Dave attempted to bug Cedez with further questions, but she remained tight-lipped, insisting that he could see the evidence for himself later. Reluctantly, he decided to give up on badgering her further and returned to the storage shed to assist Remicra with lunch preparations and the organization of various items for the new smithy.
Later in the day, he approached Murdoc and inquired if the old mage could procure some food from the market for them. Murdoc simply nodded in agreement, and Dave watched in astonishment as the massive snail departed through the gates at an unexpectedly rapid pace.
As the day drew to a close and dinner was shared in the company of Remicra, Dave engaged the dragoness in a lively discussion about their future plans. Eventually, Dave retired to a top floor room facing the clearing that Cedez had cryptically pointed at earlier.
He waited until nightfall. When the sun sank behind Nihilim, and the garden became illuminated solely by the distant, dim corona encircling the black hole, Dave stared into the gloom with bated breath, his patience stretched thin as he waited for whatever secrets the darkness might reveal.
As pyramidal runes lit up the cottage from within, bathing the balcony Dave stood in a haunting red light, he spotted a solitary, dark figure walking through the trees, her tail wagging gently.
"There you are," he exhaled, his heart thumping as he suddenly realized that there were no protective runes in the park to keep her safe against the encroaching shadows.
The black hole's shimmering corona cast a long shadow across the hill, extending away from the foxgirl. Her silver eyes glittered in the gloom like pinpricks of light, her tail blending seamlessly into the darkness behind her.
Dave felt an unnerving sense of panic take hold of him as the shadow behind the girl began to wane and boil. He wanted to cry out, to warn her, to stop her, but a part of him knew that it was too late, that he would finally bear witness to the true nature of Cedez.
The shadow behind the girl stretched, devoured her figure, and wrapped her in black flames. The girl's limbs lengthened and multiplied. Cedez rose to the sky, stretching out, waning, flickering in unnatural patterns akin to a ghost, a puddle of dark ink dissolving in water. Two silver eyes became four, then eight. Before Dave could draw another breath, silver eyes multiplied across the face of a kilometre-tall monstrosity that stepped out of the park and merged with a river of shadow pouring from the dark cloud encircling the city.
The figure of the colossal abomination solidified, becoming pure void, darkness beyond darkness. A thousand legs of a monstrous centipede-like behemoth began to circle the city, beneath the twilight of Nihilim's radiance. A hundred brilliant, silver eyes glanced at Dave, and he felt his skin crawling. The thing emitted a sound, an alien wail that echoed through the gloom, resounding like a siren of doom across Shandria.
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"God damn it all, I should have known better," Dave uttered, his entire body shaking as terror sought to overwhelm his mind.
. . .
It took Dave a considerable amount of time to fall asleep, his mind still reeling from the horrifying revelation he had just witnessed. When he finally drifted off, his dreams were a chaotic whirlwind, filled with strange sights.
In his dreamscape, Dave found himself observing Sherlock, who was relentlessly pursuing a pink flying minivan filled with unknown nefarious criminals across a vast city. The cityscape was a fantastical metropolis, teeming with flying cars that zoomed past colossal megastructures soaring high enough to pierce thick, cotton-like clouds.
The streets below were a dizzying maze of neon lights and billboards advertising everything from exotic androids to infinite open world games, all set against a backdrop of bustling crowds that thronged the sidewalks. Sherlock navigated this urban labyrinth with ease on his flying motorbike, his eyes locked on the elusive pink minivan as it weaved through the chaos.
As Dave watched this surreal chase unfold, he couldn't help but feel a strange sense of detachment, as if he were merely a spectator in his own dream. And yet, the vividness of the sights, sounds, and emotions that engulfed him felt as undeniably real as his own experiences did in Shandria.
Sherlock caught up to the minivan. The pink car was crashed into a hospital wall. As the detective pulled the door of the van open, he saw a bomb strapped to a pineapple within it. A clock on the bomb ticked down to zero and the detective's body ignited, the world awash with a fiery detonation.
Dave awoke with a start, drenched in a cold sweat from the vivid dream.
Shaking off the last remnants of sleep, he rose from his bed and made his way to the kitchen. The morning sun filtered through the windows, casting a warm glow across the room.
Seeking some semblance of normalcy, he decided to cook some bacon on the stove, the sizzle and aroma filling the air with a comforting familiarity. Once he had eaten, he headed out to the park, hoping to clear his thoughts. Remicra was either still asleep or already working in the shed, but the dragoness simply didn’t preoccupy his thoughts like his other companion did now.
Upon his brisk walk through the Estate’s overgrown park, he was surprised to find Cedez already there, sitting on the same metal bench, seemingly lost in her own world. She was softly whistling a tune that Dave recognized from a movie he'd seen on Earth. The melody was hauntingly beautiful, and it stirred within him a sense of mild melancholy for the life he would never return to.
As he approached Cedez, her silver eyes flicked towards him, and she stopped whistling. Despite the previous night's staggering revelation, she appeared almost... hominid in that moment, her expression a mixture of vulnerability and quiet defiance.
"You're... her Divine Shadow," he said accusingly.
Cedez nodded, her gaze steady. "Yes, I am."