Shadow Slave

It was all a gamble. A dire, dangerous, deadly gamble... the soldiers of the First Army were betting their lives against the Winter Beast without even knowing if they would be able to reach it, let alone hurt it.

They might have made that gamble out of desperation, but they had also made it out of necessity. All of them had received a chance to leave, and all of them turned it down. Some had done it due to their sense of duty, or camaraderie, or misguided bravery. Some had simply grown numb to the horrors of the war.

As for Sunny himself, he was not really sure what had led him here. He had come to this broken land in search of power, but that desirous quest seemed so childish now. Antarctica had put a lot of things in perspective... however, this shift of perspective only made things less clear instead of revealing the truth.

All he knew was that he felt fiercely reluctant to leave the job unfinished, and that he did not want to fail the soldiers who had entrusted him with their lives. Sunny had never wanted to be in charge of anyone, but now that he was, their hopes and desires weighed on him like chains. Strangely, though, he did not want to refuse that burden.

He felt quite protective of it. Maybe that was what Master Jet had meant when she said that no one was free in this world.

Regardless of the reason, Sunny felt a frantic hope burning in his chest as he marched into the blizzard.

'Come on, come on... we can do it...'

Behind him, the column of shivering soldiers stubbornly moved forward inside a cage of flames. The infantrymen were all encased in suits of powered armor, which were all hermetic and insulated, capable of withstanding the most hazardous environments. The Awakened were all much tougher, and many of them possessed protective Memories on top of that.

And yet, they were all suffering from the terrifying cold. It was just too insidious, finding a way to pass through all forms of defense. Even Sunny felt miserable because of the snowstorm. Much worse, the cold was getting worse and worse the deeper into the blizzard they walked.

They had to find the true body of the Winter Beast soon.

'That cold... there's something wrong about it. It doesn't feel like a... a natural... natural force...'

Even his thoughts felt slow and frigid.

But there was no way back for them now. All that Sunny could do was march forward and endure, hoping that he and his soldiers would be able to reach the heart of the blizzard.

The fire produced by the MWPs helped alleviate the cold to a certain extent. But then, slowly, the heat of the furious flames started to feel less and less substantial. The flamethrowers were still spouting long streams of burning fuel, but it was as though the fire itself had been robbed of its warmth.

How could fire be cold? Sunny did not know, but he felt as though the flames now contained no heat whatsoever. They were like predators that had lost all their teeth.

'Curse it...'

He glanced back, seeing a few of the mundane soldiers staggering as they walked, then gritted his teeth and continued to move forward.

The snowstorm could not be too vast. They had to be getting closer to its center... all they had to do was endure a little longer.

Suppressing a hint of fear, Sunny sent his shadows to scout ahead. As soon as his body lost their support, the cold assaulted it with renewed strength. He cursed quietly and concentrated on resisting the furious blows of the hurricane winds.

Behind him, the Awakened and the mundane soldiers were shielding their faces and leaning forward to withstand the force of the storm. Even the towering war platforms were struggling to keep their balance - they had great mass, but also a much larger surface for the wind to attack. The pilots controlled their lumbering machines with intricate skill, keeping them upright and moving forward.

The shadows flew into the storm. Even though it was almost impossible to see through the raging snow, they had other ways to perceive the world. Sunny hoped that at least one of them would be able to discover the true body of the Winter Beast - after all, searching for it was not hard.

All he had to do was follow to where the cold was most dreadful.

The closer one got to the heart of the blizzard, the more terrible the unnatural cold would become... and indeed, his shadows were able to discover the right direction soon.

They all failed to reach the eye of the storm, though. Sunny felt a little shaken when he realized that, further into the blizzard... even the shadows started suffering from the merciless cold.

It made no sense, since shadows were incorporeal beings, but it was nevertheless true. Once they flew sufficiently deep into the snowstorm, the power of the Winter Beast seemed to transcend logic and reason. It was capable of freezing even those things that should have been incapable of being frozen.

'How... how can it...'

To his horror, Sunny realized that the frigid slowness of his thoughts was also not just in his imagination. If the Corrupted Titan was capable of affecting shadows with its powers, why wouldn't it be able to affect minds?

Nothing within the Winter Beast's snowy domain could avoid being pervaded by its power.

Recalling the shadows, Sunny shuddered and continued to walk in the direction they had discovered. Every step he took felt heavier than the last.

Behind him, a soldier fell to the ground. Others tried to help the soldier stand up, but it was of no use - the man was not moving. His comrades had no choice but to abandon their futile attempts. The column flowed past the motionless figure, and soon, it was swallowed by the haze of the blizzard, disappearing from view.

Not long after that, someone else dropped down.

Sunny felt dread settle in his heart.

'No, no... we need to keep going. I refuse... I refuse to give up! I refuse to believe that the abomination's power cannot be broken!'

He continued to walk with an ugly expression on his face, leaning low to resist the shattering wind.

Soon, more people fell into the snow. Sunny could feel their shadows turn lifeless in the distance. Every death cut him like a knife.

It was only the mundane soldiers at first. Then, one of the MWPs staggered and froze, depowering - a moment later, a powerful squall crashed into it, making the towering machine sway and collapse. Eventually, even the weakest of the Awakened started dying.

And then the strongest of them.

continued to struggle forward. The other brigades were advancing into the blizzard by its side, too. However... their rate of progress was becoming slower and slower.

The closer they got to the heart of the snowstorm, the more murderous the cold became, the stronger the winds grew, and the harder it was to make even a single step forward. It felt as though an irresistible force was pushing Sunny back and at the same time trying to sap him of his very life, battering his body with blades of wind and ice.

'Damn it... damn it...'

At first, a soldier or two would fall every minute. Then, a new body would fall into the embrace of the snow almost every second.

Sunny felt a... a vast, maddening anguish. And a deep, biting reluctance.

And fear. Not for himself, but for the mission.

But then, he became scared for himself, too.

At some point, Sunny realized that because of the diabolical cold that permeated his mind, he could no longer feel his Dream Realm anchor. It still existed there, somewhere, but it was as though the mystical connection was distorted by a hazy wall of snow. Sunny could not sense the anchor, and could not reach for it.

He had nowhere to run, just like the rest of his soldiers.

'Are... are we going to lose, just like that?'

The thought filled him with indescribable anger and grief.

He could tell that they were getting closer to the heart of the blizzard. They were not too far away, now...

But the snowstorm had become just too calamitous.

Sunny had lost count of how many soldiers he had lost. In fact, his senses - even the shadow sense - were slowly failing him. He could not see too far, and he could not perceive too far. The world had narrowed down to a hazy sphere of a dozen meters, while everything else was obscured by snow.

In that sphere, there were only a few Awakened. As far as he knew, everyone else might have already succumbed to the ruthless cold.

'Gods... it can't be like this... it can't be, damn it!'

In his heart, Sunny would have been able to accept if they had reached the true body of the Winter Beast, but failed to defeat it. But the idea of being wiped out without even making it to the eye of the storm was enough to drive him insane.

'Damn it, damn it, damn it all!'

...But in the end, that was exactly what happened.

Eventually, still surrounded by the wall of howling snow, Sunny realized that he could hardly make even a single step forward. He had lost sight of the brigade and did not know if any of his soldiers were still alive. There were only three Awakened beside him... Belle, Dorn, and Samara.

And with each second, still, the cold was growing more harrowing.

He closed his eyes.

'...Admit it.'

Sunny hesitated, staring into the blizzard.

'Admit it. You lost.'

He shivered.

'You fool... what else did you expect would happen?'

It was almost as if the Sin of Solace was talking to him. But, no... those were only his own thoughts. He had not even summoned the jade sword yet.

His own thoughts were much more damning.

Sunny let out a soft sigh, then turned around and looked at his soldiers.

The members of his cohort were standing close to each other, bits of ice covering their hair. Their luminous Memories had grown dim and weak, and their lips were blue.

Their eyes, however... were much more calm than his own.

Sunny studied their faces for a few moments, trying to come up with a solid thought.

Eventually, he simply whispered:

"...I'm sorry."

Belle smiled with the corner of his mouth, then slightly shook his head. That action alone seemed to take something out of him, and the swordsman swayed slightly.

Samara reached out to support him, and he placed a hand on her shoulder, gripping it tightly. Dorn struggled a little and turned to face them. He gave his fellow Awakened a warm nod, then kept looking at them without saying anything. Maybe he couldn't.

Sunny remained motionless, watching.

He watched them slowly grow still.

And then, he watched as the spark of life was gradually extinguished inside them. Samara was first, and then Dorn. Belle was the last to go.

Only when their shadows had turned lifeless and empty did Sunny allow himself to dissipate into the darkness, escaping the murderous cold.

...In the embrace of the shadows, the power of the Winter Beast was not nearly as overwhelming. It could still reach here, somehow, but in a weakened state.

Sunny howled with sorrow and fury as he flew deeper into the blizzard. Even if everything was lost, he still wanted to try and reach the wretched abomination... he wanted to hurt, break, and kill it...

But he failed.

Even if the cold was not as terrifying in the shadows, it was still there. And the closer Sunny got to the heart of the blizzard, the more annihilating the cold became. He still persisted forward, feeling his very soul freeze and start to grow still, dying, for a time. He almost made it.

Eventually, though, Sunny had to turn back.

He ran away.

He ran away and hid himself, waiting for the snowstorm to pass.

He survived.