Shadow Slave

"Draw! Aim! Endure!"

Just as Night shouted these words, Aiko tripped and fell. The bundle of arrows she was carrying in her arms scattered on the ground.

"Ouch…"

Picking herself up from the coral, she hurriedly gathered the arrows and dashed to the nearest archer, then placed them near his feet.

In this battle, the role of people like her — those who were too weak to fight and did not possess a useful Aspect — was simultaneously the most simple and the most chaotic. They were charged with supplying the Sleepers participating in the battle with everything they needed, be it arrows, crossbow bolts, stones for their slings, or anything else.

There were several teams of runners doing different things. Initially, she was supposed to help carry the wounded from the first and second lines to the makeshift hospital at the back of the formation. There, a few people with Aspect Abilities having to do with healing waited, ready to help. Her friend Stev was one of them.

…But as it turned out, there wasn't a lot of wounded in this battle. Most simply died on the spot. So she was left with nothing to do and ended up here, helping to supply the archers.

She had just brought two quivers to Night, and was on her way…

…Wait, how crazy was that?

Trying to catch her breath, Aiko glanced around and shivered.

'Crazy, this is crazy…'

The scene in front of her was just too bizarre to be true. Several hundred Sleepers were besieged by a horde of Nightmare Creatures on the ground, with another falling on them from above. All that in front of an ugly, endless tower of crimson coral. Surely, she was dreaming…

'Of course you are! This is the Dream Realm, you dimwit!'

girls her age back home. Despite the fact that the two of them had

dream a teenage girl

her head to the sound of a muffled curse, Aiko saw Stev and another Sleeper carrying a crude stretcher. On it was a young woman, covered in blood and pale as a ghost, her leather armor

not too seriously. Running up

that weight with her tiny body was not easy, but she gritted her teeth

hurried to the back of the

the exhausted crews of the siege engines,

weren't going well

of monsters, but Aiko didn't know how much longer those poor people would be able to hold. The second line was now entangled with the Nightmare Creatures, too. The initial plan had been for these two forces to switch positions to give the exhausted warriors

flying abominations did not seem

all going

spread through her body, Aiko trembled and involuntarily turned her head to the tallest point in the Dreamer Army camp. There, on a protruding

was Saint Nephis herself. The other was her blind oracle.

is that

none other than Sunny, the strange young man who had gotten

important people were and what positions they held in the Bright Lady's cohort. Everyone's role was clear and

…Except for Sunny.

entirely unclear. People seemed to consider him a member of Lady Nephis's cohort, but Sunny himself always insisted that he was not. He was thought

just knew him for his tendency to keep to himself, ridiculous bragging, and carefree attitude. They simultaneously respected him for being Changing Star's scout and

the shadows and kill the

mind, Sunny was very mysterious. He was a

Lady Nephis now, she suddenly

Star had a

were going to survive, after