Shadow Slave

"Stand your ground, wretches! If anyone runs, I'll kill you myself!"

Hearing Effie's voice, Kai flinched and forced himself to look away from the terrible visage of the horde of nightmarish abominations. Glancing down, he saw that his hand was shaking and clenched it into a fist. He had to calm himself, somehow, or his aim was going to suffer.

That wouldn't do.

…But honestly, how was a person supposed to not be terrified when a literal sea of Nightmare Creatures, each stronger and deadlier than anything anyone should ever be forced to face, was approaching them so fast?

Kai prided himself on overcoming things like stage fright and social anxiety, as well as getting through many unpalatable situations with grace and elegance, not to mention managing to survive in the Dark City for three long years without losing his humanity.

But this was just too much…

'...What would Sunny say?'

Thinking of his prickly, but adorable friend, Kai couldn't help but smile a little.

'Probably something like… oh, a horde of Nightmare Creatures? Yeah I've met one a few days ago. They all died when I sneezed, though.'

The strangest part was that he would be telling the truth. If Kai decided to dig deeper, he would discover something in the line of Sunny's sneeze causing a massive avalanche that wiped all the monsters out.

…Or, more likely, that his sneeze had awakened some ancient, much more terrifying creature, which then proceeded to devour all the monsters before turning its gaze on Sunny himself.

That was just how Sunny was.

...Unpredictable.

in calming Kai down. He only regretted that the cute scoundrel wasn't close by to reassure him

approaching horde, he

face the guardians of the Spire. Because of that, the position of the third line was higher than the other two, which would allow them to continue firing long after Effie

In theory.

Artisans and their assistants were busy loading the six powerful ballistae they had transported all the way from the Dark City and put together the last night. The sight of the mighty siege engines made

they were going to survive this

"First mark!"

turned to the Artisans and waved a hand,

through the air and crashed into the wall of monsters. Many of them were eviscerated, but these losses were like a drop of water in the sea

Kai gritted his teeth.

"Second mark!"

"Now!"

melodic voice rolled over the third line of the Dreamer Army, he drew his bow and

taught to many in school, but the ancient practice known as kyudo, which was more of a meditative ritual than a real battle art. Its

Kai was,

one day he would be relying

didn't

go of the string, Kai watched as the black arrow streaked through the air and bit deep into the body of a tall carapace demon. Its bone tip pierced the metal armor of the terrible creature with ease. Not only was

could resist

as many

the weakness that overtook him every time

to take his second shot before the wave of

that was happening

all the other