Shadow Slave

Sunny was silent for a while, then sighed:

"Do you remember how Effie told us that he might as well be considered immortal? Well, she wasn't wrong. Apart from the fact that Gunlaug has probably absorbed more Soul Essence and has more experience fighting both Nightmare Creature and Awakened than anyone else on the Forgotten Shore… there's more to him than that."

Nephis frowned.

"Is his Aspect Ability uniquely powerful?"

Sunny shook his head.

"His Aspect Ability is that he is able to breathe and move with incredible speed underwater. But it is connected to what I am about to tell you."

He hesitated.

"You see, Gunlaug came to the Dark City around eight years ago. Since his Ability was of no use in the ruins, he quickly became an outcast. From what I was able to learn, things were even darker in the Castle back then. Strength decided everything, and anyone without strength wasn't even considered to be human."

Sunny shuddered. He could imagine it vividly.

This was, by far, the most cruel and bloody time in the history of the Bright Castle. Right after the last member of the original cohort to conquer the ancient stronghold had perished and before Gunlaug took control, things balanced at the edge of madness for a while.

Say what you want about the bastard, but at least he kept the humans here from turning into animals… completely.

Sunny continued:

"But Gunlaug, he turned out to be mad even by those standards. Because he actually began to hunt in the dark sea."

Changing Star blinked.

"What?"

He nodded.

racing against the approaching horrors of the depths. And at dawn, he would dive into the retreating sea to scavenge meat from the remains of creatures that the dwellers of the depths had

beneath the black surface of the cursed sea twice, and each of these harrowing meetings had left scars on their souls and

also somewhat of a

a deep

current and, once the sea disappeared, stumbled onto a mortally wounded, dying leviathan. The creature was still alive, but just barely. Knowing that the carrion eaters of the Labyrinth will soon come to feast on it, Gunlaug began cutting the meat

then said in a strangely dark

from its terrible wounds at that exact moment. And since Gunlaug's blade was the last thing to cut it, the Spell happened to

really knew a lot about the dwellers of the depths, but Sunny and Nephis had once witnessed two carapace centurions retrieve two Transcendent souls shards from the carcass of one of them. Which meant that Gunlaug's armor-type Memory was at least three ranks above the

if someone managed to kill a Fallen creature and acquire an Ascended weapon from it, the weapon would most likely still be ineffective against the Transcendent armor. And since that

Basically, Gunlaug was invincible.

Sunny sighed.

able to threaten his reign ever since. And all those who tried… well. Their skulls are out there for everyone to see, swinging on chains above

staring at the floor. She seemed to be

traits does the

He shrugged.

to tell the tale. The only thing widely known about the golden armor is that it is made out of some strange liquid metal and that it emanates a field of crushing psychic pressure. But even that is not entirely true. Actually, it only affects those who look at their reflection in the visor. Cassie

eyebrow, only now learning that everyone except for her always felt incredibly oppressed in Gunlaug's presence. For once, her terrible

had also allowed Sunny to learn a valuable secret. But he had no time to be

conversation was drawing close. He had to convince Changing Star to abandon any idea of going against Gunlaug. Otherwise,

her and asked in a carefully neutral

what do you

Star was quiet for a while, then suddenly