Shadow Slave

Sunny glided through the skies, tensely observing the underside of the Shipwreck Island through the eyes of his shadow. The chain ahead of him was teeming with a swarm of Fallen Demons, but behind him… he didn't even want to know what the thing hiding in the darkness was.

One thing became clear, though, and it was why none of the Chain Worms had tried to devour the iron giant that swayed in the wreckage of a broken heavenly chain… or rather, had succeeded in trying to bite a piece out of him. The dead colossus was like cheese in the mousetrap, attracting these vile creatures into the range at which the being that dwelled in the perpetual darkness could catch them.

Sunny was sure that many Chain Worms had attempted to feast on the iron giant, but ended up being the feast instead.

Currently, he was trying to avoid the same fate.

Luckily, the Dark Wing allowed him to glide diagonally away from the Shipwreck Island instead of plunging straight down, avoiding the attack range of the terrifying being. He reached the chain without attracting the attention of the bottom dweller, and instantly became a shadow, hiding on its underside.

Waiting for a few moments, Sunny studied the length of the heavenly tether in front of him.

'...Not too bad.'

A large section of the unusually long chain hung low, reaching the Sky Below. He would be able to ride most of it without being noticed by the Chain Worms. The last stretch of it, though… Sunny was going to have to use Shadow Step to jump from shadow to shadow if he wanted to avoid having to fight a swarm of the Fallen Demons.

The problem was that his reserves of shadow essence were already running low. Except for the short walk across the hull of the ancient ship, Sunny had no chance to really replenish it. In the meantime, he had used a lot to get to the wreck, fight the damnable chest abomination, and pursue it. Chances were, he would reach the Twisted Rock with no essence to spare whatsoever.

How was he even going to kill the vile chest, especially with one of his arms broken?

He hesitated for a bit, then rushed forward, swiftly reaching the section of the chain submerged into the Sky Below and continuing to fly through the darkness once there. To avoid tempting fate, Sunny remained on the underside of the gargantuan tether, where there were way fewer Worms crawling around.

He did, however, encounter several, and saw up close how they were tearing into the rusting iron of the chain as he silently flew past. The sight of it was simultaneously disturbing, fascinating… and strangely sad.

to an end,

as seemingly eternal as the

with the chest creature and followed it from the shadows. The bizarre monstrosity was still running as fast as it could, jumping from link to link and using its long gangly limbs to keep balance. From time to time, it got into a short and vicious fight with one of the Chain Worms and either left them severely wounded, or promptly escaped with a ghastly wound or two of its own. By now, its grating giggles grew somewhat

thinking about how

time, he was meticulously calculating the amount of shadow essence he would have to spend to cross the last section of the way to the Twisted Rock,

calculations, thought, had turned out to be for

chest monstrosity were about halfway to

rattling

for a moment, then glanced toward the goal of

'Oh, no…'

Rock had entered its ascent phase, and was now rising quickly into

***

'Curse it all!'

luck today, and couldn't help

the hell was this

was ascending meant two things

that he would have to act fast and try to kill the chest creature before the Crushing became too terrible, or somehow obliterate the damned thing while being weighed down

was that the position of the heavenly chain was swiftly shifting, making it so

the island without attracting the attention of the swarm of Chain Worms.

'Damn it!'

of the chain increased and the bizarre monstrosity swayed, then fell on all fours and rushed

'...Was my intuition wrong?'

good