Shadow Slave

1518 Ruin

Standing on the crumbling wall of the floating fortress, Sunny saw the light grow dim above Twilight. For a moment, everything was still.

And then, the entire world was suddenly drowned in white radiance, blinding him.

Stunned, he raised a hand to cover his eyes and saw a pristine star ignite in the heart of the distant city. It swelled, growing into a massive sphere of furious flame.

Everything happened in an instant.

The buildings nearest to the white star simply dissolved in its pure light, evaporating. Those further away exploded into dust and were erased from existence by an obliterating shockwave. Those behind them were flattened and melted, turning to ash from the immolating heat.

A wave of incinerating fire, taller than the towering walls of the city, spread outward at lightning speed, consuming everything in its path — buildings, trees, cobblestones, even air itself… and all the tiny human figures flooding the crumbling streets.

Behind it, the furious star rose and deformed, slowly turning into a mushroom cloud of incandescent white flame. The pillar of fire supporting it dwarfed everything, reaching toward the sky.

'W—what…'

Even driven into madness by fury, he was momentarily paralyzed by the harrowing splendor of that inconceivable sight. Twilight... Twilight was being destroyed in front of his eyes.

…That was when the invisible shockwave reached the fortress, shattering its walls and throwing him down.

The deafening roar of the explosion came next, shaking the world.

Sunny plummeted from the broken wall and hit the cold stones with a sickening sound. Bouncing off the hard surface, he rolled and then instinctively covered his head with his hands. In the next moment, a rain of stone debris fell down, pummeling him like crushing hail.

'Who… who dares…'

not care. Hunched, he rose from the ground and peered into the dust that had enveloped everything around, searching for

flame? So what if it

to kill the hateful

it

had reached the heavens and collapsed on itself, torn apart by the wind. The furious light of the

cloud of ash rose into the air and obscured the seven suns, turning the twilight of dawn into

***

like snow. In the heart of the ruined city, nothing but darkness remained. Even the air itself had been burned away by the inconceivable heat of the obliterating explosion, and so there were no flames burning

radiant figure that stood amidst the destruction, surrounded by ash and ruins. It was slowly coalescing back into the shape of a beautiful young

blemish on it, and her shining hair

in the boiling water, creating a small island of light in the sea of searing darkness. Twilight was still and silent, with

human bodies of Soul Stealer were all gone, devoured by the merciless

who had battled

Nephis remained, illuminating the darkness

reflection of the sinister mirror fiend had nowhere to go

***

standing on the surface of a calm ocean. The world around her was suffused with sunlight, and the perfectly still water below her bare feet

she was standing on a sea of golden clouds, awash in

brightly

looked at them

— the Terror Core — destroying itself before. But so many Defiled abominations had been consumed by the unleashed flames of her soul that it

the seventh core was

The last core.

its creation had already passed, and

spot of dirt and darkness in her perfectly radiant world. Out there, some distance away, a repulsive creature stood, staring at