Shadow Slave

The eel tried to catch him, but was a second too late.

"Crap!"

Falling toward the dark waves, Sunny threw the kunai in the direction of the stone giant's hand.

Instead of a weapon, the colossus was holding a tool that resembled a mason's hammer. The kunai curved in the air and wrapped the invisible string around its shaft.

'This is going to hurt!'

Sunny plunged into the darkness. A moment later, the string drew taut, and he found himself swinging through the air at a terrible speed. Flying underneath the colossal stone fist, he almost touched the black water with his feet, but then the inertia pulled him up and away.

After a few seconds of weightlessness, Sunny landed on the hammer's head and let out a shaky breath. Without wasting any time, he dislodged the Prowling Thorn and pulled it into his hand, then wedged the dagger in a narrow crack on the surface of the giant hammer.

Landing on it was one thing. Staying here, though… that was something else entirely.

The colossus was swinging his arms as he walked, so Sunny basically found himself on top of a giant pendulum. Not only was the hammer swaying back and forth, but the angle of the surface he was standing on also constantly changed, making it hard not to fly off or slid into the raging sea.

Almost kneeling, Sunny held onto the kunai and tried to keep himself from falling. Then, his face pale and grim, he looked up and glanced at the eel.

"I'm right here, you slimy worm!"

The abomination lingered for a few moments, considering whether it should continue to climb up or follow the sound made by the prey. Finally, it twisted its long, repulsive body and slid over the shoulder of the giant, crawling down his arm.

Toward Sunny.

'Come on, come on!'

had on the Corpse Eater. Both were, presumably, Fallen creatures. If one was poisoned to

not cut himself with the Prowling Thorn

to have no effect on the eel whatsoever. The monster

embued my blood with the odd quality of always being attracted back to the larger mass of it. The Corpse Eater's innards were in the way, so... Damn

hopes of killing the eel were crushed. Now, Sunny was stuck on the swinging hammer, with his only path of escape

"Damn it all!"

approached him. Even enhanced by the shadow, the blade of the tachi failed to cut the flesh of the Fallen creature, and instead simply

'Not good, not good…'

ones were used to push its massive body forward and hold onto the

were the ones that Sunny now had to

sides. Dodging and deflecting them while maintaining

were translated through grounded footwork, which allowed him

but think that Nephis was right. The best fighters weren't those who were the

continued to

enough to step foot inside its vast expanse. Take this situation, for example… what kind of a person would imagine that, one day, they would have to

himself in

most important

the seconds he had left to live were numbered. The onslaught of the slender tentacles was already too much for him to handle. And they

'Twenty-eight.'

body and rush toward the approaching eel. Instantly weakened, he gritted his teeth and tried to resist

hit against the blade of the Midnight Shard with tremendous force, sending

off the surface of the hammer. Catching himself at the last moment, he pushed away and

nowhere to retreat

But it was fine.

'Twenty-nine.'

muscles and hurled the thing entrusted to her by Sunny into the