Shadow Slave

On a dark square surrounded by ruins of once-magnificent buildings, a vicious battle was coming to an end. The remains of its solemn protectors were lying on the cold cobblestones, ruthlessly shattered into pieces.

Sunny blinked in shock.

'They actually lost.'

He was really astonished. The living statues that used to guard the square were a very tough bunch. As far as Nightmare Creatures of the cursed city went, they weren't the most formidable in terms of size and physical might. However, their strange bodies were extremely durable and capable of withstanding truly devastating amounts of damage.

Aside from that, the stalwart stone warriors were also disciplined, proficient in the use of weapons and utterly deadly. They were able to perfectly coordinate their movements, using strategy and tactics to silently overwhelm opponents whose power far surpassed their own. Countless monsters fell to their blades.

That's why Sunny had always avoided getting into a confrontation with these weird creatures. Even though they weren't Fallen by rank, the stone revenants represented a threat that was enough to make him wary.

However, now the ownership of the square was about to change hands.

The bodies of the previous masters lay shattered to pieces. In death, they looked just like broken statues. Even their metal armor and weapons had turned to stone after the wielders were destroyed.

There were five or six of these stone piles scattered around the square, while the attackers seemed to have lost only three of their numbers — including the massive monster that had been sent crashing through a building earlier. Each body towered above the dark cobblestones like a small hill.

never seen before. These new menacing monsters looked like giant spiders with bodies covered in thick plates of wrought iron. They moved with terrifying

currently two of them left on the square, circling around the lone surviving stone

statues seemed to be a female. Compared to the spiders, she was almost comically small in stature, standing no taller than Sunny himself. The graceful stone creature was armed with a sword and a round shield, wearing a plate armor that covered most of her body, leaving only the eyes exposed. Or, rather, two rubies burning with crimson flames

in color, forged from some unknown and incredibly heavy stonelike alloy. Of course, in reality, they were made out of the same stone as their wielder. However, the dark force that had turned the granite body of this Nightmare Creature into the

was standing with her shield raised, the blade of the sword resting on its rim. Her

beasts. In any case, the stone woman was doomed. Her enemies were just toying with her, savoring the helplessness of

really care. In fact, he was waiting for the show! Watching Nightmare Creatures slaughter each other was one of his favorite pastimes, and the

'Come on, get her!'

surprised. In a strange turn of events, the stone monster lunged at the spiders first. Calmly striking her

the sudden onslaught with a vicious strike of its own. One of its legs shot forward, threatening to

and bashed the spider with the round shield, putting all

body of the Fallen beast was thrown back

the spider's guts. A rain of strikes fell on the iron surface of the monster's abdomen, filling the square with the clangor of

the soft innards of the monster cracked, the

resolve were enough to give the fearsome creatures pause. Moving with the deadly precision of a bloodthirsty killing machine, the living statue

determined to take them to the grave