Shadow Slave

Suddenly, Noctis seemed… different.

He was still beaten, mangled, and covered in blood, but the sorcerer's presence subtly changed. If before it was faint and weakening, now, it became brimming with power, potency, and free-flowing energy.

Vast, furious… unrestrained.

And suffused with madness.

Despite the fact that Noctis was on his knees and crippled, he suddenly seemed terrifying. The morbid grin on his torn and disfigured face seemed more menacing than pitiful now. His one remaining eye glistened, reflecting the distant light of the crimson moon.

It was as though something that had been suppressing the sorcerer's true power all this time finally set him free.

Noctis inhaled deeply, and at the same, Solvane suddenly swayed. The hand she had used to crush his ribcage was still pressed against her body, blood streaming down on the red tunic.

Her beautiful eyes widened.

And then…

Something moved under her skin, making the War Maiden let out a pained scream.

She staggered back and looked at the kneeling sorcerer with a pale face.

"What… what have you done to me?"

Noctis smiled. His voice sounded hoarse and full of unfathomable emotion when he spoke:

"What else? I have fulfilled your most ardent wish, Solvane. I… have defeated you."

She stared at him in shock, then suddenly shuddered and let out another tortured scream. As drops of blood flew out of her mouth, the beautiful Transcendent stumbled and fell to her knees. Her sublime face was deathly pale and contorted by a grimace of terrible pain.

let out a croaking laugh and slowly stood up. Just like that, their roles were reversed. The War Maiden was on her knees, and Noctis was

lingered for a moment, and then looked at the patch of shadows where Sunny was

out,

'What the hell...'

assumed his corporeal form

magical circle in the sorcerer's residence, the river of blood that Noctis had fed to the soil below, the cracks on the stone floor, the tremors that had been running through it from

the faint scream that had awoken Sunny on his last night

the sorcerer, a

the dark. As the ghastly movement under her

this… thing?

Noctis smiled.

no point in trying to summon your Abilities. My little pet is a bit hungry for soul essence, you see. I've been starving it for a few

wounds covering it started to heal at an incredible pace. As Sunny watched, the bloody hole in the sorcerer's chest closed,

formed in his empty eye socket, slowly

step forward, leaned forward, and looked at Solvane. Then,

The profane seed that eventually birthed it was created when the

seethed with boundless rage

then glanced at the sorcerer with

Sacred Grove and Aidre's blood. He had kept

himself, making his body both the bait and the trap for the person who had desecrated the Grove and killed its Lady. All this time, the sorcerer

smile appeared on Sunny's

ruthless

thing or two from

violent convulsion, letting out a terrible shriek. The skin on her face broke, and a thin, worm-like vine appeared from beneath it, crawling forward through the blood. Another, thicker one, burst from her

then let out a stifled

this time… I am defeated… by

then