Shadow Slave novel Chapter 2914

The horror he felt was not something that could be overcome by courage, bravery, or even by having a depth of experience facing harrowing things. Not even by being one of those things yourself.

Because its source was not something that had a rational reason or could be overcome, to begin with. Instead, it was simply a natural reaction of a lesser being who found itself in the presence of the Forgotten God... of Nightmare God, the God of Corruption. The dreaming herald of the Void.

Even if what they were approaching was not the Forgotten God himself but merely the Seed of Nightmare where he was imprisoned, lulled to slumber by the Spell, their spirits simply could not resist being horrified.

It was a fear that came not from their minds, bodies, or even souls. Instead, it was a fear that was born from the very essence of their beings, like an instinctual response that could not be controlled consciously. And it was growing more and more devastating the closer to the Seventh Seed they came.

Sunny's hands trembled, making him miss a shot.

‘Curses!’

He froze, momentarily overwhelmed by bestial panic.

Then, with a groan, he forced himself to draw the bow again.

‘The Call, the Seventh Seed, the Nightmare Butterflies... come get me, damn it! I'll kill you all...'

In the depths of his half-broken, dazed state, Sunny fell back on something that had never failed him before.

Spite.

He was full of spiteful anger. The harder the world hit him, the angrier he was, the more he wanted to strike back. To make the world hurt just as much as it hurt him — no, more. A hundred times more!

So, that was what Sunny did.

His groan turned into a growl. Grinding his teeth, he channeled his animalistic fear into wrath and aggression. Driven into a frenzy by the Call, he made the Nightmare Butterflies a target of his frenzy instead of the Seeds.

‘Die, you bastards...’

Far away, one of his incarnations took Slayer into his dark embrace and joined her in the merciless, malevolent slaughter. Another avatar flew side by side with the abyssal black dragon, defending her from the Nightmare Butterflies that aimed to tear her apart.

On the deck of the Chain Breaker, an avatar was deftly steering the ship. His eyes were still covered by the blindfold, but he managed just fine by relying on shadow sense.

Four other incarnations were fighting to protect the ship. Two of them joined Saint as bowmen, while two more led the shades of the Nightmare Butterflies in the battle against their abominable kin.

The higher the flying ship climbed, the more of the Great Nightmare Creatures broke through the barrier of the three defenders — Nephis, Slayer, and the Puppeteer.

And the more those three defenders suffered, as well.

‘How much longer?'

Sunny could not see how far they had risen, and was too afraid to extend his shadow sense upward to find the four titanic scars left on the surface of the Tomb of Ariel by the claws of some unknown, unholy creature.

But he knew that if they didn't reach those marks soon, they were going to die. 𝗳𝚛𝗲𝕖𝕨𝕖𝗯𝚗𝚘𝕧𝕖𝗹.𝗰𝗼𝕞

The more Nightmare Butterflies he and those who served him killed, the more shades of those eerie creatures he could summon — and those shades, in turn, could kill more of their terrifying kind and conscript them in the Shadow Legion.

That was how it was supposed to work in theory, at least, creating a vicious cycle. And it had worked, indeed... for a short while.

But as the Chain Breaker dove into the depths of the terrifying swarm, things began to change.

At first, there were simply more Nightmare Butterflies reaching Sunny and his shades. Sunny and Saint shot them out of the sky, while his two winged incarnations sliced those who survived apart, cutting through the hurricane winds raised by countless enormous wings beating chaotically. His shades tore apart the few that had gotten past him.

None reached the Chain Breaker.

However, as the density of the ghastly swarm increased and the three vanguards of the flying ship sustained more damage, the situation turned. The arrows Sunny and Saint sent into the swarm were like a drop in the ocean. His winged incarnations were drowning in a torrent of the Great abominations, while his shades began to suffer casualties as well — because their kin fought back.

He lost a few shades at first, then more. And then, slowly, he began to lose the Shadow Butterflies faster than new shades were being added to the Shadow Legion.

By then, his winged incarnations were not eradicating the Nightmare Butterflies who had gotten through the three defenders — they were trying to survive in the flood of them instead.

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