Shadow Slave

Days later, Sunny was sitting on top of a dead scavenger, calmly cleaning the azure blood off his face.

[Your shadow grows stronger.]

His sword was still stuck between the plates of chitin armor, trembling slightly as the beast's body convulsed before falling still.

Somewhere behind him, the sound of breaking carapaces announced that Nephis was already digging out soul shards from the corpses of the creatures they had slain. After dozens of such battles, the two of them were nothing if not efficient.

Glancing back, he evaluated the scene of carnage.

The path between two crimson walls was littered with corpses. Initially, they were simply planning to lure the carapace centurion that had been tracking them for the past few days into this narrow passage to turn its size against the monster. However, things quickly took a turn.

Attracted by the noise of the battle, both the scavengers and the weird centipede creatures that were waging war against the carapace legion in this part of the labyrinth showed up to join the fight. In the ensuing mayhem, Sunny and Nephis used the animosity between the two tribes of monsters to their advantage and ended up as the only victors.

Not far from him, the Echo was mutilating the corpse of the centurion. Its lost arm had long grown back. Now, the scavenger was tearing pieces of monster meat with its new pincer and vindictively devouring them.

Technically, an Echo wasn't supposed to experience hunger. This one, however, had seemingly acquired a hatred for carapace centurions after their encounter with the massive scythe slayer on that fateful stormy night.

been two weeks since they left the cliffs. In that time, many things had changed, while many remained the

the group was dramatically enhanced. Still, they took care to explore paths to their next stop before

in another storm was minimized, as they could always either reach the next landmark in time or return to the previous

labyrinth had also changed. In the past, Nephis and Sunny tried to avoid the scavengers, resorting to fighting them only if there was no other choice. However, the battle with the centurion opened their eyes to the

moving in groups of no more than three. The idea of two Sleepers consciously seeking out Nightmare Creatures of the Awakened rank was pretty ridiculous,

as Nephis had said,

who had always been an extremely formidable fighter, was now able to showcase the full extent of her combat ability. Simply put, she was

powers grew with each soul shard she consumed. Every increase was barely noticeable, but with dozens of them added up together, the difference was apparent. She

said about Sunny, although, in his case, it was predicated on the timely use of the shadow. His own body had become considerably stronger due to the rigors of the

the consumption of soul shards, he was quickly collecting shadow fragments. Of course, he wasn't able to get every kill, so their amount was less than that of the shards. But he also didn't have

the result, the rate of their progress was more or less

the only factor that influenced the rapid

Under the tutelage of sword goddess Nephis herself,

to practice, participating in bloody battles each day with his life on the line. This brutal, merciless reality was, for better or worse, the best training grounds for a true fighter. There was no room for mistakes, only progress — because a single mistake would most likely become

real fight was worth a thousand hours of training. With experience, Sunny was able to gain knowledge. With clarity, he

contributor to the dramatic increase in the