Shadow Slave

Sunny got comfortable on his criminally soft bed, picked up a few succulent grapes from the tray placed on an intricate table near it, threw one in his mouth… and finally summoned the runes.

'Let's see…'

The first thing he glanced at was the shadow fragments counter. He vaguely remembered receiving what felt like much more than six after slaying the black steed, who had been an Awakened Terror. So, Sunny was hopeful to see a pleasant number…

However, when he did see it, he almost choked on the grape juice to death.

'What… what the Spell?! What?!'

He even rubbed his eyes, thinking that he was seeing things, but no. The counter was the same.

Shadow Fragments: [2823/3000].

Sunny stared at it in disbelief.

'Six hundred… I received almost six hundred fragments for killing that damned horse?'

Absentmindedly, he threw another grape into his mouth, and proceed to almost bite off one of his fingers from the sheer disorientation of it all.

'How is this even possible?!'

He thought about it for a bit, stunned, and then tilted his head a little.

'Could it be…'

One of the advantages, but also inherent drawbacks of Sunny's Aspect was that it operated through shadow fragments instead of the usual soul ones. So, while Sunny didn't need to collect and absorb shards to grow stronger, he also could not use the shards of creatures that he had not personally slain for that purpose.

detail was that, unlike all human Awakened, he did not receive a portion of all the accumulated soul fragments after killing others of his own kind, and instead received

did not consider him a human? He was a divine shadow, after all, and shadows recognized him as one of their own. So… would it be safe to say… that in this context, his own kind were actually not humans, but

possessing six cores, and with a thousand years of battles and bloodshed behind his shoulders to fill them to the

accumulated by the tenebrous courser throughout his long and grim life, as a normal Awakened would after slaying

certainly supported

Sunny's eyes ignited.

'That… that is it!'

he might have just stumbled on one of the most crucial secrets about

Creatures to create a new one would exert. As a Sleeper, or even an Awakened, he was too small

meant that there would be fewer creatures he would be able to hunt down to collect shadow fragments, since slaying those lower than him in Rank did not give him any at

he could gain from destroying true shadow creatures… perhaps, there

steed. Neither of these feats had been easy… in fact, both rewards had cost him an unimaginable amount

…Almost.

months later, Sunny was already near the finish line. This fact was both exciting and

amazing. I survived,

he had been subjected to in the Nightmare,

Sunny stumbled upon it almost by accident while seeking the runes describing his Shadows. Before that, he had noticed that the runes of the Mantle of the Underworld seemed to

shifted his gaze to the last string describing the enchantments of the onyx armor… the counter of victories tied to

Now, it read:

Vanquished Foes: [3291/6000].

He blinked.

'Huh…'

that the Nightmare Creatures and humans he had killed in the Read Colosseum had not counted toward the requirements of the strange enchantment for a simple

thousand vanquished foes come

Sunny frowned.