Shadow Slave

Cassie swayed faintly, overwhelmed by the dreadful scale of the battle.

It looked as if the world was ending.

The world was really ending, no matter which side won — so that a new, ghastly world could be born from its corpse.

‘What is my endgame here?’

Suddenly, Cassie felt lost.

She had resolved herself to stand by Mordret till the bitter end, but she did not want him to win. His victory today would mean that humanity had been wiped out — all its Awakened warriors, at least, which meant the same in the world of the Nightmare Spell.

So, Cassie did not know what she was doing here.

‘No…’

No, she did. She had made a choice to fight with Mordret for a reason… so, these frightened thoughts did not belong to her. They were the Dreamspawn’s poison seeping into her mind now that she had opened it once more. Gritting her teeth, Cassie focused on the battle.

Far away, the vessels of Mordret and the forces of humanity collided on the surface of the seven great chains. The two Sovereigns had chosen different tactics in this harrowing clash — Mordret sent his most fearsome champions, his Reflections, to lead the armies of detestable vessels.

Asterion, meanwhile, kept his strongest champions back, first sending weaker thralls forward to exhaust the Reflections.

It was a chilling massacre.

The massacre was especially chilling because one of the Reflections was wearing Cassie’s own face, slaughtering humans with utter lack of mercy or hesitation. So, it was like watching herself murdering them.

For a brief moment, Cassie wondered if Mordret was doing that to torment her.

But no… he was simply commanding one of the Reflections to mirror Cassie because her powers were simply too lethal in combination with his own. Not only did they allow the Reflection to sense its adversary’s movements in advance, but they also made it so that Reflection could warn the other six, as well.

As a result, all seven were far more unassailable and lethal than they would have been otherwise.

If the Dreamspawn had any qualms about burying them under a tide of human bodies, he did not show it. Instead, he allowed Ascended and Awakened warriors to die by their hands, claws, and maws in scores… he really did not want to sacrifice the lives of the Saints, it seemed.

Because the Saints were meant to become his main course when he eventually devoured humanity.

Asterion was forced to change his strategy soon, though.

It was because the human waves he sent to bury the Reflections not only failed to weaken them, but were actually making them stronger. It was as if they were offered an impossibly generous feast of human souls, and as torrents of soul fragments poured into their depths, the Reflections absorbed them like a dry riverbed.

As Cassie watched, one of them actually evolved in Class, gaining newfound strength.

That was why Asterion reacted, having judged that the necessity of sending forward his strongest champions far outweighed the risk now.

The cadence of the fierce battle on the heavenly chains changed.

The human soldiers retreated in eerie unity, and instead, their commanders moved forward to lead the charge.

On one of the Chains, Seishan appeared like a walking nightmare, her grotesque figure obscured by a bloody haze. On another chain, a swarm of crows descended to form a figure of a tall, gaunt man. Somewhere else, a river of liquid metal flowed across the links of the great chain, rushing forward like an unstoppable silver flood…

When the advancing Saints crashed into the Reflections, the Ebony Island quaked. Mordret clicked his tongue.

“Does he really think that these pathetic…”

However, before he could finish the sentence, his expression changed.

Six of the seven Reflections managed to repel the fierce assault of the human Saints, entangling them in a ferocious melee. However, on the chain where Morgan had appeared, the Reflections was almost instantly overwhelmed and pushed back, the surface of its mirrored body covered by cracks and on the verge of shattering. Mordret gritted his teeth.

“Ah, it seems… that I am spread too thin…”

His tone sounded relaxed and amused, but his expression was dark.

A moment later, the wounded Reflection retreated into the darkness of the Sky Below, escaping the lethal river of steel. The flood of metal, meanwhile, coalesced into the figure of a woman with black hair and cold, cutting vermillion eyes.

Facing a sea of Mordret’s vessels that stretched into the distance, covering the length of the heavenly chain, she smiled chillingly and lunged forward.

Blood spilled on cold alloy.

Morgan’s breakthrough forced Mordret to change his tactic, as well. The Reflections retreated one by one, allowing the Saints to advance toward the vessels of the King of Nothing himself — seven bloody battles unfolded on the groaning chains that swayed above an endless void, two vast swarms of abominations ripping each other apart above them.

Mordret was also fighting a battle on the Ivory Island, on the Nightgarden, and on the islands that surrounded the Tear, preventing the assault forces from being endlessly reinforced.

The whole world seemed to have dissolved into chaos and slaughter.

He managed to hold most of the chains… but on a few, his forces were being pushed back. Morgan especially seemed almost unstoppable, reaching closer and closer to the Ebony Island.

Cassie did not know what kind of purpose she seemed to have found, or what kind of reason had been instilled in her by the Dreamspawn, but the former Princess of War was proving to be a force to be reckoned with — a force far more frightening and lethal than any other Saint on the battlefield.

And all Asterion needed was for one chain to be conquered, not all seven of them. Watching his sister slaughter his vessels, Mordret sighed.

“Dear sister… I really should have killed her all those years ago, when I first returned to Bastion.”

Shaking his head regretfully, he glanced to where the silhouette of the Ivory Island loomed high in the sky, obscured by the battling abominations.

Somewhere on its shores, Asterion was probably looking down and smiling at them. Mordret raised a hand and rubbed his temple, grimacing briefly.

“Get out of my head, damn it…”

Uttering a quiet curse, he inhaled deeply and smiled.

“Let’s take it up a notch, shall we?”

Somewhere far away, at the base of the heavenly chains connected to the flying islands, the seven Reflections appeared from the darkness of the Sky Below, landing among the soldiers of the Hunger Domain and cutting off the assault forces from the main mass of the army.

At the same time, innumerable vessels poured from the reflections on every island where the human soldiers were assembled, widening the frightening scope of the battle even further.

Mordret was throwing all of himself into the fight now, not leaving himself a way out. Not holding anything back.

Holding nothing back.

Somewhere above, Asterion prepared to descend onto the battlefield personally. Cassie glanced down and closed her one remaining eye, overwhelmed by the bloodshed.

…One of the chains snapped.

***

“The Children of Weaver greet Ananke of Weave.”

Sunny stared at the gorgeous young woman whom Nephis was hugging tightly. Ananke wore a surprised expression… his own must have been just as stunned.

It was really her.

Ananke, the last priestess of the Nightmare Spell, was still alive.

She was alive and not beholden to the currents of the Great River anymore, it seemed, like all River People were meant to be.

Well… it made sense.

The currents of the Great River were no more, after all.