Shadow Slave

Sunny remained motionless for a while, then shifted his gaze, moving it to the very end of the field of shimmering runes. Soon, Neph's description appeared before him. He lingered for a few moments, and then read:

…Soul Fragments: [2478/4000].

The corner of his mouth twitched.

'Of course. She is in a hell of her own, after all…'

The gap between them had diminished, but barely. He was still behind… still lacking…

But she was alive, at least. And fighting with all her strength to return.

If Neph refused to give up, then he would have to persevere, too.

With a sigh, Sunny turned away and looked back to his runes, finding the list of his Memories and Echoes. His eyes suddenly gleamed, but then grew dark and slightly despondent.

'What the hell… how is this even possible…'

Among the names of his Memories, dozens of new ones shimmered in the darkness. It seemed that the Spell continued to reward him even while their connection was obstructed by the sorceries of Hope. It sort of made sense… the fact that Sunny had not been able to communicate with the Spell did not mean that it had not continued to watch his every step.

He was inside one of its Nightmares, after all. Which created a swarm of questions on its own…

Sunny

were thirty-nine

not a single Echo he had received after slaughtering nearly a

sense… none at all. What is this,

Memories had been incredible, while his luck when it came

the darkness for a while, his expression glum. Then,

doesn't matter. It's a pity that I did not receive an Echo of the Red Priest, though.

names and descriptions. A few were good, and a couple was splendid. The rest, however, were worse than what he already had in

to give them away as sustenance for the taciturn demon. Instead, Sunny hesitated for a long time, and then dismissed

with while not fearing to damage or destroy an actually valuable instrument. He would be able to use Weaver's needle now, too, instead of cutting his fingers on the ethereal, but perfectly sharp

decision, Sunny finished the last of synthpaste tubes he had taken out of the Covetous Coffer, indifferently dropped

toward the horizon, and the night

meant that he would have to

***

next few days, Sunny traveled southeast, staying in the darkness of the Sky Below during the night, and finding shelter on the undersides of the floating island during the

these days, Sunny

to him. As it turned out, there were far fewer Nightmare Creatures populating the Kingdom of Hope in this era than there were in the future. That included the harrowing abominations that

far easier for him. Of course, there were still some monstrosities hiding in the darkness, but not nearly enough to make

the levitating islands. It was because of them and their efforts that the population of Nightmare Creatures was so low. It was also the reason

he made was far less fortuitous, and also had to do with the human inhabitants of the Kingdom of Hope. He was still in the territory of the worshippers of War, which made it all but impossible to appear on the surface of the islands during the day, unnoticed. But the dark side wasn't