Shadow Slave

Sunny looked at the wounded demon, a grim look of resolve on his face.

At this point, there was no reason to argue. They had no other choice but to face the guardian of the island themselves. Sunny's bag of tricks was all empty anyway — in the end, their fates were still going to be decided by sharp blades.

Someone was going to get killed, and someone was going to be the killer.

"How are we going to deal with his armor?"

Nephis weighed the sword in her hand and glanced down.

"I will break through the armor. Can you create an opening?"

Sunny nodded, not wasting time on unnecessary questions. If Changing Star was certain of her ability to cut through the demon's carapace, he had no reason to doubt it.

Creating an opening… that was not going to be easy. Even though the monster had suffered terrible injuries, he was still a force to be reckoned with. His size alone was going to pose difficulties. They would have to bring the behemoth down to his knees before even thinking of carrying out any sort of an effective attack.

And he was not just going to stand still under their assault, either.

But what else was there to do?

While Nephis was tying the golden rope to the branch, Sunny walked over to Cassie and lightly squeezed her shoulder.

She tried to force a smile.

"I take it that the Carapace Demon is still alive?"

Despite the heavy, cold, dark feeling gripping his heart, Sunny tried to make his voice sound relaxed and carefree.

"Yeah, but just barely. Don't worry too much. This whole thing will be over in no time."

'One way or another,' he added inwardly.

Cassie's smile weakened. She was clearly not convinced by his clumsy attempt to reassure her.

Sunny hesitated.

"Hey. Have you ever eaten demon meat?"

clearly

"What? No."

Sunny grinned.

cook, I'll have you know. Uh… I think. Neph had sort of monopolized the preparation

of all sorts of

some demon meat, I'll make you a steak. It'll

smile appeared on Cassie's face. She gave him a

a

She threw

"Are you ready?"

and close his eyes for a second, feeling the strength of his body

"Yes. Let's do this."

***

touched the ground, Sunny felt a heavy gaze burning a hole in his chest. Glancing up, he saw the crippled Carapace Demon staring right at

other one was gone, leaving

with azure blood... sadly, none of the cracks were near the vital organs. His horns were shattered, as was one of

of his two severed arms were pressed tight against his torso to stem the heavy bleeding. The other two were hanging to the ground,

before. Because, despite the horrible wounds, his gaze was still firm and

concentrated on Sunny and Nephis — the architects of

first beams of the rising sun shone on the spikes covering the demon's once lustrous carapace, painting them in shades of

Azure Blade and

careful. He's lightning

who had seen the terrible creature in action. As such, only he knew how dangerous the

eyes off the enemy,

toward the waiting Carapace Demon. Sunny was slightly ahead and aiming to circle the behemoth from the right — the side where the demon

him, aiming to circle the creature from the left — the side

letting his partner deal the lethal blow when the time was right. Through the tacit understanding that they had developed through surviving dozens of life or death situations, the two of them

their

Sunny felt a slight shift in the demon's posture. Instantly,

with it himself. Sunny knew that he was much slower than the giant creature, but he still had to find a way to dodge the massive,

an Aspect Ability that made him ten times faster than the silver-haired girl — at least. However, in the end, he only won by a hair's breadth. Nephis had almost smashed

no amount of reaction could have helped her. Instead, she was able to predict and manipulate the opponent's attacks, starting the

was in control of the

now, they had to repeat that feat against the ancient demon of the Forgotten Shore. Luckily, his