Shadow Slave

There was a black dot in the sky, far in the distance, slowly moving in the direction of the dark island. At first, Sunny felt a glimmer of hope ignite in his heart as he remembered a similar situation from the past.

That time, it had turned out to be Kai.

But, this time...

This time, his intuition was ringing alarm bells, and a cold feeling of dread crept from somewhere to grip him with icy claws.

Sitting on the Shadow Chair with his legs crossed, Sunny leaned back and sighed.

"...Crap."

With that, he exploded with a flurry of activity.

First, Sunny dismissed his precious chair and dashed toward the middle of the island. At the same time, he sent a mental command to Saint.

Nephis and she were currently engaged in a furious sword fight. Light and darkness were intertwined in a shimmering whirlpool of sharp steel, and the graceful knight's onyx figure was starkly contrasted against the rippling white tunic and alabaster skin of her slender opponent.

Following Sunny's order, Saint froze. The tip of Neph's sword stopped a split second later, hovering millimeters away from the slit of her visor.

Nephis frowned, then retracted her sword and looked around.

There was a shadow on a rock outcropping that protruded from the ground a few meters away. It seemed to belong to a young man, and was currently waving its arms in the air while pointing at the sky.

She swiftly turned around and looked up, then dashed away a moment later.

'That's done...'

and landed near a half-eaten fragment of tarnished silver. The scrawny figure of Imp could be seen nearby, laying on the ground with a blissful smile on his fiendish face. His hands were rubbing his ballooning belly

"Stand up, buddy!"

then awkwardly tried to rise to his feet. However, outweighed by his full

have

grabbed the weakly struggling fiend,

'What... the hell...'

the little bastard swallowed

of an Ascended Tyrant, Sunny was struggling to carry Imp. His veins swelled, and a befuddled

he threw one more look at the sky and, noticing that

were side by side, pressing themselves into the weathered slope of the fissure as they desperately tried to calm down their breathing. Saint and Fiend were nearby, the former standing calmly, the

was there as well, hiding within the deep darkness enveloping the

with mesmerizing patterns. It was another one of the Memories Summer Knight had given to Nephis, and its purpose

the amphora was going to

to volunteer to leave its area of effect and serve as

"volunteer" was the wrong

shadow had performed a few dangerous tasks recently, and the happy fool was not someone Sunny would ever entrust an important matter to, the next in seniority had to go. So, the creepy guy was currently hiding a few meters away from the edge

keeping it company with a bored expression

covered them with a dome of silence. Then, he let out

"I... I see it."

intently, then asked in a low

"What is it?"

lingered for a

expression turned

"It's a... butterfly."

From afar, it seemed like an ethereal and beautiful creature. But as

and underbelly were the color of white bone. It had six long, seemingly fragile legs that ended in sharp points, and two enormous, faceted eyes that were like orbs of pure darkness. Between them was a disturbingly long, oily-black beak, which was currently bent into a spiral like an elephant's trunk. Two antennae rose from its

from that, the butterfly was at least a hundred meters