Shadow Slave

438 Prince of Nothing

Sunny stared into the void suspiciously.

"Yeah? And how come you are so concerned about my well-being?"

The voice remained silent for a bit, then answered wistfully:

"I haven't really spoken to anyone in a long, long time. It would be a shame to finally find someone to talk to, only for them to die soon. Don't you think?"

'That guy is definitely not just a simple Lost… what is his deal, really? Is he actually a human or only pretends to be one?'

Sunny thought for a bit, then said:

"I guess. And since we're on the topic… how is it exactly that we are able to talk?"

He expected the voice to change the subject or ignore the question, but to his surprise, it actually answered:

"I am not really sure. This has never happened to me before, either."

After a while, it added hesitantly:

"Have you… have you perhaps found a piece of a broken mirror somewhere?"

Something clicked in Sunny's mind.

"Broken mirror… Mirror Beast… Beastie…"

The Ascended Reflection! The shard of a mirror that the strange creature had left behind was still inside the Covetous Coffer… smeared with his blood…

'Crap!'

So the owner of the voice was the creator of the murderous Reflection Sunny had encountered on the Reckoning. That… that gave him as many questions as it had given him answers.

He couldn't really think about it right now, though, because the pressure of the Flaw was already building in his mind, forcing him to speak.

"Now that you mention it, I did, indeed, recently find a piece of a broken mirror. With the word "Beastie" written on it in a child's handwriting."

The voice remained silent for a while, then asked quietly:

"Oh? How exactly did you find it?"

Sunny did not answer for as long as he could, then reluctantly spoke:

"That mirror shard was left behind by a powerful creature I killed. I took it with me, thinking that it might turn out to be important."

This time, the voice was quiet for an especially long amount of time. When it finally spoke, there was a hint of anguish in it. The owner of the voice tried very hard to suppress it, but his pain seemed to be too deep to not seep into his words even slightly.

"...So it's dead. I see."

Then, it fell silent once again.

Sunny tensed. After a while, he asked carefully:

"You, uh… you're not going to be angry with me for killing your pet, are you?"

A deep sigh resounded from the void.

"Angry… with you? Why would I be angry with you? You are not to blame for what happened to us."

Sunny shivered, suspecting that whoever or whatever it was that had been responsible for the Mirror Beast becoming separated from its creator — and eventually dying by his hand — was extremely lucky that the owner of the voice had become one of the Lost.

Then, he asked cautiously:

"What… what exactly was it, though? I have never seen a creature like that."

The voice seemed more in control of itself when it answered after a few long moments:

"A manifestation of my Aspect Ability. A kind of an Echo, you can say. I… I created him when I was just a lonely kid. We were together for a long time, before… before we weren't anymore."

Sunny tilted his head, then frowned slightly.

"What do you mean, a kid? A kid with an Aspect Ability?"

The voice laughed bitterly.

"Ah, that… I had my First Nightmare when I was twelve. It's rare, but does happen sometimes. Few children survive the trial, though."

Sunny blinked.

'Being sent into the Nightmare at twelve… of course very few survive!'

He did know that, in extremely rare cases, the people infected by the Spell were outside of the usual age range. The entire first generation of the Awakened had been, for example. And there were cases of this anomaly to this day, even though it usually happened to someone older than the norm, not someone younger.

'And I thought that I was unlucky…'

He cleared his throat, then said awkwardly:

"Well… I am sorry for your loss. If it makes you feel any better, the creature tried to say something before it died. Uh… we never stopped searching. Something like that."

The voice, however, didn't respond. It seemed that its owner had once again spent all of his soul essence… or whatever it was that allowed him to communicate with Sunny… and was now gone for another few days.

Sunny sighed.

"Curse it! I didn't even have time to ask him how to survive the damned stars!"

More strategic with how he chose his words, damn it!

***

Sunny spent a few more days plummeting into the void. By now, he was having trouble remembering what it even felt like, to not be falling. The darkness seemed to be eternal and everpresent, as though he had always been here, in its empty embrace, and all of his actual life was just a strange dream.

'Maybe it was?'

No... no, it wasn't. He was almost sure.

By the time the voice returned, the void had changed slightly. Not only were the distant shimmering lights now closer and brighter, but it also felt as if the air was getting warmer.

Sunny was in his usual spot, sitting cross-legged in the center of the treasure chest and training to better control the flow of shadow essence. On the surface of the lid near him was a dark longbow and a quiver of black arrows.

"...You practice archery?"

Sunny opened his eyes and glanced into the darkness, then shrugged.

"Not really. But I hope to learn a bit of it soon."

He made a grimace and nodded toward his broken arm:

"I do need two functioning hands before I'll be able to, though."

The bow and the quiver of arrows were the same he had entrusted to Saint before. Both of the Memories were Ascended, but only of the first tier. The bow's enchantments made it incredibly strong and sturdy, while the only enchantment that the arrows possessed was that they came as a whole quiver instead of a single one.

His broken arm, meanwhile, was healing. He could already move his fingers, but the process was far from over. He was halfway there, though.

Sunny healed much faster than mundane humans, and even other Awakened. He was sure that in another week or so, he would be able to take off the splint and draw the black bow.

The voice lingered, then said:

"We had no time to discuss the divine flames last time."

Sunny nodded.

"Indeed."

Then, he remembered something and asked:

"Oh, by the way… what do I call you? Do you have a name? It's a bit awkward to keep thinking of you simply as the Voice."

The voice laughed.

"A name? I used to have a name, I guess."

Sunny sighed.

"Yeah? Well, what is it?"

The void lingered for a while, then answered with amusement:

"...Mordret. Or, rather... Prince Mordret, I guess."