Shadow Slave

The flying ship soared through the darkness, descending deeper and deeper into the empty void. After Saint Tyris had left, nothing much happened for a long time.

They were surrounded by nothing, and nothing bothered them.

This was the oppressive nothingness that Sunny was familiar with all too well.

However, now, things were different. The first time he had fallen into the Sky Below, he was alone and desperate, without any way to escape and no certainty of what awaited him below. This time, he was surrounded by people, knew where he was going, and that they would be able to turn back at any point, if need be.

Not to mention that Sunny had a whole ship to explore, as opposed to plummeting down atop the corpse of a dead devil.

The ancient vessel was not giant, but large enough to make their journey rather comfortable.

There was an upper deck, the main cargo hold, the lower deck stretching from the bow to the middle point of the ship, the auxiliary cargo holds beneath it, and various compartments near the stern, including living quarters for the crew, two separate mess decks, a spacious captain's cabin, several smaller cabins that seemed as though they were meant for either guests or officers, a large war room, and a few service compartments.

Currently, there were less than thirty people on board, so there was more than enough space for everyone. In fact, the vessel seemed rather empty and rough around the edges — the members of Cassie's cohort and other Fire Keepers that joined them to assist in the repairs had done a splendid job of restoring the flying ship's overall integrity, but had had no time to work on its interior.

A few essential facilities had been haphazardly outfitted with everything necessary to barely function, but most of the compartments still required a lot of work. There was no furniture of any kind except for some crude tables, chairs, and flimsy hammocks, and most of the vessel looked empty and barebones. It was a far cry from how luxurious it must have been furnished, outfitted, and decorated once, in the ancient past.

environment seemed almost like paradise. He had a whole cabin to himself, and the cargo hold was stocked with enough food and water to last them for a few months. The galley was also

wobble constantly up and down like a seafaring one would, and instead swayed gently from time to time,

due to the wind. The Fire Keepers seemed more or less capable of operating the sails, be it somewhat tentatively, and used either their Aspects or Memories akin to Cassie's wooden staff to produce gales that pushed the ship in the

their descent into the abyss was

slowly recuperating from his wounds, restoring his strength, and resting. He slept a lot and ate as much as he could, knowing that the Second Nightmare was going to test the limits of his endurance. He had to enter it in as good of a shape

had learned about Mordret, and go other each of his thoughts and decisions, trying to learn from his mistakes. The memory of

— information about the Awakened of higher Ranks, Anvil of Valor, the great clans, the tension between them… and even

Soul Sea were not there just for decoration, after all. He had always suspected that there

he tried after the battle with Mordret, the shadows refused to react. They just stood in their usual spots, silent and lifeless just like before, as if

almost like he had imagined

fact that the mystery of the shadows was

his soul had a fearsome defense system against those who

This was somewhat of a useless process, really, since he would be inhabiting a different vessel entirely inside the Nightmare. But training the body helped him put his mind in order,

City. Kai, Effie, and Cassie joined him, too, working on improving their own condition, as well as

four of them fought side by side. All of them had grown since then, both in terms of power and experience. They were Awakened now, possessed new Abilities, and had improved in their understanding of combat, technique, and skill. They needed to find new and better ways of enhancing each other's strengths and shielding each other's weaknesses, as well as cooperating seamlessly to achieve a

the guiding hand of Changing Star, it was much harder than they had remembered. None of them was really a natural leader, let alone one as talented and gifted in the art of battle as Nephis had