Shadow Slave

Sunny reeled from all the information he was receiving.

He had already been exhausted after the battle against the flying armada, the race across the burning city, the confrontation with Mordret… and the rest.

Witnessing Hope in her true form and hearing her inhuman, beautiful voice had almost overloaded his mind. Looking at the Spell through the prism of his new knowledge of sorcery had been another shock.

And this latest revelation…

Sunny groaned.

'What does it all mean?'

Of course, he could not be certain of the validity of his guess. But his intuition told him that he was at least partially right… the appraisal of the challenger's performance did not depend on the greatness of the feats they had achieved, but instead on how far they had strayed from the predestined outcome. How well they had resisted the current of fate.

The Spell wanted humans to strain against the chains of fate… maybe even break them.

But why? Why would the Demon of Fate want fate to be subjugated? By mere mortals, no less.

And what was the point of manipulating fate inside illusory Nightmares? No matter how much was changed, it was never going to affect the Dream Relm and the Waking World. It was never going to reach reality. Whatever changes had been made, they were going to disappear forever as soon as the Nightmare ended.

As far as Sunny knew, no echo of the events that transpired in the First, Second, and Third Nightmares had ever affected change in the real world. The only thing that returned from the Nightmares…

Were the Awakened.

He frowned, feeling a vague hint of suspicion appearing in his mind. However, before he could grasp it, the Spell spoke again. Its voice resounded in the darkness, enveloping him from all directions:

[The Third Seal is broken.]

[Awakening dormant powers…]

Sunny was about to Ascend.

Just as before, he felt as though something was waking up inside him. His four Shadow Cores ignited with intense heat, the power within them surging. The heat spread through his soul and his body, rejuvenating and changing them.

The feeling was familiar and euphoric. He felt his body being reforged into a stronger, better, more perfect version of itself. His soul was going through the same sublime transformation.

This process was already familiar to Sunny, since more or less the same thing had happened to him twice before. However, this time… something was different…

Instead of stopping after reaching the threshold of qualitative change and immense fortification, the transformation continued. His body and soul, both turned incandescent and malleable by the furious heat flowing through them, started to melt into each other.

They were slowly merging.

But they were not simply joining into a single whole… instead, the two parts of his being resonated with each other, reinforcing one another. The power of that resonance grew stronger and stronger, and then exploded once it reached his four cores.

him even further on the

change

of his being with stark clarity. The difference was so staggering that

and soul were now deeply interconnected, the effect of one on another also went through a fundamental change. He could do

true

with words yet. All Sunny knew was

newly reforged self subsided and turned into a pleasant coldness. The coldness then disappeared, absorbed into his spirit, his flesh, and his

black void

He felt…

Powerful.

as though there was furious might boiling under his skin.

his body, the Spell spoke from

[Awakening Aspect Ability.]

[Aspect Ability acquired.]

Sunny held his breath.

Ability Name: Shadow

He clenched his fists.

is this what I

the Spell was not done

voice resounded

[Your Attribute has evolved.]

Ability has

paused for a

[Your Ascension is complete.]

his

'What?! What has evolved?!'

hurriedly summoned the

Name: Sunless.

Lost from

Rank: Ascended.

Class: Devil.

Shadow Cores: [4/7].

Shadow Fragments: [744/4000].

at the number of his fragments for a moment, then shook his

[Fated], [Flame

Divinity] to transform once again, but it was

[Child of Shadows] was

Attribute had replaced

stared at