Shadow Slave

'Gods... oh gods...'

The pain... was exquisite. It was inconceivable.

It was the kind of pain that could kill a person, or at least make the pass out in an instant. Sadly, the latter did not happen, because the pain was not physical.

Instead, its source was Sunny's soul, which was being altered and transformed.

Not in a way it had been changed every time a new core was formed, but rather in a way his blood and bones had been altered in the past.

"Aaargh!"

Sunny hit the lid of the sarcophagus with enough force to split his skin and fell to the ground, the carpet of leaves softening his fall.

'Wh—what... what the hell?! How... is... this possible?!'

He knew what was happening to him. However, he had no idea why it was happening, and how eating the golden fruit from the tree growing above the grave of Oblivion had caused it.

In any case, Sunny had no choice but to endure.

He wasn't shy about screaming and howling in pain, though, especially because there was no one here to witness his sorry state.

"D—damn it! Damn it! D...damn it all!"

After an eternity — this time, quite a literal one, considering that time did not exist in the Estuary — Sunny found himself laying on the ground, staring blindly at the beautiful crown of the mystical tree. His body felt weak, and his face was wet with tears.

'...Curses.'

That one was definitely going into the collection of the most horrendous agonies he had experienced. What place? Probably not the first, which was still held by activating the [Where is my eye?] enchantment of Weaver's Mask. But it was a confident second.

Sunny groaned, and then shakily rose to his feet. Then, he took inventory of his soul.

It felt... different, somehow. And much, much more potent. Already knowing what he would see, Sunny summoned the runes.

'It can't be... can it?'

But it could.

There, in the shimmering field of runes, a new string appeared in the list of his Attributes.

Pale as a ghost, Sunny read:

Attributes: [Fated], [Flame of Divinity], [Master of Shadows], [Blood Weave], [Bone Weave], [Marble Shell]...

And at the very end, a new one:

[...Soul Weave.]

in air,

'How the hell...'

the new string, he

a part of Weaver's forbidden lineage. Your soul has been altered and imbued

demon shed tears standing above a forgotten grave. A tree grew from the ground where the demon's tears fell, and from it

a while, then dismissed them and concentrated

It felt... reinforced, somehow.

The soul itself seemed more robust and durable, capable

They did not look very different, at the surface, apart from the fact that the dark flames burning within them seemed even

peered into the depths of his cores... was he seeing things, or had he glimpsed a weave of ethereal golden strings

the Soul Sea, both elated and

I inherited another part of Weaver's lineage. Soul Weave. That's

was, indeed, a

the hell was it doing

left there? If anything, it should have been

part of his... her?... soul

two of them

strange incongruity in the number of daemons that had participated in

Sunny did not know.

all of it... was

even the most

great that my soul has

was Soul Weave supposed

exactly was

distracted him from these

an ominous detail. Looking down, he stared at the Guiding Light, which had rolled away from him when he fell down,

at the top of the sacred staff was still shining. However,

into the

slowly looked up... at that moment, it felt as though a ripple spread through the

His eyes widened.

Nightmare... it's

delivered a fatal blow to

on that thought for too long. Because just

hunched, towering shape that filled him with

I

sight, his nose, and even his shadow sense, despite being the size of a hill. It had a hunched back, a disheveled mantle of

more Corruption than he had ever seen, spreading outward

'A... a Cursed Terror...'

Sunny took an involuntary step

round, utterly insane eyes