Shadow Slave

The hidden passage led Sunny underground, twisting and turning through the mass of stone. Despite the fact that he had been cautiously walking forward for a few minutes now, Sunny felt that he was still beneath the cathedral. In fact, by his estimation, he was approaching its center.

And indeed, right beneath the spot where the statue of the goddess should have been, the narrow passage opened into a larger room. In it, a deep well leading even further down was situated, with a winding staircase spiraling down into the darkness.

Sunny frowned.

'What is it with this place and creepy dark wells?'

Going further down was going to place him dangerously close to the catacombs. He knew all to well what kind of danger that would pose — the last time Sunny had ventured into the maze of ancient tunnels below the city, he barely escaped alive.

After hesitating for a while, he stepped onto the staircase and began descending. Deep, ancient shadows surrounded Sunny, giving him a little comfort.

At least he was among his kin.

After a minute or so of walking down the stairwell, Sunny entered a large chamber that seemed to be carved into the bedrock, as opposed to being constructed by human hand. On the other side of it, a large door forged from black steel stood, illuminated by two burning torches.

Two thoughts entered Sunny's mind simultaneously.

The first one was that the metal from which the monolithic door was made looked eerily familiar. It was the same dark, lusterless, impenetrable alloy that the Black Knight had been made of.

The second thought was even more disturbing.

'...How come those torches are still burning?'

aflame

be producing light, but it

cast by the ghostly flames were the most disturbing, though. Because of the movements of the fire, they were supposed to be dancing on the floor. But instead, the shadows were absolutely motionless.

while, and that ordered his own shadow to stay back. The shadow did not protest — in fact, it was visibly relieved. Taking a few exaggerated

black door and lowered the Midnight Shard into a protective stance. He was ready to face any

…But nothing attacked him.

a sudden shill that run through Sunny's body when he had entered the

of a protective charm. I am almost sure that their power can harm

torches meant to keep something from entering the space that

meant to keep

only one way

underground chamber just because of

pushed him to study

his intuition was more than a mere manifestation of his subconscious. It had turned out to be correct one too

he had consumed

divinity. And sometimes, he was even drawn to it — like he was drawn to this cathedral and to the mysterious key that lay buried in the body of the Lord of the Dead. The two seemed

he was about to find out how

it was not all his intuition was capable of. There were

that after he had been changed by the ichor, that Attribute was slightly enhanced, giving him the ability

and his close relationship with those strings gave Sunny a slight affinity to revelations and fate —

enough to guide him to this door and make him want to