Shadow Slave

Eventually, they ran out of food. Ananke's wooden box was now completely empty - except for the plates and cups that Sunny had washed and carefully placed back. There was not even wine left, despite the fact that neither he nor Nephis were fond of alcohol, diluted or not.

The old woman seemed stricken by guilt at the lack of things to feed them... Although she was not that old anymore.

Ananke looked to be in her sixties now. Her figure remained small and gaunt, but her back was as straight as an arrow. The cataracts disappeared from her eyes, revealing their original piercing blue color. The thin white hair of the elderly priestess turned grey and full, and although her tan skin was still mapped with wrinkles, it was not brittle and transparent anymore.

Her frailness and fragility were gone, replaced by wiry tenacity. Overall, she resembled quite a healthy old woman now.

...That old woman was currently pacing the wooden deck, crushed.

"Oh, no. Oh, what a blunder. I should have prepared more..."

Sunny and Nephis looked at each other in confusion. After a few moments of silence, Neph cleared her throat and said:

"Grandm... Ananke. You don't have to worry about us. Sunny and I... we are both used to hunger and hardship. This is nothing."

The old priestess looked at them silently.

"But you are Children of Weaver. How can I..."

Nephis shook her head.

"How do you think Children of Weaver live?"

Ananke fell silent, then said hesitantly:

"I don't know."

Sunny sighed and leaned on the side of the ketch with a smile.

thousand kilometers of abomination-infested mountains in bitter winter. We are used to storming the strongholds of dreadful horrors, clashing with titans, and surviving all kinds of unspeakable things. Hell... that one time, Nephis destroyed an entire sun. So believe her when

a while, her eyes wide.

of the Serpent King,

Sunny raised an eyebrow.

"Serpent King?"

nodded with a distracted expression

We never met him or his people, but rumors

back of

met

The old woman froze.

Lord... you met

He nodded, slightly embarrassed.

"Yeah..."

Sunny looked

"...I killed him."

widened, prompting him

but he was already corrupted! It's not like I just killed him for

silent for a while,

arriving at Weave soon, but still. My Lord and Lady shouldn't suffer hunger

turned away from them with a determined expression... which

the warmth of the seven suns on his face. After a few moments, though, he

exactly one went about catching fish in the Great

turned out... Ananke had a very strange idea

a bundled rope with a jagged hook attached to it, a set of heavy stone weights, and a scattering of softly shining soul shards, which were

grabbed the bottle and climbed onto the helmsman bench, looking at the water from above. When Ananke opened the ceramic vessel, the

was, indeed,

At the same time, the ketch suddenly started to slow down, and a subtle, imperceptible change spread through the

'Our concealment is broken.'