Shadow Slave

Some time later, they were hidden in a small cave at the bottom of a deep canyon, sitting in front of a fire. A piece of monster meat was roasting on it, filling the cave with a delicious smell. Sunny was a bit sullen, because it had taken all his knowledge of wilderness survival to make the small fire... snowy reaches of Antarctica were not exactly the best place to search for fuel.

He had almost been forced to use the divine flames of the Cruel Sight to cook, which would inevitably result in an atrociously burned dinner for him.

Currently, Sunny was passing time by trying to play a simple melody on a flute made of emerald bone. Kai would have probably become ill if exposed to his musical talent, but Jet didn't seem to mind.

She stared at the fire, flames reflecting in her icy blue eyes. After a while, she suddenly said:

"...I can smell things too, you know. When I am sufficiently full of essence. My Aspect might only give me a semblance of life, but it's a faithful imitation."

Sunny lowered the emerald flute and looked at her gloomily.

"What I'm hearing... is that you want to rob me of some of this meat. Right?"

Jet lingered for a moment, then grinned.

"Right. That was exactly what I meant. I am hungry, too."

He sighed, then hung more meat above the fire.

"Should have just said so. Gods... what is up with me always ending up with gluttonous women? It just never ends..."

Sunny turned the meat over. After a while, following a whim, he asked:

bad... but if I survived the First

did not understand how it

stone roof of the cave.

it wasn't during the assessment. Actually, I did not survive the First Nightmare. I was young, and weak, and frightened. And

and

innate Attribute, created the possibility of something like that happening... it had to be an infinitely small possibility, though, because the Spell seemed rather impressed with the result. Otherwise,

the body of a temple slave, Shadow God would not have responded to his unintentional call. And if he did not have the [Fated] Attribute, he would have never

to create the possibility... he had been the one to grasp it, though. Anyone else

thinking about her Flaw. What would happen if he gave her Weaver's Mask? Would she come back to

Sunny developed an intuition about these things. Jet would indeed come back to

only

his own

imagine the life he would have had if not for the inability to lie. Would it have been easier? Would it have

trusting them, out of fear

lesson he was supposed to

Weren't you yourself the master of

a waste of time. He would still choose to get rid

breaking the

hardest part. The hardest part was surviving the time between the Nightmare and the solstice. As you can imagine, it's not easy for a Sleeper to find things to kill before entering the Dream Realm. I ended up having to ask for help... and

Sunny shifted slightly.

"Who did you ask?"

She chuckled.

of my Aspect... on a voluntary basis, of course. But what would an ignorant kid from the