Shadow Slave

'What the hell am I doing...'

Indeed. The wall of the city was breached, a menacing Nightmare Gate was towering above him, and not too far away, a furious conflict was raging in the rabble of the staging area. And yet, Sunny was staring at the runes that shimmered brightly in the air in front of him.

His vision was a little blurry, but the runes were clear and perfectly legible, as if existing outside of reality. Which they probably did.

'Oh, well...'

Sunny needed a couple of minutes to recover, anyway.

He looked at the field of runes, searching for the names of his Shadows. A new string of them replaced the old one:[Onyx Saint]

'Onyx, huh...'That had a nice ring to it.

Marble Saint had turned into Onyx Saint. Was his Marble Shell going to evolve into the Onyx Shell, as well, once he Transcended?

Sunny would have loved to pursue that train of thought, but unfortunately, he couldn't. His thoughts were slow and erratic, refusing to consider anything too complicated.

Giving up, he concentrated on the runes of Saint's name and started to read the descriptions.

Shadow: Onyx Saint.Shadow Rank: Ascended.Shadow Class: Devil.Shadow Attributes: [Battle Master], [Stalwart], [Ember of Divinity], [Heart of Darkness].

'Heart of Darkness... that's new.'

Sunny glanced at the mass of attacking arachnid warriors, catching a glimpse of Saint decapitating an especially menacing abomination with a swift slash of her black sword, then sending its body flying into the mob with a strike of her shield. Even before the rim of the shield connected with the creature's chest, the blade of the stone sword was already moving to deflect an incoming blow.

'...She's not dead yet.'

He looked back to the runes.

darkness dwells in this

the sphere of black stone in the tunnel... she had taken something from it. Sunny had expected as

darkness now coexisted within Saint, somehow... there was something interesting about that

past the runes nervously and then hurry up. The Gate Guardian could arrive

Sunny lowered his gaze.

Armament], [Mantle of

'Two new ones.'

of the first Ability was a bit familiar. He concentrated on it and

darkness, and true darkness more so, her swiftness and might will increase. Her wounds will be healed,

a

explains how she is so powerful

one thing that Antarctica did not lack, it was darkness. Although the staging area was usually well lit, most tech nearby had been destroyed by the pulse of the opening Gate. Saint was wreathed

physical augmentation of the [Mantle of Darkness] seemed to be a formidable one, and combined with the embrace of his four shadows, it produced a truly

Saint would also be able to heal herself from now on, at least when surrounded by darkness. That alone was an

soul. Sunny suspected that it alluded to both the true darkness dwelling in Saint's heart, and her essence... or whatever it was that the Shadow used instead of essence. The point was that its replenishment rate

abilities... were very similar to what the Black Knight had possessed,

the shadows and to the elemental darkness. Those were supposed to be mutually exclusive, but were not, in her case. It seemed that Saint's nature as a Shadow led

mundane and true darkness. Recalling how harrowing his journey through the underground tunnel had been, Sunny could not help

'Interesting...'

he turned his gaze to the

[Blade of Darkness].

of a fearsome weapon, as long as the Shadow has mastered the use of that weapon. The Blade of Darkness can slay those of flesh and those of spirit; it never dulls, never falters, and never breaks. Alternatively, the darkness can be

Sunny smiled.

sword

she could wield any weapon with superb proficiency...

weapon would be as strong as Saint was herself, growing stronger if Saint evolved again in the future. It was capable of killing both corporeal and incorporeal creatures. It could even be used to augment an existing weapon or a weapon-type Memory, both making it more powerful and adding

it was simply

Sunny gathered enough