Shadow Slave: Rainy Days

Nephis's eyes slowly opened, as she felt the bright morning lights hovering gently over her face. She sat up, her silky silver hair running down to her neck. Even though she wasn't fully awake yet, Nephis instinctively summoned her sword. The silver blade appeared out of nowhere, having materialized in her right palm.

She didn't know when she had fallen asleep, nor did she know how or why.

Rain, who sat just a little bit further away from her, was savoring some meat, eating it out of a makeshift bowl. It kinda resembled a soup, just without any liquid inside of the bowl. Rain, sensing the confusion of Nephis, grinned slightly, before giving her an explanation.

"You can put the sword down, Nephis. I sent you to sleep, since you tried your hardest to stay awake, which isn't the healthiest thing to do."

Nephis narrowed her eyes at Rain, and gripped her sword tighter. She didn't exactly know how Rain did it, but she was pretty sure that she had used her Aspect Ability. She didn't like the idea of someone having controlled her mind, but she also couldn't deny the fact that the sleep had made her thoughts become much more clear.

"You used your Aspect ability on me.", Nephis stated, her tone monotone and unreadable.

Rain continued chewing on a piece of meat and shrugged.

"You're welcome, by the way."

Nephis remained silent and started looking around for Cassie, who she found leaning back against a large rock, still asleep. The Carapace Scavenger also remained close, mindlessly looking into the distance.

Nephis would've liked to discuss this further, but instead, she turned her gaze towards the edge of the Hill, where she saw that the black ocean had fully disappeared into nothingness, a crimson labyrinth now visible to the bare eye.

Nephis's eyes were fixed on the labyrinth, studying every corner, every curve and every wall she could see. But as hard as Nephis tried, she didn't succeed at remembering many passages, the labyrinth too complicated for any human to truly understand.

"Is there even someone who could navigate their way through this ?", Nephis asked, her voice an expression still masked.

"Who knows ? What I know though it's pretty much impossible to truly navigate in this hellhole without a suited Aspect..", Rain answered casually.

Nephis kept on gazing at the crimson labyrinth, the sight alone making her insides feel weird and heavy.

Rain, now having finished her meal, tossed the make-shift bowl away and made her way towards the silver-haired girl. She was abruptly cut off by Cassie, who's breath was heavy, even though a smile was on her face.

Cassie quickly stood up, her eyes wide open. She seemed to have been excited, yet nervous at the same time.

Nephis frowned.

"Cassie? What's the matter ?"

"A... a vision! I had a vision!"

'Is she like a seer ? Probably is, considering what kind of flaw she has.', Rain thought, finding her ability to know things about the future very interesting.

Since Nephis already knew what kind of powers Cassie had, she wasn't as surprised as Rain was, making her quickly ask the most logical question.

"Are we in danger ?"

Cassie energetically shook her head.

"No, it's not that! People... I saw a castle full of people!"

Rain froze, as she heard what Cassie had said.

'She saw a castle full of people ? If she sees it now, it must mean it's in the Dream Realm, right ? So it's a place we can reach, a place I can live at."

Cassie's smile turned brighter, as she moved her finger to a certain direction.

"I don't know how far it is, but I'm sure that it's in that direction!"

Cassie was confidently pointing west with her small, delicate finger.

As Nephis and Rain stayed silent, Cassie's smile slowly disappeared, replaced by one of confusion. The sudden change in attitude made her hesitantly ask:

"Uh... Is something wrong with my vision ?"

Rain let a low breath slip out.

"Uh... you know. The direction you're pointing at is west. I said that that direction is a little bit more dangerous yesterday. I guess I finally know what lies west, I guess. But fighting our way through those monsters will be hard.

The blind girl's face fell.

"Oh."

Nephis, not letting the chance go, spoke up.

"You said "our". That means you'll come with us."

Rain paused for a moment, surprised by herself that she actually decided to go with them.

"Did I say our ?"

"Yes you did."

Rain sighed, scratching the back of her head.

"I guess I did indeed say that ..."

Cassie's confused expression from before turned brighter again, happy with the fact that someone who knew her way around this place decided to come with them.

"That means you'll help us reach that castle, right?", Cassie said with excitement.

Rain exhaled deeply, knowing that she deep wanted to reach a better place. If she couldn't leave the Dream Realm, she at least wanted to live somewhere where there was no constant danger.

"Yeah, I'll help. But I can't promise to keep you safe. I'm going because I want to reach that castle too, not because I want to help you reach it. I have my ways of escaping, so if things get bad, I'll leave you without a second thought.

"That's fine. We can protect ourselves.", Nephis chimed in. "Let's get going then", she then said firmly.

***

The small group moved quickly, wanting to make their way down the hill.

In the month Rain spent alone on this hill, she had quickly found out the best way to descend this mountain. But climbing down the hill with a blind girl was going to be a way harder challenge altogether.

Thankfully, Cassie interrupted them before they tried descending the hill, saying that she had a memory that would fix the problem with ease.

Nephis, who stood next to Cassie, felt how her shoulder was touched my a small, soft hand, before the voice of the spell suddenly spoke up.

Nephis had received a new memory.

Nephis looked at Cassie for a few seconds, showing no emotional expression, before summoning the new memory. A golden rope suddenly materialized in her hands.

"This will help us.", Nephis stated simply. "Did you get it in your First Nightmare ?"

Cassie nodded.

"Yeah, I did. It actually helped me a lot through my Nightmare. But I think it will be put to better use in your hands."

Rain, who had been listening since the beginning, did not understand how that rope would help them. Of course they could just attach Cassie to one of their bodies, but that was also really dangerous.

"What's so special about that rope ?", Rain asked.

Without giving Rain an answer, she threw the rope. Right in front of Rain, the size of the rope increased at an incredible rate. Nephis attached one end around a rock and threw the other end down to the labyrinth.

"Oh. That's cool."

Nephis helped Cassie find the rope, helping her climb down, before quickly following too. Rain stepped closer to the edge, noticing how both of the girls had already descended to the ground.

'It would be their perfect chance to recall the memory while im climbing down. I could also just go down my way ... '

In the end, Rain sighed and grabbed the rope. It would waste less time and would be easier than climbing down the unstable hill and rocks. And even if she got betrayed, she still had a way to save her from falling to the ground, so she just decided to trust them.

Rain didn't have any prior professional training when it came to climbing, but her life in the outskirts had made her pretty good at it.- All the climbing over walls and buildings did have a use after all except for running away faster.

Rain descended quickly, confidently and fluidly moving downwards. As soon as Rain reached the ground, the memory disappeared back into the soul sea of Nephis, now slowly spinning around her core as a white orb.

The small and unofficial cohort now stood in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by the red coral-like blades of the crimson labyrinth.

"So where do we go from here ?", Nephis asked, the weird new terrain making her feel slightly caged.

Rain, stepped forward confidently, like she knew her way around this place.

"There is this one large statue we need to reach, preferably before night. We'll die if we don't."

Cassie tilted her head slightly, a slight unease in her tone.

"The water will come back up when night comes, right ?"

Rain didn't stop talking, nor did she look back, but what happened was her expression turning grim.

"Exactly. If we don't make it in time, the water will come back and so will some horrors. But I've walked towards the statue a few times, so we should be able to get to it, except if something unexpected happens."

In the meantime, Nephis had already materialized the rope again, binding one end to Cassie's arm and pulling the other one, so Cassie could follow, of course.

With that, she then turned around and started to follow Rain.