The black-haired warrior was truly terrifying. To be able to resist both an Ascended Demon and an Awakened Terror at the same time, even after being damaged by the Strike of Thunder and the explosion of the chalice was something only the most fearsome Masters of the waking world would have been able to do… if any.
However, her luck had run out.
Because today, she met Sunny.
Stepping through the shadows, he appeared behind the maiden and struck her in the back, not at all concerned with how cowardly and dishonorable such an attack was… or would have been considered by some people, rather.
Honor was for fools… and while Sunny knew himself to behave like a fool on occasion, he was at least immune to this particular kind of foolishness.
The blade of the Cruel Sight pierced the heart of the brave War Maiden and flashed with white incandescence of divine flames for a split second, dealing devastating damage to everything it touched. The woman died instantly, without even realizing who had killed her.
At the same time, her second copy finally succumbed to Nightmare's hooves and stopped moving, her body a terrifying mess of torn flesh and broken bones. A moment later, it shimmered with a dark red glow, and disappeared.
The Spell spoke:
[You have slain an Ascended human, War Maiden Gvenravyr.]
[Your shadow grows stronger.]
'One more left…'
Regretting his decision to not let the Serpent finish off the Ascended, thus replenishing his now empty reserves of essence, Sunny gritted his teeth and turned his head to glance at Saint…
However, at that moment, the voice of the Spell suddenly resounded once again:
[You have slain an Ascended human, War Maiden Kara.]
[Your shadow grows stronger.]
…What he saw was the War Maiden's decapitated body toppling to the floor, the taciturn knight standing above it with a shattered sword in her hand. The length of its stone blade — what remained of it, at least — was painted crimson, heavy drops falling down from it.
Saint remained motionless for a few moments, then glanced at her broken sword with regret. Her shoulders moved slightly, as if the Shadow sighed. Dropping the shattered blade, she then bent down and nonchalantly picked up the scarlet odachi that slipped from the Ascended's fingers.
Finally, the taciturn demon brandished the odachi and turned around to look in the direction of the entrance to the great hall.
'What is she looking at…'
Sunny frowned, then suddenly shivered.
'Oh, right… Effie and Kai!'
He spun, remembering that his friends were currently facing off against a dozen of powerful Awakened warriors.
However, he didn't have to worry.
The War Maidens… almost all of them were already dead.
Kai was just about to finish off the last one. The young man was clad in beautiful armor forged out of white steel and gold, wielding a swift saber. His battle skill seemed to have improved tremendously since their time on the Forgotten Shore… those months in the army of the Ivory City must have taught him a lot.
Effie was done with her share of enemies, as well. The little girl was now wearing a familiar bronze armor, the white chiton beneath it replaced by the red silken tunic of the War Maidens. The Dusk Shard was also there, on her hand. However, now the heavy round shield was almost the size of her entire body.
Just then, Kai dodged a strike of his opponent, hovered above the floor at an impossible angle, and delivered an unexpected thrust to the War Maiden's abdomen. A moment later, Effie slammed into her with the Dusk Shard. The female warrior fell to the ground, either dead or dying.
Suddenly, the devastated hall of the Temple of the Chalice was enveloped in silence.
The three of them — Sunny, Kai, and Effie — stared at each other with confused expressions on their faces.
It was all over.
Have they really… won?
Chapter 676: Glass Knife
Surrounded by devastation, Sunny, Kai, and Effie stared at each other with confused expressions on their faces. Their weapons were still raised, ready to strike at the enemies… however, there were no enemies around.
Just dead silence.
Sunny tensely studied the devastated hall, then slowly pulled out the emerald amulet and looked at the little girl with a silent question written on his face.
"Effie… tell me… is there, perhaps, a slumbering Saint somewhere in the temple?"
She frowned, then shook her head.
Sunny was genuinely perplexed.
"Uh… maybe there is an indescribable horror that had been contained by the chalice? And we have set it free? Or an ancient curse? "
The little girl wiped the sweat off her bruised face, then said in her soft, childish voice:
"Not that I know of. Uh… no, there are no horrors. Or curses."
Sunny blinked a couple of times.
"So, what… we really won? Just like that?"
Effie stared at him for a bit, and then yelped in outrage:
"What the hell do you mean by just like that?! We just wiped out half a hundred vicious Awakened battle zealots, and you yourself killed three Ascended champions! Not to mention destroying the chalice… which was supposed to be indestructible, by the way… was that not hard enough for you, you crazy demon?!"
He tilted his head a little and thought about it.
"Well, when you put it like that… I guess it was a bit hard…"
The three of them, especially Sunny, had indeed achieved something remarkable just now. But it still felt weird… he didn't even lose a single limb, body part, or heart!
Well… he did lose half of a horn. That had to count for something, probably?
Sunny scowled. That victory had not been easy — in fact, it had been the opposite of that. However, it had not been as costly as he would have expected it to be.
Three Ascended were no joke, let alone as fearsome as the War Maidens had been. Granted, they had faced him after being mangled by the Strike of Thunder and the consequent explosion of the chalice. And he had only been able to damage the chalice, thus allowing the divine flame contained within to destroy it, because of his insight into how true sorcery worked.
So, in a sense, this victory was the result of those months Sunny had spent barely surviving in the Red Colosseum, as well as his trials in the countless nightmares that gifted him his third Shadow.
…And more than a bit of luck.
He sighed, then asked dubiously:
"So, what? We can just… go?"
Effie looked around, her gaze lingering on the corpse of the white-haired Maiden for a few seconds. Her little face turned somber, and then, she simply shrugged.
"Unless you want to get roasted even more by the divine flames, I suggest we do."
Kai, who had been silent this whole time, looked around, as well. His gaze, however, seemed to be aimed at something beyond the walls of the devastated hall. Then, he lowered his head, his eyes turning dark.
The young man lingered for a few moments, and then said in a low, hoarse voice:
"Are there… are there other children that were being trained in the sect? Do we need to take them with us?"
Sunny froze, then scratched the back of his head in embarrassment.
"Oh, yes. I, uh… did not think about that. The War Maidens were known to take in orphaned girls, right? Where are they?"
He wasn't too happy about the prospect of taking care of a bunch of kids, especially since he had just slaughtered their previous caretakers. But the idea of leaving them here did not sit right with Sunny, whether or not they were just phantasms of the Nightmare.
Noctis would end up having to deal with settling the children in the Sanctuary, anyway.
Effie's childish face slowly turned still, and she briefly glanced down, in the direction where Kai had been looking a few moments ago. She turned away and said in a strangely even tone:
"Ah… there were a few other girls with me before, indeed. But they… well, they didn't make it."
She dismissed the Dusk Shard, then bent down to pick up one of the swords laying on the stones.
"The War Maidens were not bad people, you see… at least not at the start of it all. But somewhere along the way, the sect changed. By the time the girl whose body I took over ended up with them, it was as though… as though everyone here had gone insane."
She walked to the next corpse, stared at it with strange darkness in her eyes, and then picked up another weapon.
"They were obsessed with the idea of creating a warrior capable of slaying someone called Solvane. So, their training — what they called training, anyway — had grown vicious, cruel, and inhumanly hard. Of all the girls subjected to it, only a handful survived. In this batch, ah… I was the only one."
Effie sighed, then stopped, staring once again at the body of the white-haired War Maiden with a complicated expression.
"Strange, isn't it? It was not like they hated us. On the contrary, they seemed to care about their wards a great deal. Didn't stop them from killing us, though."
She remained silent for a bit, and then added:
"...And despite the fact those girls were being tormented and killed, it didn't stop them from loving their killers. Humans are very weird that way, huh?"
The little girl was silent for a few moments, then suddenly smiled.
"So, yeah. I would like to get out of this place very much. If there is nothing else… let's just go."
Sunny hesitated, then silently motioned to Kai to come closer to Effie. She was putting on a brave face, but he could sense that beneath it, the huntress was... deeply disturbed by what had happened to her in this temple, and what they had done to the temple themselves.
Then, he turned around and headed for what remained of the stone chalice.
As he got closer, the heat of the divine flame grew almost unbearable. Sunny once again activated the enchantment of the Memory of Fire and the augmentation of the Underworld Armament, then moved carefully between the burning shards of stone.
In the spot where the chalice had stood before, surrounded by a ring of flames, a simple knife made of a piece of ghostly glass lay, reflecting the furious white light of the fire. Because of the shape and position of the deep fractures that had spread through the cracked floor, it seemed as though the glass blade had been the epicenter of the terrible explosion.
There was not a simple blemish on its surface, though.
Sunny lingered for a moment, then leaned forward and picked up the Glass Knife. It was light and cool to the touch... just how he remembered it. Just to make sure, Sunny glanced beneath the surface of the glass blade and froze for a moment, transfixed by the sight of a single string of fate encased within it, looping endlessly on itself.
Even if he had not seen that knife in one of his nightmares, he would have instantly recognized it for what it was.
The key to an immortal's death. The Ivory Lord's death.
...He had found it.
Chapter 677: Current of Fate
Outside of the now-empty Temple of the Chalice, the dawn was slowly painting the world in a beautiful shade of lilac. Sunny was sitting on the ground, staring at a scarlet odachi and a spear with a blade etched with runes that lay on the ground in front of him.
Kai had dismissed his armor and was standing nearby, his wooden mask charred and blackened by the heat of the divine flames. His gaze was distant.
Effie was also close. She was standing in front of a pile of weapons, some of them whole, some broken and melted by the fire. Despite her exhaustion and injuries, the little girl, whose body was almost entirely covered by bruises and lacerations, was picking up one weapon after another, then thrusting them into the rocky ground with somber determination.
The graveyard of swords surrounding the temple was slowly growing, thanks to her efforts.
Sunny observed Effie for a while, then sighed. He did not see a lot of sense in leaving so many enchanted weapons behind, even if most of them were only equivalent to Awakened Memories. However, he was also not going to stop the girl from performing the wasteful ritual, as long as it gave her some closure… or whatever it was she was seeking by performing the strange burial.
It gave him food for thought, however.
In the future he knew, there was no such graveyard around the ruined Temple of the Chalice. Which meant that no one had done this last mercy for the War Maidens slaughtered in the great hall. Was that the reason they had turned into vengeful wraiths, perhaps?
…Maybe. Or maybe the swords had just been stolen or destroyed at some point later in time. He had not seen the rest of the graveyard in the future as well, after all.
So then… what, exactly, was the connection between the Nightmares and the Dream Realm?
Before, Sunny had been sure that Nightmares were simply recreations of the past. Now, however, he was not so certain. After all, the Temple of the Chalice was destroyed in the same exact manner as it had been in the future. Which meant that… he had always been the one to destroy it?
The Seed of Nightmare was a portal to the actual past?
Sunny scowled, then shook his head.
No, this didn't make any sense. If that was true, then too many things would have been changed in the waking world every time an Awakened conquered their Nightmare. The connection was too easy to spot… all he had to do was to go and carve his name into one of the menhirs of the Sanctuary, then check if it had actually appeared outside the Seed.
People weren't fools… they would have known, by now. Nightmares were almost certainly simply recreations of the past of the Dream Realm, and not the actual thing.
However, the coincidence of how the Temple of the Chalice had ended up was too glaring to be natural. Logically, the appearance of Awakened from the Waking World should have changed the course of events that had happened in the past completely. And yet, it had not… at least not yet.
He could think of two explanations for that, one far less frightening than the other.
The first explanation was that this was a simple case of his knowledge of the future informing his actions in the past. Sunny had thought of destroying the chalice because he had already seen it destroyed in the future, and so, the cycle had been complete without any ominous reasons. Just due to a logical connection.
The second explanation… was far more concerning, at least to Sunny. He knew more about fate than most people. He knew how hard it was to change it, let alone escape its stranglehold completely. So what… what if fate had a pull on all things, had influence over all of existence, and pushed everything, everywhere in a certain direction?
To a certain conclusion, no less.
If so, the details of what happened could potentially change, but the end would inevitably, and inescapably, be the same. That… that was a thought that terrified Sunny beyond belief.
He had proclaimed fate to be his sworn enemy, after all. And now, that enemy seemed for fearsome than ever.
...With a grim expression, he glanced at Effie one more time, then rose from the ground and walked over to the pile of weapons, picking one of them up and thrusting it into the ground.
The girl was breathing heavily, her little body seemingly on the verge of collapse. Nevertheless, she glanced at Sunny with a stubborn expression:
"What are you doing?"
Sunny picked up another sword and shrugged.
"...Helping. You must be hungry, are you not? The sooner we are done with this, the sooner you can eat. Everyone wins, no?"
Effie hesitated for a bit, then turned away and nodded slowly. Together, they continued to bury the swords of the Maidens in the rocky soil, with Kai soon joining them.
Before too long, the pile of weapons had disappeared, joining the countless swords surrounding the empty, silent temple.
Sunny did not know if what they had done was going to change fate, even a little bit.
But he hoped ardently that it would.
***
The next morning, the inhabitants of the Sanctuary saw a very peculiar thing. A man in a wooden mask and with skin that resembled tree bark effortlessly landed on the soft grass of the island, his tall figure covered by a fitting silk garment.
A moment later, a towering four-armed demon climbed from beneath the island and joined him. However, that was not all…
There was a scrawny girl of about eleven or twelve years of age sitting on the shoulders of the demon, holding his horns with her little hands and swinging her skinny legs wildly.
"Gee-up! Faster!"
Listening to Effie laugh, Sunny gritted his teeth, then said with irritation:
"Can you… stop swinging your legs? I am not a horse, damn it!"
The huntress did not listen, so he grabbed her legs with two of his four hands and held them in place.
…Which was not easy to do, considering the little girl's monstrous strength.
"Ouch! My bruises!"
Effie made a pitiful face and whimpered.
"Oh, no… please don't hurt me, Uncle Demon! I'll be good, I promise! I'll try to recover from the beatings faster… you don't need to get angry…"
As the people stared at the girl's terribly bruised body with dark expressions, then looked at Sunny angrily, he hissed:
"I didn't… she's not… you stop it right now, Effie! That is not funny!"
The little girl threw her head back and laughed again, then leaned down with a mischievous smile:
"Yes, of course! Whatever you say, Uncle!"
After that, she glanced at the tall menhirs of the Sanctuary and lingered for a few moments, then whispered quietly into his ear:
"...So, let me get this straight. Everyone in this Nightmare was driven insane by the Demon of Desire, and to conquer it, we need to set her free… with the help of a mad Transcendent sorcerer who wants to defy the gods, start a war against the other four Chain Lords, and kill them. And it was that guy, Noctis, who sent you to the Temple of the Chalice. He is the one we are here to see?"
Sunny looked forward with a dark expression on his bestial face, and then growled.
"More or less. We have a thing or two to discuss with him…"
He paused for a moment before adding, murderous flames igniting in his eyes:
"...because I am pretty sure that Noctis, that rotten bastard, has swindled me again!"
Chapter 678: Wind of Change
The three of them entered the Sanctuary, crossed the beautiful garden, and entered the sorcerer's residence through a familiar wooden door, Effie still sitting on Sunny's shoulders with a curious expression on her childish face.
The rooms within, however, had changed since the last time Sunny had seen them.
The luxurious furniture was gone, as well as beautiful decorations covering the walls. Instead, all that met them was barren stone, with a few broken Sailor Dolls laying on it, their limbs disassembled and laid out around the bodies like macabre pieces of art.
The floor of the whole central chamber was covered by a circle made out of a myriad of runes, powerful currents of soul essence flowing through it and dissipating into the ancient stones. Noctis was sitting in the center of the circle, his eyes closed. Without the familiar carefree smile, his beautiful face seemed ominous and strangely terrifying.
Hearing their footsteps, the sorcerer slowly exhaled. The crushing flood of essence slowly thinned, and then dissipated, retreating back into his body. He turned his head slightly and opened his eyes, which shone in the darkness for a moment, as though full of pale moonlight.
Then, they slowly turned human again, and Noctis smiled, returning to his usual laidback persona so suddenly that it seemed almost disturbing.
"Ah, Sunless, my friend! You are back! Sit down, have a drink… welcome!"
He stood up and outstretched a hand, as if trying to gesture at a set of comfortable seats. Then, a surprised expression appeared on the Transcendent's face, and he looked around the empty hall with a bit of confusion.
"Oh, right… I've been remodelling…"
Noctis sighed, then clapped his hands together.
"Well, no matter. Dolls! Bring my guests something to drink! They must be parched after their journey!"
His voice echoed around the residence… however, nothing happened.
He hesitated, then glanced at the broken mannequins lying on the floor and awkwardly shifted his feet.
"Ah. How unfortunate."
The sorcerer shook his head, then shrugged and looked at the three of them with a smile:
"Anyway... welcome!"
He tilted his head and stared at Effie, then blinked a couple of times.
"Ah, you have brought a ch—child with you. How curious. It doesn't bite, does it?"
Suny frowned, but before he could speak, Effie blurted with feigned outrage:
"I am not a child! I am twelve! Uh, almost."
Noctis stared at her with doubt.
"...It speaks. How bizarre."
Sunny slowly inhaled, then said evenly:
"This child is called Effie. She is the friend I have told you about."
The sorcerer's polite smile remained glued to his face. He stared at Effie some more, then furtively glanced at Kai.
"So, uh… one of your friends is a cripple you randomly stumbled upon in my Sanctuary, and the other one is a small child?"
Sunny nodded grimly.
Noctis rubbed his chin, and then cautiously said:
"Sunless, uh… are you utterly sure that you did not just invent having friends? To make me value our own beautiful friendship more, perhaps? If so, let me assure you! I value it a great deal already! There's no need for you to feel insecure just because you are not as beautiful, wealthy, wise, generous, and delightful to be around as me!"
Sunny gritted his teeth and then hissed furiously:
"I am! Wait… I mean I am sure... that I did not invent them! Are you sure that you really want to know the truth about me and my friends?"
Noctis raised his eyebrows with a sincere look on his face.
"Well, of course…"
Sunny stared at him for a few moments, and then said:
"In that case. My friends and I are not actually a demon, a cripple, and a small child. We are humans from a distant future whose souls were sent here by a nearly all-mighty entity known as the Nightmare Spell, after the gods had died and this whole world had been destroyed. Oh, and this place? It is not real! You are not real, too. All of it is just a complicated illusion created by the Spell to test us three… no, us five, actually. That's the honest truth."
The sorcerer looked at him with wide eyes. Then, he sighed, shook his head, and uttered in a hurt tone:
"Sunless… there's no need to weave such stupid lies to mock me. If you don't want to tell me, you don't have to."
He pursed his lips and turned away.
"...So childish! I take it all went well, then? Since you are in the company of a new friend, you must have successfully infiltrated the Temple of the Chalice, found her, retrieved the Glass Knife, and fled before the War Maidens noticed?"
Sunny flinched, then cleared his throat and remained silent for a couple of seconds. Finally, he said in an even tone:
"Uh… well, actually… not exactly. We did retrieve Effie and the knife, but…"
Noctis looked at him with surprise:
"But what?"
Sunny coughed.
"We sort of… destroyed the chalice and killed all the War Maidens."
The sorcerer stared at him in shock.
"...You did what?!"
Kai sighed, and then strained his vocal cords to speak:
"We were left with no other choice. The Maidens were willing to give us a chance to earn the right to take the Glass Knife away, but they would have never let Effie go. That was a tenet of their sect. So… the sect had to go, instead."
Noctis stared at them with wide eyes, his face turning deathly pale. He swayed a little, and then yelped:
"But what do you mean, you killed all the Maidens?! How did you manage to kill them?! What about their Transcendent sect leader… did you kill her, too?!"
The three of them looked at each other with confusion. Then, Effie cautiously spoke up:
"Uh… the venerable foremother, who was the last Transcendent of the Red Sect, died like two hundred years ago. There were no other Transcendents among the Maidens since."
The sorcerer blinked a couple of times.
"Wait… really? Huh. So she just went and died? How… pedestrian."
Sunny stared at him, aghast. Did that fool... did he really forget that real people had a habit of dying from time to time, unlike his own immortal self? How insane could that charlatan really be?!
But then, he had to stop himself. No, that was not right. Noctis was no fool, he just enjoyed playing one. There was no chance that the immortal would not have known whether or not there were Transcendents living in his territory. Which could only mean one thing...
Sunny took a step forward and growled.
"Do not insult us! You knew perfectly well that there were no Transcendents in the Temple of the Chalice. And you also knew that you could have easily obliterated that whole place and taken the Glass Knife, if you wanted to. We three are formidable, as far as Awakened go, but not nearly as formidable to be able to do something that a Chain Lord would not have been able to."
He glared at the immortal and said, the emerald amulet almost cracking in his fist:
"So, Noctis, my friend… why don't you tell me the real reason for why you really sent me and Kai there instead of going yourself? And be very careful about what you say… because our beautiful friendship might depend on your answer!"
Noctis remained silent for a while, looking at him with an unreadable expression. Then, he sighed and waved a hand.
"...Alright, alright. If you want to be boring, I'll tell you the truth. No need to get angry."
He clapped his hands again, and the disassembled Sailor Dolls suddenly rose from the floor, their limbs flying up and connecting to the wooden torsos. Then, one of them disappeared for a moment and returned with a silver goblet full of fragrant wine, presenting it to the sorcerer with frightened reverence. The others backed away and froze, standing silently near the walls.
Noctis took the goblet, took a sip, and looked away with a somber expression on his exquisite face.
"Yes, it is true that I could have retrieved the knife, saved your friend, and destroyed the Temple of the Chalice myself. That would not have been too hard… with or without the Transcendent guarding it. However…"
He stared west, his eyes turning dark.
"...If I made such a move myself, the other four would have learned of it. Then, they would have understood why I made it, and what I am going to do next, as well. They will know my intentions eventually, of course… but now is not the time. Not yet. Revealing it all now would be troublesome."
Sunny scowled, then briefly glanced at Kai. The archer was looking west, too, his shoulders tense.
The Ivory City lay to the west. The Red Colosseum, too.
He hesitated, and then said in a grim tone:
"So you can't act openly out of the fear that the other Chain Lords will unite to attack you?"
Noctis turned to him and smiled.
"...Fear? No, nothing that whimsical. It is simply a matter of convenience. You see, until…"
Suddenly, the sorcerer grew silent. His face turned grave, and his eyes shined with a glint of distant moonlight.
…This time, it was not a performance. Sunny could feel that something had really gone wrong, because the whole room inexplicably changed, becoming much darker, colder, and full of dire tension.
Noctis slowly turned his head and whispered, his voice stunned and solemn:
"Something… something changed… no… no, it can't be…"
He looked toward the doors, and then added with a grim expression.
"We have another guest, I think. A messenger, from the north…"
Chapter 679: Messenger from the North
The sorcerer seemed shaken. No, more than that… he seemed deeply troubled by something. Noctis stared at the door for a few moments, then frowned and said, his voice devoid of any emotion:
"...Let us go and see who is knocking on my door, then."
With that, he drained his goblet, threw it aside, and walked toward the exit.
Sunny, Effie, and Kai glanced at each other, then followed along. No matter who it was that had come to the Sanctuary, they were currently enjoying the sorcerer's hospitality, so the identity of the new arrival concerned them too.
Who could have affected Noctis that much? Or was the change he had spoken about the real reason for this strange behavior, while the appearance of a guest just happened to coincidence with it?
They were going to find out soon.
Together, the four of them — three Awakened and an immortal Saint — crossed the garden of the Sanctuary and walked between the ancient menhirs, to the field of grass beyond. There, an elegant figure waited for them, dressed in an austere black garment. It was a young woman none of them recognized.
The young woman was tall and slender, with pale skin and lustrous raven-black hair that moved gently in the wind. Her face possessed an almost otherworldly beauty to it, its lines full of solemn grace and splendor. However, that lovely face was blemished by a stark flaw — her eyes were covered by a simple strip of black cloth, the same color as the dress she wore.
The contrast between the austere black dress and the flawless white skin, between the softness of her captivating face and the severity of the crude blindfold, created a tantalizing, ominous, and slightly disturbing sight.
…However, Sunny was not paying attention to the young woman's sublime beauty, or to her dress. Instead, his eyes were glued to a single detail…
There was a leather belt tied around the beautiful stranger's slender waist, and on it hung a black scabbard. He recognized the hilt of the blade encompassed within in an instant…
'Quiet... Quiet Dancer? Cassie!'
For a moment, Sunny was overwhelmed by a feeling of profound, boundless relief. She was alive… Cassie was alive… all of them were. And now, despite all the dire trials of this harrowing Nightmare, the four of them were finally reunited.
It was as though a terrible weight that had been crushing his heart all this time, without him knowing, was suddenly lifted.
Sunny felt Effie's grip on his horns grow tighter, and glanced at Kai to see that the young man's eyes were shining behind the wooden mask. The two of them had recognized Cassie, too, and were sharing in his glee.
However, a moment later, Sunny's elation was gone.
He remembered how and why they appeared in this field of grass to meet Cassie, and looked at Noctis with concern. The sorcerer still had an ashen face… and unlike them, he did not have any warm feelings toward the blind girl.
The situation was still strange, and dangerous.
As if sensing his gaze, Noctis frowned, then looked at the beautiful woman with a dark expression and asked coldly:
"An eyeless of the Night Temple… isn't it terribly far for a blind priestess like you to travel south, all alone? Speak, girl… what do you want?"
Cassie lingered for a moment, then bowed slightly. When she spoke, her unfamiliar voice sounded deep and pleasant. She said:
"Greetings, Lord Noctis. I bring a message from my mistress, the One in the North."
The sorcerer grimaced.
"Oh, yeah? What does that dreadful woman want from me?"
The blind girl remained silent for a few moments, then lowered her head slightly.
"She doesn't want anything, Lord Noctis. My mistress, Lady of the North, blessed of the Black Skies… is dead."
***
Noctis swayed slightly, as if struck. He stared at Cassie with a pale face, then raised a trembling hand and silently grasped his neck. After a few moments, he spoke again:
"What are you talking... what is the message she sent, exactly?"
The blind girl was still looking down. Without raising her head, she answered evenly:
"Just these three words. I am dead."
The sorcerer scoffed.
"It takes weeks to get from the Night Temple to the Sanctuary on foot… if one can even make it alive! Was she dead when she sent you? Huh?"
Cassie silently shook her head.
"No. She was alive."
Noctis gritted his teeth in outrage.
"That woman… so insufferable. If she knew she was going to die, she could have said more than three words, at least! After… after everything we shared… ah, she just had to be frustrating till the very end!"
Despite the sorcerer's irritated tone, Sunny could tell that Noctis was deeply aggrieved by the stunning news Cassie had brought… as if he had not been planning to kill the One in the North himself all along. The immortals were very strange people, indeed…
But Sunny was stunned himself. One of the Chain Lords… was already dead? Just like that? After a thousand of years of solemn duty, someone had managed to kill the undying Transcendent without alerting the other four?
Suddenly, I feeling of unease grasped his heart. If not one of the Chain Lords, then who could have killed the ruler of the Night Temple?
Who else possessed one of the seven knives?
He knew of only one person…
As if reading his thoughts, Noctis stared at Cassie and asked, his voice trembling with anger:
"So, who was it? Who killed her? Solvane? Or the Ivory Lord?"
The blind girl slowly shook her head.
"Neither. It was a… a creature. A creature that came from the fog."
The sorcerer chuckled.
"...I see. So the Ivory Knife fell into the hands of one of those. Ah, she could have saved herself, if she had only wanted… but she grew indifferent to things like that a long time ago, didn't she? That… that was her madness."
Noctis remained silent for a while, and then suddenly asked, his eyes glinting with his own madness:
"So then, the north is in disarray, the Night Temple is without a leader, and its army needs a new commander? Thousands of soldiers, hundreds of Awakened warriors, all hoping to find someone to serve and protect their families? Right?"
Cassie lingered for a moment, then shook her head again.
"...No."
Noctis raised an eyebrow.
"What? Why not?"
She straightened, then answered simply:
"They are also dead."
The sorcerer blinked a couple of times.
"Huh? Who is dead?"
The young woman remained still as she said, her voice calm and even:
"Everyone. The soldiers, the priestesses, the Awakened, the families. Everyone is dead, and the northern reach stands empty. The creature took them all."
Chapter 680: Lost and Found
Everyone seemed stunned into a grave silence by these words... even Noctis, who must have heard and seen a lot during his long life. Frozen, Sunny stared at Cassie, his lightless pupils narrowing into two vertical slits. Everyone… was dead?
Everyone?
Had Mordret... slaughtered an entire region? Thousands of people, or even tens of thousands? Mundane humans, Awakened, Ascended… even the Transcendent Lady of the North herself?
Suddenly, a cold shiver ran down his spine.
Sunny knew, of course, that the Prince of Nothing — the owner of the friendly voice he had heard once, in the darkness of a bottomless abyss — was formidable, and would have grown more formidable still after being sent into the body of a Terror. He also knew that Mordret was not completely of sound mind, and that the influence of Hope would have only exacerbated that subtle fissure.
But a slaughter on such scale… he had never even thought that Mordret would be capable of committing something like that… and why? What goal was the banished prince pursuing? He was never cruel without a cold and calculated reason… or at least he had not been, in the past. Every monstrous act that Mordret had perpetrated before was full of perverse, but deliberate practicality.
How could something like that be practical? Even forming a seventh core would not have demanded a hecatomb of that magnitude...
Sunny really did not know how to feel. On one hand, the news of a Chain Lord's demise was beneficial for his plans… in that sense, the Prince of Nothing had already accomplished more to conquer the Nightmare than the four of them combined. But on the other hand, Sunny just couldn't help but feel uneasy about it… about Mordret.
What was the son of Valor planning?
His thoughts were interrupted by Noctis, who let out a deep sigh.
"Everyone is dead… ah, I barely remember the last time something like that happened. But when I was young, at the dawn of the Age of Heroes, things like that were rather common… you wouldn't remember, I guess. That is what happens when human champions grow unfit for their duty."
He looked away with a dark expression, and then added in a grim tone:
"And we, the champions of this kingdom, have been unfit for quite a while now… if the Lords can even be called champions, still. Come to think of it, I am surprised that this had not happened sooner."
He sighed again, then shrugged and turned to Cassie, seemingly having no desire to elaborate on this strange statement:
"Thank you for delivering this message, girl. If everyone in the north is dead… that makes you the last one, then?"
The blind woman lingered for a moment, then nodded.
Noctis pursed his lips.
"Ah, well, I am very sorry. For what it is worth, you are welcomed to stay here, in my Sanctuary. This is a place for those who are lost, lonesome, and have nowhere else to go. Don't hesitate to ask if you need anything…"
He turned away, as if losing any interest in the conversation, but at that moment, Cassie suddenly spoke:
"Actually, there is indeed something that I need."
The sorcerer stopped, then looked at her with a slight frown and asked with a bit of surprise:
"Really? Oh… then tell me! I am sure I'll be able to help."
The beautiful young woman placed a hand on the hilt of her rapier, and then said, her voice deep and pleasant:
"I am looking for my friends. I wonder if you would be able to help me find them, Lord Noctis."
Noctis blinked a couple of times, then glanced at Sunny, Kai, and Effie with a strange expression on his face. Finally, he answered in a cautious tone:
"Of course! Gladly. But... uh... do you, perhaps… not know how your friends look, where they are, and what they are called? If so, finding them will be... difficult."
Cassie tilted her head, remained silent for a few moments, and then answered with a bit of confusion:
"...Why would I not know? I am looking for a four-armed demon, a cripple with a grating voice, and a little girl. Their names are Sunless, Nightingale, and Raised by Wolves. They should be here in your Sanctuary, my lord, or at least visited it not too long ago."
Noctis smiled radiantly.
"You would, wouldn't you? Not knowing something like that would be very strange! Gods, finally, someone normal... a four-armed demon, you say? A four-armed... four... huh..."
The sorcerer's voice trailed off, and then he slowly turned to Sunny, seemingly struggling to say anything else.
Before he managed to speak again, however, there was a sound of little feet pattering on soft grass, and a small figure collided with the young woman, hugging her with inhuman strength.
"Cassie! You're alive!"
Despite the fact that the blind young woman could perceive several seconds into the future and had to have known that Effie was going to tackle her, a bewildered expression still appeared on her beautiful face. She remained frozen for a few seconds, and then hesitantly lowered a hand to pat the little girl on the head.
"Uh… yes, yes I am. I am happy to see you too, Effie…"
The little girl stared up at Cassie, and then made a pouty face:
"What the hell, Cassie? How is this fair? Sunny was short but became tall, Kai was pretty but became hideous, and I… let's not talk about that… but you were pretty before and became even prettier now! The injustice!"
The young woman smiled gently, and then tightly hugged the little girl.
"...Why? I think you became very pretty, too."
Noctis stared at all this, then looked at Sunny with an inexplicable expression. The immortal sorcerer hesitated for a couple of seconds, and then cautiously asked:
"Ah, Sunless… is this beautiful priestess one of your friends, too?"
Sunny glanced at him, and then raised the emerald amulet.
"Yes… the last friend I wanted to find. Her name is Song of the Fallen."
Noctis remained silent for a while, then looked away and mumbled in a barely audible whisper:
"By the Moon… I guess I really need to improve my friend-making skills. Otherwise, I would not be able to call myself the friendliest man in all of the Kingdom of Hope anymore…"
Hearing that, Sunny smiled. He had a reason to.
Their small cohort... was finally back together.
Chapter 681: The Incredible Adventures and Astonishing Deeds of Heroic Dreamer Sunless in the Lonesome Land of Nightmares, Abridged (Volume III)
Soon, the four of them were gathered in Sunny's room. There was plenty of food on the table, and a kettle of fragrant tea. They had a peaceful meal, avoiding discussing anything important… but soon, it was time to have a serious discussion.
None of the four seemed too excited about the idea, perhaps because doing so would mean revisiting their experiences in the Nightmare and opening up wounds that had barely any time to heal. There were a lot of invisible scars each of them was hiding... none of the four had survived these three months unscathed.
Effie looked at her empty plate for a few moments, and then sighed.
"Can't we just have a few days off before getting to work? The world won't collapse if we take a small vacation… uh, I think…"
Sunny glanced at his friends — the bruised girl, the cripple with a disfigured face, and a beautiful young woman whose empty eye sockets were covered by a black cloth — and slowly shook his head.
"If we do, Noctis might grow… impatient. I promised to give him an answer after I find my friends. He has already been gracious enough to abstain from killing me, putting my soul into a doll... or a mop... and ordering it to give him the knives. So, we better not linger."
Cassie turned her head slightly and asked, her deep, pleasant voice still sounding strange and unfamiliar:
"An answer? To what question?"
Sunny grimaced, then looked away.
"...Right. All of you must have already understood what the conflict of this Nightmare is. Hope, the Demon of Desire… Noctis is preparing to rebel against the will of the gods, kill the other immortals, and break her chains. And we have to either help him achieve his goal, or somehow prevent Hope from escaping. The former seems insane, but the latter… the latter seems impossible, considering that she is already able to influence the world from inside her prison."
He shivered, grew silent for a few moments, and then added:
"Each of the immortals represents — or rather, embodies — one of Hope's eternal shackles. They can only be destroyed by one of the Sun God's knives. I am in possession of two of the remaining four knives, Noctis knows where the third is being kept, and the fourth one is in the hands of Solvane, who will freely offer it to anyone who can grant her a worthy death. So… while his plan means going to war against three ancient Saints, it is not entirely crazy. Just… mostly so."
Sunny sighed, poured himself some tea, and concluded:
"So, we need to decide whether we want to help him in this craziness, or not."
Cassie nodded, seemingly not surprised by what he told them. Then, she lingered for a moment, and said:
"Then, first, we need to share everything we learned about the Nightmare while we were apart. The more information we possess, the better informed our decision will be."
Sunny took a sip of his tea and shrugged. That was what he wanted to do, as well. He studied the faces of his companions, and then gripped the emerald amulet tighter.
"In that case… I will begin, I guess."
Effie, Kai, and Cassie turned to him, trying not to show how curious they really were. And who could blame them? Out of the four, Sunny's situation was indeed the most… abnormal.
He hesitated for a few moments, and then spoke:
"As you might have noticed, the Spell sent me into the body of a demon… a shadow demon, to be precise. I found myself far to the west, in the territory of the followers of War. Even worse, just seconds after coming to my senses, I stumbled upon a beautiful woman wearing red. That woman… was Solvane, the Transcendent priestess of War God. She easily overpowered me, but decided to keep me alive."
Effie's eyes glistened when he mentioned Solvane. Kai, too, seemed to be shaken by that revelation… after all, he had been an officer of the army that was embroiled in a bloody war against Solvane's cult. To soldiers of the Ivory City, her name must have been synonymous with power, death, and horror. To them, Solvane was as much of a person as she was an ancient, terrifying myth.
Sunny's face grew dark.
"After that, I found myself in the Red Colosseum… an ancient theater built by Hope, which the Warmongers had turned into a perverse temple of slaughter. There were thousands of Nightmare Creatures locked in its dungeons, as well as a few unlucky humans. Every day, we were forced to kill each other. Those who survived received the dubious honor of fighting against the Warmongers themselves, and if we somehow prevailed… well, then we got to live another day, just to repeat the whole process come dawn."
He remained silent for a while, and then added:
"Two months… I spent two months in that purgatory. Of course, I would have succumbed to my wounds very fast if it wasn't for my partner, a captive young man from the Ivory City… Elyas. His healing Aspect kept me alive, and I kept him alive in the arena. Together, we endured the slaughter, day after day, week after week. Still, our days were numbered, so I kept searching for a way to escape. And after two months, I finally found it."
Sunny touched the terrible scar on his neck and grinned.
"Turns out, all I had to do was to trick our Ascended jailer into chopping my head off. Free of the collar, I killed him, and then got Elyas to attach my head back…"
Kai, who was in the middle of taking a sip of tea, spat it out.
"...What?!"
Effie only remained silent because she was in the process of choking on a pastry. Her eyes, however, were similarly wide. Even Cassie seemed stunned.
Sunny chuckled.
"Ah, you see. That Transcended priestess, Solvane… actually, I had already killed her once. She had been serving as the host body for a Corrupted Monster the Fire Keepers and I had slain in the Dream Realm to capture the wreck of Noctis's flying ship. That was where I received an enchanted armor that allows its wearer to stay alive for as long as they have essence… I also had means of regaining essence, and so, I was able to survive without a head long enough for Elyas to heal me."
Effie finally managed to swallow her pastry and glanced at Kai with wild eyes.
"Kai… tell me he's lying, please…"
The young man blinked a couple of times, then solemnly shook his head. The little girl swore, then mumbled in a small voice:
"Crazy bastard… he's crazy!"
Sunny shrugged nonchalantly.
"What? That wasn't even the craziest part. Anyway, Elyas and I almost managed to escape the Red Colosseum, but at the last moment, we were intercepted by Solvane… that cursed fiend."
The smile disappeared from his face, and his black eyes flashed with cold hatred for a moment.
"She… she killed Elyas, tore my heart out, and threw my body into the Sky Below. Luckily for me, this demon body has two hearts, which was why I didn't die immediately. Solvane either didn't know about that or did not care, thinking that the abyss would finish me off. But I survived and found my way back to the Isles, thanks to my Memories."
He sighed.
"...I survived, but was not in the best shape, either physically or mentally. My one remaining heart was not enough to keep this body going, so I was effectively dying, albeit slowly. I made my way south, planning to eventually reach our rendezvous point in the east. However, before I could, I stumbled upon Noctis on the Southern Island."
Sunny smiled bitterly.
"That mad bastard was very happy to see me. He thought that fate had brought us together… and who knows, maybe it did. We made a deal, he and I… Noctis would replace my missing heart, and I would learn the location of the Glass Knife from a Terror that resided in the nearby fortress. That Terror, you see, had belonged to one of the Chain Lords before… had belonged to the Shadow. So was there a better candidate to meet him than a shadow demon?"
He didn't speak for a while, then let out a heavy sigh.
"The problem was, the centuries of loneliness and being subjected to Hope's poison had driven the creature mad. So, it attacked me. That Terror had power over dreams and nightmares, and he subjected me to a few hundred of those. In each one, I was horribly tortured, experienced unimaginable sorrow, and was eventually killed. Luckily, I had forgotten most of those nightmares… yeah. Most of them…"
Sunny took a sip of tea, then shook his head.
"...Ah, anyway, eventually, I escaped from the nightmares as well, by breaking all of them, and then killed the Terror. Noctis replaced my heart, as he had promised, and brought me to the Sanctuary. Here, I met Kai, and we went to retrieve the Glass Knife — and Effie — from the Temple of the Chalice. And here we are."
He scratched the back of his head, and then added thoughtfully:
"Overall, I guess it could have been worse…"
Effie swore again, and then shoved another pastry into her mouth. She chewed furiously, and then hissed, sending crumbs flying across the table:
"...What the hell could have been worse than that?!"
Sunny stared at her for a moment, and shrugged.
"I don't know… I could have been sent into a body of a worm? Or even worse… a child…"