Shadow Slave: Shameless Self Insert

Unholy Union

I was flying.

Not really. Though I was gliding.

Slowly gliding down towards the hollow mountains, I glanced at Cassie with an uneasy expression. She took notice and smiled towards me, clearly happy about the fact we weren't plummeting towards the ground.

Although we were not, I was still extremely frightened. The colossus had already triggered my fear of heights big time, and having to jump around its body parts battling, I was close to passing out from fear. I got a bit over it though.

There was a really close call with the True Darkness that flowed from the tentacled beast, and that had filled me with a sense of mortal danger I had never felt before.

That had kind of made my fear dwindle a bit, heights were nothing compared to that.

But I still did not enjoy being so far away from solid ground.

As we all made it to the ground, the stone colossus turned around, and started making its way to another corner of the forgotten shore.

Saint looked at the imitation of life in disdain, and we walked into the hollow mountains after a night's rest.

Bruised, but unbroken, we walked through the eerie path that the first lord's cohort had tread before us.

The hollow mountains did seem like the earth I had left from, just much more silent and disturbing. Not even earth before the nightmare spell was completely empty of chao's of some kind.

"Stay close." Neph seemed worried about how empty this place was.

Until... we came to a clearing. A massive creature that the carapace demon would bow down to was laying on the ground, dead. The corpse would've been disgusting if it wasn't made of stone.

I didn't bother climbing inside it and said:

"It was killed by the first... lord's cohort."

Caster turned to look at me.

"How do you know?"

Without speaking, I pointed to a certain stone that was sunken into the ground. We began walking towards it in tight formation, before the rest saw what was written on it.

"Her nightmare is over."

I had always been an emotional person, with even lazy attempts at getting me sad working. The only reason I hadn't been very emotional until now, was the [Forethought] attribute. My unstable strings were keeping me away from this world.

However, this lonely grave made me cry. Tears I didn't really want to come out fell from my face. My companions looked at me in solemn understanding, and Kai put his hand on my shoulder in solidarity.

Many things made me cry. The poor sleeper whose grave was placed here, the perilous future that lay ahead, the family that I had inadvertently left behind, and so many others.

And so, this time, I didn't forget, I didn't try and solve those problems, I didn't make plans, I just stood and cried. Letting all of my feelings out.

***

A few hours later, we were in the depths of Nether's domain. My eyes were sealed shut with wax, it kinda felt like a punishment for crying earlier, but I knew otherwise.

My companions were being led by a rope connected to me, and I encountered the first shadow. Alone and with no one to cast it, it looked eternally heartbroken. It shuffled back and forth, as if it had been searching these tunnels for a long time.

When it noticed me, it was happy, until it realized I wasn't who it thought I was.

I offered it my hand.

'It's alright. Come find peace with me.'

[Your shadow grows stronger.]

I began to walk and I kept trying to find the exit of the dark tunnels.

As I was, I began to think about the murals that we had seen just before in the hollow mountains. I summoned Neph's runes.

Attributes: [Dreamspawn], [Nephilim], [Flame of Divinity], [The Fire].

[Nephilim] Attribute Description: "There once were terrible creatures born of an unholy union between the divine and the profane. Nephilim were the most beautiful, and the most harrowing of them all."

'So, a being of white hot flames with three eyes and darkness for blood fell from the sky like a star, and from it, the curse of the forgotten shore was born.'

It may not have been a Nephilim, but it most certainly was one of the other creatures born of the unholy union. Why had it fallen from the sky? Had it perhaps fled to this realm from another? After all, the forgotten shore was most likely another realm before being swallowed up by the dream realm.

And... the flood of pure darkness... sounded a whole lot like the one that poured out from the three eyed skull the tentacle beast had used as a shell. Was that darkness the purest form of the curse? Or maybe a diluted version.

If that was the case, it made sense that Neph's flames could make them dissipate.

After all, her flames were seemingly the same as those wielded by this creature. Neph did recognize the creature, so what did she know about it? Did she see that it resembled the description of her attribute, or something deeper?

I wanted to keep pondering, but I had finally found the exit.

After loading us all into the next boat, we made it to the otherside of the second river and gave ourselves sight again. Except for Cas.

A skeleton was sitting there, forever solemn and graceful.