Shadow Slave

The shadows stared at Sunny, and Sunny stared at the shadows.

After a while, the situation became a bit awkward.

Sunny shifted a little, then hesitantly asked:

"Uh… are you guys not going to do anything?"

The shadows did not react, remaining as motionless and quiet as they had been from the start.

As a matter of fact, he didn't see them move or show any sign of life at all. In that regard, they were even more lifeless than his Echo had been here in the Sea of Soul. Sunny scratched his head.

His initial fear was slowly disappearing. At first, he was scared out of his wits, but more so from being startled than from feeling an actual threat. This was his Soul Sea, after all. Very few things could harm him here.

Sunny was pretty sure that the shadows were not capable of doing anything, let alone attacking him. They seemed more like manifestations of some weird facet of his Aspect rather than actual beings. As such, they weren't dangerous.

The question was… why did the shadows suddenly appear?

After briefly thinking about it, Sunny came to the conclusion that they did not actually appear, per se. Instead, they were always here, it's just that he had not been able to see them.

But now, with his eyes changed by the strange transformation he had gone through, he could, just like he could see the diamond strings inside the Puppeteer's Shroud.

Speaking of the Puppeteer's Shroud…

Glancing at the silent shadows one last time to make sure that they would not lunge at him, Sunny frowned with suspicion and turned away. His back instantly began to tingle.

'Just think of them as fashionable pieces of furniture. Who says Soul Seas don't need a touch of interior design?'

Somewhat consoled, he walked closer to the shining spheres that represented Memories and summoned the Puppeteer's Shroud. One of the spheres floated down and slowly dimmed, revealing the armor within.

Just like before, Sunny could see five glowing nexuses and countless strings permeating the grey fabric. They resembled miniature stars assembled into a constellation.

'The Shroud came from a tyrant, which is a class of Nightmare Creatures with five soul cores. Five soul cores, fifth tier Memory, five nexuses… makes sense.'

For some reason, the number five moved something in his mind. Sunny scowled, not understanding the feeling of unease that suddenly appeared out of nowhere and disrupted the flow of his thoughts.

Trying to concentrate on the task at hand, he summoned the runes describing the Puppeteer's Shroud. The familiar description appeared in the air around the armor:

Memory: [Puppeteer's Shroud].

Memory Rank: Awakened.

Memory Tier: V.

Memory Type: Armor.

[A worm

helpful and incorporated Sunny's new understanding of the inner workings

was just an improvised way of differentiating Memories of different power levels within the same rank. It was often unreliable and outright wrong, but it was better

in the case of Sunny, the information was one hundred percent true. He could confirm it with his own two eyes just by counting the number of core remnants inside a Memory.

might be

At the very bottom of the description, a new cluster

[Enhanced Durability],

smiled. That was what he was hoping for. Previously, he had only been able to intuitively sense the special qualities of his Memories, with no way to learn their true nature and limits except for

Now, however…

concentrated on one

Enchantment: [Doubtless].

with a small amount of protection

'Good to know.'

was just an Awakened Memory. Since "enhanced durability" was self-explanatory, Sunny

much less bright than the ones inside the Puppeteer's Shroud, at that. Studying the runes did not show anything interesting. It was a tier one dormant Memory with a single enchantment that increased the range at which its ringing could be

The graceful blade

Memory: [Midnight Shard].

Memory Rank: Awakened.

Memory Tier: III.

firm and unyielding. It favors those

Memory Enchantments: [Unbroken].

[This blade refuses to be broken, and thus is durable beyond reason. It will greatly enhance the power of

of his heart when the Midnight Shard was in his hand. However, it could only be done when he was at the death's door, wounded and

care for heroics, so the second option did not seem appealing at all. The first one was much more useful, but only in the case of him screwing up terribly and getting himself in a lethal amount of

it could only be used if he failed. In normal battles, the special qualities of the Midnight Shard were of no use

pity. But… an ace in your sleeve in case things really

learn of the new Attribute he had received. Considering how much pain he had to go through to acquire the damn thing, he had pretty high

Attributes,

of Divinity], [Child of Shadows] and the new one,

summon the description

Something was not right.

did not

of unease from before had returned, now

he

felt a strong inclination to forget all about the strange feeling and concentrate on