Shadow Slave

The swarm of brood beasts descended upon Sunny and Master Jet. The two of them moved with speed that would have seemed utterly inhuman to mundane soldiers, if any of them had remained nearby... curiously enough, a Master would have been stunned just as much.

Both Ascended Irregulars were showing a level of physical prowess that only those with extremely powerful combat Aspect were supposed to possess.

Soul Reaper's glaive turned into a blur as she spun it, dissecting scores of the ghastly abominations. The gorgeous jade jian danced like a feather, harvesting life after life.

Of course, neither Sunny nor Jet remained static, moving across the wide expanse of the battlement similar to a hurricane of cutting steel. They danced between the attacking Nightmare Creatures, never remaining in one spot long enough to be buried under their onslaught.

Well... Sunny danced. His battle style was graceful and fluid, to the point where it seemed as though he had no rigid shape at all. Master Jet, on the other hand, fought with the dire and straightforward inevitability of an experienced butcher, slaughtering her enemies both methodically and ruthlessly.

...There was an awful beauty to her mesmerizing savagery, as well.

"Get ready!"

Sunny did not need the warning. The whirlwind of abominations surrounding them was already poor enough, but it was also just the beginning - most of the protuberance of the Devouring Cloud had yet to reach them, and the situation was about to become numerous times worse.

'Oh, oh... why did I come to this damned continent?'

Full of self-pity, he pivoted to the right, narrowly avoided a diving brood beast, and brandished the Sin of Solace to cut down another one. At the same time, he glanced over the edge of the wall, where a long stretch of the world was obscured by the swarm of abominations.

By now, the two of them were surrounded from all sides, but most of the enemies were still coming from a single direction. The excellent news was that the Dying Wish was working, preventing the brood beasts from passing the wall and escaping into the city.

The poor news was that he could not see the glow of Winter's flames at all now, which meant that the part of the swarm attacking them was a second at most from growing much harder to deal with. There had to be really, really numerous of them to obscure the wildfire entirely.

Sunny called upon the shadows, and a black wall suddenly rose between the battlement and the main body of the protuberance. Countless brood beasts slammed into it in the next moment, impaling themselves on the sharp spikes that shot from the black surface. Even more had to twist in the air to avoid the obstacle.

That did not slow the swarm much, but it did funnel it somewhat, giving Sunny and Jet some room to breathe.

At least for a moment.

Then, things got really tense.

"Argh, dammit!"

There were too numerous brood beasts lunging at him to kill and evade them all. Sunny did his best, but it was still not enough. Even with the help of shadow hands, he was forced to receive several attacks head-on.

Making his body as heavy as a slab of rock, Sunny gritted his teeth and stood his ground. A disgusting leathery body slammed into him - if he had not used the Feather of Truth to change his mass, the impact would have thrown Sunny to the ground, or even worse, off the wall.

As it was, he only took half a step back, while the brood beast bounced back with the nauseating crunch of breaking bones.

'Ah, that hurt...'

Before Sunny could do anything, another creature tore into his forearm. The leather vambrace of the Puppeteer's Shroud held some of the horrid fangs back, but not all of them...

However, the creature's fangs scraped fruitlessly against Sunny's skin, not leaving even a scratch on it.

He grinned.

'Chew on this, bastard.'

With that, Sunny spun the Sin of Solace into reverse grip and easily cut through the abomination's long neck. Usually, it would have been difficult to deal any damage from such an awkward position, but the jade blade of the cursed sword was so sharp that he did not have to put any effort into the cut at all.

The brood beast's body convulsed and fell down. Its severed maw, however, was still stubbornly trying to gnaw on Sunny's flesh.

'Whatever...'

Ignoring the vice-like and unpleasantly moist grasp of the creature's jaw, he threw himself back into the battle. A few moments later, it flew off his forearm, pulled away by powerful inertia.

Sadly, that was not the last abomination that managed to hit him. As their number grew and grew, Sunny started to miss more attacks. Most of them failed to penetrate the adamantine barrier of the Marble Shell, but a few did not - there were now shallow scratches here and there on his body, and their number was swiftly increasing.

Master Jet was in a similar position, although she did not seem to be bothered by it at all. Even though her black leather armor was torn and shredded, revealing glimpses of alabaster skin and trickles of crimson blood, she fought with the same unrestrained, magnificent brutality. There was even a dark, wicked grin on her face.

'What is wrong with that woman?'

He wasted a moment to shift his sight and glance at her core, only to see that it was brimming with essence, full to the limit. That cost him another scratch, as well as a pang of envy.

'Damn it, Master Jet's Aspect is simply cheating...'

To be fair, his Aspect was somewhat of a cheat as well. More than that, both of them were fighting in nearly optimal conditions - Soul Reaper was well suited to fight against large numbers of weaker enemies, who could provide her with a nearly endless supply of essence, while Sunny was a true menace when surrounded by shadows.

Throughout the cruel length of the polar night, the whole world was enveloped by shadows, and he was their Master.

And yet...

Both of them were in dire danger.

Even if individual brood beasts did not pose much of a threat to the two Ascended, thousands and thousands of them did. An army of ants was more than capable of killing an elephant.

Whatever an elephant was.

Grinding his teeth, Sunny danced between the countless abominations and felt his own essence disappear with frightening speed.

'Winter better be very busy obliterating the main body of the swarm... fast!'