Shadow Slave

Sunny remained motionless for a while, then shifted slightly, causing the chain of his cage to rattle. Attracted by the sound, Elyas woke up from his restless sleep and stared into the darkness, a tired expression on his young face.

"...Demon? What happened?"

In the next moment, he heard the sound of a heavy body slamming against the iron bars, and then another crash. His partner's cage swung widely, and at the highest point of its swing, a long arm suddenly shot from between the bars, claws scraping against metal as Sunny took hold of the youth's own gibbet.

Elyas flinched.

"Wha... what are you doing?"

Sunny growled, trying to express his intention as best as he could. The young Awakened didn't know how to read the runic language he knew how to write, so this was the only way of communication between them. Luckily, an honest effort to answer truthfully was enough for the Flaw. It didn't punish Sunny for not being able to deliver the truth, as long as he really tried to.

Their cages hung diagonally, connected by his hand. Sunny groaned, straining his muscles to pull them even closer together. Then, staring at the young man's pale face, Sunny took hold of the bars with two more hands, and stretched the fourth one to grab the Awakened by the throat.

Elyas's eyes widened slightly, but he didn't even try to struggle. The youth simply looked at him, no fear written on his gaunt and emaciated, but still childishly soft face. Instead, there was only confusion... and trust.

Sunny sighed.

'What a fool. If I wanted to, I could have snapped his neck right here and now…'

Of course, he had no such intentions. Instead, Sunny brought the youth closer and stared intently at the steel collar wrapped around his neck, studying it. He couldn't really see his own, so this was the next best thing.

Elyas remained motionless for a while, then said:

"I don't know what you are trying to do, Demon, but you better stop it before the priest comes to check on the noise."

other. Elyas was right… there were mere seconds left before the Ascended showed up, judging by how long it had taken the solemn giant to appear before. He was always somewhere near, ready to intervene in case the slaves misbehaved. Sunny had timed their jailer's reaction time many,

He had already seen all that he needed to see. The pattern of runes carved inside the collar, and the stream of soul essence

to have

***

a complicated cradle of black strings was weaved together, forming a strange and hypnotic pattern. Sunny had advanced a lot in his ability to thread shadow strings and

material world. However, they could interact with his flesh, which was why

his phalanxes, reinforced by the evolved Bone Weave, had not offered the essence strings any resistance. All that remained were

in place. Considering that there were eighteen of them left, he still had more than a human would. Not that it

something like a needle, perhaps. Coincidentally, he had one of those in his possession, a needle used by Weaver themself, no less. But it was locked away in his Soul Sea,

to endure and be very, very careful, lest

another problem,

an intuitive understanding of the guiding principles of spellweave, but it was not like he really knew what to do. All he had was his memory of

enough to master sorcery… but

parallels between them and extrapolate how their weaves produced the desired effects. There were

ability to be summoned and dismissed, the ability to repair themselves unless completely destroyed, and the connection to the

in theory, determine which parts of the weaves were the exact same across

pattern perfectly was a challenge, despite him having a very good memory. Sunny, however, had to recall not only many, but also do so with a sufficient degree of precision to

he had to somehow rebuild the repeating parts of those weaves with nothing but his bare hands and shallow reserves of

obsession, resolve, and desperation, he

…And also failed.

one of the three patterns he had managed to isolate. But as soon as the pattern

hold.

Something was missing.