Shadow Slave

Sunny rolled over his shoulder, and just as he did, countless arrows hit the deck in the spot where he had been just a split second ago. Sent from powerful bows made for Awakened archers, each carried enough force to pierce plate armor with ease. Of course, the Mantle of the Underworld was not just any armor…

And yet, Sunny was extremely apprehensive of the threat posed by archers. Being battered by a rain of arrows was going to take a toll on his body, and all it took was for one to slide into the slit of his visor… not to mention that there were all kinds of Aspects the enemy could possess, and all kinds of runes the bows and the arrows could be enchanted with.

The heavy javelins sent flying by the bolt throwers came next...

Streaking through the air with terrifying speed, they hit the ship like missiles. Each possessed enough momentum to tear a hole in the deck, sending an explosion of splinters into the air. Sunny was not sure if he would be able to survive being hit by something like that, so he took no risks, diving into the shadows and turning into one of them.

The wisest move right now would have been to step onto the deck of a different ship… however, only the two attacking vessels were close enough to not require a truly vast expenditure of essence to perform a jump, and their crews were undoubtedly already prepared to resist an assault.

Plus, Sunny was reluctant to leave without killing the remaining soldiers and destroying the ship completely. He had a very good reason for that.

While the gargoyles and the four boarding parties were harassing the formation and slowly whittling down the number of enemy vessels… the fleet's main target still remained the same.

All of them were attacking the graceful ship with a beautiful tree growing around its mast, surrounding it like a murder of hungry crows.

Cassie was the fifth and final part of the cohort's assault force, and the one in the most danger. While Sunny and the rest fought with the soldiers of the defending fleet… she was battling the fleet itself.

responding with its own attacks from time to time. The bolts sent by its ballistae were much more devastating due to runes carved into them by Noctis, taking whole chunks out of the enemy ships or obliterating them completely. It was larger, faster, and much

it was also

of the graceful ship as it dove down, the figures of Sailor Dolls bracing themselves against rails and releasing the strings of their powerful bows. There were deep scratches on its hull and holes in its sails, dozens of arrows sticking out of the deck like needles… but it was

to predict and avoid the enemy attacks, at least to some degree… for now. But the pressure on the lonely ship was mounting with each second, and no matter how many enemy vessels

a star. She was leading the fleet

or, even worse, into one of the heavenly chains. But Cassie had no choice… she had to limit the amount of vessels that had a direct line of

barely hanging

lived were not going to be able to both control it and mount

took the enemy archers to notice him and take aim again to push one of the steering oars all the way up, wedge the Prowling Thorn into the wood, and then secure the handle of the oar in place with the invisible string

down, sending it into a downward dive. Sunny made it just in time — not a moment after he finished the task,

thrown forward and hit the deck, which was slowly turning into a vertical wall. Sunny allowed himself to slide down, dodging a few more arrows that way, and saw the

feral grin appeared on

'Done!'

him to

shadows, Sunny noticed the massive siege engine on

Cassie suddenly gave up on the sure-shot and threw the ship into a desperate spin, changing course so abruptly that one

Sunny frowned.

'What…'