The castle's training hall was lit by a sparse row of torches wedged into the stone walls. The orange light undulated softly, casting shadows that stretched and contracted across the floor.
In one of the corners stood Arthur.
His Umbral Husk armor clung to his body while in his hand he held Dawn's Ballad, the sword tilted slightly toward the ground as his posture remained relaxed but perfectly balanced. Despite that apparent calm, four augmentations coursed through his body, strengthening every muscle, sharpening his senses, and accelerating his reflexes.
On the other side of the hall was Sunny.
He was using Puppeteer's Shroud, while Midnight Shard rested in his right hand, the sword angled slightly forward and his body already in a battle stance. Three shadows adhered to his body, making him stronger, and a flow of essence so faint it was almost nonexistent, even after all these months.
Even so, the difference between them wasn't as vast as anyone might have expected. They were as evenly matched as possible.
For a few seconds, neither moved. The tension in the hall grew slowly as both analyzed the other's posture, evaluating distances, angles, and possible openings.
Then the fight began.
Arthur was the first to move. His body surged forward with sudden speed, closing the distance between them in just a couple of steps. Dawn's Ballad descended in a clean cut aimed at Sunny's shoulder, a direct, precise attack loaded with the additional force from the augmentations coursing through his body.
Sunny reacted just in time. Midnight Shard rose to intercept the blow, and the impact forced him back several steps as the force of the attack traveled up his arms. Arthur didn't stop. The first attack was followed immediately by another, and then another, each movement chained to the next with brutal fluidity. Dawn's Ballad traced quick arcs through the air, constantly pressuring Sunny's defense.
During the first exchanges, Sunny barely managed to stay on his feet. His movements were efficient, but the pressure Arthur exerted was too great to counter immediately. He retreated, blocked a descending cut, and twisted his body to deflect a thrust aimed at his chest. Each impact sent a vibration through his arms that threatened to break his guard if he failed even once.
Arthur advanced step by step, using his slight advantage in strength to dominate the rhythm of the fight. His style was direct and aggressive, designed to gradually crush the opponent's defense. Each attack forced Sunny to readjust his position, each move reduced the available options.
However, Sunny was not a fighter who relied solely on strength.
As he retreated, his mind analyzed every move Arthur made with pure focus. He observed the angle of the attacks, the rhythm between each strike, the way his body weight transferred from one foot to the other before each cut. But more importantly, he analyzed the movements of Arthur's shadow.
Gradually, his blocks began to become more precise.
Instead of intercepting the attacks directly, he started to deflect Dawn's Ballad's blade with minimal movements, allowing the force of the blow to dissipate to the side. When Arthur launched a horizontal cut aimed at his side, Sunny twisted his torso and deflected the sword just enough to avoid the impact entirely. For the first time, he responded with a quick counterattack aimed at the now-exposed opening.
Arthur stepped back half a pace to avoid the blow.
From that moment on, the fight began to change.
Sunny's movements became more efficient, his defense more compact. Although Arthur kept up the pressure, he could no longer push him back with the same ease. Sunny started to anticipate some of his attacks, reacting before Dawn's Ballad reached its peak speed.
The swords clashed again and again as both combatants moved across the hall. The distance between them varied constantly, expanding and contracting depending on who managed to impose their rhythm at that moment.
As the seconds passed, Sunny began to even the fight.
His style slowly adapted to Arthur's, incorporating small variations to neutralize the advantages his opponent had in strength and technique. When Arthur tried to increase the pressure with a faster sequence of attacks, Sunny responded by deflecting each blow with millimeter precision while advancing half a step whenever he found an opening.
Gradually, he started to gain the upper hand.
Arthur blocked a cut aimed at his neck and replied with a thrust to the chest, but Sunny had already read the move. He twisted his body and deflected the blade, allowing Midnight Shard to move in a quick counterattack toward Arthur's side. He retreated to avoid the hit, and Sunny followed him immediately, chaining two more attacks that forced Arthur to block instead of strike.
For the first time since the fight began, Arthur found himself reacting.
He wasn't at a real disadvantage, but Sunny had managed to break the offensive flow that had dominated the fight until that moment.
Arthur observed this change calmly, then decided to end the fight.
His posture shifted almost imperceptibly. The weight of his body redistributed, his guard dropped just a few centimeters, and the way he held Dawn's Ballad became different. The direct, dominant style he had used until then disappeared.
Sunny noticed the change immediately, but didn't understand its meaning until Arthur moved again.
The next attack wasn't a powerful cut or an aggressive thrust. Arthur simply slid to one side, dodging Sunny's strike with a fluid movement that seemed closer to a dance than a fight. When Sunny tried to adjust his attack to follow him, Arthur had already changed position.
The dynamics of the fight changed completely.
Instead of constantly pressuring, Arthur began to move around Sunny with light, precise steps. His attacks were rare and calculated, appearing only when Sunny left a clear opening. Whenever Sunny tried to impose his rhythm, Arthur would vanish from the attack's path with minimal movements, avoiding direct contact whenever possible.
The change caught Sunny off guard.
For several seconds, he had to completely readjust his focus. His attacks, which had worked against Arthur's direct style before, now hit empty air as his opponent moved with irritating precision.
Arthur seized that moment.
When Sunny launched an attack that was too wide, trying to cut off his retreat, Arthur slid forward and responded with a quick thrust aimed at his side. Sunny managed to block the blow, but the impact forced him back.
Arthur continued advancing with this new, fluid style, using mobility to create small openings in Sunny's defense. His intention was clear: end the fight before Sunny could adapt again.
But Sunny was exceptionally fast at learning in the middle of a fight.
As Arthur moved around him, Sunny began to observe the hidden patterns in those evasive movements. Though they seemed unpredictable at first, each shift followed certain physical limitations.
After a few more exchanges, Sunny started to anticipate those trajectories.
Instead of attacking directly, he began to restrict the available space for Arthur, using angles that forced his opponent to move in specific directions. When Arthur tried to dodge one of his attacks to the left, Sunny was already twisting his body to intercept that movement.
Arthur raised Dawn's Ballad to block the blow.
The fight intensified again.
Now both were constantly adapting to the other's style, adjusting their movements with each exchange. Arthur still used his superior mobility to avoid direct attacks, but Sunny had reduced the effectiveness of that strategy by anticipating his shifts faster and faster.
Arthur began defending more frequently.
He wasn't in serious trouble, but the pressure was gradually increasing. Sunny chained several consecutive attacks that forced Arthur to block instead of dodge, momentarily breaking the fluidity of his evasive style.
The swords clashed repeatedly as both fought to regain the initiative.
Finally, after another quick exchange, Sunny found the opening he was looking for. Midnight Shard descended in a fast cut aimed at Arthur's torso. He raised Dawn's Ballad to block the attack, but the angle of the strike shifted at the last instant.
The tip of Sunny's sword struck Arthur's armor directly on the chest.
The impact resonated through the hall, and both stood still for a moment.
The fight was over.
Silence slowly returned as the tension drained from the atmosphere.
Sunny lowered his sword first. Arthur looked at the mark left on his armor for a second before relaxing as well. The fight had consumed more energy than either wanted to admit.
Almost at the same time, both let themselves drop onto the stone floor, leaning their backs against the cold slabs as they caught their breath. The torches continued burning on the walls, casting long shadows across the empty hall.
Arthur stared at the ceiling for a few seconds before turning his head slightly toward Sunny.
His breathing still heavy, he asked a single question.
"Did you get it?"
Sunny replied between breaths, "Yes, I did."
Arthur gave him a thumbs up. "Good."
***
The darkness of the Dark City was absolute.
Even after months living among those ruins, Arthur found it unsettling to see nothing. He was sure that the day he saw the sun for the first time after so long, his eyes would melt.
Not that he was missing much. The Dark City at this point was in a far more deplorable state than months ago when they returned. Buildings that once stood were now collapsed. Houses that once had form were now rubble. All a result of the constant fights they had, and the ones the Creatures had among themselves.
Obviously, Arthur and Sunny weren't the only ones hunting among the city's ruins. The creatures, noticing the lack of humans, started attacking each other more frequently, and when they did, they were always in the area to steal the kills.
The number of Nightmare Creatures Sunny had managed to kill using this technique was countless. So many that four months later, he was already halfway through his Demon Core.
Arthur, in contrast, hadn't been so lucky. Only getting fragments from consuming Shards meant his progress had slowed considerably, and this situation of Creatures killing each other didn't help, since they couldn't always retrieve the Shards from the kills. Many times they'd had to escape or abandon them precisely for this reason. Furthermore, the use of Static Void in various situations had also limited his growth.
What had increased, however, was the kill count on Dawn's Ballad. The sword was close to one hundred and thirty kills away from ascending to a Transcendent sword. Even though they had agreed Sunny would take all the kills, there were situations where Arthur had to participate and take a few.
And today was one of those situations where his count would increase.
Arthur and Sunny were hidden on a floor of a collapsed building, while Sunny observed an open plaza extending below.
They had reached a level of synchronization where neither needed to speak, and both were focused on the creatures moving slowly among the ruins. It was the last mission left before leaving the castle and heading toward the Relictombs.
They had saved it for last for a very simple reason: it was also one of the most dangerous they had encountered.
A Fallen Tyrant.
Even now, after all the progress they'd made over the last few months, the creature's presence was still unsettling.
The monster occupied the center of the plaza. Its body was long and grotesque, with a shape similar to a serpent. Its scales were thick and irregular, dark plates overlapping with hardened flesh. Its body must have measured over twenty meters long.
Its skull was wide and deformed, with a jaw too large even for its size. When it opened its mouth, an irregular row of curved fangs became visible, each as long as a dagger. Between those teeth, a black forked tongue moved, sliding in and out constantly.
Its eyes glowed with a sickly hue, two yellowish points in the midst of the darkness, but the worst part wasn't the creature itself. It was what surrounded it.
Dozens of similar, smaller creatures moved around its body, slithering among the stones and the remains of collapsed buildings. Unlike the Tyrant, these creatures were much simpler in form, but still disturbing to observe.
Most measured between two and four meters long.
Their bodies were covered in dark scales similar to their leader's, though much finer and more flexible. Some had a dark grey tone, others shiny black, and a few presented reddish veins running along their backs. Their heads were triangular, with jaws full of small, sharp teeth designed for tearing flesh.
They weren't all the same.
Sunny had already observed enough to classify several of them.
The weakest were Dormant Beasts, fast but relatively fragile creatures that moved constantly around the plaza, exploring every corner.
Among them were also several larger serpents, thicker and clearly more dangerous. Those were Awakened Beasts.
Their bodies were almost twice as long as the previous ones, and their scales seemed much more resistant. Some had small bony protrusions running along their backs like spines, while others had slightly deformed heads, with wider jaws and longer fangs.
They all obeyed the Tyrant.
The central creature barely moved, but every time its black tongue slid out of its mouth or its body contracted slightly, the lesser serpents responded immediately, changing direction or grouping around it.
It was like observing a single organism divided into dozens of bodies.
Sunny studied the scene calmly. They had identified this creature during their first month and a half in the castle.
Back then, they had barely survived several fights against much weaker enemies. Facing a Fallen Tyrant with a swarm of minions would have been practically suicide, which is why they had decided to wait.
During the following months, they focused on clearing the rest of the Dark City, eliminating lesser threats and creating more cores. Little by little, their synchronization improved, their combat techniques became more refined, and their strategies more efficient, but even so, this creature remained the greatest threat left.
The only thing that had changed recently was Sunny.
A week ago, during one of their daily sparring sessions, he achieved one of his goals.
They had been training almost every day since returning to the castle. The fights between them had become routine, a constant way to improve and for Sunny to learn different fighting styles that Arthur taught him.
After nearly four months of continuous training, Sunny finally achieved something he hadn't managed before.
He won.
The victory itself was significant, but it wasn't the most important thing that happened during that fight.
In the middle of the battle, Sunny achieved the second step of his Aspect Legacy.
Not only did his understanding of fighting styles deepen considerably, but he also gained something much more tangible.
He now commanded two shadows under his control.
Stone Saint remained by his side as always; its presence alone was enough to change the balance of any fight. As an Ascended Demon, it was one of their greatest advantages.
The second shadow was Serpent, the relic from the first step of his Aspect Legacy. Now an Awakened Demon with the ability to take the form of any creature Sunny had previously killed that met the requirements.
Between both shadows and Sunny himself, their total strength had increased considerably. Combined with Arthur, that created a group of four fighters capable of facing threats that would have been impossible before.
Arthur, Sunny, Stone Saint, and Serpent.
Four against a Tyrant and its swarm.
Sunny watched the movement of the serpents for several more seconds, memorizing their paths and how they reacted to their leader's movements.
There were too many creatures, but most didn't pose a real threat on their own.
The real problem was still the Tyrant.
Its enormous body moved slowly over the plaza stones, coiling and uncoiling. The creature seemed to be waiting for something. Maybe food. Maybe intruders.
Or maybe just obeying a primal instinct to dominate that territory.
Sunny finally looked away from the plaza and leaned back slightly against the collapsed wall of the building. After observing the creature for so long, one thing was clear. This time, they weren't retreating.
They had waited months to face this Tyrant, and now, with the strength they had accumulated and the new advantages he had recently gained, the outcome of the battle seemed inevitable.
The Fallen Tyrant didn't know it yet, but its reign over this part of the Dark City was about to end, because that was what they wanted.
Hours later, they were ready to begin the mission.
During the time between that observation and this final moment, Arthur and Sunny had reviewed multiple strategies. It wasn't the first time they'd planned a complicated fight, but this one was different. Not just because of the presence of a Fallen Tyrant, but because of the unknown number of creatures surrounding it. Every decision had to be made considering that any mistake could leave them surrounded by dozens of enemies.
Between them, they had agreed on several plans. None were perfect, but all had a certain logic depending on how the situation evolved. The idea wasn't to follow one rigidly, but to start with the most convenient one and discard or modify options as the battle developed.
The first plan they thought of was also the simplest.
If the real problem was the Fallen Tyrant, then the logical thing was to try to eliminate it first.
After all, starting a fight against the minions didn't make much sense if they could directly attack the creature commanding them. Isolating it was completely impossible; they'd known that from the start. The Tyrant rarely moved far from the center of its territory, and the lesser serpents always moved around it.
That's why the only viable option was to attack from a distance.
They both had Ascended-rank bows. They were excellent Memories, capable of piercing the defense of most creatures they'd faced over the last few months. In theory, if they found the right angle, there was a possibility of gravely wounding the Tyrant before the real fight even began. However, Sunny didn't trust that plan too much.
After observing the creature for so long, he had reached a fairly clear conclusion. The Tyrant's hide seemed extremely resistant. The scales covering its body weren't just thick; they were also overlapped in a way that deflected impacts at awkward angles. Even when the monster moved, those dark plates shifted against each other like living armor.
It was possible that a well-placed arrow might penetrate a vulnerable spot, but it was also very possible it would simply bounce off.
Still, they were going to try.
If by some chance they managed to kill it before the battle truly began, the whole problem would disappear immediately.
The alternative within that same plan was to attack the minions from a distance first. They could use the bows to reduce the number of serpents before engaging in direct combat.
But that option had several disadvantages.
The most obvious one was Arthur.
For him, killing enemies at a distance was far less useful than doing so in direct combat. He wanted to increase Dawn's Ballad's kill count, so if they eliminated minions from afar, Arthur would lose that opportunity to strengthen his sword for the future.
Furthermore, if the ultimate goal was still to kill the Tyrant, spending time eliminating lesser serpents from a distance didn't make much sense. If they could kill the leader first, everything else would resolve itself.
The second plan was much slower.
Instead of trying to finish the Tyrant immediately, they could start a war of attrition. The idea was simple in concept: kill minions gradually, reducing their numbers little by little until the Tyrant was practically alone.
It was a cautious strategy, but it was also an extremely uncertain one.
The main problem was that they didn't know exactly how many minions there were.
The serpents they had seen during their observations were many, but not necessarily all of them. There was a possibility that dozens more were hidden among the nearby ruins, or even hundreds. If that were the case, the war could last weeks.
And while technically they had time...
Neither of them wanted to keep waiting. Both had felt something when they found the portal to the Relictombs.
For Arthur, it was a sensation he had already experienced at the beginning of his adventure in the Forgotten Shore, and now he knew exactly where it came from.
The feeling had grown stronger since they discovered the portal. At first, it had been a small, constant nudge in his consciousness, but since they discovered the reason, the sensation had increased, and now he could hardly look in that direction without feeling completely drawn.
This also led him to question many things.
Questions like, what if the decision to stay behind was a decision he made because of this pull?
Gray had told him that the map in his soul would act like instincts, pushing him to make different decisions. And what if that very decision wasn't entirely his own? What if this map had influenced it?
No matter how much he had "accepted" this mission Gray left him, Arthur didn't like having his decisions manipulated, especially by someone who was supposedly him and did this hundreds or thousands of years in the past.
This also raised the question of how?
Supposedly, Gray hadn't been able to see the threads of Fate around Arthur... unless he had lied.
That was his first thought, but the answer was more obvious when considering Nephis, Sunny and even Cassie. The three deeply connected to Fate.
Gray didn't have to see or manipulate Arthur's threads of Fate; he only had to manipulate those of the people Arthur would end up surrounded by...
This theory became more plausible when Arthur considered that Sunny had felt it too.
In his case, the origin was different. Sunny hadn't fully explained the reason, but he made it clear that he too had felt something upon seeing the portal. A sensation he already knew the meaning of. Something was waiting for him in the Relictombs.
They both knew it, and they both wanted to go as quickly as possible to claim what belonged to them.
For that reason, the option of starting a long war against the minions was discarded. Even if it worked, it could delay them too much. Moreover, the basic calculation of the confrontation was quite clear.
There were four of them.
Arthur.
Sunny.
Saint.
Serpent.
The Tyrant, on the other hand, had an unknown number of minions.
If they tried to face them all in a prolonged war, the serpents' numerical advantage would always be a problem. Even if each individual was weak, the accumulation of enemies would eventually wear them down. In that type of war, they would already be starting at a disadvantage.
That's why they decided to adopt an intermediate plan.
First, they would try to kill the Tyrant from a distance.
It was unlikely to work, but it was worth trying. If an arrow managed to find a vulnerable spot, the battle could end before it really began.
But if the attempt failed, which both considered almost certain, then they would execute the main plan.
They would split up.
Arthur and Saint would draw the attention of as many minions as possible. Their goal wasn't simply to survive, but to keep the majority of the swarm occupied to prevent Sunny from being surrounded.
Meanwhile, Sunny and Serpent would handle the Tyrant.
It was a logical division. Arthur and Saint had the endurance and strength necessary to sustain a fight against multiple enemies for an extended period. Sunny, on the other hand, had the mobility and adaptability needed to face a more powerful creature directly, plus the presence of Serpent.
If everything went well, one of the two groups would finish first. In that case, they would immediately go to help the other, but they had also considered the possibility that something might go wrong. For that scenario, they had a last safety measure.
A Memory they had obtained weeks ago after killing a particularly strange creature.
The Memory took the form of two metal bracelets.
At first glance, they seemed quite simple, just two thin bands of dark metal with no decoration or visible symbols. However, when both parts were active, a link existed between them.
The effect was simple.
One person could send a small electric shock to the other. The shock was almost imperceptible. It wasn't painful or dangerous, just a brief impulse that felt like a tingle under the skin, but it was enough to communicate a message.
They had decided on a very clear system.
A single pulse meant something had gone wrong.
Three pulses meant there were no problems.
It wasn't a complex system, but in the middle of a battle where they could be separated among dozens of enemies, even such a simple signal could mean the difference between an orderly retreat and a complete disaster.
With the plans finally set, only one thing remained.
To begin the hunt.
Arthur stood in one of the wide streets surrounded by collapsed buildings, at the exact point where he had decided to attract the minions when everything started.
He would have to fight in complete darkness against countless creatures. The darkness was too dense for his human eyes, transforming the landscape into a uniform mass of absolute nothingness. He didn't like it.
Over the past few months, he had gotten used to fighting at a disadvantage many times, but relying completely on his Aether sense to move and on Sunny to detect the creatures was something he hated. Mainly the latter, as it made him feel useless and unable to help with anything. Still, it was a limitation he simply had to live with, despite his distaste.
At least he knew the other three could see perfectly.
On top of a nearby building, Sunny, Saint, and Serpent observed the plaza where the Tyrant rested.
All three held bows.
The scene wasn't that strange, but the most striking part was Serpent.
The shadow wasn't in its usual form. Instead of the dark creature, it wore the form of one of the human hunters who had the misfortune of crossing paths with Sunny months ago.
He was one of the men Caster had convinced to go up the Crimson Spire while he and Nephis faced the Crimson Terror. That group's original intention had been simple: eliminate Nephis when she was weakened after the fight.
They never got the chance.
Before they could even get close to the tower, Sunny had crossed paths with them and killed them all.
One of those hunters had a particularly useful Aspect. His ability notably increased the precision of his attacks, both with sword and bow. At the time, it hadn't meant much, but now it had become extremely valuable.
Serpent had replicated that exact form and crouched beside Sunny and Saint, bow ready. Despite the change in appearance, the shadow hadn't lost its natural ability to see in the dark, which was perfect for the situation.
Sunny and Saint had no issues with that either; all three could see the Tyrant clearly.
Arthur, on the other hand, was the only one blind in this situation. The idea irritated him, but of course, he said nothing.
On top of the building, the three archers remained completely still, watching the monster as they waited for the signal. Serpent held a bow that Arthur had lent to Sunny specifically for this operation. Drowned Oath.
It was a peculiar Memory, even among Ascended-rank ones. Its enchantment didn't produce an immediate effect; instead, it worked through accumulation. Each successful arrow slightly increased the power of the next, creating a growing progression of force that became dangerous after several consecutive accurate shots.
In addition to the bow, Arthur had also provided another important resource. The Tempest Shaft arrows.
These arrows had a fairly direct enchantment. The greater the distance they traveled through the air, the greater the force they accumulated before impact. In other words, their potential depended entirely on the archer's precision. For that reason, Sunny had decided Serpent would be the one to use them.
Among the three, the shadow had the highest probability of correctly leveraging that effect. Its new form, with the Aspect that increased attack precision, made each shot dangerously accurate.
Everything was ready, and minutes later, Arthur finished preparing.
His real armor began to materialize over his body, and his 4 augmentations started coursing through his channels. Then Dawn's Ballad materialized in his hand. The familiar weight of the sword settled into his grip as he remained completely still, waiting for the exact moment to begin.
Then he activated the communication Memory. The small bracelet on his wrist emitted a brief discharge, and on the nearby building, Sunny immediately felt two electrical impulses travel up his arm.
A smile appeared on his face. It was the signal they had agreed upon.