Shadow Slave

‘Curse it all!’

As the wind howled and the endless bolts of lightning scorched the sky, a ferocious mass of dark clouds churning like a celestial ocean, the Night Garden plummeted toward the ground. At first, Nightwalker simply meant to descend below the clouds to shield his warriors from the rising moon — but now, the living ship was wounded too severely to be controlled, and its fall had become unstoppable.

Of course, the titanic creature holding it in a crushing grip was not helping the situation either.

The hull of the great vessel was slowly devouring its flesh, but the damn abomination was too vast and too powerful — there were fractures slowly appearing on the miraculous wood already, and the damage being dealt to the Night Garden was far beyond what the living ship could return.

Usually, slamming into the ground would not have been a major concern. However, with the ship already damaged, a collision could very well become catastrophic — not to mention that the impact would devastate countless districts of NQSC.

The Night Garden was a dozen kilometers from stern to bow, after all, and its mass was incalculable. The speed of its fall looked deceptively tame because of its size, but in truth, it was dire.

Nightwalker couldn’t right the ship with the damn Titan weighing it down, though. Sinking his colossal, ethereal fangs into the flesh of the monster, he tore off an enormous chunk of flesh and bellowed, his eerie voice drowning out the deafening roars of the storm.

His Transcendent form, the Starbeast, was uncanny and immensely powerful. However, one thing it did not possess was vocal cords capable of human speech... it was alright, though. Because Aether could understand him.

So, what Nightwalker was relaying to his warriors was quite simple:

“Aether! Concentrate on its right shoulder joint! Take its remaining wing off!”

Almost immediately, the soldiers below rushed to turn the cannons. Some were crawling across the deck, dazed by the terrifying presence of the Titan... some were dead, having been turned into bloody stains. But no one had abandoned their duty. Nightwalker’s Saints were all going all out to free their ship from the abomination’s grasp, as well.

But it was not going to be enough.

Perched on the creature’s endless back and rending it to shreds with his ethereal fangs, Nightwalker could see the ground clearly. The devastated landscape of the abandoned battlefield beyond the walls of NQSC was drawing closer and closer.

They were not going to kill the Titan in time. They were not even going to sever its one remaining wing in time.

Even with Nightwalker expanding space to extend the calamitous fall, it was not enough — the world he was trying to reshape with his Will was permeated by the Will of the colossal Nightmare Creature, after all, slowing him down.

”Goddammit!”

Looking up, Nightwalker hesitated for a moment, then turned into a torrent of starlight and flashed toward the scarred and battered Mainmast Pagoda. Once inside, he slid across the floor of the runic hall and jumped to his feet, bending space to enter the runic circle in one step.

There, Naeve was standing on one knee, blood streaming down his face. The runic hall had sustained severe damage, but luckily enough, the circle itself was intact — steering the living ship without it was not impossible, but quite difficult.

”Grab the rails!”

Nightwalker’s voice boomed across the entire main deck of the titanic vessel, sending the soldiers scurrying to grab something as if their lives depended on it. The Night Garden was supposed to keep them firmly standing on the deck no matter what maneuvers its helmsman had in mind, but with how damaged it was, there was no telling what would happen.

There was nothing to grab onto in the runic hall, though, so Naeve simply grabbed onto the belt of Nightwalker’s armor.

The Night Garden careened, its bow moments away from crashing into the ground...

But just before it could, an enormous fissure opened in the fabric of reality, revealing an endless black void that was illuminated by countless stars and dreamlike nebulas.

The bow of the living ship plunged into the Dream Gate, which had opened parallel to the ground. The colossal fissure swallowed the entire great length of the Night Garden — from the runic hall, it looked as if they were falling into the starlit sky.

Then, the Mainmast Pagoda crossed the Dream Gate, as well.

A moment later, Nightwalker was blinded by brilliant light.

He was assaulted by unbearable heat.

The howling cacophony of the endless storm disappeared, replaced by a deafening litany of countless monstrous wails.

When Nightwalker’s eyes adjusted to the light, what he saw...

Was a world on fire.

The Night Garden had exited the Dream Gate upside-down, momentum taking it higher into the azure sky. It was already spinning to right itself, but for now, all Nightwalker could see was the ground — the vast expanse of a sandy desert, all of it drowning in an ocean of silver flame. Myriads of Nightmare Creatures were moving in that flame, the black fractures of Nightmare Gates towering above them like dark pillars.

The air was full of winged abominations as well, all of them fusing into a harrowing swarm. Far in the distance, a battered city was unleashing a hail of explosive rounds into the swarm, streams of tracer rounds twisting like radiant snakes.

The terrifying sight was like a scene from hell... but it wasn’t some distant inferno. The Night Garden gave Nightwalker the ability to open his Dream Gate between two points in the same realm, and that was what he had done, bringing his ship to the Western Quadrant.

They were currently in the Sahara Desert, where the forces of humanity were fighting a desperate battle against the advancing tide of abominations.

The hull of the Night Garden cracked precariously as the Titan tightened its coils, and since the titanic ship appeared right in the middle of a great swarm of winged abominations, those monsters were shifting their attention to its vast expanse as well. Nightwalker gritted his teeth.

“All battle crew below Transcendent Rank! Kill the vermin! Don’t let a single bastard land!”

As the Night Garden spun, aligning its main mast with the boundless sky above, the soldiers let go of the rails and unleashed a squall of attacks at the churning swarm. The Saints, meanwhile, kept attacking the Titan. Nightwalker swayed as the colossal creature’s claws tore into the Mainmast Pagoda, then cursed and gazed at the swarming sky outside...

And there, he saw what he was looking for, moving like an annihilating shadow in the endless mass of abominations.

A great dragon with scales the color of the midnight sky was reigning terror in the sky above the ocean of flames, carving a path of destruction through the swarm. As Nightwalker watched, its enormous maw opened, and a haunting song resounded above the endless battlefield.

In the next moment, a blinding pillar of silver flame incinerated countless Nightmare Creatures, plunging toward the ground and cleaving a deadly path through the horde of abominations attacking the city.

Thousands of them were slaughtered in an instant, and more still perished as the dragon moved its head, sending the beam of silver death rolling across the desert. The sand boiled, turning into molten lava and flowing like a fiery sea.

Even if the dragon was too far for Nightwalker to see its eyes, he suddenly felt a heavy gaze crushing into him.

Smiling crookedly, he waved and then pointed to the enormous Titan strangling the ship.

The dragon studied him for a few moments and then changed course, moving swiftly in the direction of the Night Garden. Nightwalker let out a tired sigh, then laughed.

”Damn it. Is his shift not over yet? I hoped to meet one of the young ladies instead...”

Then, he helped Naeve to his feet, patted him on the shoulder, and turned into a stream of starlight again.

By the time Kai arrived, he was already rending the Titan’s flesh. The Starbeast attacked the colossal abomination from the left, while the dragon descended upon it from the right like a dark mass of celestial fury.

Soon enough, rivers of blood flowed onto the deck of the Night Garden.

...An hour later, the Titan was dead. The swarm of winged abominations had been repelled, and the horde of Nightmare Creatures on the ground had turned to ash. The enemy was not defeated, but it was pushed back, for now — for a few days, or perhaps hours.

Or perhaps even minutes.

In the endless chaos of the end of days, nobody could say for sure.

Nightwalker was inspecting the damage when Kai landed on the bloody deck beside him, having already assumed his human form. The young man looked quite stunning, but also tired and grim — there were bruises under his eyes, and his skin was smeared with soot and dried blood.

Looking around, he grimaced.

“How bad is it?”

Nightwalker cursed.

“Quite bad. The Night Garden is grievously wounded... I think I’ll need to spend at least a few weeks at the wharf Lady Ananke built.”

Needless to say, with the Night Garden disappearing for several weeks, the situation in the waking world was bound to turn from bad to worse.

Kai sighed.

”Effie can cover for some of it... I’ll talk to her.”

Then, he closed his eyes for a moment, suppressing a groan.

When he opened them again, Nightwalker could already see that their conversation would be cut short.

Kai took a step back and nodded.

“I cannot stay any longer. Do not linger either — stay safe.”

Saying that, Kai threw one last look at the devastated deck of the Night Garden and pulled himself across the realm boundary.

A few heartbeats later, the unbearable strike of the vast desert, a great swath of it turned to glass, was replaced by unbearable cold. The winds howled, throwing sharp ice crystals into his face. The air smelled of blood and ash, and he was plunged into the clamor of battle once more.

Kai sighed and looked ahead.

In front of him were the spires of the Jade Palace, and beyond them, on the plain below the mountains, a great blizzard was devouring the world. He could see the shapes of countless snow wraiths moving under the cover of the blizzard, and the banners of Seishan’s legion fluttering in the wind like a river of blood.

With his miraculous sight, he saw it all — Seishan and her sisters, their Transcendent champions, Ascended officers, Awakened soldiers, Beastmaster’s thralls shielding the humans with their bodies, countless Echoes throwing themselves into the mass of enemies, the Ravenous Fiend moving through the blizzard like an obliterating mountain of fire and steel...

Mundane soldiers were manning the fortifications that protected the city, and more Awakened were bracing themselves as the towering, churning white wall of the blizzard drew closer to the vast expanse of scarlet fields.

He also saw three colossal shapes moving far in the distance, guiding the blizzard like profane shepherds. Each of them was tall enough to dwarf mountains and eerie enough to make even his blood run cold. Kai inhaled deeply and summoned his bow.

“It just never ends, does it?”

He nocked an arrow and launched himself into the swirling snow.

Then again, perhaps it was good that the battle never ended.

Life was war, after all.

The day all fighting ceased would be the day all humans were gone.

For now, though, they were still here.

They were still fighting.