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'A Shadow…'

What an unexpected boon.

Usually, a Legacy Relic came in the form of a Memory, or very rarely an Echo. Perhaps there were some other types of Relics out there, but he had never heard of them.

That didn't mean much, though. By now, Sunny was reasonably certain that there were a lot of things that he, as well as the rest of mundane humans, had never heard about. Awakened kept a lot of secrets.

Nevertheless, receiving a Shadow pleasantly surprised him.

Looking up, he saw new runes appearing out of thin air:

Shadows: [Marble Saint], [Soul Serpent].

Sunny hesitated for a few moments, then furtively looked around. The small room was empty and quiet.

Feeling a little bit stupid, Sunny shook his head and summoned his new Shadow to take a good look at it.

A slight breeze moved his hair, and in the next second…

Nothing happened.

'Huh?'

Sunny frowned and looked around the room, then scratched the back of his head.

'What the hell? Where is the damn snake?'

He had hoped to see a giant serpent made out of shadows appear in front of him, with black scales as thick as plate armor and a mouth wide enough to swallow his enemies whole. Or an average-sized snake, at least!

But there was nothing.

He even checked to see if a new shadow joined his two invaluable helpers, but no. Both rested on the floor, one seemingly content, the other bored and in a perpetually bad mood.

'Weird…'

He raised a hand to rub his eyes, but froze at the last moment.

"What is that?"

There was something dark on the skin of his wrist, peaking out slightly from beneath the sleeve.

Following intuition, Sunny hastily stood up and took off the top of the training suit provided to him by the staff of the hospital complex. Left naked to the waist, he then looked at himself through the eyes of the shadow.

'...Huh?!'

Out there on his pale skin, an intricate image of a black serpent was tattooed, so detailed that it almost seemed alive. The serpent coiled around his arms and his torso, its tail resting just above his right hand, its head just above his left.

"...What? I have… a tattoo now?'

In the darkness of the small room, the serpent almost seemed to move under his skin, two curved fangs threatening to break its surface. It was striking, beautiful, and disturbing.

Of course, Sunny recognized the serpent immediately. Both the nameless temple slave and his mother had a very similar image marking their skin, after all.

It was the Shadow God's mark.

But why did his new Shadow turn into a tattoo?

Confused, Sunny listened to his body and soul, trying to feel if something had changed about them.

And soon, he did notice a small difference.

The flow of the shadow essence through his body had changed. If previously it had circulated naturally, now, it seemed to follow the coils of the serpent, moving faster and with more intent, as if directed by them.

'Soul Serpent… does that thing enhance my shadow essence control?'

To experiment, Sunny poured essence into his limbs and then performed several movements of Shadow Dance. After that, he jumped from one shadow to another a few times, expending even more essence.

He felt the difference instantly. Not only was he able to control the essence better, but it also seemed to be consumed at a slightly slower pace, and restore at a faster one.

Soul Serpent served as a channel for it, existing both on the material and the spiritual plane. As such, it was connected both to his cores and to his body, creating a strange bridge that allowed Sunny to use his shadow essence with better efficiency.

'This is… a very useful Shadow.'

Those words were an egregious understatement. Sunny had already understood how important and vital managing essence was for the Awakened — any tool that could enhance that aspect of their power was truly precious.

And he got such a marvelous one, practically for free.

He was also sure that the Serpent would only get more powerful in the future, provided he kept it well-fed, of course.

…But how was he supposed to feed Memories to a tattoo?

Perplexed, Sunny thought for a bit, then finally concentrated on the runes once again.

Shadow: [Soul Serpent].

Shadow Rank: Dormant.

Shadow Class: Monster.

Shadow Attributes: [Shadow Guide], [Soul Weapon].

Shadow Description: [When the end came, Shadow was the last of the gods to be destroyed. Many have resented him for creating death, but in the end, death embraced all.]

Noting the interesting detail of a connection between Shadow God and death, Sunny lowered his gaze.

However, the last string, the one he had been accustomed to paying the most attention to when it came to Saint, was missing. There was no indication of how many shadow fragments it would take to make the Serpent evolve.

Sunny frowned.

Come to think of it…

That strange Shadow was clearly connected to his soul. Perhaps it wasn't a coincidence that it was a monster — Sunny was a monster himself, after all. So, maybe, the Serpent would not evolve its Class like Saint had, by consuming the soul core of a suitable Nightmare Creature. Most likely, it would grow alongside Sunny himself.

But why was it of the Dormant Rank, while Sunny had already become an Awakened?

'Huh…'

Maybe… maybe its Rank was not tied to Sunny's soul, but to his comprehension of the Shadow Dance? Currently, he had mastered only the first of the seven steps of the battle art, and the Serpent belonged to the first of the seven Ranks. Would it evolve to a higher Rank if he mastered more steps?

Full of thoughts, Sunny sighed and turned his attention to the Shadow's Attributes.

[Shadow Guide] Attribute Description: "Soul Serpent guides shadow essence as it flows through your body."

[Soul Weapon] Attribute Description: "Soul Serpent can assume the form of a weapon."

'The form of a wea… wait, what?'

Sunny blinked a couple of times, then stared at his left wrist, where the head of the Soul Serpent was drawn under his skin. Its scales were so intricate that it almost seemed as if the creature was moving.

Now… it really was moving.

Following Sunny's mental command, the Soul Serpent slithered up to his hand, and then escaped from it, turning into a dark blade. As the coils moved across his body, the blade grew longer and longer, until a hilt wrapped in black leather rested comfortably in his grip.

The tattoo was gone.

Sunny found himself holding a lusterless greatsword. It was a menacing, formidable, foreboding odachi.

Including the hilt, the odachi was as long as he was tall. It was surprisingly light for its length, but heavy enough to inflict truly devastating wounds.

Almost invisible on the dark steel, an lifelike image of a coiling serpent was etched into its blade.

He weighed the greatsword in his hands for a while, then smiled darkly.

'...Truly, this is a weapon worthy of a shadow.'

It was still weak, though. If it was a Memory, it would have been only a Dormant one of the second tier. Sunny was going to have to put in some work to make the dark odachi really fearsome.

With a sigh, he commanded the Serpent to slither back onto his body, and then to disappear entirely. A few seconds later, his skin was clean and empty once again.

'What a bountiful harvest I had today.'

Sunny stared at the darkness for a few minutes, then sighed heavily.

It was time to do something that he had dreaded doing ever since returning to the real world.

He couldn't put it off any longer.