Sunny led Cassie through the streets of the dark city. They were on their way to destroy the forsaken knight that Sunny had been calling his roommate. Their time on this Dammed forgotten shore was coming to an end and Sunny wanted Saint to become a demon.
Initially that was his only plan for leaving to the Ruined Cathedral but then - Cassie had asked to accompany him and he could feel the air around her grow tense.
It took a while but with Sunny slaying everything on their way they had eventually reached their temporary home.
Cassie walked in and sat down on the bed that Sunny had summoned.
Sunny to had summoned a chair and sat in it with his one leg over the other as if he were in a therapy session.
"I think you've realized I didn't want to come with you just for fun, huh?"
"Well you're usually smiles around me so I think it wasn't that conspicuous"
She let out a sigh and her shoulders seemed to slump.
"Sunny... I'm sure you've thought about what that vision I had back in the dark sea meant"
"The one about me and Neph having to fight with Gunlaug dead on his throne" - he said it so naturally as if the concept was not at all what it was. He paused and continued with a slight seriousness to his tone.
"I assume you know the name already"
"So it was a True name" - Cassie responded dejected
"Yup"
"So then I betrayed you..." - a tear had found it's way into her eyes threatening to fall.
Sunny dismissed his chair and walked over to the bed sitting besides her.
"I guess you could say that... I mean that's what I felt for a long time" - he put his hand on shoulder and patted it - "but that choice was not really fair was it"
"What?"
"Well I wasn't the best of friends to you during that Timeline and you had a much stronger relationship with Nephis - so it was a natural decision"
Cassie was still tense, very tense but she managed to choke out - "So then how is everything different"
Sunny summoned the endless spring and handed it to her
"Cassie do you know how the original timeline went?"
She took a sip and lowered her hand - "I know that giving your true name to Nephis made me hate you and that you try to kill each other - I know Gunlaug dies and that I did something that tore a hole in me, made me feel..." - She was looking for the right words but then Sunny finished it fir her
"As if something so precious had been lost?"
"... Exactly. But everything was moving different from my visions so I didn't know if maybe my visions were just a possibility or an actuality and if so then why in God's name's did I give your true name to Neph".
Sunny let out a sigh - "Your visions are the future, not a possibility and the reason you gave Neph my true name was because you tried to save her"
Cassie interrupted - "By dooming you? Why would I do that in the first place why would you fight. Above all what's the big deal with that name"
"Geez calm down with the questions" - Sunny chuckled trying to relax the mood.
"Before I found about the future... I was different to you and Nephis during this time, alot more difficult one might say. And you learnt the knowledge that me and Nephis would fight you gave her my true name in hopes to save her"
Cassie listened intently - "I feel like It didn't work"
"Well in a way you saved us both though it took me a long time to realize that. If that secondary flaw of mine was not given to Nephis who could at least be trusted - a murderous bastard would have taken grasp of it"
"What is this secondary flaw..." - Cassie said almost not wanting to ask
"The innate ability of my old aspect - it bound me to someone who knew that true name and made me their slave. I could not disobey anything they want and had to do everything they asked - I'm glad that part of my aspect doesn't exist anymore" - He spoke in a wistful tone
He turned his head and saw the tears flowing from Cassie's milky blue eyes but he didn't move to comfort her.
He laid back his elbows resting on the bed as his looked at the roof - "I didn't trust you for a long time after that... No I actually hated you, maybe both but you gave me back my freedom to"
He turned his head to her and Cassie sensed it through the shadows - "Your true name will come soon and if I can relay the meaning shortly it means you will know of the future, more specifically of the destruction and death it holds and will have to carry the memory of it"
Cassie could feel the laugh boiling in Sunny - "But that was the bullshit fate wanted to give you and I - but I'm different than I was supposed to be. With me you aren't forced to just watch - I can change it, save people and prevent that destruction"
The reason he laughed wasn't because he was trying to comfort Cassie or the fact that he now could prevent so much unnecessary death.
It was a different reason. A simple reason
'Cassie was right in the end... I truly did become a weapon against fate'
Cassie was silent for a long while before she spoke again
"... I promise I won't do anything like that without speaking to you first... Actually I won't do anything like that at all"
"I know Cass" - he raised his head an almost distant gaze showing in his abyss like eyes.
"I assume a lot of... Well forgive my language but a lot of shit things are going to happen in the future and I'm going to get a vision of it soon"
"If that was the bad word you were planning on using it would be that multiplied by at least a billion or 2"
"Well as long as we all are together"
Sunny was moments away from responding with - 'And we're all alive'
He was interrupted by a sudden chill permeating his body and that was saying something - he already knew that the back biting cold of the black mountain was negligible to him and in terms of being he was a lot more shadow than his previous life even as a supreme.
The reason for that was simple - He wasn't just a fellow shadow, their master or their lord or sovereign anymore rather he was now the Heir of Shadows and soon he would be all those other things atop of his Shadowy royalty
And yet he still felt that deep insurmountable chill down his spine. It wasn't the sort of chill one gets when afraid, nor was it the one you'd get from the elements or an odd nightmare creature
Sunny could feel that this chill was like something had been realized something so profound and meaningful that it basically encompassed his entire world
But the thing was - Sunny, while yes knew a lot, changed a lot and as a result changed many other things as a consequence but he himself, did not make any earth-shattering revelations nor had anything been revealed.
"Sunny what's wrong" - Cassie's worried voice came from right besides him
"I don't know I just... I feel it isn't something bad" - he responded quietly easing her worry but his confusion only grew as did the chill.
Suddenly Sunny heard the mechanical voice of the spell and he suddenly knew who had the revelation
[Your shadow has achieved enlightenment]
It paused as if trying to understand or at least trying to put what was happening into words
[Your shadow has reclaimed its aspect - it ancient knowledge and power]
It paused again this time as if something impossible as been done
[Your shadow has reclaimed it's true name]
[Star of Darkness, Lost from light - your Shadow as reclaimed it's aspect as a Shadow Slave and wishes you to become its true master... Speak it's true name]
Sunny could barely understand what was happening, no, rather it was just that what he was hearing was something he had never believed or even imagined would ever happen.
He summoned the Runes of Shadow Knight and gazed at the part where that very name should have been was replaced by something new
[Name: Nyx Solari]
[True Name: Eclipse of Oblivion ]
Sunny looked at the Runes first a greater confusion as to why his shadow now had not just a name but a true name. As to why his name was similar to that of the Greek primordial was a mystery to him similar to why he had not 1 but 2 names.
Perhaps it was some form of poetry or some cruel destined fate for him to become someone with the powers blessed upon them by Shadow God. Nyx was darkness after all and Solari was the sun - and the bridge between those was Shadows.
And that true name... Eclipse of Oblivion - well Sunny was a little saddened as to how cool that true name seemed compared to his, well compared to both of his but that too was a fitting name for his knight - an eclipse was the convergence of the Sun and moon into a position where nothing but shadows marked the lands
But Sunny too knew his Runes, better than most in fact.
Eclipse of Oblivion could very well be translated to Shadow of... Well Oblivion could mean many things honestly - first and most improbable and frankly completely incorrect was the Daemon, next could have either been the void or nothing - both good translations of 'Oblivion'
It was just that all 3 were incorrect after all. I'd he were the shadow of any of those things he would also be their death. As Shadows and Death were one and the same and as far as he knew Nothing still existed and so did the Void.
So perhaps he was the Eclipse of Oblivion in the likely sense as if he were the shadow that would follow destruction
Perhaps like Sunny, Knighty was destined for some great purpose but unlike him, Knighty perished and vanished along with the vast litany of Stars that had been snuffed out by the Corruption, or perhaps Weavers plans involving fate - more specifically it's alterations caused it
Sunny did not know. What he did know was that he was binding a slave to him much as he was bound to Nephis.
Only like he had realized much later and perhaps Knighty was using the same logic
Sunny couldn't help but want to chuckle though he didn't. Cassie would most likely think he had gone mad - well more mad.
But he was reminiscing about something Jet told him that was very closely linked to him, his aspect and now this situation
'Perhaps the only freedom we have is the freedom to choose the chains that bind us'
He stood as walked towards the middle of the room stopping just before where he summoned a table and placed the Shadow Lantern in all its divine glory.
Just as he did a shadow slipped out from the dark gate and a large human form tool shape in front of Sunny the lantern and mist of the table aside from its edges unable to be seen any longer
He saw Shadow Knight and the scars that lined his body, the tears and almost tiredness radiating from him.
Sunny looked at him and Cassie too had felt the new form. Though she didn't know who or what it was especially since she had no shadow sense when Knighty was with her
But she did not do anything because the tone in Sunny's voice was something kind one might say
"Are you sure"
The Knight looked down at him those raging blue orbs that it had for eyes set in Sunny and then he nodded.
He dropped to a knee and thankfully the ground did not crack or break under his weight. His blade was plunged into the ground in front of him much like how sunny had been during his Knighting at valor by Morgan just without him holding the blade
Rather he held something much more potent than a blade.
"Eclipse of Oblivion"
Sunny said it and found an odd feeling rage in him, something was shifting in his body, mind, soul, shadow - all of it.
It wasn't how he felt when he was bound to Nephis for the first time, perhaps it was because he was the slave and she the master but he didn't think that it was the same
Sunny felt a cold permeate his hand and then it spread towards his left hand.
It was something akin to an insignia based tattoo. There was a skull on his hand and a blade going through it and a beautiful design of stripes going up his hand but stopping half way up his forearm.
It honestly looked like something he saw in those 'Mafia Saint and the Sweet Mundane' comics he saw in his past.
But he didn't dwell on that because just as he said the name and tried getting used to the new feeling
Shadow Knight... Well Nyx's body started to change.
All the scars in his body began to vanish and mend before Sunny's eyes and speaking of eyes those blazing flaming orbs had begun to coalesce backwards and forming actual eyes.
The Knight stood before Sunny from its kneel and bowed.
Then Sunny heard it.
[Your Shadow has been destroyed]
"W-What?"
He let out a sigh in the next few moments though as the message that came after explained it.
[You have received a Slave]
'How wonderful as if I didn't have a hundred others or well, I will have'
[Shadow Slave]
Well, there was a first for everything in the end after all - not many would ever see their past aspect on someone else much less having the good end of possibly the worse innate ability in existence
To summarize the Runes shortly it was honestly just a mother set of Runes similar to Sunny. It just lacked other things such as the sections for shadows, echoes, memories and even...
'Where the hell is the fragment count'
Well that was something else easy to explain especially after looking at a particular attribute of the knight.
It was a bound attribute.
Specifically it stated [Shadow bound] - This echo is now bound to your shadow and will not perish until your shadow does as is the will of his power
Suddenly the true name became clear and had an explanation
Eclipse of Oblivion meant that for himself, he was the death or more specifically the Shadow of his own death - he was the death of his own oblivion as long as he was bound
As long as he was bound. Shadow knight would not die until his master did.
"Sunny what the hell is happening" - Cassie whisper shouted
Sunny paused. The implications of what had just happened was not something that one could process easily
Rather they could it was just something impossible but Sunny too had done the impossible
"Knighty has evolved... No rather he has a bit of his old self"
Cassie held that incredibly confused expression and it grew even more but before she could talk Sunny did first - "He found himself... His aspect his name I don't even know how but he did"
Then Sunny's eyes fell on the blade - it wasn't the blade of manifested shadows it was a blade forged from a particularly black stone
'not stone... That's... That's bone'
And then the fragment of mind weave allowed Sunny to quickly understand what happened.
The Knight. His knight went into the shadow realm, and did something - whatever he did he got himself back and had forged a blade out of the bone of a shadow serpent. One of the more powerful colossal ones - one of the divine ones.
'perhaps it was his one... His serpent'
"He has a name? " - Cassie calmed slightly, perhaps glad that there was no danger or perhaps glad that the danger was on their side
"Well, I guess the most fitting part of his name to use on something... No, to call someone this incredible is... Eclipse"
"Well, it's not Knighty but if that's his name then I guess it's good"
Cassie spoke very happily without any shock. Perhaps the reason was that knowledge of soul bound things were not something she knew yet. Nor was the incredible feat of braving the Shadow Realm, or even forging something out of that incredibly tough bone.
" Well... How about we put his power to the test?"
" What... How?"
Sunny was going to accomplish his main goal of this expedition back to the ruined cathedral.
The forsaken Knight was going to die.
Die by the hands of a Shadow, his Shadow slave and the oracle.