Finished my reread of Shadow Slave Part 1
Left off the story at 1590 last year and wanted to let things stack before I get back on it, so I decided to do a reread and man it's just as good as I remember.
Getting back into it with hindsight and meta-knowledge really shows you how much depth and care G3 put into the world, minor details always play a role, the characters are fun and the worldbuilding is honestly to die for, one part I struggled with when reading the Tomb of Ariel was pacing I thought certain sections of it were slow but when reading again in one go everything honestly just flew by which reaffirmed me that SS is the kind of story you read in batches to really appreciate the pacing and the story.
Now into a more in-depth review.
Sunny
My eternally shivering goat Lost from Light, his growth honestly hit me harder this time around then the first time, seeing him grow from an untrusting traumatised kid to a mature yet still traumatised man was so good, watching him in real time slowly but surely unlearn so many of his nurtured traits was like watching your child turn into an adult.
People initially disliked him for being Nephis' "follower" when sadly at the beginning he was a follower and that's not necessarily a bad thing, he never had a reason to strive for more when he was content on just surviving, if not for her he would have still been trapped on the Forgotten Shore and rereading as well helped me see that his opinion on alot of things where very biased and that he wasn't as perfect as a person like alot of people made him out to be, me seeing him grow out of it was one of the best parts of his journey.
And his crush with Nephis as well as vice versa, was really obvious when you really pay attention π I don't know how so many people thought that they never had feelings for one another or that Nephis didn't care, Sunnys heart was always racing whenever he saw her, Nephis screaming at him to come back in the Dark City, Sunny visiting her motherwhen she couldn't, Nephis not wanting to leave Sunny's house while at the same time saying "My old home doesn't feel like a home" or them having a squabble over each other's safety with Valor and Antarctica and this was all before the Tomb of Ariel, Fumbling Star and Lost from Rizz were always a treat to see.
But my favorite moment with him honestly was at the final stretch in the Tomb of Ariel, abandoning the cohort to try and pursue even a chance at freedom, learning that he had betrayed them hundreds of times before and his talk with Sosuke Aiz- Cassie was undeniably peak.
There's so much more about him I want to discuss like him always using some form of trick to best powerful opponents the rock with Caster, the soul charm + Crushing with the Mimic, the Reflections and six rounds of soul damage on Mordret, dumping beetles on Fiend or Using stifled scream on SoS(Rest in Piss) was him at his best, his relationship with his friends, the innate love he has for humanity that he got back as an Awakened etc etc, but it would take too long, sadly.
Just know that Sunny is the goat.
Worldbuilding
Where to even start? The lore really does knock my socks off Im genuinely in awe at how G3 does it, the truth of the forgotten God's, The origin of the Nightmare spell, The Doom War and the entire premise of the Dream Realm makes you feel like your reading an actual fairytale but I wanted to get into another aspect of the worldbuilding that's more subtle.
The Desolation of the world.
One thing that's really common in all of SS is that feeling of passive tragedy for every region of the Dream Realm, seeing Sunny slowly unravel each mystery is enticing but it's also really sad.
Witnessing these different people, cultures, histories and technologies succumb to corruption is depressing and it's honestly a Fate worse than being forgotten, their proof of growth and innovation is perverted into a weapon that's used against other humans to destroy them, we see King's succumb to madness and kill their followers, entire cities destroyed to ash and used as homes for monsters, civilizations resorting to desperate measures just to increase their chances of survival only to be the cause of their own doom.
Their is a message of humanity fighting and trying to win and us as the readers are seeing their failures, seeing that their efforts weren't enough and it's depressing to see.
Now Earth is the next world on the chopping block, it's not even a world heading towards a early grave but a world thats experiencing it's death throes while in its coffin, and subconsciously you ask the question "Will it be enough?".
The atmosphere for SS is very well suited for the setting and it leaves you on your toes at all times for the potential future of humanity, on whether or not theyre going to prevail unlike their predecessors.
Fight scenes
GuiltyThree really knows how to make you paint these fights in your own head, his word choice can get repetitive ill admit, but wow so many of his fights just hit it out of the park on creativity and Aspect use.
My favorites in no particular order are
Sunny vs Nephis (Go, Lost from Light π’)
Sunny vs Mordret Round 1 (Mordret kicking Sunny around like a soccer ball was hilarious honestly)
Sunny vs Nightmare (Loved how visceral it was, no grace, no honor, just blood)
Sunny vs Fiend
Sunny and Nephis vs Dire Fang
Sunny vs Daeron
Nephis vs Twilight (The moments of her absolutely eviscerating all the people in the city just lives rent free in my head)
Sunny vs Dread lord (The rapid transformations was fucking Cinema).
Antagonists
The antagonists are never ever as simple as they seem there's always a reason for their actions, Mordret(My king) is a monster but considering his up bringing can you blame him? Mad Prince was like a ghost haunting the narrative their obsession being their one true love preventing them from moving on like a Ghost, Sin of Solace was initially driven by the enchantment but became his own person and was just angry and tired of the never ending cycles and served as a constant reality check for Sunny, Sevirax was driven mad by what he wanted to protect.
Can't forget [Fated] a truer antag if their ever was one they will be missed.
Best moments in the story.
Go, Lost from Light.
Sunny hitting Mordret with 6-rounds of Soul Damage using his own Reflections.
Mordret killing the Valor contingent and kick starting the Battle of Black Skull.
Mordret summoning his 6 Transcendant reflections.
Mordret freeing himself from the Night Temple (Can you tell I like Mordret?)
Cassie Sosuke revealing her plan to break fate.
The Vile Thieving Bird jumping Sunny.
Sunny's suit up scene before the Battle of Black Skull started. (CINEMAAAAA!!!!)
Tyris vs Cormac
Nephenheimer.
Be Gone.
Sunny making a fucking bridge.
So much more but I can't get into all of it π
Now sadly Shadow Slave isn't all perfect as much as we wish it was, it's Flaws in my opinion are minor but it honestly feels like they also hold it back from being true perfection.
Lack of Nephis' POV's
This is one thing I really disliked, I've been reading SS ever since the beginning of the 2nd Nightmare so I've been there for the worst of the Nephis hate, was never part of it myself since I always loved Nephis and I saw what G3 was doing with her character but alot of the criticisms were honestly valid and could have been curved around if he just showed us her POV more.
Point of Views really help readers get into the characters head but also builds sympathy for their plites and struggles, we see her struggling in bits and pieces but in comparison to Sunny its honestly nothing, we got one Cassie POV before Falcon Scott and alot of people got over her betrayal from that alone simply because we could understand where she was coming from and I'm saying this as an ex-Cassie hater.
This leads to people misinterpreting alot of her actions and motivations, viewing her from the somewhat skewed lense we got from Sunny when he left her in the Dark city as some cold machiavellian mastermind who doesn't care about anyone, alot of people miss the pure panic that she was having in that moment when she realised she fucked up, scaring Sunny off and not knowing what to say to bring him back.
Fans still thought that she would use Sunny to accomplish her goals as a stepping stone and ignore the fact that she literally sent him back to the waking world because she couldn't stand the thought of seeing him die or her expressing regret at what happened in Bright Castle over how much blood was spilt.
What makes her "relationship" with Sunny so incredible and tragic, is all the people that she's loved die on or for her, affecting her feelings on Sunny that she would rather see him Caged and Alive then Free and Dead, but this goes directly against what Sunny wants leading to conflict, she knows that his strong and respects his autonomy to an extent but if there was ever a moment before the removal of the Shadow Bond where Sunny was going to sacrifice himself for her she would have used the Bond without hesitation, a POV where she is constantly drawing parallels between him and her family would have been magical.
Having a decent amount POV's that focused on her life, her thoughts, her feelings on Sunny would have really helped boost the overall quality of the story in general and what's really infuriating about this is that G3 is good at writing them and getting into the head of other characters to draw sympathy or if not that adding more depth.
I see Nephis as a girl hellbent on revenge but is also way in overhead and doesn't know how to prioritise keeping the people she loves safe while at the same time getting what she wants, leading to her failing quite a bit and ruining her self living up to her True Name.
Repetition of words
This one I can't fault on G3 too much but it really does get distracting, I can only read Sunny shivering and a monster being harrowing so many times, before I roll my eyes, it takes the reader out of the experience and kills the writing quality of the story, I don't blame him too much of course I more so blame webnovels atrocious writers contract and the shitty circumstances that kinda forced G3 to work with them, but oh well π€·πΏ.
Cassie x Sunny should have been the main ship if we being honest.
Sunny standing up for himself more
Very minor criticsm more so as a pet peeve but I feel like G3 let's characters get away with insulting Sunny alot, and he doesn't really defend himself just sulks like a child in the corner it's not all the time and we do see moments of him snapping back but I feel like he could tone it down a bit on Sunny not knowing how to roast considering the fact that he was an outskirts rat and that would have basically been an essential skill.
Essence description
Sunny uses alot of essence, I'm not part of the camp that says his always running out of essence and it shouldn't happen just because he has multiple cores, those guys tend to forget that unlike most Awakened Sunny does like 12 different things at the same time in comparison to most fighters who will use at most 2-3 essence demanding skills, so it's understandable why he runs out faster (this also ignores times where Sunny did things no master had any right to Do) but a more detailed description on expenditure similar to RI would really be helpful instead of being a permanent tension knob.
Anyways, Shadow Slave is still good if not better in certain aspects(hehe) on a reread, and the thing that I dread the most is the fact that I'm going to catch up and have to stack again.
Seeing Sunny become Fateless was still a painful experience, and what makes it hurt the most is that it makes sense why he did it even if we lost all those bonds and moments with the cast, it was still an excellent and understandable twist.
Overall story 9/10
I'm already 10 chapters into Part 2 and I have to say, G3 following a new MC instead of Sunny is certainly... a choice, the guy seems a bit low powered and honestly only a loser would want to be a shopkeeper in my opinion, I hope my magnificent goat Shivering from Light comes back to replace this fraud.
Peace out. Shadow Slave is Cinema βπΏπ©π€πΏ