Shadow Slave

Sunny woke up from the insistent sense of alarm coming from his shadow. Groggy and disoriented, he opened his eyes and sat up.

'Wh—what's wrong?'

He looked down at the shadow and saw it repeatedly pointing up with a tense expression on its… well, it didn't have a face. He could just tell that it was nervous.

'Trouble?'

Sunny looked up and saw nothing but the scarlet leaves of the great tree. The sky was hidden, but he could easily tell that the sun was still up. It seemed that he was asleep for just a few hours.

There was no threat anywhere in sight. He frowned.

'What got you so spooked?'

The shadow just pointed up again, seemingly irritated by his stupidity. Sunny blinked a couple of times and addressed it again:

'High in the tree? Higher? In the sky?'

Finally satisfied, the shadow crossed its arms.

'Something dangerous is above the island… that creepy raven thing again?'

He had to check… but why did he feel as though he was forgetting something?

Sunny scowled, trying to understand where this feeling of missing something important had come from. What was there to miss? He was asleep, then woke up and conversed with the shadow.

Asleep…

Suddenly, he remembered bits and pieces of a strange dream. At least it seemed like a dream… was it? People weren't supposed to dream in the Dream Realm. It was just how things worked… from what he knew, only Cassie seemed to be an exception from this rule.

He didn't remember much about this supposed dream of his, with even the remaining fragments already fading from his memory. There was a… a woman grabbing him by the shoulders, an expression of horror and panic on her face. She was saying something, but he couldn't hear what.

No, not a woman. It was… Cassie? Yes, it was her. And the thing she was saying…

Sunny strained his memory, trying to catch the pieces of the dream before they completely disappeared.

'Yeah, I think she was saying… uh…'

Suddenly, he could clearly hear Cassie's frightened, tense voice as she was hurriedly telling him to remember something, repeating the same sentence over and over again in a begging tone:

"...you have to remember, Sunny! Five! It's five! Remember! You have to remember! It's five!"

'What a strange dream.'

Sunny cast a glance at Cassie, who was sleeping peacefully near Neph, and shook his head in bewilderment. He wasn't sure if this memory of his was really a dream or some strange scene he had imagined right before falling asleep. With how the Dream Realm worked, he was leaning toward the latter possibility.

'Still. I better tell the girls when…'

He was distracted from this thought by the shadow, which waved its hands impatiently.

a threat in

his intention to share the contents of this strange memory of his

judgment was sudden and unnatural, but since Sunny couldn't remember things that he had forgotten, he didn't notice anything amiss and

might not have been the first time he

the Midnight Shard and glanced darkly at the blood-red leaves of the great tree. Feeling the coolness of the black polished hilt in his

quiet movements, Nephis opened her eyes and looked at him, her body tensing up. There was a

Sunny shook his head.

don't know yet. Stay with Cassie

the island, where the branches of the colossal tree were not as thick and the sky could be seen through the openings in

where the danger was unknown, Sunny usually preferred to keep the shadow close by in

eastern slope of the Ashen Barrow, he carefully looked up, still

above in the vast grey sky, a small black

the terrible winged beast

shadow behind to keep watch on the black dot, he returned and

island. I don't know if it's the same creature or not, and when it is going to

Changing Star frowned.

time, it wasn't very interested in searching for live prey. Perhaps it's mostly a carrion eater, and thus

her own

it? After all, it never came for the corpses of the scavengers we

Sunny shook his head.

it as well before leaving. So it'll be too optimistic to think that this abomination will not try to devour

for a while,

of action would be to stay away from the Carapace Demon for

looking up, she

must observe it to make sure that

spot where he had left his shadow. There, they sat on the ground and watched the black dot as it circled

left them disturbed and unsure of what

they had encountered a few weeks before, or at least a creature of the

joined by two other abominations of the same breed, each as horrifying and repulsive as the first one was. Now, three black

limbs protruding from its wide chest, each ending with a set of terrifying talons, was enough

massive beak was still fresh in his mind. He suspected that these abominations were at least as

were

better hide well.' he thought, cold sweat

approach the Ashen Barrow for some reason. They just circled around it, sometimes hesitantly approaching, but

time,

"Maybe they're not hungry?"

world where a Nightmare Creature might not

on the other

don't know about these albino chickens, but I'm hungry

three of them had not eaten anything since yesterday. Sunny was afraid that if the abominations did decide to land on the island, the loud growls of his stomach would give

and him

eat some

opened his eyes wide and

think

him, then turned