Shadow Slave

The Sepulcher Song was an active enchantment that consumed as much essence as the number and power of the corpses stirred into a murderous rage by its power was. An Ascended could wreak a lot of havoc with its help...

But not nearly as much havoc as Sunny, an Ascended Tyrant whose soul was augmented by Neph's flame, could.

Influenced by the angry melody he was playing, most of the bone orchard was already in motion. Some of the giant skeletal remains were too severely damaged to assemble into the semblance of a whole creature... but there were plenty of dead abominations who could.

Some of them had clearly been aquatic abominations in the past. Nevertheless, they slithered and crawled forward in the throes of bloodlust. Some of them seemed to have been able to walk on land. Those were moving much faster to kill something, as quickly and as cruelly as possible.

Slowly, towering figures rose from the ground in a cacophony of groaning bones. The terrifying bloodlust and murderous rage emanated by them were almost palpable.

'Crap, crap, crap...'

Both of Sunny's hands were busy with the flute, and he obviously could not speak. Aloud, that was.

"[Go now.]"

Sending the mental message with the help of the Shroud of Dusk, Sunny glanced at the dark entrance to the caverns that had been revealed when the dead creature obscuring it moved closer to him.

Sparing him one last glance, his companions rushed away and dove into the welcoming darkness. Nephis lingered on the edge for a few moments, then gritted her teeth and jumped down. Saint and Fiend followed right behind her, leaving Sunny and Nightmare alone with the army of risen abominations.

The towering corpses, meanwhile... were staggering toward them with a clear intent to rip the flute player and his steed apart.

for the

the piece of bone he had been sitting on suddenly flew up. Somehow managing to keep the

every skeleton he could have brought back to life had already risen, Sunny stopped for a moment and took a deep

away, he started to

fast and angry, then this one was calm and soothing. It was meant to bring the murderous corpses under his control. Sunny had succeeded in his experiments to play the second movement of the Sepulcher Song a couple of times - on

'Any moment now...'

the shambling bone giants were still approaching him with a clear intent to rip him to shreds and bathe in his

they going to be bathing in?!

Even worse...

had been motionless before suddenly moved, as

the sinister Memory paid no attention to the state of the corpse.

Butterfly was coming to a perverse semblance of life,

it did, the drain on Sunny's

'Curses!'

going to put this army of dead monstrosities

that was fine, too. Sunny had accounted for

to him - he just needed them to create

so until Sunny's essence ran out, or until they were completely destroyed. There was plenty

would be able to reach Effie and travel to the blood lake much faster. Cassie and her team would be able to reach the overgrown shrine without