Shadow Slave: Shadow of Blood Chapter 65 65: Signs of Evolution

Sunny sighed as he stood in the VIP room surrounded by his sisters.

He was now suffering even more…

"So, this one you said to Kai.

I am the Shadows Kai, don't provoque ."

Moon's mocking voice made all his sisters laugh at his expense. He just stood motionless, taking everything in with a dead-pan expression.

anwhile, Nephis observed poor Sunny being tortured by his sisters, not knowing if she was thankful or distraught for not having sisters.

The rest were also looking at Sunless' torture scene, Effie and Kai holding their laughts while the movie staff escaped the scene, leaving the director behind to deal with the spotlight.

Sunny was done, the teasing of his sisters reminded him of every horrible scene, every ti Caster was disrespected, every cringy line they made him say…

Sunny Shadow Stepped, appearing behind the director and grabbing his collar, pulling the man towards a separate room.

"L-Lord Sunless-?!"

"I want to talk about the adaptation."

Sunny basically dragged the… 'Poor' director while the sisters watched, chuckling at the immaturity of their brother. His friends anwhile, felt amusent and fulfillnt, except for Kai, who felt bad for the man, and that was obvious in his face.

"You really don't feel a little satisfied?"

The young archer jumped in surprise, turning to see the grey beauty, Seishan, standing behind him with her mysterious smile that sent shivers down his spine the first ti he saw it.

He chuckled humorlessly, giving a self-depricading smile.

"Not really, although it's not really fair, since I wasn't a focus and the fact the screenwriters actually knew , I wasn't really different from reality."

The Princess chuckled lightly.

"True, I expected so scenes with , but I barely appeared in the movie. Thank the God's."

The archer looked at the sisters and smiled, rembering his friend suffering.

"I can see why you are glad, it must be hard having so many siblings!"

That smile… That damn smile. Seishan just had to blush, she looked away in embarrassnt, trying to hide it.

"I-It's hard, but rewarding."

Kai raised his brow curiously not understanding Seishan's reaction.

Eunbin was seeing the two and rolled her eyes.

'Great, Sunny is almost dating Changing Star, Shan has a crush on the charming archer, Moon is dating a hot Master, who sohow is keeping a healthy relationship, and to top it all off, Revel, I repeat, REVEL, is starting to see soone!

I was supposed to be the hot daughter with a great dating life, where's MY Knight in shining armor?'

Bin never really had a good dating life, most, if not all n who she started dating ended up just being 'nice' to her, just looking after her looks and power. The rest who were good people, who were genuine weren't able to keep up with her life as a Saint, anwhile, the other Saints were too preoccupied and feared her too much.

When she went undercover to find soone? The second they found out she was the Beastmaster they ran away, thinking they were being enthralled. In the end, she may have been destined to be alone.

As Beastmaster tornted herself inside her own thoughts, Revel stood up.

"Where are you going?"

Revel smirked.

"I'm going to give Immortal Fla so advice."

Howl perked up at her words and stole the rest of Silent's popcorn.

"I want to see this!"

Silent anwhile, jumped at her sister, struggling to get what was rightfully hers.

—

Lightslayer walked with confident steps towards Nephis, who was lost in her thoughts until an aura of True Darkness involved her.

"Changing Star? Can I talk to you?"

Nephis snapped back into reality and stared at Revel, lowering her body, guarding herself and opening her hand to summon her sword.

The power exuding from the Saint was different, but similar to the power of the Forsaken Knight, her muscle mory kicked in and she furrowed her brows.

Revel stared down at the girl, a small smirk creeping in.

"No need to be on guard, Immortal Fla. I just want to talk, privately."

Darkness involved the two, creating a sphere where only Revel and Nephis were present.

Nephis's vision was taken away from her, and imdiately to summon her flas, white light illuminated little, only letting her see her own hand… And the hand of the other woman when she grabbed the wrist of Changing Star.

"Rember, you can only do that because I let you."

Nephis felt a chill co down her spine as Revel's face slowly ca out, and imdiately, she could tell that the Saint could crush the white flas with but a thought.

Yet, Nephis didn't feel like Revel would do anything to her.

The Saint let her wrist go and looked at Changing Star with an amused smile.

"Do you intend to kill my mother?"

Nephis furrowed her brows.

"That remains to be seen."

Revel's smile slowly transford into a thin line.

"Hmm. You want to talk to her, no?"

"Yes, is there any chance?"

Revel looked to the side, at the barrier separating them from the outside.

"No, not yet at least. Sunny must have already told you, she doesn't want forgiveness, if anything, she wants you to hate her."

Nephis gripped her fist tightly.

"But she wasn't the one who sent assassins after . Or who stole my Clan, I just want to talk, and figure out what happened, understand."

Revel looked back at Nephis emotionally.

"And if my mother is completely in the wrong? If you co to the conclusion that she really is a power hungry murderer and that guilt doesn't erase anything?

Sunny will still be by her side, Changing Star, you will have to kill him before getting to mother."

Nephis took a step back, her eyes widening, she hadn't thought about that. If she goes to kill Ki Song, she would have to fight Hollow Death… To fight Sunny…

"I… Won't do that…"

Revel's smile returned upon seeing the conflict in Nephis's face, reaching her hand to her back, she summoned a storage mory and took a big book out, with a black hardcover and white roots of a plant as details. Giving it to Nephis.

Nephis took it confused, really confused, but she got even more confused as she read the na of the novel.

"Torns of Darkness?"

Nephis looked back at Revel, who had a proud expression on her face.

"One of my favorites, classic enemies to lovers. Even Sunny couldn't help but confess he liked it… Although that was after he passed the First Nightmare…

Well, either way, I'm letting you borrow it for a month, give it back to after that, got it?"

Nephis stared at Lightslayer for so monts.

"Why are you giving this?!"

Revel raised her eyebrows confused.

"Why? To give you material of course!"

Her smile disappeared for a second and glared at Nephis.

"If you lose this, or tell anyone about anything that we talked about, you are dead, got it?"

Nephis felt a chill run down his spine, she nodded, putting the book in her own storage mory that one of her Firekeepers gave to her.

"Good, oh, and don't worry, so other day we'll introduce all of your boyfriend's sisters."

Nephis snapped her head towards Revel, whose smile returned and with a snap of her fingers, the sphere of darkness disappeared, and the Song Princess returned to her sisters.

Howl and Silent stopped their immature struggle for a second and turned to look at Revel. Howl was extrely disappointed.

"Wha-? It's already over?!?!"

Eunbin nodded and stood up.

"It appears so, now get up, we have to go."

And so, the sisters of Song had to leave, apart from Seishan, they were Saints, they had many responsibilities on the Dream Realm.

Moon turned to Seishan.

"Bye Shan, and make sure Sunny doesn't burn the place down!"

With Seishan's unconscious nod, the Saint sisters of Song pulled their tethers and disappeared from the room.

At the sa ti, Sunny entered the room, dragging the unconscious director.

He looked around, noticing that his sisters disappeared with the exception of Seishan, who was looking away with her ears red, Kai curiously checking her. Nephis staring at nothing while blushing, and Cassie laughing to the side. Effie just looked around, wearing a knowing smile.

"Did… Did I miss sothing?"

— — —

An hour later, the group was in the upper floor of a restaurant, close to the windows that showed the streets of NQSC.

The cohort were using costic mories to hide their identities, changing their hair and eye colors, even their skin in Seishan's case, but even with that, many eyes went in their direction.

Truth was, they were just too beautiful.

Sunless and Seishan had received the Lineage of Beast God, the Goddess of beauty, so naturally, they were much more beautiful than the natural Awakened.

Nephis, Kai and Cassie were also extrely beautiful, with exquisite skin and beautiful faces.

Effie, however, was drawing attention for other reasons. An enormous pile of neverending plates dirty with the rest of food stood right in front of her, all the while she was eating more and more.

Sunny, who was using [Different Style] to make his hair red and eyes green, rolled eyes at Effie's sloppy consumption and turned to Nephis, who now had black hair and eyes.

"Can you tell why you wanted to talk?"

Nephis nodded, then turned to Cassie to say sothing, but the blind seer beat her to it, summoning multiple sound isolating mories, making sure their conversation was private.

Seishan noted the sound barrier with her now blue eyes, her current silk white skin, she grabbed her tea with one hand and elegantly drank the liquid. After taking one gulp, she traced her eyes to Nephis.

"It must be important…"

Changing Star nodded.

"I'll get straight to the point, we found a Second Nightmare Seed in the Chained Isles."

Sunny furrowed his brows and looked at his sister, who elegantly rested her chin in her hand in interest. He turned his gaze back to Nephis.

"You want to conquer it, not even a year after Awakening."

Nephis nodded.

"Yes, we found the seed in the Chained Isles after an adventure so complicated I won't bother you in the details. In little less than a month we'll have free access to the Seed, to challenge the Nightmare."

She leaned forward, looking directly at Sunny's eyes.

"And I want you two as part of our cohort to conquer it."

Sunny breathed in and thought about the proposal.

Becoming a Master was a no-brainer, he wanted to climb the Path of Ascension as fast as possible to catch up to his sisters and prepare for the inevitable war against Valor.

Moreover, the cohort was powerful, Nephis was a powerhouse that could be a destroyer of nightmare creatures and a healer. Effie was a vanguard to take any damage head on, Kai was a master archer able to hit any target. Cassie, being a seer and the Heir of Fate, could perceive what many couldn't, so she was an invaluable peace to have. Not to ntion Sunny and his sister, between his Shadows and her tricks, anyone wanted them in their cohort.

However, he wasn't ready for the Second Nightmare, he needed to beco a Tyrant first, then reach the next step of Shadow Dance, that way, he won't find himself in a situation like last ti when he beca a Devil, and his Serpent will reach the Ascended rank, letting him do much more.

"Fine, but I'm going to need so more ti. I still need to prepare."

Seishan nodded.

" too, how about… A month? After a month we'll challenge the Second Nightmare."

Nephis turned to Cassie, who nodded non-chalantly. Turning back to the Song siblings, she breathed steadily.

"Very well then, in one month, we'll et in the Chained Isles, I imagine getting there won't be an issue?"

"No, it won't."

As Sunny answered, Kai smiled and let out a sigh of relief.

"That 's great! I thought you would already have another cohort ready to challenge the Nightmare, you know, Shadow Watchers and all."

Sunless let out a little chuckle.

"Actually, we were already planning on the Nightmare, just needed to find the Seed and research the site, but I'll leave it to them. Plus, I did want to do the Nightmare with you guys."

Effie finally looked up from her devouring session and asked a loud question.

"So, are Doofus and the scary lady joining?!"

Kai froze when he heard those words, rembering the state the poor movie director was in when Sunny finished with him.

Turning to the two, both sohow held the sa expression, a mysterious, scary smile, like they thought the sa thing. Yet their smiles were also different, Sunny's showed so irritation and annoyance, Seishan's showed amusent, like she was planning sothing underneath that smile.

It was actually sothing Kai had thought about before, all of Ki Song's children were adopted, none held any blood relation with each other, yet they were extrely similar. So of these similarities could be explained by their childhood.

Being siblings, they had the sa upbringing, sa mother, teachings and training. Many of Ki Song's mannerisms must have also brushed onto them. But they also held physical similarities, the face structure and shape of the eyes, their hair. It ca off as almost uncanny, especially when Kai saw Sunny's older sister, Saint Lightslayer, it was like she was the female version of his friend.

It made Kai wonder how Sunny would be if he wasn't raised by Song…

Suddenly, a loud beeping ca off their communicators, they knew what that was very well, and the panic of the other custors just confird the aning of the ergency warning being transmitted.

A Nightmare Gate was about to break.

— —

Getting to the Gate, the streets were already free from civilians, having escaped from the Gate, the cohort encountered five other Awakened already there, trembling and nervous, with sub-par equipnt and mories, they clearly weren't experienced, except for one, a loud, outspoken girl with dirty white hair that was staring at the Gate, inching for it to open.

Sunny sighed, knowing full well his disguise will serve for nothing.

rlin seed to sniff the air for a second, then imdiately turned, looking at her boss with her green cat-like eyes.

"Boss!!!"

She basically jumped at Sunny, running full steam ahead, raising dust as she stopped just centiters before stopping right in front of him.

"Hey Boss! I didn't know you were here!"

Her cat eyes widened like puppy eyes… A Nightmare Gate was seconds from breaking and she was like this?!

Sunless sighed and patted her head, the girl loved it, not noticing the death glare she was receiving from Changing Star…

Effie and Cassie weren't present here, they wouldn't be of much help, Effie considering her condition in the waking world and Cassie because… Well, she didn't want attention.

The group dismissed their costic mories since they would be useless. They would need to use their aspects, which would rat them out the second they used them.

As soon as they did, the four trembling Awakened stared in awe at them. They were famous after all.

"Changing Star? Why is she here?"

"The Song siblings too? We can do this…"

"Thank the God's!"

Nephis ignored the comnts and marched forward, dawning the [Undying Chain] and the [Dawn Shard], summoning the [Cruel Sight] in her hand, she raised her sword to the Gate.

"No abomination passes, understood?"

The Awakened suddenly grew confidence from her words and presence alone, raising their weapons and standing in formation.

Sunny crossed his arms and sighed, summoning the [Mantle of Shadows] and [BloodRaven], using the tattoo form Serpent to keep his essence efficient. Turning to his teammates, he started giving orders.

"Kai, stay in the air and give us cover, rlin, cover Nephis, Shan, you and are going in."

As they nodded in understanding, Sunny summoned his two Shadow Saints to help in the battle, they both rose from his shadow and proceeded to stay in the flanks of the formation.

rlin got even more excited.

"Igris and Saint too?! This day just keeps getting better!"

Sunny rolled his eyes with amusent at his subordinate, and it turns out the na 'Igris' stuck to distinguish the two Shadows.

He gave orders to his own shadows, Gloomy wrapped around himself, Happy went to [BloodRaven],while Haughty and Creepy augnted the Shadow Saints.

Kai raised through the air and summoned his bow, getting an arrow and drawing it, aiming directly at the Gate.

rlin cracked her arms and summoned two short swords to use in battle.

Seishan also summoned her claws, [Blood Queen], and her dress made by Undying Blade, [Beauty's Thirst]. It was a long crimson dress that covered her whole figure, black flowers served as details to contrast the bright color, covering her tight sleeves and torso, going up until her neckline, the collar that joined the dress shared the details while keeping the red crimson. The long skirt of the dress went to her feet, with a long line drawn until her thigh, showing one of her legs that were covered by black stockings.

The cohort was ready, and in a couple of seconds, the Gate finally broke, opening to reveal several abominations coming out of it.

They were a combination of horrific beasts and humanoid monsters, tribal and animalistic, using clubs and make-shift swords and spears.

Sunless imdiately activated his Awakened Ability and Shadow stepped. He ran through the shadows and appeared on the right side of the growing army of nightmare creatures.

He dashed in, slashing through the horde, his odachi t little to no resistance. Using Shadow Step, he teleported around the battlefield, disappearing completely as soon as a warrior tried to hit him, only for the beast to be decapitated the next second from behind.

[You have slain a Fallen Beast…]

[You have slain a Fallen Beast…]

'Funny, before, Fallen Beasts took a long ti to beat, it threatened my life, and I always had to be careful… Now?'

He looked at the monster's shadows and saw the rudintary fighting style complete the frawork in a couple of seconds, predicting every move the humanoid beastn and their attack dogs could make. He now could easily see the style of creatures, he just needed to shadow their fighting style, which was a whole other can of worms.

He dodged nurous strikes made against him, transford into a shadow to get them behind their backs annihilating the abominations, his sword growing more and more deadly as more blood landed on it.

'This is child's play.'

When his blade had absorbed enough blood, he switched targets, from the creature's flesh to their shadows. Utilizing his attribute, [Executor of Death], to pierce the creature's shadow. Because of the low Rank of the horde, one slash to their shadow was enough to kill a warrior.

Countless died without even realizing it, their bodies without any wounds as the Heir of Shadows executed them.

While he slathered the tribal warriors, his sister had joined the battle. Invading the horde, dancing between the warriors, giving them horrific wounds, letting the blood spill on her claws and destroying even more creatures.

Her Awakened Ability makes them bleed even more, a single scratch killing a tribal warrior.

From the skies, Kai rained down precise arrows that killed the most dangerous abominations he could detect, making sure to cover Sunless and Seishan in case they were in danger.

But they couldn't kill the whole horde, many ignored the two humans annihilating their backline, rushing into the humans in front of them.

The Shadow Saints advanced to contain the abominations, trying to prevent them from dispersing from the battle and endangering mundane humans that couldn't defend themselves.

Any nightmare creature that clashed into the Saints was destroyed, their power and skill completely outmatching the tribal, underdeveloped horde of abominations. Cut in half, decapitated. None escaped the Knights.

The rest charged into the Awakened that stood their ground, they were burned into a crisp.

Nephis's flas ran through the ground where they stood as she slashed the air, unleashing the white fire of her Divine Aspect.

Warriors died in countless numbers as they continued to advance, ignoring their dead fellow creatures, ignoring the pain, the heat, just searching for humans to kill. Their screeches and screams making the Awakened shutter in fear.

But one of them jumped right into frey.

rlin smiled widely as she imbued her Awakened Ability into her swords, manifesting cutting winds that extended her swords and exploded inside her body.

One step from her and the ground shaked, wind was unleashed onto the nightmare creatures, launching them to the sides, cutting them and killing many.

She beca a tornado of death.

And Nephis went right behind her, flas in her sword.

The rest of the Awakened just stood still, being the last line of defence, and the ones in awe, not believing their eyes. The strongest among the Forgotten Shore survivors were showcasing their power, and they had the front seats.

At that point, Sunny was finally hit by the club of a Fallen Demon, a giant tribal warrior with a skull as a mask, sliding through the asphalt and summoning Wraith through his shadow.

He suffered little to no damage, between his shadow augnting him and his Transcendent uniform, not to ntion [Stone Shell], he shrugged off the attack while summoning the Shadow wolf.

Wraith imdiately jumped and attacked the Fallen Demon, utilizing its innate Ability to pass through the club and piercing the torso of the creature directly, killing it.

Sunny ignored the Spell and entered the shadows, targeting another Fallen Demon, slashing its shadow in two.

However, the creature resisted, a loud scream coming out of its mouth. Because of its Class, it resisted one strike, its shadow rebuilding… But it died from the other three slashes of the Heir of Shadows.

Sunny appeared and landed on the body of the Demon he just killed, looking around, the horde couldn't be called a horde anymore. It was basically completely destroyed, Nephis killed the last of them with her flas.

However, it wasn't over, the Gate wouldn't be closed until the Gate Guardian was defeated, said guardian was always one rank above the Gate's own rank, in this case, it would be a Corrupted Tyrant.

He deduced it would be a Tyrant because of the nightmare creatures, they were more like thralls than anything else.

'Speak of the Devil…'

The Gate shifted, rippled, and a giant tribal warrior appeared.

It had a giant black sword, using black furried bestial armor that protected parts of its body, revealing its muscled forearms, thights and neck. Giant red eyes showed maddening rage as it walked forward, creating craters on the ground.

Sunny couldn't help but ask himself…

'Can I beat that?'

Between his Aspect, attribute [Executor of Death], his Shadows and mories, could he beat a Corrupted Tyrant on his own?

Well, he wouldn't discover it today anyway.

The giant warrior was suddenly assaulted by darkness coming from a black figure, making it sway to the side.

The Tyrant quickly raised its weapon and attacked the mist of darkness, however, inside the mist, an armored hand suddenly appeared, deflecting the blade, even if it was at the cost of the armor.

Slowly, the mist made of darkness disappeared, revealing a construct made of True Darkness with an armor made from military steel. It looked like a creature of Darkness transford a ch into its armor. Having the weapons and skeleton corrupted by Dark energy.

The Tyrant sharpened its red eyes and scread at the ch, only to be interrupted by a blast of energy made of True Darkness, piercing its forearm and disarming it.

Another True Darkness construct revealed itself from the Darkness, flanking the Corrupted Tyrant, this ti, it possessed a long range ch that had a powerful arc cannon.

The giant sword fell to the side. A maddening scream invaded Sunny's ears, but he didn't flinch, he knew exactly what was happening, who was the culprit behind these constructs.

Sunny sighed, sitting on the corpse of the Fallen Demon.

'That guy… He sure knows how to make an entrance.'

A man appeared from behind the formation of Awakened, wearing a navy military uniform, using a long overcoat on his back and a cap that showed the stars that showed his rank, a Master, hiding his eyes. A white hair hid itself in his lean figure and pale skin.

All Awakened stared as he walked slowly and with extre calm, hands in pockets. He raised his head, revealing his serious red eyes, and took his right hand off his pocket, snapping his fingers.

Imdiately, the Darkness inside the constructs intensified and they attacked the Tyrant with ferocity, the closest to it stabbed its blades inside the Tyrant, pinning the giant warrior in place.

The long range construct concentrated the True Darkness, condensing it and empowering it.

The Tyrant scread as it struggled, destroying the armor of the construct that was pinning it, tearing the tal skeleton, purging the circuits. Finally, the Tyrant was able to crush the construct with its right arm.

However, a laser made from Darkness obliterated its head.

The headless body of the Tyrant fell to the ground, destroying the asphalt. The consequence was the implosion of the second construct of True Darkness.

Sunny turned his head towards the Master who was now approaching him.

"Hmp, thanks for the assist."

The Master nodded.

"You did a fine job yourself, Sunless, better than so Masters I know."

The man's voice was professional, his tone serious. Sunny looked at what was left of the chs the constructs used as bodies.

"Won't your superiors give you a talking to?"

The Master looked ahead and shrugged.

"I doubt it, and if they do, I'll take the heat."

Sunless sighed.

"How the hell are you Moon's boyfriend? She's not exactly a strict rule follower."

The Master chuckled.

"Maybe it's because we are busy people who don't talk much."

Sunless rolled his eyes.

"She doesn't like liars either, Shin."

Shin's apperance ---