His gaze lingered on his shadow. He stood frozen in shock, yet thanks to his passive skill, Remorseless, his expression remained calm, betraying none of the alarm surging through him.

Ashergon was staring directly at him. However, it did not seem as though the great dragon had managed to escape his imprisonment.

Damon had used the Book of Shadows to seal away the great dragon, but he had been far too weak to maintain such a seal on his own. In the end, he had tossed the book into his shadow storage, using the combined power of his shadow and the storage space itself to keep both the book and Ashergon contained.

However, Ashergon was ancient. A creature that old was bound to possess methods beyond common understanding.

For that reason, he was staring right at Damon.

"Ahh," Damon groaned, dragging a hand down his face. As if it was not bad enough that he already had Ashcroft, the Demon Lord of Domination, living in his head, now he also had to deal with the voice of a great dragon.

He glanced toward Renata and found her staring at his shadow, several beads of sweat visible on her forehead as she slowly edged backward.

"That... he can’t escape, right?" she asked, taking another cautious step away from Damon and his dragon-infested shadow.

Damon turned toward Lilith, only to discover she had already teleported to the farthest end of the laboratory.

"What was that?"

Lilith merely shrugged, looking entirely unconcerned with the fact that a dragon capable of burning nations was currently peering out from someone’s shadow.

Damon scoffed before lowering his gaze once more.

"You dare come into my shadow?" he asked, forcing his voice into as much calm authority as possible.

Ashergon’s vast draconic eyes narrowed into thin slits.

"We’ve already established you are a fraud. Do not test me."

Damon’s hands trembled slightly with indignation. Sure, he was not Ashcroft, but he had still defeated Ashergon. Underhandedly, yes, but a win was a win.

"Yet you lost to a fraud. What does that make you?"

His words caused the dragon’s eyes to churn within the darkness like a storm trapped beneath black water. Yet all of Ashergon’s fury amounted to nothing before the power restraining him. He could not leave unless Damon released him.

And Ashergon would never beg.

His draconic pride would never allow it.

"Grrr..." A low growl rumbled from the shadows. "Free me, and I shall grant you a merciful death."

Damon sighed heavily and rubbed his temple.

"Can you shut up for a moment? You’re a very annoying background noise. Jeez, have you heard yourself talk, you damn edge lord?"

Coming from Damon, a literal shadow user, that spoke volumes.

"Stop trying to sound different. I know you can speak like the rest of us. Nobody thinks you’re cool. You’re stuck in the shadow of a guy weaker than you. Do you want to know what you are? A bum. No, worse than that. You’re a fraudddddd."

Renata watched him tear into Ashergon with insult after insult. Slowly she leaned closer to Lilith.

"He really feels sour about being called a fraud."

"Yeah, I’d hate to be Ashergon right now," Lilith whispered back.

After several minutes, Damon finally stopped his verbal assault. Having thoroughly lost the exchange, Ashergon reluctantly withdrew deeper into Damon’s shadow to sulk.

Which honestly made Damon feel like he was dealing with a child.

A very powerful child capable of burning an entire continent if he so desired.

Damon sighed and turned his attention toward the newly advanced Seventh Class shadow drone. 𝒻𝓇𝑒𝘦𝘸𝑒𝒷𝓃ℴ𝑣𝘦𝑙.𝒸ℴ𝘮

Its power was impressive to say the least.

He reached forward and pulled back the hood. Beneath it was a suit of gleaming armor that covered the figure completely, a helm concealing its face and leaving only a narrow visor exposed.

A dark glow flickered behind it.

Damon casually waved a hand.

The armored figure immediately collapsed into a living shadow, melting soundlessly into the floor before flowing across the ground and merging with his own shadow at his feet.

Moments later he summoned it back.

The figure rose from the darkness and solidified once more.

Damon nodded slowly.

This thing was as powerful as someone in the Seventh Class Advancement.

"Yes. I have decided a creature like this must serve a very important purpose."

Renata and Lilith exchanged a glance.

Was he finally ready to attack the temple head-on and remove it from power?

For years they had worked together spreading a more atheistic ideology among the people.

Though in truth it was simply another form of religion, one devoted to the pursuit of credible knowledge rather than worship of a figure in the sky.

"You used the corpses of those Seventh Class monsters who died fighting the outsiders on the Demon Continent."

Renata nodded, resting a hand on her waist.

"For the most part. I did use a lot of other materials. Creating something like this costs a lot, though the base material is Seventh Class. The more of them we have, the more we can make."

"Can’t believe you’re treating those in the Seventh Class like materials," Damon whispered.

"But we’re at war, so some of them will die, and when they do we’ll be there to rob their tombs," he added with a smile.

Those who reached the Seventh Class were usually honored and buried within family tombs and grand mausoleums.

"Hmm. Why wait for them to die when we can steal... I mean borrow some from existing tombs? They may not be as good as fresh ones, but they’d still do," Lilith said calmly.

Damon had actually been joking, but both Lilith and Renata looked completely serious.

"Erm... we are talking about grave robbery here."

Lilith nodded slowly.

"It’s so sad. I can’t believe anyone would do such a thing."

She did not sound sad.

Renata, however, lowered her head as tears suddenly began gathering in her eyes.

"We have to accept this. I feel so sad."

Their acting skills almost convinced Damon, even though he was fairly certain both of them were lying through their teeth.

So, deciding to match their energy, he put on a righteous expression.

"Why would Amon do such a thing? How can he stoop to robbing graves and desecrating our ancestors?"

He was Amon.

Amon was his alter ego.

Yet here he was speaking as though he were merely an outraged witness.

If there was a god, Damon felt that deity had a responsibility to punish these people.

Damon sighed and shook his head.

"Too bad we can’t use the lesser gods without breaking their seals and letting them out."

"Anyway, what do you want to use this Seventh Class shadow for?" Lilith asked, recalling that he had called it a very important assignment.

"Oh, this? Its job is to guard my dear Ranar. Feels like forever since I last saw her."

"So you’re going to deploy an asset in the Seventh Class to be a glorified babysitter?" Lilith asked, smiling faintly.

"Yep," Damon answered without hesitation.

Renata snapped her fingers.

"Right, speaking of baby Ranar, she’d be happy to see you since you’ve been gone for almost two and a half years."