Shadow Slave

"Shadow! Shadow! Shadow!"

…Sunny swayed, looking at the broken sword in his hand. When did it break? He didn't quite remember. This was one of the first weapons he had picked up in the arena, right after killing… wait, who had he killed for that sword?

Dead faces spun in his mind, staring at him with empty eyes. There were so many that he couldn't even tell whether all of them had once belonged to real enemies or were simply created by his imagination. No, that one was real… the first human he had killed in the coliseum. That had been the battle where he took the sword.

These days, he was having trouble remembering things.

Sunny threw the broken sword away and looked at the crowd that was chanting his name. Shadow… right! That was him.

'What is wrong with you, fool… since when was that your name?'

He growled, wishing that he had thrown the broken weapon at one of the humans. Not that it would have done any good — there were powerful enchantments permeating the ancient stones of the coliseum. Some of them were meant to prevent the fighters from escaping, others protected the audience from their ire. Some, he had no idea about.

All his attempts to break free of this cursed place had failed… for now.

"Demon… are you alright?"

Sunny lingered for a few moments, then glanced at Elyas, slowly returning from the bizarre state of mind the battle had sent him into. The young man was looking at him with a strange expression on his face, a bit of apprehension hiding deep in his light blue eyes.

The youth had grown considerably stronger in the weeks they had spent fighting all kinds of monsters — both of the Nightmare and human kind — in the arena. All those soul shards had not been wasted on him. His healing Ability was now much more potent, and his skill as a warrior blossomed. His face also changed, becoming gaunt and angular... almost mature.

One had no choice but to grow up quickly in hell...

The pain of the Flaw washed over Sunny, finally shattering his strange trans. He gritted his teeth, and nodded.

"Well… good. You are being weird recently, you know. I have some essence left, so let me heal you before they take us back to the cages."

approach and activate his Aspect Ability, staring at the Warmonger they had just killed. This one was a bit of a challenge… the bastard had

fought were growing stronger

'Something is wrong.'

been in very bad shape… day after day, he had fought in the arena, receiving terrible wounds and being beaten down, time after time, just to claw his way

his spirits high despite all the horror of his situation. He kept thinking and studying his surrounding, searching for a way to escape. He

after a while, when nothing had worked, the weight of pain, torment, and hopelessness had grown heavier and heavier, and then heavier still. A seed of despair had taken root in his soul. And once there, it grew

survive in the arena without losing pieces of his flesh each time, to bide his time

that way

kept in the depths of his mind for a long time, but only now, faced with this soul-crushing despair, had Sunny summoned it into the light. He had decided to try and expand the purview of his battle style to include not only shadowing humans,

result... was a

into the very essence of how the mad abominations carried themselves in battle, how they used their

claws, too. He had fangs and horns, too. He had plenty of hatred

It was the willingness to

he learn how to ravage,

shadow

what impulses guided them was, in a sense,

but practice, as if his life

his efforts bore

he had made a breakthrough, but at some point, he found himself being able to understand the Nightmare Creatures much better. From that point onward, his mastery of Shadow Dance,

And with frightening speed.

was able to use Shadow Dance to assume the shape and form of all his enemies, at least in his mind, and thus know how they were going to try and destroy him. By knowing that, he had been able to anticipate and kill them first, instead, one after another, day

And here he was.

remembering who he

Elyas healed his wounds, Sunny stared at the dead Warmonger, his

I… becoming a

a cold shiver running down his