[13]Shadow Dance

Nephis pondered over Sunny's offer to show her how to express herself, and agreed pretty quickly. They could start immediately, even though night was coming, but the two of them took a page out of Cassie's book and decided to get some sleep.

Well, Sunny wasn't really sleeping. He knew that either the headless statue or just the current day had triggered Cassie's visions in his past life, so he rested lightly while Nephis listened, and waited for Cassie to be overwhelmed by her visions.

Because Nephis had taken first sleep shift in this timeline, Sunny was already on shift when Cassie woke up screaming. It barely took him a moment to make it to her side, he didn't even let her make it to the platform's edge before he had scooped her up in a princess carry.

It was as simple as bending down and catching the girl as she stumbled backwards into his arms.

Nephis had reacted well, and was already standing in the darkness, her blade pointed in he and Cassie's direction. Sunny paid it no mind and called out to her.

"It's alright! I caught her, she's safe!"

Finally, after making sure Cassie's scream didn't attract any nightmare creatures, Sunny held her in his arms. She was still shivering and terrified. What a horrible thing. Cassie had an awful flaw, and an awful Aspect.

No matter how tempted he might be to believe that the Nightmare Spell was a benevolent thing, one look at this horrified girl was more than enough evidence of its sinister cruelty.

Sunny quickly composed himself and called out to Nephis.

"There isn't anything in the dark around us. There are no wounds on her body either. She probably had another vision. I don't think it was anything good. Stay alert."

Sunny set Cassie down in the center of the platform. Nephis was a little flushed. Somehow, she had accurately managed to express worry on her near emotionless face.

After a second or two, she asked in something that might have been her version of a calming tone. It sounded pretty much exactly the same as usual:

"Cassie? What happened?"

Magically, that did seem to calm the blind girl down a little. At least enough for her to speak in a quivering voice.

Cassie extended one hand and pointed down.

"Th—the head... I saw... oh gods!"

Sunny frowned and looked at Nephis.

"You should probably look after her. I know that Cassia is strong and brave, but there's no telling what kind of horrors she just witnessed. I don't know the exact details of what she saw, but I don't have a good feeling about any of this."

Now it was Nephis' turn to frown. She didn't seem to understand.

"I feel like she needs some space. She needs time to process what she saw."

This time, Sunny looked her dead in the eye and insisted.

"Go over to her, wrap her in an embrace, and squeeze her hand. Cassia does need to process what she's seen, but whatever it was that she saw clearly traumatized her. What she needs is moral support. She needs proof that she okay because she is not alone."

Sunny had not learned nothing while dragging survivors across Antartica. There was nothing he could do about the traumatizing nature of Cassie's visions, but he had learned plenty from Beth about how to console survivors and keep their spirits high.

The Forgotten Shore was child's play compared to the looming catastrophies that threatened to swallow their entire world. Sunny had never proclaimed himself a hero. He had never wanted to be one. He didn't care about that.

It was too bad that Sunny's sister lived on the planet that the Nightmare Spell was trying to consume. He would be damned and dead long before he sat back and watched the entirety of humanity get destroyed, and he'd revive the dead gods and bitch slap them back to eternal rest before he let something happen to his sister.

***

In the early hours of the morning,  Sunny was stretching his body in weird ways. Sunny remembered how to unlock every facet of his Aspect Legacy so far, but knowing what to do and meeting the requirements had long proved to not be the same thing.Luckily, Sunny was close to a familiarpoint now. Sunny was every bit as experienced as he was before he came to the past, but his body was clearly not up to par with Shadow Dance yet.

At this time in the past, Nephis had taught Sunny swordsmanship, but he had not asked about any of that to Nephis in this life. He was sure that she still doubted his intentions quite a bit. There was nothing except his knowledge of the future to hide, though.

Nephis meditated, and gave weird glances to Sunny, who was performing awkward stretches and poses, his toned body glistening in the light of dawn. She had wanted to spar with him, but now she was starting to wonder what he was doing.

As she started to watch him in earnest, his body began to seemingly blur. It wasn't due to his speed, or some unnatural change in the nature of his body. Rather, the way Sunless moved was just so graceful and connected that Nephis found it basically impossible to follow his movements. 

To her, it seemed that Sunny was almost . . . dancing. He was performing a dance. His movements became smoother the more he moved, and he fell into an amazing rhythm. Unknown to her, in the midst of this dance, Sunny was going over all of his life's battles. The Dread Lord, Daeron, Dire Fang, Dusk . . . Nephis.

Everything clicked when Sunny remembered his brutal brawl with Nephis. He originally planned to go over all of his previous major fights, one by one, but his mind had drifted to his fight with her on the top of the crimson spire. Sunny's Shadow Dance clicked into place, and he didn't even advance one step at a time. Instead, he took two.

...Looking at the shimmering runes, he read:

Aspect Legacy: [Shadow Dance].

Shadow Dance Mastery Level: [2/7].

First Relic: [Claim].

Second Relic: [Claim].

Third Relic: Unearned...

Sunny stopped, smiled, and then spoke in his mind.

'Claim.'

The Spell whispered softly into his ear.

[You have received an Aspect Legacy.]

[You have received an Aspect Legacy.]

[You have received a Shadow: Soul Serpent.]

[You have received a Memory: Drop of Ichor.]

Sunny froze. This was either a really good thing or a really bad thing. Sunny knew that not only had he recieved that Drop of Ichor before obtaining Blood Weave, he had also done it with Nephis right next to him. She had not only witnessed his technique take a massive leap in quality, she could also read his runes and see exactly what he had gained from it.

Sunny ultimately had a lot to ponder. He did not know what would happen if Blood Weave and Bone Weave did not absorb Shadow's legacy. Sure, Sunny was sure his power and affinity to shadows would increase. He might even gain a new attribute, or an ability, or even a change in Aspect. The very idea of becoming to a different Aspect made him very excited. It could obviously only be an upgrade, unless the Spell was particularly petty about making him absorb Weaver's legacy. 

Actually, it might. Weaver was the one who created the Spell and messed with his fate in the first place, so messing up their plans a second time could very well result in an early grave for Sunny. He didn't care. Sunny died because of Weaver's plans in the first place. 

Sunny remembered how he had felt when Blood weave had absorbed Shadow's inheritance. The feeling he had gotten had made his skin crawl. Sunny did not yet have weaver's intuition, but if Sunny changed nothing about the past, then he would be doomed to an early grave.

Turning to Nephis with grim resolve, he spoke up.

"Can you do me a favor, Changing Star?"