She would endure everything still to come.
Because that was her will—the will of the last Immortal Flame.
She looked up then, almost by coincidence, and her gaze caught on a boy walking through the cafeteria. Short black hair. Casual posture. A cup of coffee or tea in his hands, which he sipped as he walked, seemingly indifferent to the oppressive mood around him.
Her eyes followed him without conscious intent.
He sat across from a blonde girl she had noted before. The girl's Flaw—blindness—rose unbidden to her thoughts, and with it, a familiar surge of pity. Blindness in the Dream Realm was not merely cruel; it was practically a death sentence. Once more, she was reminded of the Spell's merciless nature, and of why she could not afford to fail.
She watched the pair sit in silence.
They never spoke, at least not that she had ever seen. Their quiet was awkward, almost painfully so, and yet there was something strangely endearing about it. Three outcasts, she thought absently—including herself. For a fleeting moment, she imagined walking over, joining them, letting the three of them sit together in shared silence like some odd gathering of misfits.
Because that was what they were.
The blind girl, already marked as a corpse in the eyes of others. Herself, distant and burdened by secrets she could never voice. And the black-haired boy—crass, outspoken, almost aggressively alive. He had gone out of his way to alienate himself, provoking even the Legacies. The memory of his exaggerated boasts, and of how they had cracked even Caster's carefully maintained facade, drew a small, genuine smile to her lips.
Quietly, she wished for him to survive.
To live well.
It was all she could offer.
She rose once her meal was finished, smoothing her clothes and straightening her posture. She did not look at anyone as she turned away, head held high, steps measured and steady.
Her destination was the training rooms.
Practicing so soon after eating was ill-advised, but her body could endure it. Even before Awakening, she had been stronger than most. More importantly, wielding a sword calmed her. The rhythm, the discipline, the clarity of motion—it centered her in a way nothing else could.
Of course, she would never reveal the full extent of her abilities. Not here. Not with the Government and the Legacy Clans watching her every move.
As she walked, her hand clenched unconsciously at her side.
Soon, she thought.
Everything begins here. Today.
Soon, the world would learn just how brightly a Star of Change could shine.
He awoke with the numbing awareness that today was the day.
The realization settled into him fully formed, heavy and inescapable, as if it had been waiting patiently for his consciousness to surface. For a few moments, he lay still, staring at the ceiling, his chest rising and falling with slow, measured breaths. Then he exhaled deeply, the sound rough, almost forced, and pushed himself out of bed.
The room was immaculate, preserved in the sterile perfection expected of a Legacy. He crossed it without hesitation and stopped before the bathroom mirror. Cool white light washed over his reflection, revealing every detail he would have preferred to ignore.
He studied himself in silence.
His fingers moved absently to his chin, tracing the coarse stubble that had grown overnight. It was a small thing, insignificant by most standards, yet it served as a constant reminder of his Flaw—of the weakness bound inseparably to his Aspect. No matter how disciplined he was, no matter how refined his control became, it was there, mocking him, proof that he was not whole.
His other hand rose to clutch the hourglass pendant hanging from his neck.
He never removed it. Not to sleep, not to bathe, not for any reason.
The metal was cool against his skin, reassuring in its weight. This was his lifeline. His most important Memory. More important even than the emerald odachi resting in his Soul Sea. That blade helped him survive. The hourglass kept him alive.
Focus.
The word snapped through his mind like a lash.
He struck his own chest with a clenched fist, not hard enough to injure, but hard enough to jolt himself into discipline. His reflection did not flinch.
You are a Legacy, he told himself coldly. You are special. You are unique.
The words came easily, rehearsed and refined over years of indoctrination.
The mongrels and rabble hold no sway over you. They exist only as stepping stones. You have a mission, and it must be completed. Do this, and your life will never again be threatened. Ascension—no, even Transcension—will be within your grasp.
His grip tightened around the pendant.
Accomplish the Sovereign's will. Extinguish the last spark of the Immortal Flame.
Yet when he truly looked at himself, the face staring back from the mirror betrayed none of that certainty.
It was hollow. Gaunt. His eyes were rimmed with exhaustion, his expression stretched thin by fear he refused to name. The bravado rang false in the silence of the room.
His fist moved before his thoughts could catch up.
Glass shattered.
The mirror exploded outward as his knuckles slammed into it, fragments spraying across the polished floor in a sharp, ringing cascade. Pain followed a heartbeat later, distant and dull. Blood welled from his hand, dripping in rivulets down his fingers, splattering dark red against porcelain and tile.
He barely noticed.
He stared at the jagged crater in the mirror, at the warped remnants of his reflection fractured into countless pieces. Anger churned in his chest, tangled with fear, resentment, and emotions too complex to untangle.
Turning away abruptly, he felt a flicker of guilt for the destruction—but it died almost instantly. He could replace the mirror without a thought. A thousand mirrors, if necessary.
Wrapping his injured hand in gauze with practiced efficiency, he left the room.
The bleeding had been minimal to begin with, and it had nearly stopped on its own. Still, he did not take chances. No half measures. That lesson had been beaten into him long before he ever entered the Dream Realm.
If you are going to do something, see it through to the end. This is our pride as a Legacy.
His grandfather's voice echoed clearly in his memory, stern and unwavering.
But what would you say if you were here now? he wondered bitterly as he walked the pristine corridors. What would you think of this mission? Of murdering a young girl for the crime of carrying a name?
Would you scorn me? Would you strike me?
Or would you understand?
I do this for our Clan. For our future. For our survival.
Does that not make me right?
The question hung unanswered.
His grandfather was gone. Dead of heart failure just over two years ago. He had lived a long life, full and respected, and had passed peacefully in his sleep. The Clan had mourned him properly. Honors had been paid. His legacy secured.
For a brief, unwelcome moment, he wondered if he would be granted the same mercy.
Then he hardened his expression and pushed the thought away.
There was no room for hesitation today.
Once again, she was dreaming the same dream.
A gigantic web of golden and silver strings stretched before her, so vast that only the smallest corner of it could fit within her vision. It spun endlessly, infinitely, threads crossing over and under one another in patterns too complex to follow. From one angle, it looked chaotic and meaningless, an incomprehensible tangle without order or purpose. From another, it resembled a cage—or perhaps a net—cast across the void to ensnare everything beneath it.
She no longer panicked at the sight.
She had learned what to do here.
Ever since she had escaped the Spell's grip in her First Nightmare, this place had returned to her again and again. The first time, the dream had terrified her so completely that she had snapped awake almost instantly, heart pounding, mind blank, unable to grasp even a fragment of what she had seen. But repetition had dulled the fear. Familiarity had bred not contempt, but discipline.
Now, she observed. She focused. She learned.
She fixed her attention on a single node in the vast web.
The dream shifted.
A massive castle stood in solemn vigilance over a majestic yet ruined city, its walls scarred by time and calamity. Towers lay broken, streets cracked and overgrown, the grandeur of the past lingering like a ghost. On the horizon, a sprawling coral expanse shimmered faintly, alien and immense. Far in the distance, a crimson obelisk pierced the sky, its shape unmistakably deliberate, as though it had been built not merely to stand—but to challenge the heavens themselves.
The vision fractured.
She stood upon a vast open plain, yet she instinctively knew it was no plain at all. It was an island—one of many—floating within a black void. Colossal black iron chains connected it to countless other islands of varying sizes, stretching outward in every direction like the framework of a broken world. Below, a dim sea of stars glimmered softly, mirroring the night sky above, as though reality had folded in on itself.
Her attention narrowed to five islands.
One bore an ivory tower, pristine and severe.
Another held a temple of black stone, heavy with solemnity and dread.
A third cradled the wreckage of a massive wooden ship, shattered and overgrown with vines, as if nature itself had claimed the remains.
The fourth island supported a raised dais, atop which a knife had been driven into the stone, its presence sharp and absolute.
The fifth lay far below, almost lost in the sea of stars, housing an ebony tower submerged in darkness.
She was torn away again.
The world was frozen.
The land, the sea, the air itself—locked in absolute stillness. Ice and darkness and death ruled everything. Across the frozen expanse, vortexes of blackness tore open reality like festering wounds, roaring into existence one after another. From them poured an endless tide of monsters, beasts, and horrors beyond comprehension, their forms so alien that her mind refused to fully grasp them.
Yet her gaze was drawn to one vortex in particular.
It began to turn translucent.
Through it, she saw another world: a vast desert, shimmering beneath oppressive heat. In the distance, half-obscured by wavering heat haze, a massive black pyramid rose from the sands, ancient and implacable.
The scene dissolved.
She was on a boat, drifting down a river beneath a sky lit by seven golden suns. The boat moved backward—yet somehow, she knew she was progressing forward all the same. Islands, rafts, and strange structures passed by, each wondrous in design but abandoned and decayed. Time seemed to lose all meaning here.
No, she realized numbly. The river was time itself.
As she approached the horizon, the seven suns began to dim, their light fading into shades of dusk and amber that heralded an ending. At the river's edge stood a city of gold and ivory, radiant even in decline, banners fluttering in a wind she could not feel. But at the city's very heart, a writhing mass of poisoned flesh pulsed and twisted.
As she watched, it sensed her gaze.
And it looked back.
She was gone again.
She stood in a cold, dark palace beneath the ribcage of a skeleton so enormous it could only belong to a god. Its bones arched overhead like the vaults of a cathedral. Upon a throne sat a man cloaked in shadows, his face hidden, yet the hollow pits of his eyes glimmered faintly from within the darkness.
The vision shattered.
She was in a mirror maze, reflections of herself stretching endlessly in every direction. One by one, the reflections began to smile—slowly, unnaturally—and then they shattered, glass exploding outward into nothingness.
Another shift.
She wandered an expansive city cloaked in murky fog, passing creatures that cast no shadows at all. Their absence felt wrong, deeply and instinctively so.
She was—
She was—
She was—
She was on the moon.
Behind her, Earth glowed softly, a gentle blue gem suspended in the darkness. She froze, overwhelmed by its unspoiled beauty, drinking in the sight. Then she noticed something else.
A shadow.
It crept from behind the planet, emerging from the folds of the universe itself. Slowly, inexorably, it reached out toward Earth.
And then there was no Earth anymore.
Stunned, she turned, driven by instinct rather than thought.
A figure sat nearby on a simple chair, hands resting loosely over his knees. He wore an astronaut's suit. The visor was shattered, yet his face remained obscured, hidden by shadow. He sat perfectly still, like a corpse, as though he had been watching the Earth for millennia—and would continue to do so for millennia more.
Then he spoke.
"You're blocking my view."
Before she could respond, the dream tore her away once more.
She found herself back at the beginning, surrounded again by the endless loom of golden and silver strings. This was where the dream always ended. This was where she was supposed to wake.
She waited.
Nothing happened.
Instead, a new light bloomed within the void.
Slowly, inexorably, it expanded. Against its radiance, even the golden strings and distant stars dimmed, eclipsed by its brilliance. Her eyes widened, her thoughts scrambling as the light rose like a sun and began to take shape—vast, overwhelming, too large for her mind to properly comprehend.
Only then was she violently yanked backward, falling away, tumbling toward reality.
Yet just before the dream released her completely, she was far enough away to finally understand what she was seeing.
Ah.
It was a cross.
Then she was gone.
In a space beyond the confines of space and time—where distance held no meaning and moments could not be measured—a single golden flame flickered within an otherwise empty void.
It was small. Fragile. Soft.
Its light did not blaze or roar, but trembled gently, as though a single breath might extinguish it. An invisible presence hovered close, dutiful and tireless, endlessly tending the flame with motions that were neither hands nor will, but something more fundamental. It stroked, fed, and preserved the fire by instinct alone, carrying out a purpose long since forgotten—even by the flame itself. The kindling burned without understanding why it burned, or what it was meant to become.
Far away, and yet impossibly close—for space did not truly exist here—countless shadows and distortions lingered.
They did not approach.
They watched.
Their forms shifted ceaselessly, warping and folding in on themselves, defying any stable shape or interpretation. Within them lurked both ultimate reason and omnipotent madness, intertwined so thoroughly that they could no longer be separated. To behold them directly was to invite dissolution of thought itself. They were concepts given hunger, logic given teeth, insanity given patience.
They had been waiting.
They had waited since before Time had learned to move forward. Since before causality had chosen a direction. Since before the first question had ever been asked.
What was a little longer?
The flame was already fading.
After all, there was no one left to truly tend it. No conscious guardian. No inheritor of purpose. Only an automatic system remained—an echo of intent left behind by a wanton child of Fate, careless in its power, convinced that eternity would be kind enough to clean up its mess.
The flame crackled softly.
Its light wavered.
Each sputter was barely perceptible, yet monumental in consequence. With every faltering pulse, the surrounding void crept closer, inching inward not through motion, but through inevitability. Darkness did not rush. It did not need to. It merely waited for the fire to fail on its own.
The watchers did not move.
They did not salivate.
They simply endured, certain that the ending would come, as all things eventually did.
And above it all—beyond flame and void, beyond watcher and system, beyond even the concept of observation—a long, weary sigh echoed through the nonexistence.
It was the breath of a god still asleep.
A sound heavy with age, resignation, and forgotten regret.
The flame flickered again.
And the waiting continued.
"I told you it would be interesting," the first figure said lightly, a hint of satisfaction threading his voice.
The second did not bother to look at him. His attention remained fixed on the screen suspended before them, its shifting images reflected faintly in eyes that seemed carved from indifference itself. "The main plot has not even begun," he replied at last. "Save your praise for then."
The first scoffed, unoffended. "The prologue is just as important as the story itself. It sets the tone. Establishes the rules. Without it, everything that follows lacks weight."
"Yet the ending is more important still," the second countered calmly. "And from what I have seen, your little pet does not appear capable of changing it in any meaningful way."
"He is still young," the first said dismissively, waving away the criticism as though it were dust. "Give him time. He will grow into his role."
The second merely hummed in response—a low, noncommittal sound. He offered no rebuttal, no agreement, no further interest. His silence was judgment enough.
Amused, the first chuckled softly. With a casual motion, he reached out and tapped the screen.
It fractured instantly, dividing itself into countless panes. Each displayed a different scene: people moving through streets and halls, across wastelands and citadels; men and women, children and elders; warriors sharpening blades, scholars hunched over notes, cowards hiding, heroes hesitating. Lives unfolding in parallel, intersecting and diverging in endlessly complex patterns.
"I was skeptical of his choice at first," the first admitted, studying the multitude with open fascination. "I truly was. But I must concede—this world does have an extensive cast. Not especially refined, not particularly subtle… but extensive nonetheless."
His smile widened, eyes glinting with anticipation. "I am curious to see how he reshapes them. How their stories will be bent, reframed, broken apart, and rebuilt through his own perspective."
The second figure watched in silence, his expression unchanged.
Gradually, the space settled once more into stillness.
The screens continued to glow.
And the observers continued to watch.
Damnation," Sunny cursed, driving the austere tachi down into the stone with all the frustration he had left in him.
The blade sank in with a sharp, ringing note, vibrations shuddering up the hilt and into his arm. The Midnight Shard hummed faintly, as if offended by the abuse, but true to its reputation, the so-called indestructible weapon showed not even the slightest chip or crack. Sunny left it there for a moment, leaning on the hilt as he caught his breath, shoulders rising and falling.
Beside him, Nephis and Cassie had also dragged themselves ashore, collapsing onto the cold rock like survivors of a shipwreck—which, now that he thought about it, they were.
Dark seawater clung to Cassie, soaking her clothes through and plastering pale fabric to her skin. She shivered, blind eyes unfocused as always, her expression calm but tired. Nephis, on the other hand, looked almost pristine. At some point during the climb—or perhaps the moment her feet touched solid ground—silver flames had blossomed around her body. The water had vanished instantly, turning to hissing steam, and any lingering injuries had been burned away just as easily.
Unfortunately, so had the water on Cassie.
Sunny noticed it a second too late.
He jerked his gaze away immediately, heat creeping up his neck. "Tch… damn it," he muttered under his breath, fixing his attention very firmly on the horizon, the rock, the sky—anything but Cassie.
Why does Nephis' Aspect have to work like that? he complained internally. Healing is fine. Fire is fine. But burning away clothes too? That's just unnecessary.
He shifted uncomfortably and pretended to be very interested in pulling his sword back out of the stone, anything to avoid looking in Cassie's direction again. It wasn't that he wanted to—well, maybe part of him did—but the problem was that he absolutely shouldn't. This was already a bad situation. Making it worse by being a creep was not on his list of survival strategies.
Below him, his shadow stirred.
Gloomy Shadow peeled itself off the rock and looked up at him, its featureless face somehow radiating smug amusement. Then, just to make things worse, it raised one shadowy hand and formed a neat little circle with its thumb and index finger, wiggling the remaining fingers in an unmistakably vulgar gesture.
Sunny's eye twitched.
"I will stab you," he hissed quietly, glaring down at it. "I don't care that it won't hurt. I'll still do it."
The shadow only seemed more pleased, its outline rippling as if it were laughing soundlessly at his misery.
Sunny sighed, exhaustion washing over him once more. Between the sea, the climb, Nephis' flames, Cassie's condition, and his own treacherous shadow, he was rapidly running out of patience.
And this was only the beginning.
"Please tell me," Sunny began, voice heavy with grievance, "that that was the only crater we have to sail across to reach this so-called City?" His words carried every ounce of exhaustion, frustration, and disbelief he'd felt since being tossed into this hellish stretch of the Forgotten Shore.
Cassie bowed her head slightly, silent, letting his tone wash over her without comment. Nephis, however, frowned sharply, her silver flames dimly flickering around her hands as if to mirror her irritation. Sunny's momentary shame flickered in him, briefly consuming his bravado, before he pushed it away. Why should I feel ashamed, damn it! he thought, clenching his jaw. We almost drowned. Nephis almost got eaten by that sea monster. And don't even get me started on that tree… that abominable mind-bending bastard. This is survival, not guilt.
"The City is real," Nephis said firmly, her voice steady, carrying the authority of someone who had endured too much to be shaken by conjecture. She reached out, resting a hand lightly on Cassie's shoulder to ground her, a small gesture of reassurance. "I trust Cassie's visions, and there has to be a Citadel in the region. A city like Bastion makes the most sense."
Sunny let out a short, humorless laugh, flicking back his soaking black hair with one hand. "I wouldn't know," he said flippantly. "I've never been to Bastion, and I know precious little about Citadels other than the fact they're apparently our ticket home. That's all that matters, right?"
Nephis' storm-grey eyes locked on his onyx ones with unwavering intensity, piercing through his façade. "Right," she said simply. "So we need to reach it as fast as possible, so we can finally leave this place."
Sunny's lips curled into a grin, sharp and almost predatory, more teeth than warmth. "Say less, Princess," he replied, the exhaustion and exasperation in his voice giving way to resolve. "On that much, we agree."
The golden rope shimmered faintly in the darkness, coiling around Cassie's waist and wrist with an almost sentient precision. It pulsed gently, a tether of Memory and guidance that allowed the blind girl to move forward with confidence, even in the fractured and unpredictable terrain of the Dream Realm. Nephis walked just ahead, her every step measured, every glance calculated, her silver flames occasionally flickering to illuminate the path. Sunny's shadow, Gloomy, drifted silently above, scouting ahead like an extension of his own senses.
From Gloomy's perspective, the landscape shifted constantly, yet some structures stubbornly rose from the ruin below. One caught his attention immediately. "Heads up," Sunny's voice came through the mental link he shared with the shadow, careful to keep his tone casual. "I think I see another one of those Stone Statues up ahead. Looks like…a woman? Decapitated. Huh. You know, I think someone has a grudge against these things."
He didn't dwell on it, though his attention constantly flitted between the structure and the surrounding shadows. Every movement of the coral, every jagged fragment of collapsed stone was scrutinized for ambush. Even the air seemed to thrum with the potential for danger, and Sunny's shadow flitted ahead, a silent, morbid scout.
Nephis's voice cut through his thoughts. "Any roads or easy paths?"
Sunny shook his head, scanning the terrain with a practiced eye. "Nothing clear. Stray coral, broken stone fragments…no road, Cass. Looks like we're taking the rough way."
Cassie's hand, still grasping the golden rope, didn't waver. "It's fine," she said simply. "I trust you and Neph."
Sunny's lips curved into a mirthless smile, hidden from the two girls since he was facing away. Trust, he mused silently, does anyone ever really deserve it?
Before the Soul Devourer, he would have laughed at the notion. Trust was a poison disguised as a gift: a hope that lifted you only to cast you down. He didn't need trust. He didn't need friends. He only needed himself.
But the memory of survival, of battles barely won, tugged at him. If he had been alone, he never would have slain the Centurion Demon, never would have escaped the Soul Devourer, never would have crossed the Dark Sea. Whether he liked it or not, Teacher Julius and Awakened Rock had been right: no one survived the Dream Realm alone.
He glanced back over his shoulder. Nephis moved with careful precision, eyes scanning the shifting terrain, alert for the smallest irregularity. Cassie's movements were steady and deliberate, her free hand hovering slightly at her side to catch herself if she stumbled, the golden rope a lifeline around her other.
Sunny studied them silently. Did he trust them? Could he place his life in their hands? The answer, he already knew.
And with that, he turned back to face the path ahead, stepping into the chaos with the quiet certainty that they were stronger together than they ever could be alone. The golden rope stretched taut between them, a fragile yet unbreakable bond, guiding them onward.
The Dream Realm was vast. It was cruel. And it was relentless. But Sunny, Nephis, and Cassie would face it—not as three scattered souls, but as a team bound by necessity, by experience, and by the faint, flickering light of trust.
'So this is what friends are like?" he mused. 'Not unpleasant. Not at all.'
Sunny hit the ground first, rolling hard across the jagged coral and fractured stone. His bones groaned and his skin tore against the abrasive ground, but Blood Weave worked instantly, sealing the deepest cuts and leaving only two drops of crimson to stain the earth. Above him, a warm silver flame wrapped around his torso, drifting from Nephis' sword, knitting muscle and sinew back together as if time itself had paused to obey her will.
He pushed himself up, the taste of salt and blood on his lips, and peered through the chaos. Cassie had pressed herself against a rock formation, limbs tucked close, eyes wide with fear but determined. Nephis stood at the forefront, sword alight in purifying silver flames. Her blade arced and sliced with deadly precision, flames trailing in elegant ribbons that incinerated the abomination's attacks before they could strike her.
The monster was a horror made manifest. Its torso was sleek and humanoid, yet scaled and menacing like a man-shark, three crab-like heads pivoting independently, snapping and shrieking. Its barbed tail arced like a cruel scythe behind it, tipped with a jagged, axe-like blade. That tail had sent Sunny flying earlier, and it threatened him again now.
Sunny's advantage was not strength. Not skill. Not raw power. He was weaker than Nephis by a vast margin, and even the slightest hit could cripple him. His edge was cunning, trickery, and mobility—the art of surviving through misdirection, deception, and precise timing. He let the monster focus on Nephis, letting her attract the creature's aggression. Each time it struck at her, she drew its attention, and each miss was a step in Sunny's invisible dance.
He rolled to the side, narrowly avoiding a snapping jaw, and slashed with his Tachi. Gloomy Shadow wrapped around the blade like a living thing, amplifying the edge with dark energy that hissed against the air. The strike wasn't meant to wound deeply; it was meant to distract, to redirect the creature's movements, to plant a seed of confusion. Its clawed head snapped at him, and Sunny tumbled backward, letting the momentum carry him into a narrow crevice of jagged stone.
Nephis roared a wordless command, swinging her sword in a wide arc. The silver flames cut through the abomination's closest head, burning muscle and scale alike, forcing it to twist violently. Sunny used the opening to dart between its thrashing limbs, Tachi slashing at the joints of its monstrous appendages. Each strike was precise—nicks and cuts, not massive damage, but enough to alter the rhythm of the creature's assault.
The creature pivoted, sensing Sunny's presence now. One of its heads lunged straight for him, jaws snapping like pistons. Sunny rolled under the swing, feeling the scrape of its teeth across his shoulder. Pain flared, but he twisted the Tachi, letting Gloomy Shadow coil around its hilt to strike the head mid-lunge. The edge met the skull's jaw with a hiss and a screech, diverting it enough to keep him safe.
Nephis pressed the attack relentlessly. Flames blazed from her sword in towering arcs, incinerating the area around her and forcing the creature into defensive maneuvers. She drew every strike, absorbed every attack, and every blow landed on her made Sunny's pulse quicken—he couldn't survive what she could endure. Her strength made her a target, and she paid for it with each swing, absorbing punishment so they could all live.
Sunny darted again, this time approaching from above the monster's right flank. Using a jagged stone ledge, he vaulted, spinning in midair, and slashed the webbing between two of its heads. Sparks flew as shadow energy met scale, and the creature shrieked in frustration, heads snapping wildly. He landed, rolled, and immediately valuted behind a rock formation, removing himself from the monster's line of sight.
The monster reared back, confused and enraged. As soon as it looked away to focus on Nephis again, Sunny used the opportunity to strike again, darting behind it, his movements almost a blur. Every nick he delivered was designed to create openings for Nephis, to keep the abomination off balance, to manipulate it like a living puzzle. He was weaker, yes, but his intelligence and cunning were weapons in their own right.
Nephis' silver flame sword carved a path straight down the center of the monster, flames licking and healing at the same time, carving out pieces of the creature's body while keeping her own vitality intact. Each time it lashed at her, Sunny intercepted from angles she couldn't cover, using his shadow to create phantom doubles, forcing it to waste its energy on attacks that didn't exist.
The abomination twisted violently, barbed tail swinging and snapping. Sunny rolled under the strike, Tachi angled to slice the spiny appendage, not to sever, but to cripple its momentum. The tail skidded across the ground, leaving deep furrows as he sprang back and out of reach. Nephis struck again, flames burning hot enough to make the very air around her shimmer with heat.
Sweat and blood ran down Sunny's face, but he didn't falter. He didn't hesitate. Each moment, each breath, each step was a calculated gamble. He couldn't overpower the monster, couldn't take its attention like Nephis could, but he could control where it directed its rage. And that, combined with Nephis' firepower and Cassie's steady guidance along the rope, was enough.
With a quick glance over his shoulder, Sunny saw an opening forming—a head twisted awkwardly, tail just barely out of place. He darted forward, shadow curling tightly around him, and leapt onto the monster's back. Gloomy Shadow surged into the blade, turning it black as midnight. He slashed diagonally across the base of two heads, slicing deep into the muscles that controlled them. The creature screamed in a mixture of agony and rage.
Nephis seized the opportunity without hesitation. Flames roared, her sword slashing down the central head, the silver fire igniting what remained of the beast's vitality. Cassie guided them safely through the debris of falling rock and shattered coral, the golden rope keeping her tethered to life.
The abomination fell, crashing into the jagged terrain with a thunderous impact, twitching and writhing until finally lying still. Smoke and foulness filled the air, and Sunny breathed heavily, shadow dissipating from the Tachi as he dropped lightly to the ground.
He turned to Nephis and Cassie, sweat dripping, muscles trembling—but alive.
"Next time," he muttered, smirking despite the blood and bruises, "I get to do the fancy finishing blow."
Nephis' silver flames flickered in amusement, and Cassie exhaled softly, golden rope still tight in her grip.
The trio worked in a quiet rhythm around the monster's corpse, the only sounds the scrape of knives against flesh, the crackle of the campfire, and the occasional sigh of exertion. Nephis' flames licked the edges of their workspace, purifying the meat as they dug, ensuring that no toxin or corruption remained. Even the stench of the beast seemed to vanish in the glow of her fire, replaced by the faint, almost earthy scent of cooked flesh.
Sunny moved with careful precision, though he ate as if the world might vanish any second. He cupped each piece of meat in his hand, bringing it to his mouth in deliberate bites, chewing quickly yet cautiously, scanning the shadows as he ate. Every movement carried a subtle tension, the paranoia of someone who had learned long ago that survival wasn't guaranteed, that even a moment of weakness could be fatal.
Cassie, in contrast, maintained a quiet elegance. She sliced her portion into neat, measured pieces, holding her knife and fork like a conductor would hold a baton. Her expression, serene at first, soured slightly when a particularly unpleasant bit of muscle passed her lips, but she swallowed it with grace, refusing to waste the meal or show overt displeasure. Even in the face of a monstrous feast, she maintained a proper composure.
Nephis was different entirely. Her method was efficiency incarnate. Flames danced along her knife and fork as she cut and consumed, indifferent to taste or texture. Each bite was swallowed almost immediately, her eyes scanning the surrounding area while her body operated like a well-oiled machine. There was no hesitation, no moment wasted on appraisal or hesitation—her priority was nourishment and speed, sustaining herself for whatever came next.
Around the fire, they existed in their own worlds, each absorbed in the manner that survival had taught them. The crackle of the flames mirrored the unspoken rhythm of their teamwork: Sunny's cautious vigilance, Cassie's disciplined grace, and Nephis' relentless efficiency. Despite the silence, there was a kind of quiet understanding among them, a shared trust forged in battle and hardship.
When the last scraps were eaten and the fire burned low, the three of them leaned back slightly, sated but alert. For the first time since he had arrived in this godforsaken deadzone, Sunny felt a strange tranquility settle over him. Not the false calm of the Soul Devourer's grip—that had been forceful, suffocating, an attempt to enthrall them into eternal servitude—but a real, earned silence, the kind that comes only after surviving a storm by wit, luck, and steel.
The series of coincidences that had saved them—the Puppeteer's Shroud granting Sunny mental resistance, Nephis' cryptic sharing of the names "Song, Aster, Vale," and Cassie's prophetic insight about his number of Attributes—felt almost fated. Yet it was the encounter with the Spawn of the Vile Thieving Bird and acquiring Blood Weave that had been the true linchpin, a single moment where chance and skill had intertwined to carve them a narrow path to survival. Fated, indeed—but still, the shadow of what could have been lingered.
Sunny shifted on the ground, the warmth of the dying fire at his back, and realized he needed to know. The questions had been clawing at his mind all evening, and now, with Cassie asleep and the camp wrapped in darkness, he spoke.
"Hey, Neph."
"…yes, Sunny?"
"About what happened back there," he started carefully, "when I convinced you the Soul Devourer was bad…who are Song, Aster, and Vale?"
The crackle of the fire was suddenly deafening in the still night. Nephis froze, the sound of her breathing slowing, deliberate and careful. Sunny waited, heart thrumming with the tension of anticipation. For a long moment, it seemed she might ignore him, might slip back into the silence of night, but then she spoke.
"Sunny, I am saying this because I consider you a friend: don't get involved with this. Those three…well, let's just say they are the prime reason why the Immortal Flame Clan only has me left."
Sunny's breath caught, a small intake that almost betrayed him.
"Of course," Nephis continued, her tone measured but carrying the weight of memory and loss, "I'm not saying it is entirely their fault. Even without them stoking the flames, my Clan was doomed when my father perished. He had taken most of our most powerful Memories with him, you see, and his death practically bankrupted us. Anyone who falls from grace is inevitably devoured by hyenas—this is the natural way of things. But—"
"I will still kill those three."
The conviction in her voice struck deeper than Sunny expected. It wasn't blind hatred—it was something far colder, far sharper. It was wrath, tempered and contained, wrapped in the shell of absolute control. He remained silent, letting her words sink in, the firelight flickering against her resolute expression.
"Is that why you don't trust the other Legacies? Because those three have influence over them…because they have a vendetta against your family?" he asked carefully.
"Not my entire family," Nephis replied with cold precision. "Just my direct bloodline, the bloodline of my mother. My father married in, remember? But yes—the Legacies cannot be trusted. Any one of them could be a spy…or an assassin."
Sunny swallowed, the weight of her words pressing on him. "…Including Caster?"
"Especially Caster," she said with a hint of dark humor, almost a laugh caught in her throat. Then her tone shifted, firm and measured once more. "But that's enough talk. As I said, Sunny—you should keep to your own affairs. My feud with the Sovereigns has nothing to do with you, and I don't want it to. Just…survive, and live well. Goodnight."
The sound of her rolling over was definitive, a clear signal that the conversation was closed. Sunny exhaled slowly, drawing his knees closer, the warmth of the fire and her words both a comfort and a reminder of the dangers that still waited beyond the camp.
"Night, Neph," he murmured, letting the stillness settle back over the three of them. The shadows of the Dream Realm lingered outside their small circle of light. As always.
They pressed on through the hostile terrain, their pace steady but cautious. The ground beneath their feet grew increasingly uneven, riddled with shallow pits and jagged ridges that forced them to watch every step. The black grass thickened as they advanced, each blade stiff and sharp, brushing against their legs like a field of half-buried spikes. It whispered when disturbed, a dry, rasping sound that made the silence feel fragile, as though it might shatter at any moment.
Nephis walked at the front, posture straight and unyielding, one hand holding the golden rope with measured care. The Memory glimmered faintly, its soft radiance a fragile line of certainty in the gloom. Cassie followed closely, her steps cautious yet surprisingly confident. Her head was slightly tilted, as though she were listening to the world rather than seeing it, every sound catalogued and weighed. The absence of sight had sharpened her hearing to an uncanny degree; the scrape of stone, the distant groan of shifting coral, even the subtle movement of air through the broken terrain did not escape her notice.
Sunny lingered a few paces behind, his expression dark and thoughtful as he divided his attention between the waking world and the shadow slipping ahead of them. Through Gloomy's eyes, he watched the land unfold—collapsed stone slabs half-swallowed by the earth, coral-like growths piercing through ruined masonry, and the occasional skeletal remnant of structures that might once have been roads. Whatever civilization had existed here, it had not merely fallen; it had been dismantled, erased with intent.
The Stone Statue loomed closer with every step. What had once been a vague silhouette now revealed its unsettling craftsmanship. The figure was undeniably human, carved with a mastery that captured the tension of muscles beneath stone skin, the folds of clothing frozen in motion. Yet the neck ended in a jagged break, the head violently removed. Sunny's gaze lingered on the wound, his unease deepening. This was not decay, nor the work of time. It was execution, repeated again and again.
They passed beneath the statue's shadow, and even Nephis seemed to slow, her eyes flicking up briefly before returning to the path ahead. Cassie frowned faintly, as if sensing something amiss in the air, though she said nothing.
They continued on, the terrain gradually sloping upward. The black grass thinned, replaced by cracked stone and scattered rubble. The silence grew heavier, pressing in on them until even their breathing felt too loud. Then, without warning, Sunny stopped.
Nephis halted at once, tightening her grip on the rope. Cassie nearly bumped into her back, catching herself just in time.
"What is it?" Nephis asked quietly, already shifting her stance, ready for combat.
Sunny did not answer. He stood perfectly still, eyes unfocused, his attention pulled inward as he reconciled what he was seeing through his own eyes and his shadow's. Seconds stretched on, taut and uncomfortable. Cassie turned her head slightly in his direction, her brow furrowing.
"Sunny?" she prompted gently.
He swallowed, his throat suddenly dry. His hand rose slowly, trembling despite his effort to steady it. For a moment, it seemed he might lower it again, as if afraid to confirm what he had seen. Then he extended his arm and pointed ahead.
"I think…" His voice came out rough, hoarse with disbelief and something dangerously close to awe. He cleared his throat and tried again. "I think… I see the city."
Nephis followed the line of his finger, her eyes widening almost imperceptibly as the distant horizon resolved into shape and structure. Cassie, though unable to see, still sensed the atmosphere and her expression changed.
For the first time since they had crossed the Dark Sea, the dead land before them seemed to offer something other than despair.
Suffice to say, entering the Dark City was a lot harder than they had thought.
The trouble began long before they ever reached its walls. The moment they crossed some invisible boundary—roughly a mile from the city's outskirts—the sky itself seemed to come alive. A shrill chorus echoed overhead as shadows peeled away from the clouds and ruined spires in the distance, resolving into a swarm of flying monsters that poured toward them like living shrapnel.
They were small, lean creatures with leathery wings and hooked limbs, closer to skeletal gargoyles than birds. Their bodies were wiry and aerodynamic, built for speed rather than brute strength, and their eyes glimmered with a cruel, dim intelligence. Individually, they were nothing special—Dormant Monsters, barely worth noting under normal circumstances. Together, they were a nightmare.
At first, they had attacked recklessly, diving in clusters, screeching as they slashed and clawed. Nephis had answered with overwhelming force. Silver flames bloomed into the air, turning half a dozen of the creatures into falling cinders in the span of a few breaths. Their charred remains rained down on the blackened ground, sizzling as they struck.
That should have been the end of it.
Instead, it was the beginning.
The swarm adapted with alarming speed. The monsters spread out, no longer attacking en masse. They began to harass instead—two or three at a time, darting in from blind angles, striking once before retreating beyond reach. They learned Nephis's reach, learned the cadence of her movements, learned to veer away the instant her silver flames flared.
Minutes stretched into an exhausting procession of interruptions. Every few moments, wings would beat overhead, claws would scrape stone, and Sunny or Nephis would be forced to react. The monsters never committed fully, never risked annihilation. They simply refused to let the trio advance in peace.
Sunny's patience frayed by the second.
He swatted one out of the air with the flat of his tachi, the Midnight Shard humming as the creature's body snapped in half and tumbled away. Another raked its claws across his shoulder an instant later, tearing fabric and drawing a thin line of blood before darting off again.
Blood Weave sealed the wound almost immediately, but Sunny barely noticed. His glare followed the retreating monster skyward, eyes dark with irritation.
"Neph," he snapped between breaths, "can't you just fry them all?"
Nephis glanced at him briefly, silver hair whipping in the wind as another pair of creatures circled overhead. Her expression was calm, but there was tension beneath it.
"They're smarter than the average beast," she replied evenly. "After I burned a dozen of them, they stopped grouping up. Now they dodge whenever I point at them."
As if to mock her words, one of the flying monsters shrieked and veered sharply away the moment her gaze lifted, only to loop back seconds later from a different angle.
Sunny cursed under his breath, craning his neck to track the swarm. There had to be close to a hundred of them, maybe more, their silhouettes dotting the sky like living shrapnel. Individually weak. Collectively relentless.
If Nephis hadn't incinerated the first wave, Sunny was painfully aware of what would have happened. They would have been dragged down, overwhelmed by claws and teeth, stripped to bone before they even realized the danger. Death by attrition, slow and humiliating.
Cassie walked between them, guided by the golden rope, her head tilted upward as she listened intently to the air. Every dive was announced seconds in advance by the shift of wind and the subtle change in wingbeats, and she called out warnings with quiet urgency. Even so, the strain was beginning to show in the tightness of her posture.
Sunny clicked his tongue and glanced toward the distant skyline. The Dark City loomed ahead now, no longer just a silhouette but a mass of jagged towers and broken walls rising from the gloom. It felt impossibly far despite how close it looked.
"How much farther?" he asked, forcing the irritation out of his voice.
Nephis spared another quick glance at the city, then the sky. "Not much. Twenty minutes, maybe."
Sunny grunted in acknowledgment. He tightened his grip on the hilt of his tachi, knuckles whitening as another creature swooped low enough for him to feel the rush of air from its wings. His shadow writhed at his feet, eager but constrained, ill-suited for aerial prey.
Not for the first time, he found himself wishing for a bow, a throwing spear, anything that could reach into the sky and drag those pests down.
'Damn it,' he thought bitterly, eyes tracking a circling monster. 'Why does Neph get all the luck?'
The thought barely finished forming before guilt followed close behind. He remembered her Flaw. Remembered the price she paid for every use of those beautiful, merciless flames. Remembered her past, the weight she carried without complaint.
He exhaled slowly, jaw tightening.
"On second thought," he muttered to himself, slashing upward at a diving shape and forcing it to retreat, "maybe we both have it bad."
In the end, they made it out.
The moment they crossed an unseen threshold, the pressure above them vanished as abruptly as it had begun. The swarm wheeled overhead one last time, releasing a chorus of shrill, hate-filled shrieks that echoed across the broken land, before peeling away in a chaotic spiral. Sunny slowed, then stopped entirely, eyes following their retreat with barely concealed resentment.
Some of the creatures doubled back, circling the stretch of ground where the earlier skirmishes had taken place. He watched, jaw tightening, as they descended to the scorched earth and began tearing into the charred remains of their fallen kin. Wings folded, claws ripping, they fed with grotesque enthusiasm, crunching and gnawing at blackened flesh still faintly steaming from Nephis's flames.
"Hateful bastards," Sunny muttered.
His face twitched in disgust, and he forced himself to turn away before the sight etched itself too deeply into his mind. Cannibalism among monsters was hardly new to him, but something about the casual relish with which they devoured their own left a sour taste in his mouth.
Instead, he focused on what lay ahead.
The Dark City.
Up close, it was even more imposing than it had appeared from afar—but not in a grand or awe-inspiring way. It was oppressive, suffocating. The massive walls loomed overhead, built from black, inky stone that swallowed light rather than reflected it. The architecture felt wrong, less like a place meant for the living and more like an enormous mausoleum that had outgrown its purpose. Every surface seemed to drink in warmth and sound, leaving the air unnaturally cold and heavy.
Sunny couldn't help but wonder how many souls had once lived within these walls. How many had laughed, argued, loved, and dreamed here.
And how many of them were still around.
"Let's go," Nephis said, breaking the silence.
Her voice was steady, resolute as ever, and it pulled Sunny out of his thoughts. As usual, she was the first to move, setting the pace without hesitation. Cassie followed at her side, guided by the golden rope, while Sunny brought up the rear, shadow stretched long and alert.
Step by step, they advanced, passing beneath the vast shadow cast by the city walls. The temperature dropped perceptibly the moment they crossed into that shade, as if the sun itself hesitated to intrude here.
Sunny's gaze drifted upward, and that was when he noticed it properly.
Rising some distance within the city was a massive cylindrical structure, dark and monolithic, reaching high into the sky like a colossal finger pointing accusingly at the heavens. It dwarfed the surrounding buildings, its surface smooth and uniform compared to the crumbling stone around it.
"Think that's the Citadel?" Sunny asked, nodding toward it.
Nephis followed his gaze, her grey eyes narrowing slightly as she assessed the structure. "Perhaps. The Spell does have a habit of assigning Citadels to the most spectacular or unique building in an area." She paused, then added, "Still, we shouldn't assume. We'll explore the city to be safe."
They spent several minutes circling the outer wall, moving cautiously along its base. The black stone was cold to the touch, seamless in places and fractured in others, as though time itself had grown tired of trying to wear it down. Eventually, they found an opening—a breach where the wall had collapsed inward, leaving a jagged passage just wide enough to squeeze through.
Nephis and Sunny flanked Cassie, each taking one side as they carefully guided her over loose rubble and uneven stone. The air beyond the wall felt different—stagnant, untouched.
On the other side, the city greeted them with silence.
They stood in what appeared to be a residential district. Narrow streets stretched out between rows of houses in various states of decay. Some buildings had partially collapsed, their roofs caved in and walls reduced to skeletal frames. Others stood eerily intact, windows dark and empty, doors hanging open like mouths frozen mid-scream.
Not a single living soul was in sight.
A cold wind threaded its way through the streets, slipping between buildings and down alleys, weaving an eerie, hollow tune that raised goosebumps along Sunny's arms. The sound carried whispers of absence, of abandonment so complete it felt deliberate.
Sunny exhaled slowly, scanning the empty streets and shadowed doorways.
For the first time since leaving the Coral Labyrinth, he found himself almost missing it.
At least there, the danger had been loud.
They moved on without any real sense of direction, simply pressing deeper into the city, guided more by instinct than intention. The streets gradually narrowed, the buildings crowding closer together as though conspiring to hem them in. Black stone rose on either side, looming and silent, its surface scarred by time yet stubbornly intact.
Sunny's shadow went into overdrive.
Gloomy flitted from wall to wall, slipping through cracks, climbing façades, darting ahead to peer down intersecting streets and alleys. Through its senses, Sunny searched relentlessly for movement, heat, intent—anything. Yet there was nothing. No lurking silhouettes. No skittering shapes. No distant echoes of claws on stone.
Nothing at all.
Given the sheer scale of the Dark City, perhaps that should not have been surprising. And yet, Sunny felt more uneasy with every step. Since when had monsters ever been absent? Since when had the Dream Realm allowed such a stretch of peace?
Nephis felt it too. Sunny could tell, even though she gave nothing away overtly. Her posture was still upright, her pace steady, her grip on her sword relaxed but ready. Yet the faint tension in her shoulders, the subtle way her gaze lingered on corners and rooftops a fraction longer than necessary, told him everything. The calm was wrong, and she knew it.
After a stretch of time that felt neither long nor short—one of those strange intervals where minutes blurred together—Sunny suddenly raised his fist.
They stopped at once.
"There's a strange structure up ahead," he said quietly. "Want to check it out?"
Cassie tilted her head toward him. "What's it like?"
Sunny hesitated, then answered plainly. "Underground."
"No."
Nephis's response was immediate, her tone sharp and unyielding.
"Fighting underground in cramped spaces is the biggest taboo for any warrior," she said firmly, "especially for someone like me. I need space to maximize the effectiveness of my flames. If I lose control down there, I could bring the roof down on top of us."
Cassie remained silent, but her expression shifted subtly, her lips pressing together in agreement. The blind girl did not need sight to understand the danger of enclosed spaces in the Dream Realm.
Sunny shrugged inwardly. He didn't particularly care either way. A pit was a pit—dangerous, yes, but not inherently more so than the city itself. He was about to nod and suggest moving on when something caught his attention.
Or rather, Gloomy's.
Sunny frowned as he focused his mind through his shadow's senses, sharpening its attention on the object that had snagged it. Nestled near the edge of the pit's entrance, half-buried among broken stone, was a faint glow.
Small. Jagged. Irregular.
A crystal.
Sunny's eyebrow rose slowly. "A Soul Shard?"
The muttered words were enough to draw the attention of the two girls. Nephis and Cassie both frowned.
"What did you say?" Nephis asked.
Sunny cleared his throat. "There seems to be a Soul Shard just lying there. By the entrance to the pit." He paused, then added, "I don't sense any other creatures or monsters nearby. No corpse either."
Cassie's brows knitted together. "Do you think it's a trap?"
"I don't see anything else nearby," Sunny repeated. "Living or dead."
Nephis frowned, genuine confusion creasing her features for the first time Sunny could recall. A Soul Shard unattended was strange enough. One sitting openly at the mouth of an underground structure, in a city this ominous, bordered on absurd.
Sunny and Cassie gave her space to think.
Nearly a full minute passed in silence, broken only by the low whisper of wind through the ruined streets. Finally, Nephis lifted her head.
"Alright," she said. "Let's go check it out."
Sunny blinked in mild surprise.
"But," she continued, her voice turning crisp and commanding, "Sunny, report the slightest movement. Anything at all."
He nodded. "Understood."
"Cassie," Nephis added, turning slightly, "hold onto the rope tightly. Be ready to jump backward the moment something emerges."
Cassie tightened her grip on the golden rope and nodded once. "I'm ready."
Sunny rolled his shoulders and exhaled softly. "Alright."
With everyone in agreement, the trio advanced together, steps slow and measured, toward the dark pit and the faintly glowing Soul Shard waiting at its edge.
They advanced almost like turtles, every step slow, deliberate, and measured. Each of the three pushed their senses to the limit—Sunny through his shadow, Cassie through sound and intuition, Nephis through raw awareness and instinct sharpened by endless battle. And yet, there was nothing.
No shifting air.
No distant footfalls.
No heartbeat that didn't belong to one of them.
Not above.
Not below.
Not behind.
Not ahead.
The absence itself gnawed at Sunny's nerves.
As they rounded the last stretch of broken stone, the pit finally came into full view. Nephis saw it immediately, her gaze sharpening. Cassie, guided by the rope and Sunny's subtle adjustments, stopped just short of the edge.
Still, no ambush came.
"Maybe someone dropped it here?" Cassie offered quietly. "Sunny, you said it's a pit leading underground, right? Maybe when they climbed up or jumped down, it fell out of their pocket."
Sunny considered that, his shoulders loosening a fraction. "Yeah… it's possible. Not likely, but not impossible." He glanced at Nephis. "What do you think, Neph?"
Changing Star studied the pit in silence. Her silver hair stirred faintly in the wind as she stepped closer, peering down without crossing the edge. After a few seconds, she shook her head.
"I don't have a better explanation," she admitted. "But that doesn't make it safe." Her grip tightened slightly on her sword. "Stay ready."
With that, they closed the remaining distance.
The pit itself looked less like a natural sinkhole and more like a wound torn into the city. The black stone around its rim had been fractured outward, jagged and sharp, as though something massive had burst up from below—or been driven down with tremendous force. The opening was wide enough for two people to descend side by side, but the darkness beneath it swallowed all light after only a few meters.
Cold air wafted up from below, stale and faintly metallic, carrying with it a scent that Sunny couldn't quite place. Old stone. Dust. Something else… something deeper.
Near the edge lay the Soul Shard.
It rested innocently on a slab of broken stone, its irregular crystal facets glowing softly, pulsing with that familiar inner light. Untouched. Unclaimed. Almost inviting.
Sunny crouched a little, careful not to get too close. "If this is bait," he muttered, "it's the laziest bait I've ever seen."
Cassie tilted her head toward the pit, her expression thoughtful. "Or the most confident."
Nephis didn't respond immediately. She scanned the surrounding rooftops, the alleyways, the shadows pooling between ruined buildings. Only when she was satisfied that nothing was watching did she speak.
"I don't like it," she said flatly. "But leaving a Soul Shard behind feels wrong too."
Sunny snorted softly. "Yeah, my soul would never forgive me."
Cassie almost smiled.
Silence stretched again as the unspoken question hung in the air: do we go down?
Nephis was the first to voice it. "If we descend, we lose mobility and visibility. If something powerful is waiting below, it will have the advantage."
"And if we don't," Sunny countered, "we leave behind a resource and possibly answers." He scratched his chin. "Also, knowing my luck, whatever's down there will come find us later."
Cassie tightened her grip on the rope. "I… don't sense immediate danger," she said carefully. "But my visions are unreliable when it comes to specifics like this."
Nephis exhaled slowly. "Then we don't all go down."
Sunny looked at her, already guessing where this was headed. "You want me to scout, don't you?"
She met his gaze evenly. "You're the best suited."
He sighed dramatically. "Of course I am."
Before either of them could argue further, Sunny straightened slightly and rolled his shoulders. "Tell you what. Let's not risk actual limbs yet." His lips curled into a thin grin. "I'll send Gloomy down first."
Nephis nodded at once. "Do it."
Cassie turned her face toward him. "Be careful."
Sunny closed his eyes briefly, then extended his senses, feeling the familiar weight of his shadow shift and stretch. Gloomy peeled itself away from his feet, thinning, elongating, and then slipping soundlessly over the pit's edge.
As it descended into the darkness below, Sunny's expression grew intent, every scrap of his focus narrowing to what his shadow would find.
Gloomy slid down into the darkness like spilled ink, soundless and obedient, carrying Sunny's senses with it.
At first, there was nothing but black stone rushing past—then the pit widened, opening not into a cavern, but into something far more deliberate.
A hallway.
The shadow's descent ended barely two meters below the surface, its amorphous form pooling onto a stone floor. From there, the world unfolded—and Sunny's eyes constricted sharply as the information slammed into his mind.
The walls were not walls.
They were columbaria.
Every vertical surface was carved into countless narrow niches, stacked with methodical precision from floor to ceiling. Inside each recess lay bones—skulls placed forward like mute sentinels, long bones arranged beneath them, ribs stacked, femurs crossed. Some were orderly. Others had slumped, spilling fragments outward as time gnawed at whatever structure once held them in place.
The floor was worse.
Bones carpeted it entirely.
Skulls rolled against one another when Gloomy shifted, teeth clacking softly in a sound Sunny felt rather than heard. Tibias and ulnae formed uneven ridges beneath the shadow's weight, thousands upon thousands of remains crushed into a pale mosaic that stretched endlessly forward.
Tens of thousands.
Maybe more.
Sunny's stomach tightened.
There were no fresh corpses. No signs of recent death. The bones were old—bleached, cracked, worn smooth by time and footsteps that had long since ceased. The air down there was dry, stale, and heavy with the faint mineral tang of dust and decay.
No movement.
No monsters.
No lurking presence brushing against Gloomy's senses.
Sunny pushed his shadow farther, forcing Gloomy to stretch thin and wide, extending his range to its limit. The hallway went on and on, straight as an arrow, a funereal corridor of the dead. At the very edge of Sunny's perception, far ahead, a dim light flickered—steady, artificial, and unmistakably deliberate.
An opening.
Something waited beyond it.
And then—
That was it.
The strain snapped taut. Sunny reached the limit of his control and pulled Gloomy back, the shadow recoiling instantly and flowing back into his feet as if nothing had ever left.
Sunny exhaled sharply.
When he relayed what he'd seen, Nephis didn't interrupt him once. Her expression grew increasingly cold, increasingly focused, until by the time he finished, there was no hesitation left in her eyes.
Without a word, she stepped forward, bent down, and picked up the Soul Shard.
The crystal dissolved into silver motes as she absorbed it on the spot.
Sunny blinked. "That was… decisive."
Nephis ignored the comment and stepped to the edge of the pit, peering down. "How far down is it?"
"Huh?" Sunny stared at her, momentarily thrown. "Oh. Uh. Just two meters or so."
She nodded once.
Then bent her knees and hopped down.
"Neph—!" Sunny's eyes widened.
Cassie turned her head sharply, confusion flickering across her face. "Nephis? Where did you go? Sunny, did Nephis go in?"
He pinched the bridge of his nose and sighed. "Yeah. She did."
Before he could say anything else, Nephis' voice echoed up from below, calm and steady.
"Well? Are you coming or not? Don't worry, Cassie. I'll catch you."
Cassie hesitated, tightening her grip on the golden rope. "Sunny…?"
Sunny grimaced, then snorted. "Of course." He looked down into the hole. "What about me?"
There was a pause.
"…if you want," Nephis replied.
Sunny choked on his breath. "Wow. Just—wow."
Still muttering under his breath, he guided Cassie carefully to the edge and lifted her by the armpits. She was light—alarmingly so—and even with his malnourished frame, the effort barely registered. He lowered her slowly, muscles tense, listening intently.
"I have her," Nephis called up.
Sunny released his grip and leaned closer, heart thudding despite himself. He listened for the sound of impact—
—but instead, Cassie's calm voice floated up.
"She has me, Sunny. You can come down now."
Sunny closed his eyes briefly, then opened them and stared into the dark pit, jaw tightening.
"Yeah," he muttered. "Guess I can."
Sunny hopped down without ceremony, bending his knees as his boots struck the uneven floor. The impact still rattled him; a dull shock ran up his legs, and his bones went briefly numb.
He winced.
If only Blood Weave also strengthened my bones, he thought sourly. Like some sort of… Bone Weave.
Straightening, he rolled his shoulders and took in the scene again—walls of skulls, the endless pale carpet beneath their feet, the oppressive stillness. Nephis had already turned away, apparently satisfied that he was intact, and began moving forward without hesitation.
She naturally took the lead.
The hallway swallowed them as they advanced, and soon the only sound left in the world was the crunching and crackling of bones underfoot. Every step shattered something: a skull collapsing with a dry pop, a rib snapping like old kindling, fragments grinding together into powder. The noise echoed faintly, multiplying in the confined space until it felt as though the dead themselves were whispering.
Cassie flinched at one particularly loud crack. She lifted her foot, brow furrowing.
"These can't be the original inhabitants of the City, right?" she said quietly. "There are so many. The City may be big, but it didn't seem that big. And besides… if everyone died, who buried them?"
Sunny shrugged, though no one could see it. "Maybe they belong to another civilization. Or maybe they were sacrifices." He glanced at the skull-lined walls. "The Gods do love human suffering, after all."
Nephis looked back at him over her shoulder, her expression unreadable in the dim light. After a moment, she turned forward again and continued walking.
"There is a possibility both of you are overlooking," she said calmly.
Sunny and Cassie both focused on her.
"These might not have been buried all at once," Nephis continued. "They could have been placed here over generations. We don't know how long this City existed. And none of us are archaeologists—we can't tell the age of bones just by looking at them."
The thought settled heavily over the group.
If she was right, then this place was not merely a mass grave.
It was a tradition.
A long, deliberate act repeated again and again, until death itself had become part of the City's architecture.
Before long, they reached the point where Sunny had been forced to recall Gloomy. The dim light ahead grew clearer, spreading across the floor in a pale, steady glow that did nothing to dispel the chill crawling up his spine.
Instinctively, both he and Nephis tightened their grips on their swords.
Gloomy coiled around the Midnight Shard like living smoke, its edge darkened and hungry, while faint silver radiance seeped through Nephis' skin, tracing the contours of her muscles and pooling beneath her eyes. Without a word, they shifted their positions, placing themselves slightly ahead and to either side, shielding Cassie between them.
Step by careful step, they advanced into the light.
Sunny's breath caught.
There was no ambush. No lurking monster. No hoard of glittering treasure, nor even another chaotic sprawl of bones. Instead, the chamber was circular, its walls formed entirely of bone—yet unlike the corridor behind them, nothing here was scattered or broken. Skulls and femurs were stacked with deliberate precision, interlocked and layered in repeating patterns that curved along the walls like pale mosaics.
It was orderly. Intentional. Almost… reverent.
Sunny swept the room with his shadow one final time, pushing it into every crevice and hollow. Finding nothing, he let out a slow breath and dismissed the Midnight Shard.
"It's clear."
Nephis glanced at him, searching his face for a moment, then nodded and let the radiance beneath her skin fade. She lowered her sword, though her posture remained alert.
The three of them began to circle the chamber, their footsteps soft against the bone-strewn floor. The air felt different here—still heavy, but no longer hostile. It reminded Sunny less of a battlefield and more of a shrine.
Cassie trailed her fingers along the smooth surface of the stacked bones, moving carefully, as though afraid to disturb them. Her expression softened, sorrow weighing down her features.
"So many souls," she whispered. "And now there is no one left to remember them."
Sunny glanced at her, then looked away. He had no comforting words to offer, and for once, he did not feel the urge to fill the silence.
Instead, his attention was caught by a section of smooth stone embedded between the bonework. On it, someone had scratched a crude image: a stick figure with exaggerated, obscene additions, childish in execution and impossible to take seriously.
For a moment, Sunny almost laughed.
He stared at the drawing, then reached out and brushed his fingers lightly over the faded lines. "Figures," he muttered inwardly. "Even in a place like this."
His thoughts drifted. Maybe the one who drew it had been bored. Or afraid. Or just young. He wondered, idly, if that same person had dropped the Soul Shard near the pit.
Probably not, he decided. The etching looked old—far older than any unattended shard would survive. Monsters devoured those things just as eagerly as humans did.
Still… Sunny allowed himself a small, private smile.
He liked to imagine that whoever had carved that ridiculous little figure had unknowingly paid the price of desecrating this solemn placeby losing some of their money.
Sunny's smile faded though, when he caught something else in the corner of his eye. Turning his head, leaning closer to see it in the dim light, his eyes widened to their limits.
"What..the hell..."