Shadow Slave

As they drove to the hospital, both Sunny and Effie were alternating between feeling wary and confused.

The roads were congested because of the rain — the failing storm drains were spouting foaming torrents of water here and there, causing some outermost lanes to be entirely flooded. Taller PTVs barreled their way through the puddles, but smaller vehicles had to huddle to the middle of the road, crawling slowly. Sunny’s rust bucket was, sadly, one of the latter.

’My Rhino… would never…’

Sunny sighed.

At that moment, Effie finally spoke:

”Why would he want us to handle his case?”

Her voice was full of suspicion.

Sunny hesitated for a while, then shrugged.

”That depends. Does he really not remember anything, or were we fooled? Either way, we’ll find out when we get there.”

Effie grimaced.

”Listen, partner, you probably don’t know that guy well. But I had the misfortune of conquering two Nightmares with him… so believe me when I tell you, he is a demon. And not in a cool, sexy way — more so in the creepy, there is something deeply wrong with this bastard way.”

She paused for a moment, then added somberly:

”First of all, as you might know already, he is immortal. The Great Clan Valor and his own father went out of their way to find a way to kill him, but they failed. All they could do was turn a Citadel on the Chained Isles into an inescapable prison to contain him, complete with a Transendent warden and a hundred Lost guards. But he still escaped, massacring everyone in that Citadel in the process — Cassie was the only one who survived.”

Sunny smiled sadly, but did not say anything.

Effie looked at him with a dark expression.

”In the Second Nightmare, he slaughtered an entire kingdom. Then, he played Song and Valor against each other and provoked the Battle of the Black Skull — if not for his machinations, Whispering Blade and gods know how many more people would have still been alive. We saw a Defiled version of his Transcendent self consume literally millions of people in the Tomb of Ariel… that thing was not an abomination. It was an entire nation, in and of itself.”

A bitter smile appeared on her lips.

”And while he did not swallow millions of people in the real world, he did devour and take out an entire Great Clan all by himself. Not only that, but by doing so, he completely changed the course of the war between the Sovereigns, giving Ki Song a chance to win. He would have conquered the entire Sword Domain, too — without an army, all by himself — if not for the trick Morgan and Jet pulled off in Bastion.”

She sighed and shook her head.

”Even then, technically, he accomplished what he wanted to accomplish there by stealing a Great Citadel from Anvil without even setting foot in it. And without that Cursed Demon you somehow lulled to sleep and delivered to me, who knows what would have happened? In any case, the very fact that a Cursed Demon was needed to handle a mere Saint says everything one needs to know about Mordret of Nowhere, already. What I mean to say is… he might not have taken the last step to Supremacy like the two of you did, but he did just about everything but.”

Effie scowled.

”That guy is not right in the head, not right at all. You looked into that guy’s eyes, so you should know — something is amiss there. I don’t know what he is missing, but whatever it is, it’s the thing that makes us humans... human.”

Sunny looked at her with a subtle frown, contemplating.

’Something is missing...’

Effie’s words had reminded him of his own old impression of the Prince of Nothing, and something about it all suddenly seemed to hide an elusive meaning.

A completely bizarre idea was slowly forming in his mind. It seemed a little too strange to be true… but also a little too fitting to simply discard it.

’That is... impossible, right?’

He lingered for a few moments, then asked:

”Did you get the same impression when you looked our CEO friend in the eye?”

Effie raised an eyebrow, thought about it, and then slowly shook her head.

”Sort of? Not really. At least not in the same way.”

Sunny exhaled slowly.

He would have never suspected something like that before meeting Mordret here in Mirage City, but now, an entirely new possibility suddenly emerged out of nowhere, making him question everything. ṚἁꞐՕ𝔟Èᶊ

”Do you remember what Mordret said in the Third Nightmare?”

Effie blinked a couple of times.

”What, you even know about that? Wow. I have not imagined that Neph’s pillow talk includes talking about Mordret…”

Sunny gave her a glare.

”Yes, I do know. And why the hell are you imagining our pillow talk at all?”

Effie laughed.

”Anyway, Mordret said a lot of things in the Third Nightmare. What do you mean in particular?”

Sunny turned the wheel to change lanes and avoid a puddle that seemed deep enough to flood the weird explosion engine of his car.

”His — and Soul Stealer’s — Flaw. He said that he did not bring his Flaw along into the Nightmare, because carrying something that perilous around would have been foolish.”

Effie raised an eyebrow, then nodded.

”Oh, that? Sure, I remember. You don’t hear something like that every day, after all.”

Sunny frowned.

”I always assumed that he was either lying or talking about a thing. You know, like in the fairy tales where an evil being separates their death from themselves to become immortal, then hides it in the guise of some mundane item. Like a needle or some such — so, they could only be killed by that needle. But what if Mordret was not talking about a thing? What if…”

He fell silent for a few moments, then asked in a hesitant tone:

”What if he meant a person?”

Effie opened her eyes wide and stared at him with a confused expression.

”Wait, are you saying that Mordret’s Flaw… is a person?”

She blinked a few times.

”No, wait. You’re not just saying that it’s a person. You’re saying that it’s the CEO of the Valor Group. There are… two of that bastard?!”

One Prince of Nothing was already one too many. Two of them walking around at the same time... sounded certifiably dreadful.

’But it fits, doesn’t it? Damnation!’

Sunny did not respond immediately, choosing to keep quiet. Eventually, though, he had to answer.

”Well, I don’t know. But Mordret always had a odd relationship with mirrors and reflections. What if his Flaw is actually his reflection?”

He paused for a moment, feeling a chill run down his spine.

Something else suddenly occurred to him.

’Damn.’

”Actually, we don’t know which one of them is real. What if the Mordret we know is the reflection, instead?”

Mordret had conquered his First Nightmare at twelve. So, he had gained his Flaw at twelve, as well.

If he had really been broken in two and there were two halves of him walking around the world…

Then one of them had been scorned by the Great Clan Valor, imprisoned for seven long years, then escaped his cage and became the Prince of Nothing they knew.

While the other…

The other would have spent close to two decades in the stunning fantasy created for him by the Great Mirror of the Demon of Imagination. In a place that revolved entirely around him, where all his wishes would have come true...

In Mirage City.