Shadow Slave

Guided by a golden rope that glowed faintly into the red murkiness, Sunny swam forward. The waters of the river of time, mixed with the crimson blood of a Great Monster, were cold and tumultuous. The battle of two harrowing abominations had turned them into a whirlpool of raging currents.

'Just how far is this wound...'

Suddenly, Sunny saw something enormous appear from the murky red darkness and shuddered. He was swimming past the giant eye of the titanic turtle, now hollow and devoid of light. His figure was like a speck of dust in front of it.

The Azure Serpent had long feasted on the Black Turtle's left eye, but the right still remained. Even though Sunny knew that the ancient behemoth was dead, he couldn't help but feel as if it was staring at him.

Looking away, he pushed himself through the water.

'We're not far from the creature's neck, then.'

Every second could be their last, so Sunny was tense. The battle of the dreadful abominations could shift in their direction at any moment. More than that... the Nimble Catch allowed him to swim with great speed, and Neph's silver anklets were the same. However, she did not seem to possess a Memory similar to the Essence Pearl, and had to hold her breath.

They simply couldn't linger.

Fortunately, the dark thoroughfare of the turtle's enormous neck emerged from the cloudy redness soon. It was encased in massive bands of tarnished silver, which overlapped to form a flexible, but impenetrable armor.

Sunny caught up with Nephis as they followed the road of silver to the point where the monster's neck ended. There, its armor was torn apart and bent, sharp jagged edges surrounded by bloody foam. The stench of blood was much stronger here, and the water was much darker.

Nephis changed her direction, knowing where to go.

A dozen seconds later, they reached the gaping wound in the body of the Great Monster. Sunny froze for a moment.

'That...'

a hungry worm, tore through the insides of the monster, and then crawled out from a

in front of them was like a dark tunnel, not too different from the one through which he had guided the convoy

Was humbling.

I can kill that damned snake,

to

impacted by the shockwave of the terrifying clash between the Azure Serpent and the invading butterfly. It swayed slowly, and the dark tunnel of the harrowing wound started to move

time they reached it, half of the gaping, bloody hole was above the surface of the water, while the other half was still submerged in it. A red current was flowing out, trying to push

current was reversed, and a great amount of water flowed into the body of the dead monster,

'Crap!'

slamming against its flesh and holding tightly to the golden

Nephis appeared from the water as well. She raised her hand, igniting

breath, suddenly realizing how close the two of them

looked like a horror show... however, Sunny couldn't help but notice how tightly Neph's wet tunic stuck to her

slightly, then forcibly tore his gaze away and studied the

a place to look. Not that people had reasons to try and

which was mostly consumed by darkness, were uneven, spongy, and red. The lower half of it was covered by tumultuous water, while the upper half was filled with an almost unbearable stench of blood. Rivers of red were flowing from the walls and the ceiling, mixing with the

the bottom of