Savior in Shadow Slave

Murphy kept running, the unconscious woman slung over his back—a sight that would've been almost comical, given the difference in their size.

Honestly, he could've holed up just about anywhere for the night. Any half-collapsed building or broken shelter might've sufficed—for today.

But none of those would be permanent. Not even close.

The Dark City was far more dangerous in this time than it would be later—when Sunny and his cohort arrived. Right now, it was chaos. Overrun.

Even if he found a spot to hide, it would be sniffed out within half an hour—claimed, invaded, or devoured by whatever corrupted thing roamed closest.

Had it been a normal time, or if this had been just another isolated fight, Murphy might've welcomed the challenge. Fought them off. Killed them all.

But sadly, this wasn't that kind of day.

He was carrying an unconscious woman. And this city was crawling with corrupted monsters—territorial, hungry, and restless.

They'd come for her. They'd come for him. And they'd come fast.

The only reason he'd gotten away with fighting the troll was because it had been strong—too strong.

Strong enough that the lesser beasts had learned to keep their distance.

Murphy kept moving, head low, pace steady. The Ruined Cathedral was still far. And the city had just started moving again.

Murphy moved fast, but never blindly. His heightened senses flared constantly in this grim game of cat and mouse—though unfortunately, he was the mouse.

Still, it meant he noticed the change first. Even before the monsters.

RUMBLE.

The ground beneath his feet trembled. A slow, deep vibration—like the city itself had begun to shudder awake.

His breath hitched.

"The fuck?" he muttered, eyes darting upward.

"Why the hell is there an earthquake? That never happened in the novel!"

His voice cracked into the silence, but the city had no answers.

Just more shaking.

A heavy sense of wrongness slammed into his chest like a second heartbeat—one not his own.

He stopped running. Turned.

His gaze locked on the great wall—the boundary he'd crossed when he first arrived here.

And then he understood.

Because Kalpata was bound to him now, he could feel it. A faint pressure beyond the wall.

A slow, terrible rise. The Dark Sea.

Not as it had been. Not at its old level.

But higher. Growing. Encroaching.

And not just in tides or storms. No—Reaching.

Reaching for the city like it had finally smelled something worth devouring.

His throat went dry.

"The Dark Sea... it's creeping forward. At this pace, it'll reach the walls in two, maybe three years."

Not fast. But inevitable.

A slow, cosmic doom—one that was never in the book. One that should never have existed.

And something inside him whispered the question he didn't want to ask:

'What the hell did the Spell change? What did it give?'

"I just hope this is temporary," Murphy muttered under his breath,

"and that all my speculations are wrong."

He didn't wait for an answer—just turned on his heel and ran.

The Ruined Cathedral was still his best shot. Maybe his only one.

Behind him, the city groaned. The tremors hadn't stopped.

And the panic had begun.

The Dark City, for all its filth and decay, had been unnervingly still for a long time. Its twisted residents—those corrupted things—had grown used to the sameness of it all.

Fight. Eat. Fight again.

That was their world. That was their law.

But now—change.

Change was foreign. Change was terrifying. And the earthquake shattered more than stone.

Murphy could feel it.

A deep psychic rupture across the city. The moment the earth shifted, something in the corrupted broke with it.

The creatures began to scream. And then they turned on each other.

Madness. Feral, directionless madness.

Beasts, ghouls, and forgotten horrors clawed and tore at anything that moved—as if killing something else might stop the shaking beneath their feet.

Murphy didn't look back.

He adjusted the unconscious girl on his back and kept running. Because whatever this was—it wasn't just an earthquake.

It was a signal. Something had begun.

***

After nearly an hour of running, Murphy finally reached the Ruined Cathedral.

It stood in all its horrifying glory—towering, broken, eternal.

And at its gate, a massacre.

The ground was littered with corpses—at least a dozen beasts, maybe more. Twisted limbs. Torn wings. Shattered jaws. Creatures from different depths of corruption, all dead and discarded like scraps at the feet of something greater.

Murphy narrowed his eyes. Seems like this place was attacked by frenzied creatures during the quake...

But how could they fight a Lord? A Fallen Devil—especially one who commands True Darkness?

The answer lay in the carnage. Slaughter.

Not a battle. Just... eradication.

Every beast here had likely died within hours—maybe even minutes. And probably without even scratching the Forsaken Knight.

Murphy exhaled slowly, shifting the unconscious woman on his back. Even now, with everything he had, he couldn't defeat the Knight.

Not unless he was willing to burn ten years of his time—which he absolutely wasn't.

'[Samsara] is still on cooldown—seven months left.'

'And I've got her with me. I just hope I don't have to fight it.'

He glanced at the cathedral's entrance.

Silent. Still. Too still.

And somewhere beyond that door...something was waiting.

Murphy's head throbbed—not because of the slaughter laid before him, nor even the looming presence of the Forsaken Knight.

No. This pain came from within.

His flaw.

The maddening whispers of stories were no longer mere background noise. They were claws. They were teeth. Gnawing at the edges of his sanity, flooding his mind with fragments, scenes, and possibilities.

He clenched his jaw, nausea rising.

Focus.

How did Sunny enter the cathedral in the novel?

He dug into memory, forcing the flood of voices aside.

"Sunny's lair was in the upper part of a ruined cathedral, the entrance hidden behind a tall statue of some unknown goddess..."

He blinked. "The balcony was really high ab—"

He stopped himself. Unnecessary information.

How to get in? Come on, come on...

Then it clicked.

'Right. Sunny got in through the roof.'

There had been a gaping hole. He'd landed on one of the wide support beams, then walked across and, by sheer accident, discovered the small hidden balcony.

That was how it happened. How it was written.

Murphy's eyes lifted toward the cathedral's roof. He couldn't see the hole from here.

"I just hope it's already been made."

Because if it wasn't...If he had to punch his way through stone—The Devil might notice.

And Murphy had no intention of waking a Fallen Lord with a woman on his back and [Samsara] seven months from ready.

***

Murphy stared up at the looming cathedral, its jagged spires cutting into the ashen sky like rusted blades.

The hole Sunny will use—if it existed right now—was somewhere up there, hidden among fractured stone and broken support beams.

He adjusted the unconscious woman on his back and took a deep breath.

'No room for mistakes. Not here.'

The Forsaken Knight was still inside and any sudden disturbance might draw its gaze. And that would be troublesome.

He moved to the side of the building, boots scraping quietly against the blood-streaked stone.

Loose debris shifted beneath his feet, forcing him to take slower, more deliberate steps.

'One handhold at a time. Test the stone. Shift the weight.'

Every movement was silent. Measured. Tense.

His enhanced senses were stretched to their limit, constantly scanning for even the faintest ripple of presence from within the cathedral. But all he could feel was that thick, oppressive silence. The kind that came before a storm.

Halfway up, he paused—pressing his body flat against the wall as a jagged shadow flickered across the cathedral's broken stained-glass window.

Nothing followed. Just the wind.

He exhaled slowly through his nose and continued.

The climb grew harder near the top. The stone became more fractured, jagged, unstable. One wrong step and he wouldn't fall—he'd plummet. The woman wouldn't survive it.

'Don't think about it. Trust the weight. Trust the hold.'

And then—he saw it.

A jagged black opening, partially concealed by a collapsed archway near the far edge of the upper roof.

'The hole.'

Exactly where it was in the novel. Or at least… close enough.

He reached the ledge, slowly hoisted himself over the broken stone, and collapsed into a low crouch.

The woman on his back stirred faintly but didn't wake.

Murphy turned to face the dark maw of the roof's opening.

Below it—somewhere in the hall of the cathedral—the Forsaken Knight waited.

He closed his eyes for just a second. Let the whispers howl. Let the nausea burn.

Then he opened them again. And stepped inside.

Murphy stepped into the chamber, letting the silence settle around him like a cloak.

The room was old—once used by a priestess, long before the world soured. Dust clung to the faded tapestries.

But there were no monsters. No whispers. No eyes watching from the dark. Just stillness.

"Safe."

Murphy exhaled. A genuine, bone-deep sigh of relief. He slumped down, careful not to jostle the woman still unconscious on his back, and let himself breathe.

He looked around—not at the ruins, but at the future.

"Next... I'll start clearing the city. Street by street."

"Then I'll gather supplies—meat, water, proper clothing. Tools if I can."

His eyes flicked toward the cracked ceiling.

"And after that... I'll begin searching for the others who got transported here."

But that could wait.

For now, he closed his eyes. And turned his attention inward—toward the soul he'd just claimed.

The soul of the Cursed Troll pulsed faintly inside him. A smoldering core of fear, betrayal, and violence.

Murphy reached out to it.

When he decided to listen to the Troll's story, the head ache disappeared and a soothing melody resounded.

And the story began to unfold.

Long before it was a beast, it was a man.

A soldier.

Not a hero, not even a villain—just a nameless, faceless weapon in a forgotten war that tore through the world.

He was strong. Loyal. And utterly forgettable.

His name was never recorded. But his sin was.

During the war with dark forces, he committed the greatest sin.

During the Siege of the Black Bastion, he was ordered to hold the line while the reinforcement came along with others.

He obeyed. Until the screams grew louder than the promises.

Then, he abandoned his city. Abandoned his brothers.

When he emerged days later, soaked in blood that wasn't his own, the city had already fallen—along with everyone inside.

After that he went to another city to escape his sin. But he couldn't find solace there either.

The noble warriors declared him a coward.

The priests called him a betrayer.

But the true punishment came not from men, but from the Dark Sea itself.

As he fled across the shattered lands, something answered his cowardice. Something ancient. Something that was betrayed too.

A curse clung to him—slowly at first, like a shadow stretching too far. His flesh began to twist. His thoughts unraveled. Fear grew inside him, feeding off itself. Every heartbeat was an echo of the moment he ran.

His skin thickened. His voice turned into a snarl. His spine cracked and bent.

Until he no longer remembered what he had fled from—only that he must flee. Always flee.

And when he couldn't flee, he killed. Because that was safer. Because dead things don't chase you.

He became known only as the Cursed Troll.

A creature of brute strength and deep, soul-rooted fear. He roamed the outer edges of the Dark City, nesting in alleys and half-flooded ruins. Until now.

Slain by Murphy, under the radiant edge of Rengoku—not because he was weak, but because his fear finally outweighed his strength.

The origin of the Cursed Troll lingered in the air—a cautionary tale of betrayal's price.

'So this was the consequence of treachery.'

A slow, deliberate breath escaped him as he turned. The unconscious woman lay before him, her chest rising and falling in the rhythm of forced sleep.

'Then I suppose I'll do my own sin.'

Something stirred behind his ribs—not guilt, not hesitation, but the electric hum of a decision crystallizing. His fingers flexed. He stepped closer.

The woman's eyelashes fluttered—not waking, instead deep in sleep.

A smile touched his lips. Not cruel. Not kind. Simply acknowledgment.

The night held its breath as he extended his hand.