The Broken Halo

Lilith looked at Akaza, Sonya, Merath, and Jorra as their shadows were been drawn toward Sunless.

Before their shadows could leave their bodies completely, she raised the Chaos Blade and her draconic golden eyes flashed.

Then she slashed downward.

A dark golden line appeared in the air, and in the next moment, the same dark golden line appeared beneath Akaza, Sonya, Merath, and Jorra.

Their shadows trembled violently.

Then four thin dark golden lights pierced through their shadows and pinned them to the ground like nails.

Akaza’s eyes regained their light.

Sonya gasped and fell to one knee.

Merath almost collapsed, but Jorra quickly supported her despite the fear on his own face.

For a few seconds, none of them spoke.

Then Akaza looked around and saw the demonic beasts in the distance that had become completely motionless.

"What the hell is this?"

Nobody answered him because they didn’t have the answers.

Sonya slowly raised her head toward the sky.

Although she could not see the black sun, she could feel it. It felt like something enormous and dead was hanging above the world, swallowing everything that was meant to exist beneath the light.

"Win and make sure you don’t die, little kitty." Sonya mumbled softly.

Meanwhile, Lilith’s gaze shifted from Sonya and the others back to Sunless.

Sunless scoffed.

"Bitch."

Lilith gave no response. Her face still remained indifferent.

Then the black sun above Sunless rotated slightly.

The movement was extremely slow and not easily noticeable, but the moment it rotated, the shadows that were flowing toward the black sun became even faster.

The entire Blackwind Valley seemed to be emptied of darkness. Yet at the same time, the world became darker but not utterly and completely dark.

The pale and dim light of the black sun brought little bit of light into this dark world.

It was an extremely strange sight.

Lilith looked down at her own shadow.

Or rather, Simon’s shadow.

Sunless was trying to pull it, and Lilith raised an amused brow.

The shadow beneath Lilith’s feet trembled once.

Then it became still.

A faint ripple passed through it, and for a split second, the shadow behind Lilith changed shape.

It no longer looked like Simon’s shadow.

It looked like a pair of folded wings.

Then it looked like the outline of a dragon.

Then it looked like a long sword buried in darkness.

The changes appeared and vanished in less than two seconds, but Sunless saw them.

And her expression changed slightly.

Lilith looked at her with the same amused expression.

"You want my shadow?"

Sunless said nothing, but her eyes became much colder.

The black sun rotated again, and the force pulling at Lilith’s shadow became stronger.

The air around her twisted, and darkness gathered around her ankles like countless black hands trying to drag her shadow away.

But Lilith’s shadow did not move.

Not even slightly.

Lilith looked at the darkness around her feet, then she looked at Sunless.

Her lips curled up faintly.

"Do not touch what you cannot afford."

The moment those words left her mouth, her draconic golden eyes flashed, then she nonchalantly snapped her fingers at her shadow.

Boom!

A power shockwave erupted around her shadow, sending the darkness away.

At the same time, a crack appeared on Simon’s neck.

Sunless’ eyes narrowed, and the black sun above her suddenly released a deep pulse.

BADUM!

The pulse spread through the entire Blackwind Valley, then the black sun began to change.

While the black sun was changing, Sunless slowly pulled her Shadow Blade out of her heart.

Black blood flowed down her chest, but the wound began to close on its own.

The black sun above her shone with darkness as it morphed and started changing.

A second later, Sunless began to rise toward the black sun.

Lilith stared at her and the black sun with narrowed eyes.

Without saying a single thing, she slashed at Sunless.

An extremely thin line of dark golden light traveled at an extremely fast speed.

The power it carried was immense, and it made Sunless’ instincts to scream at her.

However...

BAM!

A massive black hand made out of shadows fell from the black sun and blocked Lilith’s attack.

Lilith’s cut nearly severed the hand in two, but it was not enough.

More shadows appeared and the injury of the massive shadow hand was healed.

Then the hand carried Sunless into the black sun.

The moment Sunless disappeared into it, the black sun pulsed violently.

BADUM!

The sound of her heartbeat echoed across Blackwind Valley once again, and the circular shape of the black sun started to distort.

The black sun bulged outward, and a massive torso slowly emerged from it.

The torso was not made of flesh.

It was made of writhing shadows.

Within the body of the enormous creature, countless faces, claws, fangs, wings, tails, and hands could be seen pushing against the surface before sinking back into the darkness.

Some of the faces looked like the demons of the Shadowgrave Clan. Some looked like demonic beasts. Some were so twisted that it was impossible to tell what they used to be.

The sight was horrifying, disgusting, and extremely uncomfortable to look at.

Akaza’s face turned pale.

"What the hell is that?"

No one answered him because they took were shaken by what they were seeing.

Two long and thick legs formed beneath the shadow torso, then arms started tearing out from both sides of its body.

One.

Two.

Ten.

Twenty.

Fifty arms grew from its left side, and another fifty arms grew from its right side.

A hundred arms in total.

Each arm held a different weapon made of condensed shadows. Swords, spears, axes, chains, bows, hooks, scythes, and strange jagged weapons that looked like broken bones.

Then three heads rose from the creature’s neck.

The middle head looked like a distorted and faceless version of Sunless. Its mouth was too wide, and its black teeth were sharp and arranged in several rows.

The head on the left looked like the face of a monkey, but its face was distorted and unclear.

The head on the right looked like a demon with six horns, but its face kept shifting. Sometimes it had six eyes. Sometimes it had none. Sometimes its mouth split into several smaller mouths that moved at the same time.

In the center of the monster’s chest, the writhing shadows parted slightly, revealing Sunless suspended inside it. Black veins connected her body to the monster like roots.

She looked down at Lilith with cold black eyes.

She said nothing because there was nothing to be said.

In her eyes, Lilith would soon become a corpse.

Meanwhile, Simon spoke to Lilith as he watched everything from his sea of consciousness.

[Can you handle that?]