Shadow Slave

The shadow retreated into his cave. He hid himself in the darkness.

Without Tatal, the world did not interest him anymore. And since Tatal did not come to visit him, the world did not invade his home, either.

He sensed the lands around him undergoing changes, but all of it left him indifferent.

In the darkness, the shadow glanced at the ugly doll. Then, he picked up the silver bell and shook it faintly.

He remembered...

In one of his lives, he lived in a gorgeous city that sprawled across dozens of flying islands, built of ivory stone. The city was prosperous, and his life was one of abundance. However, he was mad... everyone in the city was, and in the surrounding lands, as well.

His wife was mad, too. Theirs was a happy madness.

If there was one sorrow that darkened their blissful insanity, it was that the gods had not granted them children. They prayed, they waited, but it was all for naught... until, one day, a miracle happened.

After long years of bitter failures, his wife became pregnant.

The day his daughter was born, he was so happy that his heart was ready to jump out of his chest. His daughter was a miraculous child... a blessed child. And as she grew up, she only became more lovely.

Such a lovely child could have one fate — the most wonderful one of them all.

To be sacrificed to the Ivory Lord, the dragon.

Such honor!

On the day his daughter was chained to the blackened stone in front of the great tower, he smiled brightly. His wife was full of mirth, as well.

And when the dragon's flame swallowed their child...

Ah!

He was the happiest he had ever been. He was beyond himself, so much so that his smile had become painful.

...The shadow stirred, disgusted.

Yes, that was what he felt — disgust. He had never felt it before, but its bitter taste was familiar.

He did not want to remember such filthy, vile lives.

But the torrent of memories was merciless. In another life, the shadow was a proud and powerful warrior, a maiden from an ancient sect who venerated War God. But she was mad, as well.

All of them were.

The people from the surrounding lands brought orphaned girls to their temple, to be raised by the War Maidens and become devoted priestesses of War — especially those born with red hair.

She loved the children.

The other priestesses were harsh, and some of them were indifferent. But she cared for these girls, because she had been one of them herself — a long time ago. And so, she spent more time with them than the rest.

She was also far more motivated to make them worthy of the gorgeous, glorious legacy of their ancient sect. To make them strong enough to be beloved by War. Sadly... the children were weak and fragile. They were lazy. They failed to understand the honor of their station, and some were oblivious to their duty.

So, she taught them. Some survived her teaching, and some didn't. She mourned the latter, and redoubled her efforts to guide the former. She wanted them to succeed. She was full of desire to make them stronger. Stronger than the wicked traitor in the west, at least — strong enough to please their goddess. Desire, desire...

Desire burned her heart and blackened her gaze, turning her into something twisted. But, by then, her mind was already too far gone.

And, in the end, so were the children.

The shadow threw the silver bell away.

He had learned what disgust meant.

But now, he also knew what wrath was.

Full of disgust and anger, the shadow curled into a mass of darkness and trembled.

Cold, cold...

His cave was so cold now. It had never been that way before.

‘I want to rest.'

The shadow closed its mind and forced itself into a state of half-slumber.

And yet, even in that passive state, it could still feel the world changing.

Time was flowing swiftly on the outside. Now that Tatal was gone, the Shadow Tribe had chosen a new shaman... then another, then another. They came and went, indistinguishable from each other. They bowed in front of his cave and left offerings. No one dared to enter his cave anymore. No one dared to steal the offerings and eat them while giggling and swaying their little feet, either.

The shadow ignored it all.

Out there in the valley, the town grew. The people of the tribe learned new crafts and developed what they had already mastered. Bronze came to replace copper; mines and quarries were established in the mountains. Swift boats traveled up and down the rivers, carrying goods to and from distant tribes. The garments that the tribesmen wore changed, becoming more refined and tasteful. The interiors of their homes were decorated with items that considered beauty, not just utility. There were more Awakened among them now, as well as more Ascended. Eventually, there was even a Transcendent or two.

Soon enough, the town became a city.

By then, the Shadow Tribe was not really a tribe anymore — it was a small, young nation. Having absorbed the surrounding tribes and expanded its lands, they were swiftly approaching the point of becoming a city-state.

The shadow felt that the Age of Gods was swiftly approaching its end, ready to give way to the Age of Heroes — the age when humanity had already established a foothold in the world, and its Transcendent champions battled the Creatures of Corruption for dominion over it.

Somewhere far away, Kanakht must have already created the first human kingdom... But, strangely enough, the shadow never heard the name of Kanakht being mentioned. The former tribesmen were in contact with many other people, receiving news from countless mortal realms. And yet, there was no news of the first human Supreme expanding his Domain.

Instead of him, they only talked about a beautiful, dreadful creature called the White Abyss — a thing that was not human, and yet seemed to have established the first human kingdom... or have usurped it, at least.

The shadow was mildly surprised, since that differed from the fragmented memories of the future contained in his mind. But then again, some of the futures he remembered contradicted each other, so he simply accepted it as one of such discrepancies. He did not care, either way.

He did not even care about the flourishing city that grew near his cave.

Out there in the city, Tatal's descendants — the branches of her family that stayed in the tribe — were still prospering. However, he did not feel anything for them. These people were all strangers to him, after all. The shadow had felt some connection to her children, but they were long gone.

Now, those who called themselves the heirs of the Great Shaman did not even know what she had looked like.

If anything, the shadow disliked them.

As the fortune of the tribe improved and its life became more prosperous, its people slowly changed. The many temptations of civilization — wealth, power, vice — took root in their hearts. The descendants of Tatal wielded far more power than most... And power corrupted.

So, slowly, they became prideful and conceited, believing that they were better than the common folk.

The shadow did not care about the failings of humans, and yet he could not help but feel dismayed by these ones in particular, since they were dirtying the memory of his dear friend with their every action.

Tatal had been kind, but these people were cruel. Tatal had been selfless and generous, but these people were full of selfish avarice. Tatal had treated every person as an equal despite her great strength, but these ones glanced down at others despite being pathetic and weak.

The other people of the city were not much different.

The more the shadow looked, the more disgusted he became.

And so, not wishing to feel that way anymore, he turned his gaze away from the world.

He withdrew his senses, confining them to the darkness of his cave.

He thought that he would find peace then. But instead, he only felt lonely.

The shadow rested in the darkness, blind to the world.

He refused the call of his past lives, unwilling to remember them.

Instead, he remembered Tatal.

In his mind, he could still hear her bright voice. He could still see her and smell her scent. He could still feel her warmth.

That was a happy place.

So, for a while, the shadow indulged in dreams about the past.

A long time passed that way...

Until, one day, the shadow was disturbed by a familiar scent.

There was the scent of blood drifting into his cave. The scent of death...

Frowning, the shadow stirred, slowly shaking off his slumber, and directed his senses outward.

What he saw there made the unfathomable darkness of his being boil.

Out there, on the altar in front of his cave... There was a human body lying motionlessly, blood flowing onto the cold stone.

There were empty eyes staring at the indifferent sky.

There were other humans, as well — dressed in magnificent clothes, standing around the altar. One of them held a bloodied knife; the rest were bowing toward the cave, reciting prayers.

Some had prideful, arrogant smiles hiding behind the solemn expressions plastered across their faces.

"For you, oh Dark One! Like the Great Shaman before us, we plead for your favor!"

The shadow lost the ability to think for a moment.

Images flashed in his mind...

The flames of the ivory dragon.

The orphaned girls smiling tentatively on the doorstep of an old temple.

He remembered Tatal.

Kind Tatal, who had been tortured by the necessary death of a single murderer. Who refused to ask him for help in the battle against the Basilisk, knowing the price of taking a life.

The shadow remembered a gaunt man digging graves in the frozen soil on the shore of an ice-covered ocean.

And then, the shadow remembered wrath. He remembered madness.

'How DARE THEY!'

He moved.

The mountain shook when the shadow left his cave. Only, this time, he did not take the form of a human.

Instead, the shadow revealed himself in front of these people in his true form — as an endless, unfathomable, titanic torrent of darkness.

As death.

He had made Tatal a promise once, didn't he? He had sent her people a message. And he was a very honest shadow, indeed.

How short their memory was...

The shadow washed over the world.

‘Die.'

And as he willed it, everything died.

The people in front of the altar collapsed like marionettes whose strings had been cut.

The people in the city below fell, too.

The cattle in the pens, the dogs guarding the homes, the mice hidden in the walls, the ants scurrying to steal crumbs from the floor.

The wheat in the fields withered and turned into dust. The trees, the grass, the flowers — all of it died, leaving nothing but desolate emptiness in its wake.

‘Why can't they just leave me alone?’

The shadow drowned the dead city, as well as the lands that surrounded it.

He was tired of life... of the living.

He just wanted peace, so why was it so hard for these revolting things to stop bothering him?

Soon enough, the land was entirely dead, enveloped in impenetrable darkness.

The city was perfectly preserved, but it was entirely empty as well, swallowed by shadows.

It was silent.

And then, there was finally peace.

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