Shadow Slave

A sudden chill spread across the battlefield, and a moment later, the darkness that had been pushed back by the sea of soft radiance seemed to grow deeper and darker, consuming the pure white light.

Far away from where Rain was shivering in the cold, the King of Swords stood above a fearsome black mask that lay on the ground. The merciless sunlight was pouring from the torn veil of clouds, and so, he remained motionless, his sword still reaching toward the enemy who had turned to ash.

His face was expressionless, but there was a hint of unease in his steely grey eyes.

The Lord of Shadows was gone, killed not by an enemy’s blade, but by his own blade…

And yet, his shadow remained.

A disembodied shadow was a strange sight to behold, but it was the mask that made the King wary.

Laying atop the forlorn shadow, the fearsome maks stared back at him, impenetrable darkness nestling in its eyes…

And then, it trembled.

Almost at the same time, the blinding radiance of the incandescent white abyss dimmed. The veil of clouds repaired itself, and the space he had severed was mended, as well.

Anvil was suddenly surrounded by cold darkness.

The fearsome black mask rose into the air, the shadow of his slain enemy rising with it, taking shape… until it turned into a familiar figure.

The Lord of Shadows looked at the King of Swords coldly, as good as new.

Anvil seemed rattled for the first time in many, many years.

”...Impossible.”

It was not that his enemy seemed to have come back to life after being burned to ash by the merciless sky of Godgrave... it was that his subtle, but chilling presence had somehow grown vastly more powerful, now dwarfing even Anvil’s own.

The mask dissolved into shadows, revealing a handsome, pale face. There was a sinister smile on the young man’s lips, but his black eyes remained bitingly cold.

Smiling darkly, Sunny looked at Anvin.

”Oh, but it is… it is possible, King of Swords.”

He raised a hand,commanding Serpent to аssume the form of a black odachi, and inhaled the sweet air of the world of the living with a full chest.

…He felt incredible.

His body brimmed with ferocious power — more power than he had ever felt before. The difference between a Supreme physique and a Transcendent physique was not as vast as one between a Saint and a Master, but it was still substantial. The other changes that he had undergone were profound enough to make up for the relative modesty of his physical evolution.

He was still making sense of some of them, but other differences were quite apparent.

First of all, there was the quality of his essence. It had become far more potent, overflowing with an unfathomable amount of cold, fearsome power.

Second, there was the quantity of his essence. In short, it felt... endless.

Sunny possessed seven cores and Soul Weave, so the rate at which he replenished essence had always been abnormally swift. That rate had further improved now that he was Supreme, but it was not the main reason why his reserves of essence seemed inexhaustible.

Rather, it was because of the way he absorbed spirit essence. Before, Sunny could passively absorb small quantities of it when surrounded by his source element. But now, he was receiving a constant flow of it from his Domain — from every silent shadow resting in his soul.

His connection to the silent shadows had deepened and evolved, and since there were tens of thousands of them, the influx of essence from the shadows made it almost impossible for him to exhaust it.

In other words, a Sovereign had access to a nearly limitless amount of soul essence for as long as they were in their Domain. That explained a lot about how Anvil and Ki Song were able to wield their incredible powers, as well as some of their actions during the war…

But Sunny was not like them.

He was quite special. In fact, he was unique.

Because, unlike other Supremes, he carried his Domain within his soul. Therefore,his Domain was self-contained, and would be with him wherever he went. He did not need Citadels to make it stronger… he did not need loyal followers and the faith of the people, either. Ṟ𝒶ℕ𝘖ＢÊŞ

All he needed was to collect the shadows of living beings by slaying them.

’What a frightening proposition.’

Sunny was scared to even imagine such power in the hands of someone who was not as reliably sane and mentally stable as he was…

The most drastic change, of course, was his Will. It had become a far more tangible force, now, as well as far more forceful. Sunny had known how to wield it before, but it was only after he clashed with Anvil and observed him using the Will as a weapon that he truly understood how to control it.

How to bend the world to his will.

It would take him some time to truly master that skill, of course, as well as incorporate it into his combat technique… but he already knew enough to make use of it in a battle.

There were quite a few changes of a lesser scale, too.

The Onyx Mantle, for example… was not Onyx anymore. His armor was still black, but the texture of its polished surface had changed, becoming even darker, even smoother… almost flawless. It had assumed a noble, somewhat eerie quality, as if carved from black jade.

The Onyx Mantle had evolved, as well, becoming the Jade Mantle.

Oh, and of course…

The very nature of his soul had changed.

The soul of an Ascended was contained within their body. The soul of a Transcended expanded beyond the body, partially fusing with the world. The vast soul of a Supreme, meanwhile… could be freely unleashed upon the world via the medium of a Domain, subjugating it.

That was the fundamental principle of what a Domain was, to begin with.

And so…

Looking at Anvil, Sunny unleashed his soul.

He manifested his Domain.

And as he did, the shadows across the fractured battlefield moved.