Shadow Slave

1496 Bygone Battlefield

They traversed the old battlefield for several more days. By the end of the second week, there were so many dead Nightmare Creatures and ghostly ships floating in the still water, surrounded by debris and broken weapons, that it became almost impossible to navigate between them. A strange haze hung in the air, limiting how far they could see.

With no other choice, Cassie raised the Chain Breaker higher, and they flew above the scene of harrowing slaughter.

The Great River was littered with rotten husks of massive abominations, debris, and shattered ships. Shrouded in the somber twilight, they covered the water like a horrid carpet. That carpet stretched into the distance, eventually disappearing in the haze.

Sunny was appalled and shaken by this sight.

'How many people died here?'

He was no stranger to battlefields, but this one seemed especially somber and poignant.

Although there were much less broken ships than there were slain Nightmare Creatures, this section of the watery battlefield alone must have taken the lives of countless warriors of Twilight. Not all of them had been Ascended, after all… desperate to escape a dying world and create an army of Saints to reclaim it, Daeron had led most of his surviving subjects here, both Awakened and mundane. Before the fall, they had been truly numerous.

"What is this place?"

Effie's voice was low.

Nephis glanced at her, then looked back at the dreadful scene.

"...It's the outskirt of a battlefield. This is where our predecessors, warriors of the Twilight Sea, faced the Defiled legion of Verge."

The Serpent King had once led his people to besiege the cursed city of Verge, but was forced to retreat after failing to destroy the First Seeker. The forces of the Defilement must have launched an war campaign in retaliation, and this was the morbid result.

Sunny studied the floating corpses.

'No wonder the Defiled have been slow in obliterating Fallen Grace.'

The Six Plagues and their tainted army might have been the victors of the siege of Twilight, but the casualties they had sustained were immeasurably severe. Verge did not possess an infinite number of soldiers, after all. With how many of the Defiled abominations seemed to have perished here, in the haze of dawn, there would not be enough of them left to continue an aggressive conquest.

it different during the

the Six Plagues, Twilight would still be standing. Same for Weave, and some of the cities ruled by the sybils. The cohort would have been

support of the Followers of Weaver, Cassie would have become the saint of the River People, Jet and Effie

arrived, and the

past was gone now, and there was no way to uncover

weight of King Daeron's crown, and of Wind Flower's trust, to finish what the people of the

He gritted his teeth.

your

"Let's proceed."

Chain Breaker flew above the carpet

could not see far because of the haze, but the wind brought with it distant

lowered the speed of the flying ship to a crawl, afraid that something would unexpectedly attack them from below. This way, at least, they would notice an approaching

from the sky, and a black crow landed on Jet's shoulder. Her Echo had

at Crow

"What did you find?"

opened its

"Shai-nee! Shai-nee!"

Jet frowned.

You found

her for a couple of moments, then clicked its beak

"We should probably follow."

girl hesitated for a bit, then moved the oar, leading the

to be downstream, at the same time moving closer to the Edge. After some time,

battlements. The base of the wall was littered with massive spikes, as if to prevent the Nightmare Creatures from reaching it.

stretched into the distance from both sides of the structure, disappearing

a

by how imposing it looked in the dim twilight of

However…

chains that had been connected to the sides of the fortress once were torn and covered by rust. The mighty walls were breached and had

with tattered flags hanging lifelessly in the