A thing born of darkness, dug from beneath the soil.

There were many things in the world which sought to claim evil’s mantle. But what I saw was something so vile that even the light around it seemed to wilt. A thing which twisted and contorted under the weight of its own malice.

I took a step away, my hand covering my mouth.

Why, the way it wobbled, the way it lurched …

It was just like the giant flan cake at my 8th birthday party!

A fortress of custard, vanilla chiffon and crème caramel. A sculpted marvel of jiggling sweetness. A staggering treat without end, solidified from a river of sugar and the tears of my playmates tasked with watching on in envy. 

Except that at 1.94 metres tall, it also possessed the structural stability of a dandelion in a gale. 

Something my anonymous gifter doubtless knew. When it fell, it groaned, making a noise like a capsizing ship as it came crashing down towards me. 

And that’s the story of how I survived my 22nd assassinion attempt, aged 8.

“Fascinating,” said the generic robed man, all animosity removed from his voice as he jotted upon a scroll which hadn’t existed a breath ago. “A shadow demon from the abyss. An embodiment of fear itself. One which hasn’t fed upon its prey, but attached itself to it like a parasite. Highly aberrant behaviour. And it went utterly undetected even under close examination. Remarkable!”

I leaned away slightly, uncertain where upon this … thing’s constantly twisting body I was supposed to direct my distaste towards.

A shadow demon!

I knew nothing about these foul things, other than they were dredged from children’s nightmares. 

Even so, it was plain they were neither common nor easy foes. A creature formed of darkness, it clearly lacked a heart to strike and a head to remove. Not even the most powerful of knightly lances could hope to piece such shapeless things.

“Wow~ I’ve never seen one of these before!” said Coppelia, excitement scribbled upon her face. “These are the sort of things you hear about from some frightened survivor after everyone else in the village has been killed! … Like her.”

She pointed at the quivering peasant.

Still in her cage, the woman stared behind her shoulder at the monster which had moments ago inhabited her shadow. She attempted to make herself small by curling into a ball. A popular tactic now also being employed by a former noblewoman.

Renise was hugging the nearby wall, all the while doing her best impersonation of a servant unwilling to spill wine over the pre-designated dinner guests. I sincerely hoped that when the time came, she’d meet her important tripping duties with more enthusiasm. 

“A shadow demon,” she said, her hushed voice clearly resounding amidst the unfurnished chamber. “An actual demon … I can feel its evil, like some twisted wraith.”

“Nah, these are way worse than wraiths,” answered Coppelia cheerily. “Wraiths are formless, but they still have something going on there. Like magic. Some invisible weave of life. Or even some of their soul. But this thing is nothing. At least until it swipes at you. It’s a walking void which shouldn’t exist. Shadow demons are super dangerous. And reaaaal slippery. Much more than any ghost.”

“I … I see … but it can be defeated, yes? Preferably before it does … whatever it seems to be doing?”

Renise looked at me in hope. I shook my head in response.

After all–

There was no defeating a lack of decorum.

That was an enemy as old as the first time a genuine cough wasn’t followed by a statement. And here was something which had been judged and found wanting for a far graver crime.

Presenting itself before me without formal attire.

Frankly, any creature made of shadows was also one which lacked any excuse not to be shaped ready for a dance. If it wished to be brutally rejected by me, then it needed to be dressed appropriately for it. 

Naturally, I was long used to the poorly fitted appearances of those sitting at my tea table. But while I didn’t forgive them either, I at least understood their poverty.

But this?

The height of laziness. 

And there was only one response I could offer to such impropriety. The kindest there was.

To fully shine a light upon it!

“Ohohoho … to present yourself so haphazardly is a bold choice,” I said, offering a smile as I raised my sword. “It’s also the wrong one, so I shall offer to highlight the problem areas.” 

As the light fell upon it, the demon’s silhouette pulsed like a creature breaking free from an egg. 

It twisted and fought against invisible restraints until they no longer held. A moment later, the shadowy mass contorted into a lupine form, hind legs bent as though ready to leap. 

It did no such thing. 

Instead … it flew. 

For a single moment, the clear visage of a black wolf could be seen as it rose to the ceiling before plunging towards me. Clawed tendrils for paws extended forwards, reaching out like the hands of common merchants seeking my pockets.

The illumination from my sword began to grow.

“[Reading Light].”

Using what was reserved exclusively for reading beneath my duvet, highlighting imperfections in the cuffs of my maids and blowing up arcana crystals upon the armour of golems, I allowed Starlight Grace to scatter the night itself.

A blinding light filled all the edges of the chamber. But it was upon this shadow where it struck most.

It was no [Spring Breeze]. But to a creature formed of darkness, it may as well have been.

The shadow demon was thrown back, its twisting form slamming against the back of the chamber as it was held in place like a rooster to a spit.

Ssshhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.

And there, it burned.

A hissing sound filled the air. A shrill and unnatural cry which no living creature could sound.

A dark smoke rose from around its silhouette as it began to shrink. Dissipating like the door which never existed, the monster contracted until a threadbare husk remained. A further hiss filled my ears. A wrangled cry filled with ancient malevolence.

And then–

KkkKKrrrrRrAAaaaAAAAAaaaAAAAAAAhahhaAaHaahaHHhaHhaHa.

And then it began to laugh.

A garbled impression of laughter as it was forced into a light it could not possibly withstand.

All the way until the moment it was there no longer.

Starlight Grace quietened as the husk disappeared. Moonlight gradually returned to the chamber, streaming in through the conveniently open doorway behind us.

Seeing a barren wall free of décor once again, I raised a hand to my lips, barely covering my smile.

“Ohhohohohohoho! Behold, no shadow can withstand the light of my smile … and also my [Reading Light]! The scandalous quips of romance leads beneath my duvets are deadlier than anything this spawn from the abyss could ever hope to threaten me with!”

A powerful adversary from the darkness?

Ohohoho … perhaps so. But it’d chosen a poor foe to challenge. And so as the light from my sword faded, I basked instead in the astonishment of those around me as they stared at the wall where the shadow had been dispersed.

And then continued to stare.

“Um … Miss Juliette …”

Because from the recesses of the stone, it returned like water dripping through a gap.

To my astonishment, dark liquid crawled down the wall like lines of marching ants. It pooled at the foot, before whole strands began connecting like woven fabric.

What emerged was even more distorted than before.

It looked … wrong.

A fabrication of even shadow, for it resembled the silhouette of no creature which had ever existed. 

Devoid of the constraints of flesh and bones, it stretched as it towered above me, a slender torso comprised of a hundred misshapen limbs. They were grotesque appendages, spindly and cruel like broken arms, each with digits like ordinary, grotesque carrots still clinging to their roots.

The limbs convulsed, phantom bones seeking to lock itself against joints which did not exist. And though the creature jerked in silent agony as it fought to maintain a semblance of shape, those arms were the only things which remained ominously constant. 

As it rose, it stared.

A notable feat for something possessing no eyes. And yet there was no mistaking how its limbs reached towards a single figure.

Me.

“Astonishing,” said the generic robed man, still busily scribbling away. “Even when dispersed by the strength of your enchanted light, it was able to shelter in the shallow lining of the stonework. That should not be possible. This is an exceptionally powerful spawn.”

He broke into an excitable smile as he looked up from his scroll towards me.

“Why, I do believe you’re in extreme danger.”

I opened my mouth to respond. 

All that came out was my grief as the creature leapt.

A horrifying ordeal. 

Why, to fail to dress itself was one thing! But to not allow a response when someone was speaking to me was quite another!

Seeing no other recourse, I offered the full extent of my scowl … and also my sword, now brimming with light from indignation alone.

The limbed horror reacted as the illumination fell upon it.

Faster than a blink, it moved … no, shifted.

Receding like a wave, its slender, if twisted form curved away from the heart of my sword’s glare. And so I swept the light across the chamber instead. It leapt over with ungainly agility, defying its narrow form to once more fall upon me like a maddened hound. As my sword rose to meet it, the creature yet again shifted to the side like fire bending to the wind. 

I was aghast.

Why, to so cowardly avoid being burned by my sword’s glare was the height of uncouth!

At this rate, I’d need to use [Reading Light] just to strike it a second time! An outrageous thought. To use the same skill consecutively was what mages in scandalous undergarments did!

Even so … I had no means to strike it other than with a greater light.

As powerful as Starlight Grace’s typical gleam was, this demon managed to avoid it as easily as priests did my tax inspectors. But even should I use my [Reading Light] again, what would it achieve other than to force it to recede into the darkness again?

Indeed, against such a foe as this, it was not light which was required.

Clap.

It was an even greater darkness.

All of a sudden, a pure void blacker than any creature born of shadows filled the chamber.

Nothing reached my eyes. And yet within that unfaltering darkness, I felt even a shadow quiver. 

And no wonder.

Coppelia’s scythe was a far less gentle instrument than my sword.

“[Eclipse Form].”

For a brief moment, its moonlit blade glowed before being enveloped in a sinister cloud. One only a fraction as worrying as Coppelia’s smile as her agile form swept through the air.

“Welcome to the top of the bucket list!~”

The shadow turned at once.

Twisted arms extended like the branches of whatever horrific trees resided in Coppelia’s library. Serrated digits for fingers grew each to the size of hooked knives as it swiped at the clockwork doll armed with her blackened scythe.

“[Eclipse Whirl].”

And between a shadow of pure darkness and a scythe carried by a smiling clockwork doll, the scythe proved the blacker of the two.

Swoosh.

Limbs were sliced off as Coppelia twisted in the air.

Using herself as a weapon, she sent herself through it. A barrier of blades which suffered no resistance as she proceeded straight through the mass of the shadowed creature.

KkkKKrrrrArrRrAAaAaaaAhHhHAAAHhhAAAaaaHhahHhHh

A horrific scream … laughter … or perhaps both. 

None could possibly know what it was. But the sound filled the chamber as the creature was divided. Amidst falling limbs, two halves convulsed grotesquely as they slumped down. 

Broken. But only temporarily.

The moment they touched the stone floor, the two halves immediately sought to reconnect, strands reaching out as the shape of a thousand tiny fingertips.

A poor choice. Coppelia was not yet finished.

She landed deftly, meeting the swiping limbs which sought to slash at her knees with a sweeping rake behind her, snipping them like overgrown vines.

Then, without even wasting a moment to turn, she acrobatically bent herself backwards. Her scythe twisted around in her hands as it swept overhead like a reverse pickaxe. Its tip plunged directly into the demon where the two halves had already reconnected. The mass squirmed and twisted violently. 

Sensing danger, it fled into the gaps of the stone floor.

But where the tip was connected, the shadow could not break free. 

It could not escape.

Coppelia easily looked at me as I approached, even with her back impressively bent. She gave a smile, followed by a wink.

“Hey, hey, can I have what’s left?”

“Hm? Of a shadow?”

“Mmh~ a demon’s still a demon. It’ll probably leave something. And I like loot.”

I let out a small sigh. 

Not because I wished to decline. Rather, she hardly needed to ask.

Why, the ends of her fluffy, golden hair was now brushing against the floor! That was a sacrifice nobody deserved to make.

“By all means, please take whatever you’d like.”

“Yay~”

“Having said that, what would you even use … whatever it leaves behind for?”

“A huge amount of money to aid us on our expedition to rid the kingdom of knaves and squirrels. Or a really expensive smoothie ingredient.”

I raised a brow. 

A moment later, I also raised my sword.

The light burned the shadow demon as it squirmed. And this time, it could not escape as I leaned forward to perform my most devastating attack. Again.

“Poke.”

A tap of my sword.

Strange.

I didn’t know creatures composed of shadows were capable of making expressions.

But just before it shattered like cloth with all its lines of fabric undone, and countless strands of shadow melted before me, I saw an unexpected thing before this embodiment of terror vanished into the nether.

Fear.

That was good.

All things had to learn eventually. And nothing was exempt.

Not even fear itself.