Chapter 620: Death
The metal of the collars and the cages could not be broken… but it didn't mean that it couldn't be bent. Twisting a band of steel wrapped tightly around your neck would not have been a great idea, however, the iron bars trapping Elyas were another matter entirely.
Sunny just needed good leverage, and that was why he had cut the cage down.
Throwing a nervous look back, in the direction from which the Red Priest usually appeared, he gritted his teeth and thrust one hand through the bars, pushing Elyas back. He needed to soften the metal first, and that was going to be a dire process.
The blade of the Cruel Sight suddenly shone with radiant white light, spreading an almost palpable heat into the cold air of the ghastly dungeon. Sunny didn't linger and pressed the somber sword against the steel bars, letting the divine flame contained within share its immolating incandescence with the enchanted cage.
'Come on… come on…'
There were two possible results for his actions. One was that he would be able to soften the metal and bend it… the other was that he was going to cook Elyas alive inside the gibbet.
There was also the chance that their Ascended jailer would arrive quicker than usual, which would be really, really, really bad...
Sunny counted the seconds and stared at the iron bars, willing them to heat up swifter. Slowly, the cold metal turned slightly red, then bright orange. Finally, at the point where the incandescent blade of the Cruel Sight touched them, a hint of pure white appeared.
Sunny would have preferred to wait longer, but there was no more time.
Dropping the shortsword to the ground and biting down on the Midnight Shard with his fangs, he grabbed the scorching metal with all four of his hands and endured the pain of the furious heat slowly spreading through the gauntlets to his bare skin. Then, Sunny set his foot on another bar, commanded all three shadows to wrap themselves around his body… and pulled.
Now that the cage was on the ground and stable, he could use all the muscles in his demonic body to put pressure on it, not just those in his arms. His core, his shoulders, his back, his powerful thighs and calf muscles, the entirety of his body worked in unison in order to bend the steel bars.
A stifled roar escaped from his mouth, washing over the blade of the austere tachi and echoing in the cold darkness.
Sunny pulled and pushed in opposite directions with all his monstrous strength. Already a demon and augmented by the three shadows, he was terrifyingly powerful. And yet, the incandescent bars refused to budge… for a few seconds, at least.
Then, when his muscles seemed to be on the verge of exploding from the inhuman strain, the metal finally gave in. With a metallic groan, one of the bars started to bend, slightly at first, and then more, and more…
'Yes!'
Elyas, however, did not seem to share Sunny's jubilation. Instead, he paled, a frightened expression appearing on his face. Without saying a word, the youth raised one hand, pointing to somewhere behind his partner's back.
"Th—the… the priest!"
And just then, Sunny felt a mighty shadow flying toward him from the edges of his shadow sense, growing closer and closer with harrowing speed.
'Damnation…'
The Ascended arrived a few seconds earlier than he should have!
Without turning around, Sunny pulled on the incandescent bar one last time, creating enough distance between it and the next one for the youth to squeeze through.
Then, he reached inside the cage, grabbed the young Awakened, and roughly pulled him through the narrow breach.
He already could hear the heavy steps behind him.
'Crap, crap, crap…'
Elyas stared into the darkness with eyes full of fear.
"Demon! Behi…"
Without letting him finish, Sunny forcefully pushed the youth away, then swiftly turned around, grabbing the Cruel Sight from the ground and catching the hilt of the Midnight Shard.
The warrior in a tattered red robe and worn leather armor was already upon him, the terrifying heavy blade cutting through the air with unthinkable speed. Sunny moved his weapons forward, trying to block the obliterating blow…
But his exhausted, wounded body seemed to have finally betrayed him. He swayed, missing the timing by a split second.
It looked like the tiniest of mistakes…
But one mistake was all it took.
His luck had run out.
The great blade of the mighty Ascended slid past Sunny's defenses… and hit him right in the neck.
The sharp metal sliced through his tough skin, his muscles, and his spine, emerging in a fountain of blood from the other side. Sunny felt terrifying pain spread through his whole being, and then the world suddenly spun.
...The head of the shadow demon flew high into the air, disbelief still frozen in his lightless eyes. It was as though it was screaming... as though it was trying to say something. To share a fatal revelation that had come a few moments too late.
That there was no escape.
...No escape except through death.
Elyas staggered, a stunned expression contorting his soft, youthful face.
"D—demon… you…"
In front of him, the legs of the decapitated demon buckled, and his towering body, still clad in bleak steel, fell heavily to its knees.
Just like that, his partner was gone.
His partner's nightmare was over.
The young man froze for a moment, then turned to the indifferent murderer, sorrow and wrath mixing in his hollow, tired, light-blue eyes.
"You… I'll kill…"
The priest of War remained silent, disinterested in the rambling of the young slave. He turned to Elyas and made a step forward, raising the monstrous blade once again.
It was all over.
…Or, perhaps, not. Because at that moment, the decapitated body suddenly stirred and attacked the indifferent slaughterer, the radiant blade of the Cruel Sight entering the man's abdomen while the tip of the Midnight Shard pierced his chest. At the same time, the tail of the dead demon shot over his shoulder, penetrating one of the red priest's eyes with the long steel spike.
Laying on the filthy stones a few meters away, Sunny's head observed it all with a terribly pained expression.
'Hurts… crap, dying really, really hurts!'
Yes, having your head separated from your body was not the most pleasant of experiences. In fact, it was probably one of the worst.
However, Sunny really needed that to have happened. This was the only method to get rid of the unbreakable slave collar he had managed to come up with. He had even considered chopping his head off himself, but came to the conclusion that his own strength was not going to be enough to overcome the durability of Bone Weave.
So, he had decided to try and use the might of an Ascended apostle of War instead. Death, indeed, was the only escape.
…In front of him, a river of blood flowed from the body of the taciturn Master. The red priest had lowered his guard, thinking that the shadow demon was dead, and received not one, but three whole fatal wounds as the result.
Honestly, he should have been more careful. The dead were often the most troublesome of enemies, after all.
As the body in the tattered red robe slowly toppled and fell to the ground, the headless body of the demon raised one hand, hooked a claw beneath the slave collar, and tore it off its severed neck.
The band of metal rang as it hit the floor.
…Sunny was not dead, of course, thanks to the [Undying] enchantment of his Transcendent armor. For as long as it was active, he would remain alive, and even in control of his body. This was the good part…
The bad part was that the enchantment was devouring his essence with an inconceivable speed, and in the next few seconds, when his reserves ran completely dry, Sunny was really going to die.
Before that happened…
The headless demon took a few unsteady steps forward, nonchalantly picked up its head, and awkwardly placed it on his neck. Then, he approached Elyas and fell to his knees in front of the petrified youth.
'C—come one, fool! I don't have much time!'
Due to the fact that his mouth wasn't currently connected to his lungs, Sunny couldn't even growl to pull the young Awakened out of his stupor.
Luckily, Elyas shook it off himself, flinching and throwing his hands into the air to place them on both sides of Sunny's mutilated neck.
"Oh Lord… oh gods… oh Lord! Hold on, Demon!"
He activated his healing Ability, trying to make the cleanly severed head of the shadow creature attach itself back to the flat stump of his neck.
Sunny shuddered, overwhelmed by terrifying pain.
'How… how does it even makes sense?! Why am I in so much pain?! My brain isn't even connected to those nerves… argh! Curses! Damnation!'
For almost anyone else, recovering from having their head cut off would have been nearly impossible. However, Sunny was a bit special… because avoiding death was one of his specialties.
There were several factors that played to his advantage.
Firstly, the Midnight Shard had judged his current state dire enough to unlock the hidden well of power that its [Unbroken] enchantment granted him.
Secondly, his bones and his blood were transformed by Weaver's lineage, gifting him with inhuman tenacity. That was the reason why he had not bled out already, and why his body was capable of rapid healing. All those qualities were enhanced by the drop of Shadow God's ichor that Blood Weave had unceremoniously devoured, and then augmented ever further by the Midnight Shard.
And lastly, while [Undying] was rapidly consuming his reserves of shadow essence, Saint was out there in the darkness, slaying one powerful Nightmare Creature after another. She was wielding the black odachi, whose [Soul Reaver] Ability transferred a portion of essence of all creatures slain by the Serpent in either its Soul Weapon or Soul Beast form.
So, with each mighty abomination Saint killed, Sunny received a considerable amount of essence, thus allowing him to keep the [Undying] enchantment active longer.
Was it going to be long enough for him to survive, though?
That was what he was going to find out…
Torturous seconds passed, with Elyas desperately trying to heal the harrowing wound, and Sunny desperately observing his reserves of shadow essence plummeting further and further. The rate with which the Undying Chain was eating through his essence was much, much faster than the rate with which Saint and Serpent replenished it.
He was only able to slow down the inevitable, not stop it.
His whole being was overwhelmed with agony and pain… but what else was new? Even though Sunny had never had his head chopped off before, he experienced similar tortures, if not worse.
There was almost no shadow essence left in his cores…
And then, there was none.
The [Undying] enchantment deactivated.
…But Sunny was still alive.
He moved his lips, and tentatively touched his neck, which had a ghastly scar running all around it now.
Then, he bent over and spat out a torrent of blood.
Sunny felt terrible. He felt like a zombie...
But he was not dead.
More than that, he was now truly, really free…
Chapter 621: Path to Freedom
Sunny remained motionless for a few moments, then hissed quietly, which made it feel as though his throat was being sawed open by tens of dull, rusty knives. His head was once again attached to his neck… however, that didn't mean that he felt fine.
In fact, although he had avoided becoming a corpse, he still felt like one.
[...Your shadow grows stronger.]
The dark dungeon suddenly grew silent. Saint must have finished off the last of the caged Nightmare Creatures, turning him and Elyas into the last surviving captives of the Red Colosseum. No matter what happened from now on, the ghastly Trials were over, finished before time by her hand.
Sunny sensed a bit of shadow essence pour into his cores, replenishing the empty reserves a little, and scowled.
That wasn't much… the young Awakened had wasted all of his essence while healing Sunny, as well. The two of them were not going to survive if they had to fight a prolonged battle.
So, they needed to flee the Colosseum swiftly and before the rest of the Warmongers noticed their escape.
Gritting his teeth, Sunny staggered and rose to his feet, then threw a somber glance at Elyas, who was staring at him with wide eyes.
The youth still had a collar wrapped around his neck. However, there was not much Sunny could do about that right now — it was not like he could behead the young Awakened, too. Hopefully, his strength alone was going to be enough to deliver them both away from this cursed place.
Now that he was connected to the Spell and had access to all of his power, there were a lot of things that could be done. The damned zealots were going to regret ever capturing him...
Elyas opened his mouth, then asked in a shaking voice:
"Demon… how? How are you still alive?"
Sunny tilted his head, grimaced, and decided to not move his neck too much in the future. Then, he gestured at the breastplate of the Undying Chain.
The young Awakened frowned.
"Your… your armor? It's a relic? Wait… where did you even get this fearsome armor?! And all these magical weapons?!"
Sunny sighed, then nodded and pointed at his chest again.
Elyas blinked a couple of times.
"What do you mean, they were inside of you all along? Why have you not used them in the arena, then?"
One of the demon's hands rose and pointed at the collar that now lay harmlessly on the filthy stones.
The youth frowned:
"Oh… I see. The War God's binding must have hidden you from the sight of the Lord of Shadows, and robbed you of his blessings. But then…"
Sunny sighed, and pressed a finger against his lips, commanding Elyas to be quiet. At the same time, Saint appeared from the darkness, drops of fetid black blood still dripping from the blade of the great odachi. Her gaze was calm and indifferent, as always.
The youth stared at the taciturn demon for a few moments, then bowed respectfully.
"You… you have my gratitude for coming to our aid, v—venerable lady Shade!"
Saint looked at the young man without showing any sign of having an opinion on being addressed in such a peculiar manner.
'Poor fool must be thinking that she is another shadow creature that came to rescue her kin… me, that is. And judging by this reaction, he also seems to be convinced that she is my senior in the hierarchy of Shadows… what the hell, why are teenagers always convinced that Saint is cooler than me?!'
He was in no mood to disabuse the youth of this misconception, though. Plus, there was no time…
A scorched kite shield manifested itself from sparks of light in Saint's hand, and at the same time, the Soul Serpent turned into a stream of flowing darkness and reformed itself into a straight double-edged sword, this one akin to the weapon the graceful knight had wielded in the past.
Sunny hesitated for a moment, then pushed the hilt of the Midnight Shard into Elyas's hands. Holding the Cruel Sight in one of his own, he bent down and picked up the terrifying heavy blade of the red priest with the upper pair.
Sunny didn't know what enchantments exactly the two-handed cleaver possessed, but since it had managed to slice through his adamantine spine without too much trouble, they had to be exceptionally powerful.
Then, he took a deep breath… and sent his shadows forth, along the familiar corridors of the underground part of the Colosseum and beyond them, to find a way to freedom.
Sunny was good enough in a fight to survive in the arena, and even earn the love and admiration of the damned lunatics who spectated the slaughter and worshipped it… but his true calling was to remain hidden in the darkness, move unseen, and strike at unsuspecting enemies from the shadows to kill them in one fell blow.
The task of escaping the Red Colosseum unnoticed was much easier for him than that of conquering it.
As all three shadows glided into the darkness, the skin of the four-armed demon he inhabited turned from obsidian black to pale grey once again, and Sunny swayed, sensing his strength and resilience vastly diminish.
He gritted his teeth, and then gestured for Elyas to follow.
While Saint disappeared into the darkness, the two of them headed toward the exit from the dungeon.
They walked through the silent corridors, sensing the cold wind blow past, washing the stench of the dungeon off their aching bodies. Since it was night and the battles were not supposed to continue until the morning, the Colosseum was mostly empty, devoid of the jubilant crowds that filled it during the day.
Here and there, Sunny and Elyas still encountered the Warmongers — those who, perhaps, had duties to maintain, clean, and prepare the arena for the next day's slaughter. However, everyone they saw had already met Saint.
Following in the wake of the taciturn demon, the two of them found only corpses. The followers of War had been killed ruthlessly and noiselessly, each requiring just one strike.
With each death, Sunny's reserves of essence were replenished a bit more. But more importantly than that...
The path to freedom was clear.
Finally, after something that felt like an eternity, Sunny found his three shadows waiting silently before a small wooden door.
He lingered for a second, and then pushed it open.
In front of him, there was a vast green meadow, and beyond it…
Nothing but boundless, vast, starlit sky.
Chapter 622: Wooden Sword
The dawn was approaching, which meant that they didn't have a lot of time left. Sunny and Elyas had to leave the cursed island of the Red Colosseum before the night ended and the crowds of War God worshippers arrived to spectate the sacrificial slaughter on the bloodsoaked arena.
Once they were elsewhere, pursuing them would become much harder — not only because the ancient magic of the Demon of Desire would remain far behind them, but also because the Warmongers would have to split their forces to search all the neighboring isles. The further the two of the escaped, the wider net their pursuers would have to throw.
By then, the zealots would have to deal with the Crushing, as well.
Sunny wasn't familiar with the western reaches of the Chained Isles, which belonged to the followers of War, since he had never traveled in this direction before. They could try to escape northeast, toward the Hollow Mountains and the Night Temple, but that region was unfamiliar to him, as well.
Directly to the east, a long distance away, lay the Ivory City where Elyas hailed from, and the prison of Hope. However, the eastern direction would be where the pursuers were most likely to concentrate their search, since running toward the domain of their enemies, the Sun God's people, would have been the safest choice.
After hesitating for a few seconds, Sunny pulled the young Awakened toward the southern edge of the Red Island. If they journey southeast, they would eventually reach the ruined fortress… well, it might not have been ruined yet… where he had once welcomed Effie and Kai. There, the influence of the War faction was bound to be severely diminished.
More importantly, that was the boundary to the part of Hope's shattered kingdom that Sunny knew and had explored before.
Before the start of the Nightmare, he and the other members of the cohort had agreed to travel to the Iron Hand island should they be separated. Sunny would be able to easily find his way there from the southern Great Chain that anchored the Isles to the mainland beneath.
Hidden in the darkness, Sunny and Elyas ran across the meadow, aiming to reach the edge of the island and one of the heavenly chains that rattled below from time to time, disturbed by the turbulent winds of the border between the two skies.
'Come on… come on…'
Once they were over the edge, Sunny could summon the Heavenly Burden and the Dark Wing to carry them to the chain, or even hide them in the darkness of the Sky Below for a while.
Their salvation was so close! It was already just a few meters away...
But then, his heart suddenly grew cold.
'No…'
...In the end, it wasn't close enough.
Just as they reached the edge, a quiet sigh resounded from the darkness, and suddenly, Sunny was laying on the ground, his vision blurred and his whole body numb.
There was no oxygen in his lungs, and no matter how hard he tried to inhale, it was of no use. His chest seemed to be on fire.
A few seconds of agony later, the shock of the terrifying impact that had cracked the breastplate of the Undying Chain and sent him flying to the ground began to fade, and Sunny was able to finally draw in a hoarse, desperate breath.
'C… curses…'
He moved his arm, reaching for the hilt of the red priest's cleaver that lay near, buried in the soft grass.
However, before his fingers closed around it, a delicate foot stepped on his wrist, and suddenly, it was as though the weight of a whole world descended upon him.
Sunny groaned, then gritted his teeth and looked up at the harrowing creature that had attacked them from beyond the edge of the island.
It was a graceful, breathtaking beauty wearing a simple red tunic, her face tender and solemn, her dazzling eyes shining like two silver stars.
Solvane looked down at him and smiled with sadness.
"I am afraid that this is as far as you go… ah, we meet again, child of shadows!"
***
Sunny stared at the beautiful Saint with grim resentment burning in his black, tenebrous eyes. He remained motionless, knowing that his worst fear had just come true…
The Transcendent Immortal herself had arrived to hunt them down.
He thought feverishly, trying to come up with some way to escape the Priestess of War… Soul Serpent and Saint were still hiding in his shadow, so he could command them to attack.
But what could an Awakened and an Ascended Demon do against a Transcendent? An undying one that was chosen by the gods and had lived for at least a thousand years, no less… no, sending them to fight that horror would be just sending them to their deaths.
In all of his travels, Sunny had never met a creature more frightening than Solvane. Of that, he was sure. Even the Corrupted leviathans of the Dark Sea had not instilled such caution in him. Maybe only the harrowing rot in the Ebony Tower had, but he hesitated to call it a living being.
Then… what? What he was supposed to do?!
'Damn you… damn you, fate! You never let go of your prey, do you?!'
Sunny gritted his teeth, then growled, and tried to strike at Solvane with the Cruel Sight. However, the beautiful woman simply swatted it away, breaking his fingers and sending the somber blade flying over the edge of the island.
She shook her head.
"No… not like that, little demon. You deserve a better end…"
Then, Sunny felt himself being lifted into the air, and then thrown to his knees. A moment later, a stifled scream announced that Elyas, too, had not escaped the immortal Transcendent. His gaunt figure fell near him, a pained grimace contorting the young man's young face.
Soon, the unassailable power that pressed Sunny into the ground disappeared, and he was able to breathe again.
Looking up, he saw Solvane standing in front of them, his silken skin caressed by the gentle starlight. She looked at them with an inexplicable expression, her long chestnut hair dancing softly in the wind.
'There has to be something I can do… think, think!'
The Transcendent priestess smiled, the world itself growing brighter from her mesmerizing smile.
"Ah… the Trials of Life are over! I congratulate you, champions. Although some of your foes were vanquished under the cover of darkness instead of in the bright light of day, under the gaze of the gods, you have defeated them nevertheless. You have even slain one of my blessed. Thank you! Thank you for giving that which I was unable to… you have my gratitude. Both of you..."
Sunny stared at the beautiful Saint, frozen in place. Despite all the hatred he harbored against the monstrous priestess, despite how much he wanted to pay her back a hundredfold for all the suffering she had caused him… he couldn't help but forget his anger, and be enchanted by her beauty.
Solvane was just too splendid, too lovely… her eyes were too lustrous, her smile too charming, her soft lips too alluring. This woman was created to be worshipped… for men to wage wars in hope of earning the right to stand by her side…
'Snap out of it, idiot! Have you not seen beautiful things before?! Beautiful things are always the deadliest!'
Sunny bit his lip, allowing his sharp fangs to pierce it. Pain sobered him up somewhat.
Beside him, Elyas was staring at Solvane with grim eyes… strangely, the young man did not seem to be affected by her transcendent beauty at all.
It was understandable. After all, his whole family had been slaughtered by the followers and on the orders of the dazzling priestess.
…Meanwhile, something appeared in Solvane's hands. It was a small object that made Sunny's eyes narrow suddenly, and his breathing become quicker.
The Saint sighed and stretched her hand forward, a simple knife carved out of a single piece of wood laying on her open palm.
"...The Trials of Life are over, and so, I offer you this gift, and the right to fight for your freedom. To struggle for your life, as life is an eternal struggle. Will you accept, champions? Will you take this wooden blade and wield it? It… it is all I can give you…"
Sunny's heart skipped a beat.
'I'll… be damned…'
The fairy tale about a wooden sword Elyas had once shared with him had actually, inexplicably, turned out to be true.
…And more than that, Sunny recognized the "sword" instantly.
He had already held that wooden knife once, a long time ago… far, far in the future.
This was the knife he had killed Solvane with.
Chapter 623: Ardent Desire
Sunny stared at the wooden knife, suffocating pain still radiating from the spot where Solvane had hit him. The Transcendent was so fast that he had not even seen or sensed her strike… not that it mattered anymore.
As he studied the familiar blade, different pieces of knowledge suddenly clicked together, revealing a chilling truth. Stunned by the grim revelation, Sunny shuddered.
'Of course…'
Finally, the purpose of the Red Colosseum made sense to him. The cruelty of the Trials, the perverse faith of the zealous warriors, their worship of struggle, battle, and death… the tale of a wooden blade that granted the champion a chance to win their freedom.
When he looked back, it all seemed so obvious.
The strange cult of War that had blossomed on the ruins of the Kingdom of Hope was built around the tenet of glory. Glory was both the highest virtue and the highest of honors, and it could only be won by prevailing against overwhelming odds, through mortal struggle — which was the essence of life, and war, as far as these zealots were concerned.
So, they enslaved a horde of abominations and threw themselves against it, fighting to the death against their slaves in the arena. With each battle, the weak were slaughtered, and the strong got to live and fight against more powerful enemies the next day. All under the beaming gazes of the jubilant crowd.
Those who died perished in the pursuit of glory, and those who lived came closer and closer to earning it… that was the sacrificial ritual the followers of War performed every decade or so, spilling blood in the name of their glorious dream.
…However, there was one problem with this demented arrangement. A glaring flaw that made the Trials of the Red Colosseum seem futile, hollow, and senseless.
What was the end of all this?
Was everyone participating in the battle destined to die? Would there be no victor? What happened to the person, or creature, left standing at the very end, devoid of enemies to struggle against? Where was their glory?
Now, looking at the wooden knife that contained Solvane's death, freely offered to them by the immortal Transcendent herself, Sunny finally understood everything.
That last champion would indeed be gifted a wooden blade, and a chance to fight for their freedom — just like Elyas had learned from the fairy tales in the Ivory City. They just had to overcome one last enemy...
To fight against Solvane herself.
This whole feverish hell — the Red Colosseum, the bloodsoaked arena, the cult of murderous glory she had built — existed for one single purpose. To find, or rather create, a warrior capable of killing their Saint.
Eternal Solvane… undefeated Solvane... wanted to die. The madness of this nightmare was born out of the thousand years of immortality the beautiful priestess had endured, out of the desire to be free of her eternal duty as Hope's warden.
…However, Solvane didn't just want to die. She wanted to die a glorious death, one worthy of a true servant of War. Or rather, she simply could not allow herself to give up. Giving up without struggle was a sin against her faith, her god, and her conviction.
So the beautiful Transcendent could only allow herself to die if she was defeated. That was her goal…
Finding someone valiant enough to kill her was Solvane's most ardent hope. Her deepest desire.
Feeling a hint of vague suspicion, Sunny frowned. He was certain that he was right, that his reasoning and insight were correct... but at the same time, there was still something out of place. Something still didn't make sense… he just couldn't say what.
And there was no time to think.
Solvane was still offering them the wooden knife and a chance to save their lives. All they had to do was to take it… and win.
But he wasn't fooled.
Her offer might have seemed like a gift, but it was just a death sentence. Sure, the knife contained a death… Solvane's death… and would be able to slay her with one strike. At this point, Sunny was certain that there had been seven knives once, each meant to kill one of the seven immortals created by the Lord of Light. And this one, the wooden knife, was meant to kill Solvane.
However, taking it was only going to spell their doom.
Wooden blade or not, the beautiful priestess was still a Transcendent. A servant of War with a thousand years of battle experience, an ancient warrior who had fought and triumphed in battles too many to count. And despite her desire to be defeated, she would not throw this fight. Giving in without struggling with all her might was against Solvane's conviction.
Fighting against her was suicide.
By his side, Elyas pupils widened dangerously.
Feeling a small change in his partner's posture, Sunny shifted and glanced at him.
'What… what is this fool trying to do?'
The youth gritted his teeth, and then slowly rose to his feet. His tattered tunic had long ago lost any remnant of its once pure white color, and was now hanging like rags on his gaunt, emaciated body. Despite that, the young Awakened looked full of resolve and determination, his eyes glinting with grim purpose.
'What are you doing? No! You fool!'
Despite the pain in his throat, Sunny growled loudly, trying to warn Elyas of how fatal his actions were. But his call fell on deaf ears.
'Damn! Damn it! Why, why can't I talk?!'
For the first time since he had entered the Nightmare, Sunny felt really desperate to speak. But he couldn't... the demon's body robbed him of the ability to converse with humans in any meaningful way.
Panicking, he made a motion to stand up, hoping to grab the youth before the fool made a lethal mistake. But the pressure Solvane had exerted on him was back, paralyzing the body of the four-armed shadow creature. He groaned, suddenly unable to move, and struggled to even keep his head up.
Chapter 624: A New Day
Elyas hesitated for a moment, and then looked at Sunny with a sad smile.
"It's… it's alright, Demon. Thank you... thank you for getting us this far. But now, it is my turn. This is our chance. This is what we've been fighting for all this time, is it not? The tales my mother told me were all true… I'll free us both! You'll see. The Lord of Light will guide my hand…"
With that, he reached out and took the wooden knife from Solvane hand, his fingers wrapping tightly around its hilt.
The priestess smiled radiantly and took a step back. He beautiful eyes shone with joy, and he voice resounded in the darkness of the dying night, full of longing and hope:
"Be brave, boy. The gods are watching!"
Sunny struggled desperately against the crushing force that pressed him into the ground, but it was of no use. A stifled roar escaped from his mouth…
A few steps away, Elyas straightened, calmly looked the Transcendent beauty in the eyes, and then assumed a battle stance. He knew what he was doing, after all… the youth was as talented of a fighter as Sunny had been at his age, or maybe even better.
Two months of constant battles in the arena gave him plenty of experience. More than most would have acquired in a lifetime, and certainly no less than what Sunny had on the Forgotten Shore.
'No! That is not enough!'
But what if... what if Elyas really had a chance? Sunny had achieved many impossible things himself, as well, and seen others do the same.
Even in the direst of situations, there was always hope... that was a lesson he had learned against all odds in the hell of the Forgotten Shore, and later in the stone mausoleum of the Night Temple.
…Without wasting any time on doubt and hesitation, Elyas sent his soul essence flowing in a raging flood, and shot forward, moving with grace and speed that few Awakened could ever hope to achieve. His hand flew through the air, swift enough to appear as an almost imperceptible blur.
The strike was swift and cunning... however, it was just a feint. His true intention was to attack from below, and it was hidden almost perfectly. There was no sign of the fact that the young man was preparing to change the direction of the blow. He had learned well from watching Sunny fight...
But if Sunny could see it, then so could Solvane.
His eyes narrowed.
A split second before the wooden knife reached the Transcendent's flesh, Elyas suddenly stumbled, then slowed down. Taking a few unsteady steps forward, he swayed, and suddenly toppled to the ground.
A thin red line appeared across his chest, and then burst open in a flood of blood.
Above him, Solvane sighed with sorrow and lowered her hand, a single drop of crimson falling from her delicate fingers. Her lips trembled, and then, a barely audible whisper reached Sunny's ears.
"...Not today."
He didn't hear it, though. Frozen, Sunny stared at Elyas, who lay motionlessly on the ground, the grass soaking in his blood. The young man's unmoving face was turned to him, his light-blue eyes still open. However, those eyes, which had been bright and lively once, were now dull and empty, reflecting the boundless darkness of the night sky. Elyas's face seemed almost... peaceful.
The youth was finally free.
...Sunny roared, struggling furiously to stand up, but all he achieved was damaging his mangled body even further. Without paying any attention to that pain, he continued fighting against the invisible chains holding him down, feeling the ground itself shift beneath his knees.
'Kill! I'll kill her! I'll rip her to shreds!'
Solvane remained motionless for a while, and then silently bent down to pick up the wooden knife from the youth's bloodless fingers.
Coming closer, she stared at Sunny with a dark expression, and then asked:
"What about you? Are you willing to fight me, little demon?"
Sunny glared at her, his teeth bared in a hateful grin. He wanted to... oh, how he wanted to!
But he could not. Fighting Solvane meant nothing but death...
Slowly, he shook his head.
The beautiful priestess sighed.
"...Of course. Why did I expect different from the servant of cowardly Shadow?"
Her hand suddenly flashed, and terrible pain exploded through Sunny's body.
Looking down, in a morbid deja vu, he saw a graceful arm protruding from his chest, the breastplate of the Undying Chain shattered into pieces.
Solvane grimaced, and pulled his hand out of his broken chest, easily tearing the still-beating heart out in the process. She glanced at it with disappointment, and then sent the body of the four-armed demon tumbling over the edge of the island.
The last thing he saw before plummeting into the abyss was her graceful, beautiful figure standing forlornly in the tall grass.
Then, Sunny fell into the embrace of darkness.
His body flew down, faster and faster, quickly disappearing into the nothingness of the Sky Below.
Soon, it was so far away from the Red Island that even a memory of sunlight couldn't reach that far.
His chest was torn open, and his heart was violently ripped from it, leaving behind a harrowing wound.
...After falling for a while, Sunny sighed.
Luckily, this strange body of his had two hearts. And while anyone else would have succumbed to blood loss after having one destroyed, he possessed Blood Weave, which kept him alive despite receiving such a ghastly wound.
It didn't feel too good, though. In fact, the pain was terrible.
But it could not compare even a little to the anguish he felt in his soul.
Sunny closed his eyes.
'I'm sorry, Elyas. I failed. But... don't worry. I'll kill her on your behalf, one day… kill her again. I'll kill her as many times as it takes to erase the very memory of her from existence. Just you wait…'
He gritted his teeth, then summoned the Heavenly Burden, and then thrust the black needle into his flesh.
Dark Wing appeared on his shoulders, swiftly turning into a blur.
Sunny's fall slowed, then slowed some more, and finally turned into flight.
He was flying into the darkness, moving further and further away from the Red Colosseum…
Far above, the eastern horizon had already turned pale lilac, announcing the arrival of a new day.
Chapter 625: Comfortably Numb
Eventually, Sunny returned to the altitude where the dark undersides of the floating islands could be seen. He tiredly approached one, sensed something moving in the deep shadows, and glided past without coming too close.
The next one didn't seem to harbor any horrors. He flew toward the rough stone surface and sunk his claws and talons into it, clinging to the bottom of the island like a bat. Strangely, Sunny did not need to exert any conscious effort to remain in that position, and simply lay upside down on the cold stones for a while, struggling against exhaustion.
He was in much worse shape than it had seemed before. Two months of ruthless battles in the Red Colosseum had taken a toll on his body, and the terrible wound in his chest was still there, sapping him of strength and vitality.
With the help of Blood Weave, the body of the four-armed demon managed to survive having one of its two hearts violently torn out. But that didn't mean that it was going to fully recover from that vicious injury… with only one heart left to pump blood through his veins, Sunny felt lethargic and weak. That weakness would probably never go away, not unless he somehow managed to find or grow a new heart.
He was tired to the bone, overwhelmed by pain, and numb. Terribly, utterly numb. After the harrowing intensity of the past two months and the crushing strain of their disastrous attempt to escape, Sunny finally reached safety, and found himself drained of all thoughts and emotions.
He couldn't muster enough energy to feel joy or relief, grief or sorrow… even anger or hatred.
Tired… he was just too tired.
The island under which Sunny hid was separated from the Red Colosseum by four or five heavenly chains, far to the south. He was still deep within the territory of the followers of War, but no one was going to discover him, not unless they had wings… and even then, finding the Child of Shadows in the cold embrace of darkness was not going to be easy.
However, no one was looking. After all, he was considered to be dead.
Sunny looked at the shattered breastplate of the Undying Chain, and then dismissed the damaged armor to give it a chance to repair itself. Then, he summoned the Mantle of Underworld and gasped when its onyx metal wrapped itself around his mangled chest.
The intricate black armor embraced his tortured body, soothing its aches. Sunny doubted that anyone from the real world would be able to spy on him here, in the depths of a Nightmare… but even if they could, he didn't care anymore. He just wanted to be safe and protected.
As soon as the fearsome Mantle hid his wounds, Sunny tiredly closed his eyes… and plunged into the nothingness of a deep, dreamless sleep.
***
Thirst… and pain.
That were the first things Sunny felt before slowly remembering who he was, what he was, and where he had found himself.
...He was in hell. Where else?
'I fell asleep…'
He opened his eyes and saw the rough surface of the bare stone in front of him. Sunny was still clinging to the underside of the island, his claws buried deep into it and holding him in place like iron pitons.
He felt… better, somewhat. His body was still a labyrinth of pain, but it was much milder than before. Judging by the state of his wounds, he had slept for many, many days.
No wonder he was so thirsty.
Sunny shifted slightly and freed one of his four hands, then summoned the Endless Spring and drank a few gulps of water. Then, he turned his head and stared into the darkness, indifferent to everything.
His body was healing, but his mind was still empty and numb, exhausted of its ability to feel anything. All that remained was cold rationality, but even that part of him was dull and apathetic, devoid of any interest and desire.
He just didn't care about anything, or anyone, right now. The mere thought of caring seemed exhausting.
After a while, Sunny sighed.
'...What should I do?'
Despite everything that had happened, his immediate goal remained simple and straightforward. He had to traverse the whole Kingdom of Hope and reach the Iron Hand island to regroup with the cohort. Once they were together… if the others were still alive… they would know what to do.
Sunny didn't feel particularly motivated to attempt the perilous journey, but he knew that he had to. It was a simple enough objective, at least… in his current state, he felt reluctant to think about anything arduous, obtuse, or complicated.
All he had to do was to move southeast for a while, and then turn north. Maybe his condition would improve by the time he reached the eastern edges of the Chained Isles.
The road, however, was not going to be easy.
Sunny was going to have to sneak through the vast territory of the Warmongers without being seen, reach the southernmost boundary of the region, and then retrace the path he had taken to welcome Effie and Kai almost all the way back to the Sanctuary of Noctis.
It was also unclear who ruled the eastern territories in this era, or if they were wild and overrun by Nightmare Creatures, like they would be in the future.
He grimaced, remained motionless for a while, and then summoned the Covetous Coffer.
Catching the frightened box before it plummeted into the Sky Below, Sunny freed one more hand and took a handful of synthpaste tubes out of the Coffer, then dismissed it. Consuming the tasteless sludge to replenish his strength, he summon the runes and finally took a proper look at them for the first time in months:
Name: Sunless.
True Name: Lost from Light.
Rank: Awakened.
Class: Demon.
Shadow Cores: [3/7].
Shadow Fragments: …
His pupils narrowed.
'...What?'
But there was no mistake. The runes read:
Shadow Fragments: [2223/3000].
Sunny stared at the number, then hung his head back and tried to chuckle, producing a disturbing bestial snarl instead. His throat pulsed with sharp pain, but he shrugged it off and bared his teeth in a dark, bitter grin.
When entering the Nightmare, Sunny had less than three hundred fragments collected… which meant that he had accumulated almost two thousand of them in the Red Colosseum.
In fact, in those two months, he had probably slaughtered more Nightmare Creatures… and humans… than in the previous two years, his whole life as a carrier of the Spell.
…Was this the price of glory?
Chapter 626: Hiding in the Dark
Sunny remained motionless for a while, then shifted his gaze, moving it to the very end of the field of shimmering runes. Soon, Neph's description appeared before him. He lingered for a few moments, and then read:
…Soul Fragments: [2478/4000].
The corner of his mouth twitched.
'Of course. She is in a hell of her own, after all…'
The gap between them had diminished, but barely. He was still behind… still lacking…
But she was alive, at least. And fighting with all her strength to return.
If Neph refused to give up, then he would have to persevere, too.
With a sigh, Sunny turned away and looked back to his runes, finding the list of his Memories and Echoes. His eyes suddenly gleamed, but then grew dark and slightly despondent.
'What the hell… how is this even possible…'
Among the names of his Memories, dozens of new ones shimmered in the darkness. It seemed that the Spell continued to reward him even while their connection was obstructed by the sorceries of Hope. It sort of made sense… the fact that Sunny had not been able to communicate with the Spell did not mean that it had not continued to watch his every step.
He was inside one of its Nightmares, after all. Which created a swarm of questions on its own…
Not caring to consider them, Sunny silently counted the new Memories.
Thirty-nine… there were thirty-nine of them!
…And yet, there was not a single Echo he had received after slaughtering nearly a thousand Nightmare Creatures. Not even a hint of one.
'Doesn't make any sense… none at all. What is this, a joke?'
It seemed that his luck when it came to Memories had been incredible, while his luck when it came to Echoes had been beyond terrible. He should have received four of five, at least… but he had not.
Sunny stared into the darkness for a while, his expression glum. Then, he sighed.
'Well, doesn't matter. It's a pity that I did not receive an Echo of the Red Priest, though. I would have made him into a Shadow... just to get a chance to kill that bastard again…'
He studied his new Memories, slowly reading their names and descriptions. A few were good, and a couple was splendid. The rest, however, were worse than what he already had in his arsenal. Their only use was to feed Saint.
This time, however, he did not hurry to give them away as sustenance for the taciturn demon. Instead, Sunny hesitated for a long time, and then dismissed the runes. He had other plans for these Memories.
Each of them possessed a unique weave, one that he would be able to study and experiment with while not fearing to damage or destroy an actually valuable instrument. He would be able to use Weaver's needle now, too, instead of cutting his fingers on the ethereal, but perfectly sharp strings.
Satisfied with that decision, Sunny finished the last of synthpaste tubes he had taken out of the Covetous Coffer, indifferently dropped them into the dark abyss of the Sky Below, and sent one of his shadows to scout out the situation above.
The sun was rolling toward the horizon, and the night was swiftly approaching.
That meant that he would have to move soon.
***
Over the next few days, Sunny traveled southeast, staying in the darkness of the Sky Below during the night, and finding shelter on the undersides of the floating island during the day. He was still weak because of his injuries and had to make frequent stops to rest and sleep, which slowed him down considerably.
In the course of these days, Sunny made several stunning discoveries.
The first one was rather pleasant and beneficial to him. As it turned out, there were far fewer Nightmare Creatures populating the Kingdom of Hope in this era than there were in the future. That included the harrowing abominations that dwelled on the dark side of the islands.
Their absence made the task of remaining below the isles far easier for him. Of course, there were still some monstrosities hiding in the darkness, but not nearly enough to make it too hard to avoid them.
In retrospect, that made sense. These lands were not completely devastated yet, and there were plenty of humans living on the levitating islands. It was because of them and their efforts that the population of Nightmare Creatures was so low. It was also the reason why it took Solvane and her zealots a full decade or more to gather enough abominations to hold the accursed Trials.
The second discovery he made was far less fortuitous, and also had to do with the human inhabitants of the Kingdom of Hope. He was still in the territory of the worshippers of War, which made it all but impossible to appear on the surface of the islands during the day, unnoticed. But the dark side wasn't completely safe, either.
Not once and not twice, he saw humans traveling either across the heavenly chains or through the Sky Below. Hidden in the shadows, he observed several flying ships sail through the boundless darkness, some adorned with sails of pristine white, some of vivid red.
He even witnessed two vessels locked in furious battle, arrows and pieces of burning wood falling into the abyss like rain. In the end, the ship with white sails rammed into the red one, splitting the vessel in half and sending the captain and the crew to their deaths in the Sky Below.
These ships looked simultaneously similar and different to the one the Fire Keepers had repaired and guided to the Ebony Tower. They were much smaller and slower, and didn't have a magnificent tree growing around their masts. The vessel Sunny had spent several weeks on looked much more... ancient, in comparison.
Like the original in front of lesser copies.
…The third discovery Sunny made was, perhaps, the most shocking.
The Crushing... did not exist in this era. The islands rose and fell as usual, but no matter how high they climbed, no deadly force assaulted them, threatening to destroy anything too weak or too slow to run away.
Many of the Nightmare Creatures Sunny had studied before hunting them down, in the future, were somewhat different here from what he knew. He had understood that fact in the arena, and confirmed it while observing the islands through the eyes of his shadows after escaping it.
Now, he learned why. The Crushing did not yet exist, and for that reason, the Nightmare Creatures had not gone through thousands of years of adaptation to learn how to survive its burden. Neither their bodies not their behavior changed to accommodate the deadly force that would terrorize the entire region in the future yet, and that was why he had found them to be both familiar and strange.
Armed with that knowledge, Sunny slowly made his way south, leaving the Red Colosseum — and Saint Solvane — further and further behind.
His wounds slowly healed, and soon, he felt that he would not be entirely useless in the fight anymore.
…That was just in time, because his days of peace were about to come to an end.
Chapter 627: Needlework
It took Sunny almost two weeks to approach the southern boundary of the Chained Isles. The further from the Red Colosseum he went, the less presence the Warmongers had there.
With Solvane's militant order occupying the western reaches of the Kingdom of Hope and the followers of Sun God in control of its center, engaged in a centuries-old conflict with each other, the south remained desolate and neglected. That made Sunny's life a bit easier, but also caused him to lower his guard a little.
He still had to remain vigilant, though, because there were more and more unsightly horrors hiding in the deep shadows of the Dark Side as he traveled away from human settlements.
On one of these days, Sunny found himself clinging to the underside of a small floating island as he waited for the arrival of night. He had already rested and dined on several tubes of synthpaste, so for now, there was nothing much for him to do.
As had been his habit for the past week or so, he summoned one of the Memories from the Colosseum and studied its weave, trying to peer into the secrets of the complicated pattern of ethereal strings.
Armed with his innate intuition and the ability to compare different Memories to each other, he was making torturously slow progress in his understanding of sorcery… or at least of this type of it. Weaver's sorcery seemed elegant, strange, and marvelous… but also inhumanly complex and elaborate.
Sunny doubted that he would be able to comprehend its foundational principles any time soon. And even if he did, his human mind was simply unable to encompass the whole of the infinitely convoluted patterns, let alone create one from scratch.
Maybe if he had a powerful supercomputer instead of a brain… in any case, he was not going to be creating his own Memories just yet, or maybe ever.
That didn't mean that he couldn't do anything, though.
Sunny might not have had the capacity to create new weaves, but he had already proven his ability to copy those that already existed. He had reproduced the simplest and most common of them — the pattern responsible for storing Memories in his soul and then summoning them back through essence — in the dungeon of the Red Colosseum.
With enough time and preparation, he would be able to copy other enchantments of the familiar weaves, too. Creating anything meaningful was going to take a while, though… but that was not what Sunny was currently trying to achieve.
Instead, he wanted to expand his sorcerous repertoire from one trick... to no less than two tricks. He was experimenting with his Memories in hopes of learning how to modify and change an existing enchantment.
Right now, Sunny was holding a slim dagger in one hand and a small silver bell in the other.
The Silver Bell was the first Memory he had ever received, and also the simplest, while the slim dagger was one of the weapons he had won in the arena. Its enchantment was rather straightforward — it made the weapon utterly noiseless. It didn't ring when struck against armor or another blade, and didn't even rustle as it entered the enemy's flesh.
Sunny had chosen these two Memories for the experiment because, at the core, their enchantments were very similar. One was that of sound amplification, while the other was that of sound nullification. He wanted to change the latter into the former.
In other words, he wanted to turn the silent dagger into a very noisy dagger. Not because that would be very useful, but to prove that he was capable of modifying enchantments.
After studying the spellweave of the Silver Bell for many days, Sunny was close to memorizing the staggering complexity of the pattern of strings entirely. Since the bell had only one enchantment, it was easy to isolate it from the parts of the pattern that were common to all Memories. So, in theory, he knew what shape to create.
The dagger, on the other hand, was a bit different. It also only had a single enchantment and a single ember anchoring the pattern, but that ember was brighter, and the pattern itself was much larger and more intricate. However, there were certain similarities with the one in the bell… so, Sunny could imagine turning one into another.
He hesitated for a while, then sighed, and raised Weaver's needle. Just like on the day he had found it, the long and narrow needle was enveloped in a faint, weak golden shine that only he could see… thousands of years ago, or maybe sometime in the future, it had absorbed some of Weaver's deific blood, along with tiny traces of divinity.
Sunny suspected that the needle had not been a magical tool, and neither had it actually belonged to Weaver. Rather, it had been just a random needle that the Demon of Fate found in the Ebony Tower and made use of to sew a new arm to their body, and its magical properties came from being washed in the daemon's blood.
…However, now, the needle did possess magical properties. Just like Sunny's fingers, it was capable of interacting with the ephemeral strings that constituted spellweaves.
Sunny threaded a shadow string through the needle, and carefully thrust it into the sorcerous pattern that created the enchantment of the silent dagger. He was hoping to replace some of the existing strings with his own, shift others around, and remove some completely.
At first, everything went well. Sunny was on the verge of getting excited… but then, the same thing that happened with all his previous experiments repeated itself.
At some point, the strings trembled, and then the whole pattern tore and collapsed, turning into a chaotic mess of ripped and fluttering threads. Sunny hurriedly retracted his hand, afraid to lose it, and watched as the slim dagger shimmered and disintegrated into a rain of dim sparks.
A few moments later, the Spell spoke solemnly:
[Your Memory has been destroyed.]
Sunny grimaced and closed his eyes.
"Damnation! Another one..."
Then, however, he suddenly shifted and turned his head up, staring at the stone surface above him as if trying to pierce its solid mass with his gaze.
Up above, on the surface of the small island, one of his shadows had noticed movement.
Chapter 628: From the Dark Side
The grass covering the surface of the island moved, and strange shapes appeared from beneath it. Some were similar to each other, while some were not, but all shared the same deep emerald color. The shapes levitated upward, slowly coalescing together.
The creepy shadow observed the eerie event from the shade of a large boulder, darkly excited. Sunny only understood what it was so excited about when the boulder suddenly split open and fell apart, making way for another of the shapes… this one easily recognizable.
It was a massive emerald jawbone, similar to a human one in all aspects except for size.
…The creepy guy had always been strangely fascinated by dead things. No wonder he got fixated on a bunch of flying bones.
As Sunny watched, the emerald bones assembled into a towering human skeleton — very similar to the powerful abomination of the same kind Sunny had fought and destroyed in the Red Colosseum, but much larger and way more frightening.
The emerald skeleton stared north for a while, and then slowly headed toward the edge of the island, each of its steps making the ground shake.
At the same time, a loud rattle of the heavenly chain rolled through the two skies. Sunny was so used to hearing them that he didn't pay it any attention at first, but then, a deep frown appeared on his face.
Something… wasn't right. The rattling of the chain sounded different, somehow.
He lingered for a few moments, then silently dove into the shadows and glided to the northern slope of the flying isle.
As soon as Sunny saw the heavenly chain stretching far into the distance, his heart grew cold.
A terrifying abomination with a body that resembled a dirty mass of pitch-black tar was crawling underneath it, its back facing the Sky Below. Each second, a dozen tendrils of liquid darkness shot forward from the mass, sticking to the links of the giant chain and pulling the creature forward.
The monstrosity was at least twenty meters long and so heavy that the iron of the heavenly tether groaned under its weight.
'...What hellish nightmare is this?'
Sunny peered beneath the surface of the black tar creature and shuddered once he saw the taint of corruption that hid within its soul. The two hideous nodes of swirling darkness that spread cancerous veins through the body of the abomination were especially ripe and horrid, revealing its Rank.
'Corrupted… a Corrupted Monster.'
Earlier, when he had been passing the islands north of his current shelter, he had felt the shadow of a powerful fiend hiding beneath one of them. Who knew that the horror nesting on the Dark Side of the flying island would turn out to be equal to the harrowing Wormvine, and then decide to follow Sunny south on top of that?
As Sunny froze for a moment, a large boulder suddenly flew from the island and hit the massive body of the Black Tar fiend, sending ripples across its liquid flesh. The force of the impact was so great that a destructive shockwave spread in all directions, causing the heavenly chain to rattle even louder.
On the surface of the island, the towering emerald skeleton lowered its arms and stared at the invading horror, dark lights igniting in the pits of its empty eye sockets.
The boulder it had just thrown disappeared within the body of the Corrupted abomination, seemingly dealing it no damage. The creature simply continued crawling, its massive body surging forward like a black tide.
'I... I probably need to run…'
But before he could do anything, the advancing monster suddenly convulsed, and in the next second, dozens of sharp stone shards shot out of its flesh, each covered by fetid black liquid. Some rained on the emerald skeleton, and some hit the slopes of the island, causing large chunks of weathered stone to be turned into dust.
Sunny barely managed to dodge one of them, and stared with resentment at the small crater that appeared in place of his hiding place. Sure, he was an incorporeal shadow right now… but he would not make the mistake of assuming that a Corrupted abomination had no way of wounding him.
Who knew what this horror was capable of?
And just as this thought entered his mind, he noticed that there was a thin layer of black tar spread around the point of impact — and dozens of similar ones nearby. As he watched, the foul liquid started to move, coalescing into small dark blobs. Some of them began crawling up, toward the emerald skeleton…
But some froze for a moment, and then flowed toward him, as though sensing his location.
'Crap!'
Sunny hurriedly summoned back the creepy shadow and lunged away, gliding through the shadows as fast as he could. By the time he reached the bottom of the island, the Black Tar monster was already upon the skeleton.
Numerous tendrils of darkness shot forward, enveloping the towering abomination. Despite all its might, the emerald skeleton was instantly trapped and pulled inside the mass of liquid darkness. It struggled desperately, but to no avail — seconds later, its massive figure disappeared within the body of the Dark Side fiend without a trace.
'Now… just forget about me, hellspawn... I'm too small and inconsequential, anyway.'
Sunny was already on the southern slope of the island, rushing toward the other heavenly chain that led away from this damned place.
Somewhere above him, the giant mass of liquid darkness rippled, perhaps grinding the ancient emerald bones into dust…
And then, the Corrupted fiend suddenly surged forward with incredible speed, heading for the very same chain.
Or rather, for the swift shadow that hoped to use the chain to escape.
Luckily, Sunny reached it first.
He burst from the shadows, flying across the span of empty air, and landed on the surface of the heavenly tether in a roll. Without wasting a single moment, Sunny pushed himself off of the cold iron surface with all four arms, wrapped the shadows around his body, and ran.
As dull pain spread through his chest, the Mantle of the Underworld turned as light as a feather.
Just a few seconds later, the chain swayed wildly beneath his feet, announcing that the Black Tar monster had reached it, too.
'Curses!'
There were a few hundred meters of giant sunlit links in front of him, and only past that was the heavenly tether submerged into the darkness of the Sky Below and shrouded in shadows.
'I'll make it… surely, I will.'
Sunny growled, bared his fangs... and ran.
Chapter 629: Pursuit
Sunny's upper arms were much longer than that of a human. Bending down, he fell on all fours and broke into a bestial gallop, flying forward with incredible speed. With each jump, the saving darkness grew closer and closer. The links of the heavenly chain rattled and swayed wildly beneath him as the Black Tar fiend pursued.
Sunny could have tried to find safety in the depth of the Sky Below, but his speed and maneuverability in the air would have been severely diminished. If the abomination decided to expel another rain of tar-covered projectiles, he would be shredded, torn to pieces, and consumed. Besides, there was no saying if the harrowing creature could follow him into the abyss.
His best chance was to reach the segment of the chain submerged in darkness, glide across it as a swift shadow, and escape to the next island.
Behind him, the mass of liquid darkness rolled forward with staggering speed, hundreds of black tendrils shooting out of it every moment to form a ceaseless tide. The distance between them grew smaller and smaller, and smaller still.
'Oh, gods…'
Just a split seconds before the tendrils of darkness descended upon him, Sunny finally reached a sufficiently low altitude and dove into the shadows, turning into one of them and rushing forward across the giant chain. The space where he stood just a moment ago was instantly enveloped by the foul flesh of the tar monstrosity, which then lunged after him, somehow starting to move even faster.
A strange, deafening sound that resembled a gurgling wail escaped from the depths of the mass of liquid darkness, causing Sunny's whole being to wreathe in pain. It washed over the world like a wave, penetrating deep into the darkness of the Sky Below and the radiance of the Sky Above, and making both shudder.
Sunny fled across the border between two skies, and the harrowing creature from the Dark Side followed.
Soon, the length of the heavenly chain that was shrouded in shadows came to the end, and he escaped them at a terrible speed, sliding across the metal of the links and barely keeping himself from plummeting down.
A tide of black, shifting tendrils fell at him almost instantly, but hit only ancient iron. Sunny had stepped through shadows, appearing a couple of dozen meters away, and then once again, teleporting to the surface of the island that loomed above him now.
That last jump ate a lot of his essence, but he had no other choice than to make it.
Falling to the ground, Sunny grabbed at his chest, which was pulsating with dull, crippling pain, and groaned. Then, he threw himself up and continued running.
Behind him, the tendrils of black tar were already above the edge of the island.
Sunny found himself among remnants of an ancient battlefield. Carcasses of broken ships lay forlornly on the barren earth, their blackened hulls covered with scorch marks and gaping with empty darkness. Here and there, pieces of rusty weapons and armor protruded from the ground, covered with ash. The ground itself was shattered and uneven, littered with pockmarks of deep craters.
Knowing that he would never escape the giant fiend on foot, Sunny alternated between galloping and jumping through shadows for short distances, sometimes chaining several jumps in a row. By exerting every fiber of his demonic body to its limit, he managed to stay ahead of the pursuing abomination for now, even if it was just barely.
Behind him, the monstrous creature barreled through wreckages of the fallen ships, breaking them apart with a thunderous cacophony of crashes. Its tendrils ripped the wooden hulls apart like paper, sending clouds of ash and debris flying through the air.
On the opposite side of the island, Sunny saw the remnants of a colossal pyre, thousands upon thousands of charred human bones arranged into a solemn pyramid to form it. These were, perhaps, the remains of the warriors that had thought in this battle and once crewed the broken ships.
What had brought them to this island, and what had they fought for? Who had won the terrible battle, and at what cost? Had this pyre been meant to honor fallen heroes, or dispose of dead enemies... or even prisoners, perhaps?
Without sparing a single thought to these questions, he dove down from the edge and fell through the air, reaching another chain and escaping further south. A few moments later, the Corrupted fiend flowed over the edge, as well, landing at the heavenly teather with a deafening thud.
Sunny was still ahead… the fiend failed to outrun him. For now.
The problem was that Sunny was growing tired and slowly running out of shadow essence, while the Black Tar monster was not.
South, south, south… pursued by the fiend from the Dark Side, Sunny fled south, crossing one island after another. But no matter how fast he ran, the damned monstrosity was faster.
Many of the islands he traversed were populated by Nightmare Creatures of all kinds, but unlike the towering emerald skeleton, these ones did not even try to fight the Corrupted abomination. Instead, they fled, too, scattering to the neighboring islands in something that resembled panic, or being consumed if they were not swift enough.
At some point, Sunny found himself running side by side with all kinds of Nightmare Creatures that would have usually not hesitated to attack him. They were like forest animals escaping from a raging fire… when a forest fire spread like an insatiable monster, devouring all in its way, predators and prey were made equal before its terrifying strength.
Besides, with his monstrous body and his mind still clouded by the countless times he had shadowed the abominations of all kinds in the Red Colosseum, Sunny was less unlike the Nightmare Creatures than he had used to be.
The Black Tar monster, however, was making a clear distinction between him and all the other creatures. It only paid attention to those abominations that were directly in its way, while its only goal, for some damned reason, was singular — to catch and consume Sunny.
'Curse it all… what's so special about me?!'
Was it the fact that he followed the path of Ascension instead of Corruption? Was it his nature as a shadow? Or maybe… was it the flame of divinity that burned in his soul and flowed through his veins?
Was that flame an irresistible lure for a creature like that?
There was no answer. All Sunny could do was run, run, run... run as his chest became consumed with pain, and his soul became empty and barren, devoid of any essence at all.
...Some time later, he escaped from the shadows one last time and fell on the emerald grass of a new island, almost completely spent of essence and sapped of all stamina.
He was done… done for. His single heart was beating wildly in his aching chest, drowning as it tried to do the work meant for two. His four lungs were on fire.
This was it. This was as far as he could go.
Sunny drew in a hoarse breath, and then slowly rose to his feet. His eyes shone with grim darkness.
'So be it… good. Come and get me, beast. Let us see which one of us is stronger. I… I have killed creatures mightier than you before…'
Granted, during the battle with Wormvine, he had months of preparations and a whole cohort of Fire Keepers supporting him.
Sunny used the last of his essence to summon the Cruel Sight and turned around, ready to face the assault of the black tendrils.
However… something was off.
'...Huh?'
The rattling of the heavenly chains... it had grown quiet.
He frowned, then took a few steps toward the edge of the island and looked down.
The Black Tar monster was some distance away, its massive body hanging motionlessly from the heavenly tether. It was frozen and unmoving, with only its tendrils pulsating in a bizarre and nauseating rhythm.
The abomination… seemed to be reluctant to approach this particular island. It was as though there was an invisible boundary that it refused to cross, for some reason.
Sunny stared at the harrowing creature for a few moments, and then snarled.
…He had escaped an inescapable situation once again. He had successfully fled the pursuit of the terrifying fiend! It seemed that luck was on his side, in the end.
However…
Was it, really?
Sunny shivered.
'But what… what, exactly, can scare a Corrupted Monster away?'