Shadow Slave

The Dark Shaper was a Transcendent Memory of the Fourth Tier that Nephis had gained in Antarctica. It was one of the few she had chosen to keep - the rest either went to the Fire Keepers or were sold to acquire various equipment and resources.

Being the leader of a group of elite Awakened was not cheap. Even with the support of Clan Valor, Neph had to work hard to provide her followers with the best... everything. Perhaps it was a part of the King of Swords testing her competency, or perhaps the great clan simply didn't care to spend too much on the survivors of the Forgotten Shore before they proved themselves.

In any case, Nephis had decided to keep the Dark Shaper for herself.

The reason she had decided to hold on to the stone mallet was both because of its power and because its description mentioned the Demon of Dread.

The Dark Shaper looked more like a tool than a weapon. It had a handle of dark polished wood inlaid with dull silver. The hammerhead was fashioned out of perfectly black stone - which looked and felt rather familiar.

Sunny was almost certain that it was the same stone that the Tomb of Ariel had been built of.

The stone mallet's enchantments had to do with sculpting and changing the shape of things. Disturbingly, these things were not limited to stone, metal, and wood... if one wished, they could also shape flesh and bone, sculpting all kinds of nightmarish creations. The sinister Corrupted Devil Nephis had killed to receive the Dark Shaper was similarly revolting.

It was indeed a Memory worthy of being graced with the name of the Demon of Dread in its description.

And speaking of the description...

At first, Sunny simply studied the shimmering runes, finding them rather interesting.

They read:

Memory: [Dark Shaper].

Memory Rank: Transcendent.

Memory Tier: IV.

Memory Type: Tool.

step, everyone cowered in fear. Only Ariel, the Demon of Dread, remained standing - he did not feel fear, for he was fear itself. Taking a step forward, he challenged the unholy titan, and the

indestructible stone body and was invulnerable to all harm. As they fought, the land was shattered and the sky split apart. The Demon of Dread received many harrowing wounds, but the terrible titan remained wholly unscathed. Its stone body became incandescent from the heat,

his enemy, and then

the cool water, the ocean turned into searing vapor and was scattered by the winds. The stone flesh of the titan instantly cooled, causing a tiny crack to appear on its heart - that tiny spot was the only part of the creature that had not been tempered, and

heartbeat, cracks appeared on its indestructible body. After two heartbeats, blood flowed from its wounds like a river. After three heartbeats, its

the seventh heartbeat, its heart shattered, turning

how the unholy stone

out of the titan's blood,

The description ended.

that Sunny's eyes

'Wait. No. No way...'

Ariel's battle with an Unholy Titan was indeed very interesting, not the least because it seemed as though the Demon of Dread had won due to a single whisper. More than that, it hinted at the answers to several questions that Sunny had been curious about. For example, who or what was the progenitor of the Minor Shard of the Stone Titan -

knowledge were not what caused such a reaction from Sunny. What drew his

Didn't it seem... incomplete?

there was another

he knew of another description that seemed like a

runes and found the name of the Stifled Scream. Concentrating on it,