Shadow Slave

Sunny cursed and prepared himself for the worst. A few moments later, the short respite they had gotten was over.

With a sound that reminded him of rushing water, a terrifying wave of undead monsters crashed into their formation, threatening to break it apart. Effie braced for the impact and withstood the furious onslaught, somehow managing to split the wave in two.

From one side, Changing Star dove into the torrent of skeletal wraiths, her incandescent sword cutting through them like a ray of pure sunlight piercing the darkness. From the other, Caster's enchanted blade was doing the same. The scion of the Han Li clan moved with astonishing speed, turning into a blurry whirlwind of ghostly green steel.

Everything that touched it turned to dust.

Sunny glanced at Kai and said in a hoarse voice:

"Prepare yourself."

In the next moment, the wave of monsters was upon them.

Left without the comforting protection of his shadow, Sunny could only rely on his own ability, cunning, and technique. Dashing forward, he clashed with the first skeleton. His sword flashed through the air with lightning speed, and a headless corpse instantly fell to his feet, blindly clawing at the stones in front of it.

Sunny had never fought like this. From the first day on the Forgotten Shore, he always had something helping him resist the horrors of the Dream Realm — be it his shadow, cover of darkness, Changing Star, or the Stone Saint. Now, he had to face the torrent of Nightmare Creature with nothing but his own frail human body... and resolve.

This was the ultimate test of pure skill.

Gritting his teeth, Sunny tried to remember the feeling of clarity he had experienced after the carapace centurion had crushed his ribcage with one strike of its terrifying bone scythe. All unnecessary thoughts were obliterated by his will, leaving only two.

Kill your enemy.

the enemy from killing

was happening in the dark tunnel. His thinking accelerated, turning the mayhem that surrounded them into a stark and

underlying law of it all, Sunny was able to react to the actions of his

…Ssssshimmm!

Midnight Shard cut the air and slashed the next monster across the chest, splitting the skeleton diagonally in two. Without paying the

efficient, focused on delivering the maximum amount of damage while preserving as much of

with annihilating white

his body and sweat biting his eyes, his muscles on the verge of breaking apart and his lungs desperately

a furious roar from somewhere ahead and briefly looked up, noticing that Effie had dismissed her battered round shield and finally summoned the beautiful bronze spear. With it in her hands, the huntress became even more deadly. Multiple skeletons burst into a shower of broken bones, cut apart by a wide arc of

the same time, more and more wounds

everything, things weren't going well for the

at least, it seemed

cohort from the front had begun to diminish. Pretty soon, Nephis, Effie and Caster were getting a

had to hold off an ever-increasing number of undead creatures attacking the party from the rear. When the balance of the

taciturn Shadow, while Sunny moved forward to

he got there, the huntress gave him

doofus. You… look like

a dozen places and soaked through and through with blood, he looked pretty much exactly as dead as the Nightmare Creatures

Effie's state wasn't

He smiled crookedly.