Shadow Slave

Sunny stared at Cassie, struggling to believe how deep the roots of her mysterious scheme went. He noted recently that the blind girl's personality changed drastically after the cruel words he had thrown at her at the underground level of the Academy's medical complex, right after the Forgotten Shore.

That was when she had begun to weave her spiderweb, most likely.

Looking at the young woman sitting across from him, meeting his gaze with dark and defiant pride, he felt a chill running down his spine.

'...Which one of us is worthy of being called the heir of Weaver, even?'

Cassie had just as high of an affinity to fate as him, after all, if not higher.

He took a deep breath, feeling stifled.

"Yes... it was back then. Looking back, it didn't make a lot of sense, did it? You had just been burned by blindly believing a vision of yours, to catastrophic results. And yet, you seemed to not question the validity of us dying come winter, even though that vision of yours could only be called vague, at best."

Cassie had seen the two of them falling into a bottomless abyss, surrounded by snow. She told Sunny that they would die in the winter... but, in the end, the events of that vision happened in November, when the Night Temple was destroyed in a terrible battle between Sky Tide and Saint Cormac.

"You already knew that it did not mean our deaths. And yet, you made me think otherwise. But... why?"

remained silent, but Sunny's eyes widened, a

it was because I was planning to challenge the Second Nightmare in the winter. But you needed me to move the plan forward, and aim to reach the Seed in the Ivory Tower by the end of autumn. What changed because I listened to your

the depths of

was away from the Night Temple until the end of autumn. Which meant that he wouldn't

saying anything. But she did not need to... once Sunny pulled on the thread, the tangled web of her hidden actions started to unravel

Night Temple, side by side,

anchored at the Night Temple — even though neither you nor your cohort were allowed to enter the inner parts of the Citadel. Later, you left for the Sanctuary and then went on an expedition to reclaim a sapling of the sacred tree... knowing that I would come to you, and carry the mirror shard

Cassie had come very close to dying in the cage of the Valor's secretive Citadel. Knowing that she had expected the mad prince of

been an Awakened Monster, and armed with the

Aspect that could augment her endurance and resilience, so Cassie had suffered

his head in stunned silence,

to escape... why did

Second Nightmare sooner rather than later, and do it in the company of the Prince of Nothing, as well. ?ìg??օ???w????~?օ?. The very fact of his escape had put a crack in the potential relationship Sunny could have had with the great clan

turn, pushed her into accepting their terms and becoming