Shadow Slave

Indeed, the awkward fourteen-year-old girl was his little sister, Rain.

And indeed, it wasn't a coincidence that Sunny had bought this exact house in this exact district of the city. While the terrace neighborhood was nice and charming, the real reason he had chosen this home, in particular, was because it stood next to the place where Rain lived.

It was on this street, a year and a few months ago, that he had watched from the shadows as she was having dinner with her adopted family, their warm and happy life displayed for him to see through the wide window of their brightly illuminated living room.

…Well, now Sunny had a living room and a wide window of his own, even though there was usually only darkness behind it.

Back then, he had become painfully aware that his fantasy of saving his little sister was empty and misguided. Rain didn't need to be saved, least of all by a troubled outskirt stray like him... a ghost of the past that she most likely did not even remember. If he had knocked on her door on that night, nothing in her life would have changed for the better.

Sunny wasn't the same penniless kid anymore. He was an Awakened, one marked as a special strategic asset by the government. He was considerably wealthy, connected… even powerful.

But, deep down, he still believed that the statement held true. His clothes and circumstances might have changed, but Sunny himself remained the same. Twisted and damaged, like anyone who had seen the truth of this world would be.

What's worse, now that he had risen above his previous pathetic self, he had a whole swarm of new, much more serious problems. Nephis, the Sovereigns, the legacy of mysterious Weaver… all of these things promised a future full of turmoil and danger. He was not exactly the kind of person who had good things to offer to anybody.

So, no. Sunny had not changed his mind about keeping himself out of Rain's life. He wasn't going to approach her, and had no desire to meet her face to face.

was, however,

But even if he forgot about that statistical correlation, there was still a possibility that she would end up in the First Nightmare, no

Sunny was eighteen, and Rain was fourteen. Almost every person infected by the Spell had fallen victim to it while being older than sixteen and younger than nineteen, which meant that there were

due to how little she had been at the

to pull some strings behind the scenes to ensure that her chances of surviving the First Nightmare were enhanced — be it through access to better battle instructors

first needed to understand how well Rain

she lived and let his shadows loose to explore the neighborhood and spy on her

put it that way, it sure sounds a

rat willing to do anything in order to survive. Mundane humans had no idea about what he had gone through, what he had done,

So, a little hint of creepiness

hid his hands in his pockets, and headed toward the public transport terminal at a slow

hundred meters ahead, stealthily following Rain and keeping an

looked at

go to school, I

***

by the prices of the homes in the terrace district, Sunny