Shadow Slave novel Chapter 2277

Chapter 2277 This Ain't No Hymn

Eventually, Effie gave Sunny a glare and grumbled:

"I liked you more when you were Master Sunless…" _{freewebnøvel.com}

He chuckled. "I am still the same man, though."

She sighed and leaned back, picking up a pastry from the tray. "Well, yeah! But you are also a powerful Supreme who goes around beheading Sovereigns…"

Sunny raised an eyebrow, then shrugged nonchalantly. "You are the world's sweetest mom, but also a Transcendent powerhouse who goes around ripping Great Nightmare Creatures apart with bare hands. A person can be more than one thing."

Effie swallowed the pastry and gave him a satisfied look.

Then, her eyes gleamed dangerously. "More than one thing, you say? That reminds me… Princess, does he ever…"

Luckily, whatever she wanted to say was interrupted by the sound of the door opening. Cassie entered the parlor, carrying a stack of documents with her. "Oh, you are all already here. Let us start — Nephis has to move on to the next item on her schedule in thirty-four minutes."

With that, their brief meeting began. As the Supreme ruler of humanity, Nephis was endlessly busy — if she was not on the battlefield, she was usually drowned in an endless parade of strategy meetings and discussions. Every day, she had to make countless decisions, many of them having the potential to affect the very future of mankind. Of course, the benefit of being the highest authority in the world was that there were vast resources at her disposal — human resources, most of all. Humanity's best and brightest were ready to answer her call, advise her on the best course of action, and take various tasks off her hands. In fact, with Cassie's help, Nephis had built a greatly efficient pyramid of delegation.

But not all the challengers survived. In fact, for every one who succeeded, there were several who did not. The grim harvest of lives the Nightmare Spell collected was more plentiful than it had ever been, with the exception maybe of the first days of its descent.

At the same time, there were more Nightmare Gates opening in the waking world, and more youths being infected by the Nightmare Spell naturally every day. Sadly, there was little Nephis could do about the latter even if she wanted to. The Sword Domain and the Song Domain had stood on a foundation built by the Nightmare Spell — the Citadels. Her Domain, however, had no boundary, existing in the hearts of those who were inspired by her.

It spanned both worlds… but Nephis and Sunny swiftly found out that the suppressing effect Domains seemed to have on the tiny seeds of Corruption hiding in the hearts of Aspirants was not, in fact, an expression of a Sovereign's power. Instead, it was a function built into the Citadels by the Spell, just like Nightmares themselves were a function of the Spell that gave humans a chance to destroy the Seeds before they blossomed. So, only those followers of Nephis who lived in the area of influence of her Citadels could escape the First Nightmare.

That was why the population of the Night Garden could cross over to Earth and be spared the lethal trial, but the infected youths of the waking world could not rely on their goddess to save them from having to face it. All they could do was pass through the Dream Gate to postpone their Nightmares, if they wished to do so... and had enough time to flee. In the end…

Humanity was reinvigorated and inspired to strive for greater heights. However, there was still a mountain of broken dreams hiding in the shadow of its rise from the ruins of a crumbling world.