch a vicious attack of his own. The

tentacles growing out of his vast Shell shifted, turning into a forest of inky-black arms, and hundreds of hands ripped into the body of the Vulture with sharp claws, each bearing seven fingers.

Holding it in place.

The only tentacles that had not transformed then changed, as well, their ends turning into scythe-like blades. Those blades then slashed at the particular group of tendrils that attached the Vulture to the body of the shadow of Condemnation, severing them all. ℞𝔞Nó𝔟ĚS̈

Sunny pushed both the Dark One and his Shell away from the obsidian surface. The two intertwined horrors — one made of pure darkness, the other from a vast expanse of shadows — plummeted down.

As they fell, a swarm of shadow chains shot from his formless Shell, wrapping themselves around the two ivory fangs that were still stuck in the shadow of Condemnation.

The Vulture tore into the mass of shadows, one of its terrifying tendrils penetrating the formless Shell deep enough to come dangerously close to Sunny’s body. At the same time, the Dark One attempted to free itself from his hold.

However, Sunny poured more essence into the Shell, rebuilding it almost as fast as it was being destroyed — albeit not quite — and steering their fall by using the ivory fangs as purchase.

A few moments later, the two of them…

Crashed into the massive body of the appalling Leech, who had forgotten itself while gorging on the flesh of the shadow of Condemnation.

The more, the merrier.

Sunny’s bloodlust was more than insatiable enough to accommodate a pair of primordial horrors.

Now, for the last act…

As the Leech momentarily switched the target of its hunger and Sunny’s Shell became enveloped by the appalling darkness from two sides, melting between them in an onslaught of countless teeth, he abandoned all pretense of trying to attack the Dark Ones, and instead put all the dreadful power of his Shell into pushing all three of them into the black sky of the Shadow Realm.

Sunny, the Vulture, and the Leech shot away from the body of Condemnation, flying into the dark expanse of the sky.

As they flew, the formless Shell collapsed in on itself, turning into a battered sphere. The two ancient horrors were like tattered sails of darkness billowing behind it.

Of course, they never stopped shredding it with countless maws and trying to tear it apart with appalling tendrils.

As Sunny’s Shell dwindled, they passed through the silver radiance of the essence plume and were enveloped by the boundless darkness once again, flying further and further away from the shadow of Condemnation…

However, they did not fly for long.

Because just a few moments later, they crashed into the palm of its colossal hand, which closed into a fist a moment later.

Crushing the sphere of shadows, and the two vast beings of darkness, in its obliterating grip.

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