Shadow Slave: The Blessing of Fate

Turning in the direction of the thundering noise, many slaves rose their heads - only to see rocks and heavy shards of ice raining on them from above. They instantly panicked, lurching away in a cacophony of screams. Shadows happily danced on black stones as, entangled by the thick chain, those slaves fell to the ground and pulled others with them.

Sunny was one of the few that remained upright, because he was ready for this to happen. Calm and collected, he gazed at the night sky, his eyes, enhanced by [Child of Shadows], and took one measured step back. In the next second, a piece of ice the size of a man's torso hit the ground right in front of him and exploded, showering everything around with sharp shards.

Others weren't that quick. As ice and stones continued to rain, many were wounded, and a few lost their lives. Agonizing wails filled the air.

"On your feet, fools! Get to the wall!"

The veteran soldier - the one that had whipped Sunny the first time he experienced this Nightmare - was shouting angrily, trying to get the slaves to move towards the relative safety of the mountain slope. However, before anyone could heed his command, something massive came crashing down, sending a tremor through the stones beneath their feet.

The Mountain King.

'As ugly as I remember...'

Creature that had two stumpy legs, an emaciated, hunched torso and disproportionately long, multijointed hands - two of them, each ending with a set of horrifying bone claws, and another two, these ones shorter, ending with almost human-like fingers.

The ugliest part of it though - were the strange shapes moving endlessly, like worms, under its skin. Sunny could see it clearly thanks to the attribute and the fact that he had a front-row seat, being one of the closest to the Tyrant.

All hell broke loose. The Tyrant moved, slashing its claws in Sunny's direction, but Sunny was a few steps ahead. He already jumped sideways and made sure that the claws got into the way of the broad-shouldered slave and the chains binding Sunny. The chains around Sunny snapped and the corpse of the other slave fell on him, masking Sunny's presence just like before.

Sunny pushed the corpse off of him, a bit surprised at the fact that it was so difficult, he soon realized that his current body was incomparable to what his body was like when he was an Ascended.

On the opposite side of the corpse, Shifty was looking at it with a slackened jaw and a horrified expression on his face. Sunny waved to get his attention.

"Stop staring and move away idiot!" Sunny shouted out.

He grabbed the torn part of the chain and hastily tied it around the neck of the corpse that was about to turn into a horrible abomination. Choking it to death with all his might before it could rise again, thankfully the plan had worked out.

A familiar voice rang in the air.

[You have slain a dormant beast, Mountain King's Larva.]

'No time to rest!'

Another larva was soon coming for Sunny, so he moved himself to a good enough position and waited for his almighty savior. Soon, a nimble figure moved past him, a sharp sword flashed in the air and the larva was beheaded with one swift movement.

The Hero next to him looked calm and collected, a little grim maybe. There wasn't a single speck of dirt or a drop of blood on his leather armor. The Hero nodded at Sunny and moved forward to deal with the rest of the larvae. Before he went though, he gazed at Sunny and moved his hand to his belt. He threw a key at Sunny, swiftly catching it, Sunny immediately started to get rid of the rest of the snapped shackles that was stuck to his hands.

He then looked to his side and saw Shifty and Scholar, even though he wanted to just leave them behind, he decided against it, since he still needed help with shaking off the Mountain King. Sunny ran up to them and freed them swiftly. Shifty seemed overjoyed, pushing Sunny to the side and doing a little dance.

"Ah! Free at last! Gods must be smiling upon us!"

Scholar was more reserved. He squeezed Sunny's shoulder in gratitude and smiled weakly, although the look in his eyes was a bit different than Sunny remembered.

'Oh, he probably still thinks I am insane huh...'

"Well now that we are all free, we should go grab some necessary stuff like water and armor, we can't go down the mountain, since we are just going to freeze to death. One of the soldiers is dealing with the abominations around." Sunny said calmly.

"Boy, are you crazy?! I'd rather freeze to death than be torn apart by some horrible beast!" Shifty exclaimed

"... The boy is right. Right now we should figure out the current situation with the abomination and assist in any way possible, if we wish to survive." Scholar, as expected, was on Sunny's side.

Without saying another word, Sunny started walking towards the camp and watched what was happening. On the other side of the bonfire, things were turning from bad to worse. Most of the slaves were already dead. A few soldiers were still desperately trying to fight the Tyrant, but their attempts were pitiful.

It didn't matter though, since Sunny already had a plan in mind, and he didn't need any of them.

Witnessing the slaughter, Shifty got on his knees and puked his guts out. Then he shakily rose to his feet and looked at Sunny and Scholar.

"Well? We've confirmed the situation! It's helpless! How are we supposed to do anything against that?!"

"Shhhh! Lower your voice, fool!"

Blood drained from Shifty's face as he slapped himself, covering his mouth with both hands. Then he cast a fearful look in the direction of the tyrant.

Luckily, the abomination was still feasting on the slaves - lucky ones who were already dead and unlucky ones who were still alive - to pay them any attention. Shifty slowly exhaled.

'Now, we need to wait for the Hero to appear..' Sunny thought.

Soon, a bright flash streaked in the air and collided with one of the tyrant's arms, bursting into a rain of sparks. The Hero had just tossed a burning piece of wood at the abomination and was now defiantly raising his sword.

"Face me, devil!"

'More like Tyrant...' Sunny remarked inwardly.

"Come with me!" Sunny said and started running toward the far end of the stone platform, where the heavy wagon was perched dangerously close to the edge of the cliff.

Shifty and Scholar shared a dubious look, but then followed.

Behind them, Hero was dueling with the ugly creature, but Sunny was still running with all his speed, getting closer and closer to the wagon. Once there, he moved to its rear wheels. There were two wooden wedges placed under them just like he remembered.

"When I tell you, remove both of them. Then push as hard as you can. Got it?" Sunny said while pointing to the wedges.

"What? Why?"

Shifty stared at him with a dumbfounded expression on his face. Scholar just looked at the wedges, and then at the tyrant.

Hero was still alive, of course. He was weaving between the creature's limbs always just a half second away from being completely eviscerated. From time to time, his sword flashed in the air, but to no avail. Mountain King's fur was too thick, and his skin too tough to be harmed by a mundane weapon. There was a hint of apprehension on the young warrior's face.

All the other soldiers were already dead.

"You'll see."

Having said that, Sunny was running again, he looked for the torn part of the chain. After he found it, he plopped down on his knees and unlocked it as fast as he could. Meanwhile in the background, he heard a muffled scream. Hero was flying through the air, he then landed on his feet and rolled forward to pick up his sword, while avoiding the tyrant's stomp.

Sunny made a makeshift slipknot and a loop using the chain and the shackles and screamed at Shifty and Scholar.

"Now!"

He moved forward to face the Awakened Tyrant and threw the chain in the air, the Awakened Tyrant flinched back and thanks to that, the chain landed around its neck perfectly, as Sunny expected.

He immediately started running back towards the wagon, knowing that if he left Shifty and Scholar to it, the wagon wouldn't roll off fast enough. While running, Hero crashed into one of the tyrant's legs, throwing it off balance - and buying them some time.

'Nice job!'

Sunny reached the wagon and started pushing along with Shifty and Scholar, putting the entire weight of his body into it.

'Roll! You creaky piece of shit!'

The tyrant grabbed hold of the chain around its neck, but Hero was still pushing it back. The abomination didn't manage to snap the chain in the end, and the wagon finally plummeted down the mountain, taking the creature along with it.

'Great, that went well.'

Sunny was exhausted, but he knew that it wasn't time to rest yet, he picked himself up and went to join Hero who was standing close by. He looked calm and as handsome as ever. There was a bunch of dirt and many scratches on his armor, but otherwise, he looked fine.

"Good job, thinking up a plan like that on the spot isn't as easy as one might think, you all did well." Hero remarked and smiled.

"Anyways, come closer to the fire, all of you. We need to warm ourselves and discuss what to do next."

Without waiting for their response, Hero turned around and walked away. The slaves followed him.

Some time later, the four of them were seated around the bonfire, soaking up the pleasant heat. This time around, Sunny wasn't distancing himself and sat closer to them. Hero opened his mouth trying to say something, but Sunny beat him to it.

"At sunrise, we should gather whatever food and water we can find and climb up the mountain."

Hero looked at Sunny with a curious look and asked:

"Why should we climb the mountain, instead of heading back down?"

Sunny sighed and said:

"Because the abomination isn't dead yet. Think about it, it jumped down from an incredible height to land on this platform, yet it wasn't harmed at all. Why would it die by falling off the platform?"

Neither Hero nor the slaves could find a flaw in what he was saying.

Following that, the discussion was nonetheless same, gathering supplies and warm clothes to wear. Sunny also went off to grab the Bloodbane berries, making sure that nobody saw him, to poison their water later, remembering to put more into the Hero's water canteen this time. During his search for supplies, he stumbled upon a familiar dying soldier.

He sat quietly near the old man and slit his throat with precision, the old man looked at him with a shocked expression, but died soon after.

[You have slain a dormant human, name unknown.]

[You have received a Memory: Silver Bell.]

He didn't bother to summon it and instead got busy removing the dead man's fur cloak and warm, sturdy leather boots. Putting them on, Sunny finally felt a little warmer.

***

And so, after sunrise, their journey up the mountain started. Sunny made sure to poison the water canteens the others were carrying while he was filling them up with water. The journey was mostly the same. Shifty was still Shifty, trying to get rid of Sunny, saying that he was "dead weight", soon after, his condition got worse due to the poison and while climbing up a certain part of the slope, he fell down, never to be seen again. Scholar tried to get rid of Sunny again, planning to make him into bait, which didn't end well for him and so, there were two left.

"Let's go. We need to hurry."

Sunny gave the Hero a nod and headed forward. They walked in silence for some time before Hero spoke.

"Don't feel guilty about what happened. It's not your fault. The decision was mine, and mine alone."

The young Hero was a few steps ahead, so Sunny couldn't see his face.

"Besides, if you knew this man's sins... actually, it's better that you don't. Just trust me when I say that killing him was an act of justice."

'I don't feel guilty at all, you should worry about yourself instead..'

Hero spoke once more, but Sunny still didn't talk, he didn't need to anyway...

They reached the cave, where Hero was planning to kill off Sunny. Of course, it wouldn't go the way he was planning, thanks to the increased dosage of the Bloodbane poison, the Hero wasn't in the best shape. It couldn't never kill him, since he was an Awakened, but it for sure could weaken him. It's not like he has Blood Weave to save him...

"You... you are a wicked little shit, aren't you?"

Sunny rolled his eyes.

"No need to be rude about it, I am just doing it to survive."

And with that, he slashed, with a mundane dagger he picked up on the way, along the Hero's limbs, trying to make him bleed and weaken him as much as he could. After doing that a small bell appeared in his hand, Hero stared at it for a bit and frowned.

"Bastard... What are you planning to do?!"

"This."

Suddenly the bell rang and a beautiful, clear ringing sound flowed over the mountain, filling the night with an enchanting melody. After that, Sunny took off towards the temple, not even glancing back at the Hero who was soon going to be killed by the Tyrant anyways.

***

The radiant moon was illuminating the lonesome dark mountain's slopes in ghostly moonlight. Under that light, a young man with pale skin and raven-black hair reached the peak of the mountain.

The young man looked almost like a walking corpse, yet his head was held up high. His onyx eyes had a deep, almost bottomless darkness to them, and yet a flame of unimaginable resolve was blazing within them. He wasn't going to let a dumb mountain stop him.

He was unimaginably cold, but he couldn't stop, he knew that if he persevered, he would finally be able to relax soon.

Soon, he reached his destination.

He entered the temple, which looked the same as before, not that it was surprising of course... He stepped towards the altar and laid down on it, the Mountain King soon entered the temple, looking at Sunny menacingly, but Sunny wasn't bothered by it.

Sunny's body was in an awful state, but he was able to control himself, he grabbed the mundane dagger he was carrying and slashed across his palm. The wound started to bleed and drops of blood soon landed on the altar and he heard a familiar voice.

[You have offered yourself as a sacrifice to the gods.]

[The gods are dead, and can not hear you.]

[Your soul bears a spark of divinity.]

[Fate seems to favor you.]

[Shadow God stirs in his eternal slumber.]

[He sends a blessing from beyond the grave to the being recognized as one of his children.]

[Child of Shadows, receive your blessing!]

Sunny was surprised, some of the things that the Spell was saying changed.

'Fate seems to favor you?' Sunny was a bit surprised at this statement, although he didn't think it was completely wrong, it felt more like he was chained by Fate rather than favored by it.

He glanced at the Mountain King, who was entangled by tentacles that seemed to be made of darkness. The once mighty tyrant was struggling to free himself, but it was pointless.

How could a pitiful Awakened Tyrant resist the remnant power of the Shadow God himself...

The next second a furious howl escaped its maw and then his body ruptured, torn into pieces.

The Spell whispered into Sunny's ear:

[You have slain an awakened tyrant, Mountain King.]

[Wake up, Sunless! Your nightmare is over.]

[Prepare for appraisal...]