Shadow Slave

In the end, two hours passed. And then four.

After that, Seishan lost track of time. She only noticed that the sun had touched the horizon, and the roaring white expanse of the Weeping Goddess seemed to be painted red by the flaming glow of the sunset.

Or perhaps the canyons were simply overflowing blood, since Mordret was now leading two assaults simultaneously — one below the Great Waterfall, and one above it. He was also conquering the Chained Isles at the same time, as well as waging war against the deepest levels of the Hive in the Glass Hell.

And who knows what else...

”You look tired, Seishan.”

An Awakened man wearing a suit of plate armor smiled pleasantly at her from behind the visor of his helmet as his sword rushed toward her heart. Seishan batted the sword away with her forearm and lashed with the other hand. Her fingers tore enchanted metal like paper, ripping the man’s throat out.

He died drowning in blood.

The Spell did not announce her kill, though, because the man was merely one of the countless vessels of the King of Nothing — all she destroyed was a minuscule shard of his soul, no more than that.

The smell of blood crawled into her nostrils, making her see red.

She was dying of thirst.

It was ironic. All that was around her were corpses and blood, and yet she could not spare a moment to quench her Flaw.

She sent the toppling body flying with a strike of her palm and rushed forward, her eyes trained on a lumbering Nightmare Creature that rampaged among the Awakened warriors of the Human Domain. As if sensing her thirst, the abomination swivelled its long neck, allowing its head to fall back and hang upside down against its long spine. Its round eyes stared at her with a glassy sheen, and its terrible maw opened to let out a chilling wail.

The familiar words of the human language could be heard in its inhuman shriek:

“You... don’t look... well at all...”

Seishan activated her Dormant Ability, turning into a ghastly monster herself. She tore the towering creature apart with her claws and her fangs, finally drinking her fair share of blood.

The blood of an abomination was fetid and bitter.

Blood, blood... there was so much blood around her. The entire Lake of Tears was turning red with blood.

Most of it belonged to Nightmare Creatures, but there was quite a lot of human blood mixed with it, too.

The longer the battle continued, the more blood was spilled.

And the more blood was spilled, the stronger Seishan became. That was the boon of her Ascended Ability.

She was a monster who revelled in slaughter.

All around her, her Blood Sisters were battling the vessels of the King of Nothing, too. Her Transcendent Ability made them far more powerful and deadly than any Ascended was meant to be, closer to Saints than to Masters, and their power made her stronger in turn. Her essence was replenished faster because of them, too. She was using her Awakened Ability as well, making her enemies bleed more profusely while staunching the bleeding of her allies. But Mordret was right. She was tired, tired... The forces of the Human Domain were being pushed back.

Seishan threw the dead abomination down, making the ground shake, and lunged at the next enemy.

The enemy met her with a pleasant smile. “There. I like your true, hideous face far better...”

Seishan growled.

All around her, humans and Nightmare Creatures were laughing at her with the same laugh, looking at her with the same amused gaze, the litany of their voices and howls fusing into a maddening choir.

The King of Nothing moved his myriad of bodies with an impossible kind of consonance, their accord too flawless to seem anything but eerie. The defenders of the Lake of Tears were slowly melting under his merciless onslaught... but they were putting up a good fight, too, stubbornly clinging to every centimeter of the blood-soaked ground.

The mad demigod they fought against was a harrowing foe, but the soldiers of humanity were not hapless prey, either. They were all seasoned veterans of Armageddon, having spilled their blood and felled terrifying foes on myriad battlefields of the Age of the Nightmare Spell.

More than that, they were not without advantages in this battle.

Far above, Siord clashed with an enormous crystal wasp. Her talons shattered the transparent carapace of the abomination, but the shards were like fatal razors — they pierced the flesh of the radiant harpy, making her scream. In the next moment, the wasp closed its mandibles on one of her wings, rending it.

Siord barely avoided the Great Nightmare Creature’s sting and fell toward the ground, awash in blood. As she did, however, a soft radiance ignited under his feathers, erasing her wounds and mending her wing. She opened her wings and glided across the surface of the water, then sent herself barrelling into the sky once again, colliding with the wounded wasp once more.

Nephis might have been away, but her blessing was still protecting the warriors of the Human Domain — and somewhere far away, she seemed to be paying attention to this battle. As long as they weren’t killed outright, her powers would eventually heal them.

That was the horror of those who dared to challenge the Human Domain.

It was just a shame that so many warriors defending the Lake of Tears had surrendered to the Dreamspawn, instead.

‘Curse him.’

A sharp spear tore Seishan’s flesh, making her wince. She grasped it with her clawed hand and attempted to break it, but the weapon must have been a Memory of quite a high Rank — despite her bestial strength, the shaft of the spear held, refusing to shatter.

”I thought we were close. Ah, it hurts me to see you turn your back on me, Seishan — to serve the woman who killed your mother, no less...”

The Ascended vessel smiled and twisted the spear, widening Seishan’s wound and sending blinding pain through her body. Luckily, in the next moment, several Awakened warriors attacked the vessel from three sides, pushing it back. Seishan stared at them for a split second, blood dripping from her fangs.

She was quite certain that these Awakened were Asterion’s thralls.

Suddenly, she felt an impulse to laugh.

It was truly ridiculous. No, it was outrageous.

Who knew that the warriors of the Longing Domain would fight side by side with the thralls of the Hunger Domain in perfect harmony one day?

Worst of all was the fact that she couldn’t deny how reliable and helpful the Dreamspawn’s thralls were. They were truly the best allies one could wish for.

‘Have I gone mad, or has the world gone mad?’

Seishan was almost happy that Asterion had her back in this battle.

Just as he promised, he was there to help.

It was just that even his help was not enough to salvage this bloody battle.

Far above, atop the Great Waterfall, a mesmerizing song drowned out the roaring water.

Nightingale had finally assumed his majestic Transcendent form, it seemed.

‘A day or two, huh?’

Seishan felt the soothing warmth wash away the deep wound in her side.

She was willing to settle for lasting until dawn.