Shadow Slave

The battle was over.

…It was over for the Irregulars, at least. The fresh soldiers pulled from the other sections of the wall were still fighting on the ramparts of the secondary defense line, but with the Heart of Darkness and Goliath destroyed, and the boundless horde of Nightmare Creatures decimated by the titanic explosion, the siege was reduced to the usual stream of chaotic, relatively small-scale skirmishes.

The spine of the assault had been broken. Falcon Scott had faced the most dreadful battle yet, and endured.

For the most part.

The southern area of the city was entirely destroyed, replaced by a gargantuan crater. The buildings were gone, and a long span of the great wall was gone, too. Even most of the killing field beyond was erased from existence, with only the towering stone corpse of the slain titan remaining intact. It just lay on the slope of the crater like a mountain-sized pile of rubble, filling the hearts of the soldiers who saw it with dark glee.

With the collapse of the wall, defending the city had become much harder. However, the crater formed a natural barrier of its own — even though the secondary ramparts were not nearly as tall or formidable, they still gave the First Army a chance to resist the attacks of Nightmare Creatures.

More than that, four out of the five direst threats to the siege capital were now eradicated. The Devouring Cloud, the Terror of LO49, the Heart of Darkness, and Goliath… despite the terrible price the First Army had to pay, they were dead. Now, only the most powerful of the horrors remained. The Corrupted Titan, Winter Beast.

But it was being contained by Sky Tide of the White Feather clan, so…

For the first time since the start of the siege, the people of Falcon Scott felt hopeful.

They were shaken and terrified, too, but with countless millions of refugees already evacuated, and so many powerful abominations slain, it was no longer impossible to imagine the end of this bloody affair.

Falcon Scott only had to hold for a handful more days…

The ghostly flames of the aurora burned above the ravaged city, and the moon had hidden itself in the cold darkness of the night sky.

***

room of the government complex. Rather, he was sprawled on the chair, staring at the ceiling with a detached expression. His skin had healed, turning into a surreal painting of black bruises, but the internal damage

the Scavenger had done a number on him, especially near the end of their murderous clash. Nevertheless, the hateful fiend was dead, and Sunny

to count the black beetles, who were not living beings, as a weapon of his. Therefore, after the appalling creatures had devoured the Scavenger, it rewarded Sunny for

looking at the runes

do… what

shimmering symbols were at the center of

Shadow Fragments: [3857/4000].

And:

Echoes: [Ravenous Fiend].

some qualities of a shadow creature, but

was that the Scavenger's soul was corrupted, and thus unsuited to directly become a Shadow… in any case,

Ravenous Fiend had been a top tier Nightmare Creature, a peerless genius of vile abominations, so turning him into a Shadow was an easy decision. Having two Transcendent Shadows would

there were

in unbreakable bone armor… but what appeared instead was

grow stronger and acquire new traits by devouring various creatures or things. He also possessed a few very surprising and potent

carefully chose a rich diet for the little bastard, in time, the imp could potentially grow stupidly powerful — even more powerful than he had been after devouring random trash

hundred fragments was not a terribly large amount… except he was on the

runes, Sunny

Now is not

not a good time… in

something, Sunny somberly looked

only two people in the conference room

was because Winter

of Nightmare Creature, when the section of the wall under her