Shadow Slave

Left on the top of the tall mound of crimson coral, Cassie stood alone in the darkness.

Now that the Quiet Dancer had left her side, she was back to her previous self.

Lost.

Weak.

Frightened.

Utterly helpless.

The oppressive nothingness surrounded her from all sides.

But that nothingness was full of sound.

It swelled with the deafening cacophony of the nightmare horde's onslaught. Cassie heard howls, growling, inhuman screams, shrieks, and the scraping of chitin.

She heard the clangor of steel and the sound of flesh being ripped apart.

She also heard countless human voices calling out to any kind of deity that could save them. Full of fury, agony, bravery, fear, resolve, sorrow, strength, helplessness, hope, faith, despair, disbelief.

She heard them dying.

Standing above it all, Cassie shivered. She wanted to press her hands against her ears, but didn't.

…Her terrible vision was coming true.

And she was back to being lost in the darkness.

Just like before. Worse than before. Almost like on that first day in this cursed, forsaken, lightless land.

In this forgotten hell.

Back then, she had found herself stranded on a similar mound of coral. Only what surrounded her was the dark sea and not a horde of Nightmare Creatures.

But Cassie didn't know that. She didn't know where she was, and what was hiding in the boundless darkness. She only knew that she was alone, and helpless.

That she was going to die in that lonesome, cold nothingness.

she hugged her knees and tried not to cry. Abandoned and forgotten,

instead of death, a cold and indifferent voice came

"...What are you doing?"

saved and protected her ever since. Without even asking anything in return, not before, and not after learning of what Cassie's Aspect was

because she

of the darkness and destroyed the bitter, all-encompassing prison of

met Sunny. Sweet Sunny, who pretended to be

she had

now, she had to live

Or die with it...

to the sounds of slaughter, a sudden gust of

and slowly turned to face

moment later, her face paled, and her lips moved

'No!'

battle and anyone who could have heard her, Cassie closed her eyes

storm… there

***

smaller, but still held on. In fact, it was slowly pushing the horde of the

Memories to replace them summoned their melee weapons and

crossing the bridges of crimson coral and lunging forward

of the human formation and rallying fighters around her, with Effie stalling the entire horde to give the rest of the humans time to mend the breaches in their defense lines, for a few minutes, the flow of the battle froze

opposing forces seemed to finally

humans to turn that balance in their favor

"Come on! Hold strong!"

"Lit yourself on fire!"

"Follow the Immortal Flame!"

that the fate of this battle was about to be decided, a gust of wind suddenly blew over the battlefield,

The light dimmed slightly.

west, they suddenly stumbled and froze for a few moments. Their faces became as white as

world. It was approaching the battlefield with terrifying speed,

A storm was coming.

water that swirled around

it began to crawl

black whirlpool swelled and moved forward, swallowing the crimson coral meter after a meter, its dark vastness rising and

cursed sea was coming to devour

Crimson Spire, however, did not react in the same way

scurrying away to find shelter, they howled and shrieked in