Shadow Slave

The harrowing battle was still raging all around them, and Sunny struggled to suppress the feeling of primordial terror that threatened to overwhelm his reason. Thinking back to their mad dash across the dark battlefield, he felt his hands tremble.

How the hell did they survive?

He winced, and pushed the fear to the side. There was no time to be afraid.

Glancing at Jet and Seishan, Sunny nodded silently, and took a step toward the ruin.

No matter what awaited them inside, they couldn't remain in the open.

The ancient structure was in a sorry state. It had withstood thousands of years of heat and wind, but was nearly destroyed by whatever it was that had transpired here minutes ago.

The spherical dome was raptured, and stone shards lay on the white sand, some covered in dancing flames. It was as though a powerful explosion had wrecked it from within, spreading fire and debris all around. A few chunks of broken stone were large and heavy enough to crush an armored vehicle.

Sunny extended his shadow sense as far as he could, but the black walls of the ruined structure were somehow blocking it.

Followed by Jet and Seishan, he carefully approached the hole in the dome's wrecked wall, lingered for a moment, and jumped inside.

The first thing that met them was the stench of burned flesh.

The ruin was much smaller than the one they had sheltered in before, and from the looks of it, there was no path to the underground portion of the structure. There was only this one spherical chamber, with its floor partially buried under the sand.

A blackened corpse lay in the middle of the round hall. It seemed human, but it was impossible to tell who that human had been — the corpse was burned too badly, and all its features were destroyed by the flame.

There was someone else in the chamber, too.

Sunny cursed and dashed forward, appearing near the motionless figure a split second later. Nephis was laying on the black stones, her armor almost destroyed, with her eyes closed. Wisps of white fire were escaping from the terrible wounds covering her body, and in the bleak light, her face looked pale and vulnerable.

'No, no, no…'

A moment later, a relieved sigh escaped from his lips.

She was alive, just unconscious. The wounds were already healing, too — just in these few short seconds, their edges had already grown closer.

Jet and Seishan slowly approached. Soul Reaper kneeled, studying the charred corpse.

After a while, Sunny forced himself to turn away from Neph and asked:

it? Can you

hesitated, then shook

damaged. However, it gives

a

another survivor? Or had there been another creature like Ascended

were a little

Sunny shook

a chance that

There were no objections.

them gathered around the unconscious Nephis and sat in tense silence, waiting for dawn with

***

battle grew quiet. Sunny, who had not closed his eyes or allowed himself to relax for a single moment,

was utterly exhausted. Usually, an Ascended could go a long time without needing to rest, and Sunny had the benefit of wearing the Shroud of Dusk, as well… but in the past twenty-four hours, he had participated in a viciously intense battle, fought a Saint, traversed countless kilometers of the Nightmare Desert, and even survived the ruinous clash of the dead

creature that wore the corpse

Sunny was tired.

as the eye could see, and there was no sign of

had

during the night, but now that the sun had appeared above the horizon, the unbearable heat was coming

let out a

"They're gone."

into the battlefield and got destroyed, or had it waited

coming for them

Sunny did not know.

Seishan were sitting back to back, while he was a couple

beautiful glass bottle to her lips and poured out

it flowed into her mouth, Nephis stirred

eyes opened, and she stared at

slight smile appeared

Take it

then sat up and grabbed the Endless Spring. She drank from

in her eyes, as if

are you

He shrugged.

would see you on the other