Shadow Slave

Sunny remained motionless for a few moments, staring at the distant figure wearing a bright vermilion cloak.

The clouds veiling the sky were not clouds, but a myriad of flying swords. The man standing on the ruined wall of the siege capital was not a mere mortal, but a Sovereign.

One of the three Supreme humans in existence...

Anvil of Valor, the King of Swords.

The Sovereign was facing a Great Titan. Sunny recognized that harrowing creature from the Battle of the Black Skull, where it had decimated the armies of both Valor and Song. The Titan was vast and abominable, its power inconceivable...

But the King of Swords was no less terrifying.

He was more like a force of nature than a human being, a walking cataclysm that tolerated no defiance. Where Anvil stood, his will was the law. Wherever his sword pointed was his kingdom.

And within the borders of his kingdom, his authority was absolute.

Whoever dared to disobey would be obliterated by a flood of slaying swords.

Sunny took a stifled breath.

'Crazy... it's crazy.'

That was what Nephis wanted to fight against?

He slowly shook his head and forced himself to look away from the awesome visage of the rain of swords. If each of them was infused with the power of a Supreme being... then Anvil was much more powerful than Sunny had ever imagined.

Considering that he was effortlessly controlling enough swords to cover the entire sky, this whole siege capital could be destroyed by the tyrannical Sovereign in a matter of seconds. There was no one in the waking world strong enough to stop him.

the other two. Ki

in Antarctica, as

for the

gaze settled on the titanic

Gate... no, not

A Dream Gate.

clicked in his mind,

course. It makes

wary of the Sovereigns for many years, but he did not really know a lot about them — and about their power. What did it mean, exactly, to be Supreme? He had learned that the Sovereigns possessed a unique ability to create, rule,

not what Sunny

thinking about a more subtle characteristic

slept. Masters could enter it at will and physically, leaving a tether behind. Saints were like miniature Gateways, able to come and go between the two words as they pleased, and even

about the Sovereigns, then? How did this facet of their power evolve when they rose to the

theirs would be a continuation of the power that all Saints possessed? That they would not only contain a Gateway within themselves, but

opposite of a Nightmare Gate. Nightmare Gates allowed abominations to leave the Dream Realm and enter the waking world.

'...He is evacuating civilians.'

year ferrying refugees over the dreadful expanse of the ocean to other Quadrants. The process was slow — after all, the seafaring alloy behemoths could accommodate only so many

to mention all the dangers that the naval convoys faced at

had evacuated as many refugees as they could, and the operation would have probably ended in a semblance of success... if not for the three Category Four Gates that had opened during the Battle of the Black Skull. With the Great Nightmare Creatures roaming

Center had, with everyone who was not already evacuated perishing in the flood

Sovereigns must have descended, holding back the Great horrors and opening a new, much more efficient path to salvation. The

they could not allow their children — Morgan, Seishan, Beastmaster, and Silent Stalker

building in the Dream Realm had to be populated by someone,

case, here

Antarctica's salvation.

the towering Dream Gate. Relieved because his worst fears had not come true, and his mission... the Evacuation Army's mission... was not doomed to fail. All

salvation had come from those whom he despised the most — the Great Clans, whose conceited indifference