Shadow Slave

Sunny tore the Chain Worm apart, pieces of flesh and puddles of blood covering the red stones of the arena like a ghastly carpet. Then, shrouded in impenetrable shadows, he thrust his hands into the mangled carcass of the slain abomination and ripped three bloody soul shards out.

…Ironically, killing the Fallen Demon had not been too hard for him. A long time ago, Master Roan had described these vile creatures as incredibly formidable and deadly opponents, someone that even he would not have wanted to face alone. But that was because Master Roan was a human.

Chain Worms fed on metal, and as such, steel weapons and armor were useless against them. Sunny would have been in trouble if he was still in his human body, and most of his arsenal of Memories suddenly became ineffective. However, he was a demon now — one of the shadowspawn, or Shadow's kin, or whatever it was he had been turned into.

His claws, his fangs, and his shadows were the perfect weapon to destroy such abominations.

Of course, fighting against a creature one Rank higher than him was not easy. But, augmented by three shadows, he had managed to dismantle the massive abomination without too much trouble. In fact, killing the Chain Warm had been much easier than killing Master Pierce. He wasn't even wounded, at least not seriously.

The crowd grew silent, shocked by his display of ruthless brutality, and then exploded with cheers. Glory, glory… it seemed that they enjoyed seeing someone triumph against a stronger opponent much more than anything else.

'Crazy bastards…'

Sunny glanced at the spectators with resentment, then walked over to the young Awakened and pushed the soul shards into his hands. The youth looked at them with a frown.

"These… are these soul shards?"

'Gods. How can he be an Awakened and not know what a shard looks like?'

Sunny stared at the young man darkly, then nodded and raised one hand to his chest, making a fist.

The Awakened hesitated:

"Don't you want to consume them yourself?"

Sunny snarled, then shook his head. Finally convinced, the youth crushed the shards in his fists and froze, a funny expression appearing on his face.

a strange

'...Whatever.'

worse, the young man was now his partner. The stronger he became, the better he would be able to aid Sunny, both

need a lot of healing. That,

they proceeded to the fifth cage, and then to the sixth. And finally, to the

point, Sunny was nearing

had not expected, draining him of essence, damaging his body, and putting a heavy strain on his endurance. He was exhausted and overwhelmed by pain, the merciless sun shining blindingly in the blue skies and making his black

was located. In fact, Sunny had not felt the island move either up or down even once. Perhaps it had a permanent altitude, like the Sanctuary of

seventh battle… the last one they had

in shape, with six gates in its walls. Four were already opened, and two still stood

stones, steam rising from the pools of blood surrounding them. And in the middle of the killing stage, two humans stood, their faces hidden

and so were the plumes of their helmets. One was armed with a spear and a

were worshippers of War God, just like the spectators singing

The young man shivered:

"Warmongers… these mad dogs…"

studied the two humans. Both were Awakened, and from the look of it, of sufficient power and skill. They were calm and solemn, their eyes empty of even a hint of fear, and instead

them were here for, willingly or not. The masters of the arena wanted their slaves to fight for it, but they also wanted to achieve it themselves. After the initial culling had taken place, the final obstacle the gladiators had

slavers had to survive the onslaught of the slaves, if they wished

battles in the arena served a singular purpose — to deliver the best and the most formidable opponents for the worshippers of

'Mad dogs, indeed.'

insane. Sunny was now more sure of it than

kill the two Awakened warriors, if he wanted to survive. Or rather, if he wanted to earn the chance to be killed in the arena some

a low growl, Sunny sent one of the shadows to the ground. In this fight, being aware of his surroundings was going to be more important than raw strength. No Awakened human could challenge him in terms of raw might, after all… unless their Aspect was solely focused on

an enemy of his could possess. It was easy to understand and predictable,

versatility and unpredictable nature of Aspects that