Shadow Slave

In the ensuing silence, the smile slowly disappeared from Cassie's face, replaced by confusion. Feeling the sudden tension, she asked:

"Uh… what's wrong?"

Sunny sighed.

"No, nothing is wrong. It's just that that direction is the one we wanted to avoid."

After some thought, he added:

"That's where I came from yesterday. There's a lot of scavengers down there."

The blind girl's face fell.

"Oh."

Nephis, who was quietly listening to them, gave him an indecipherable look and finally spoke:

"Tell us more about the castle."

A shadow of the previous excitement returned to Cassie's eyes. With a serious nod, she began describing her vision.

"I dreamt of a vast, ruined city built of weathered stone. It was surrounded by tall, impregnable walls. Various monsters were wandering its narrow streets. In the center of the city, the was a hill, and on that hill stood a magnificent castle."

She smiled.

"But there were no monsters in the castle! Instead, it was full of people. I think… no, I'm sure that they were Awakened. Some were guarding the walls, some were going about their lives without a care in the world. There was food, safety, and laughter!"

'Well, that sounds great.'

of their

you see

to remember. Then, her face

I saw Sunny leading me through the gates of the castle! That

with so much joy that Sunny couldn't help but curl

that, when talking about reaching the castle, the blind girl only mentioned the two of them. Was there

little and secretly glanced at Nephis, trying to

Star, however, was as enigmatic as ever. Without showing much emotion, she thought for a while, and then slowly

we

***

some time planning for the journey and preparing to abandon the temporary camp. In the process, Sunny had a

almost made his head

confident, distant girl. Later, her behavior and the different revelations about Changing Star's past only served

apart from the world. She was mysterious, aloof and rather cool. Her taciturn character and strange speech patterns made people interacting with her feel unnerved and rattled, often revealing more than they had been planning to. The less she talked, the more she

out to

and aloof. After talking to her a bit more and observing their interactions

she would either use the wrong words or stumble in the middle of the sentence and fall silent. Her tone never matched what she was trying to say.

fact that, like many introverted people, Nephis was not in a habit of openly showing her emotions. It's not that she

of the time, she simply chose to talk as little as possible or not to talk at

that added up together, then multiplied by her general weirdness, was ultimately responsible for creating the false image of

shy and completely

to that realization, Sunny tried with all his might but still failed to stop himself from staring at Nephis with wide eyes. He just barely

hell? That's not in line

be the main character of any event. At the center stage, there were always confident, strong people like her and Caster. People like himself and Cassie, on the other hand, were relegated to exist far away in the background.

wrong. The fact that Changing Star had problems with expressing herself and lacked social skills did not mean that she was not strong. In fact, it might have meant the

She was still dangerous.