Chapter 202 Risk and Reward
Nephis and Kai dove away, and the massive pillar of bone shot past them. Before the thunderous sound of it crashing against the wall of the chamber even reached Sunny's ears, the pillar was already moving, whipping sideways with tremendous force.
Luckily, he and Cassie were behind it… but Effie and Caster were not. Both of them reacted with admirable speed and fell to the ground, allowing the terrifying limb of the gargantuan creature to fly above their heads.
Rising from the stone floor, the huntress screamed:
"It's just thrashing in its sleep! Move! We need to get out of here before the bastard wakes up!"
Cursing, Sunny dismissed the Midnight Shard and faced the mountain of bones, trying to predict its next move. He was beginning to understand how Effie's original hunting party had perished in the catacombs.
A sword wouldn't be of any use in this situation.
The Lord of the Dead was slowly coming to its senses. The bones constituting its repulsive body moved and rippled, unfurling from within the white mass like giant, twisting limbs. It seemed to be slowly turning from a shapeless hill into some semblance of a creature.
What shape that creature would assume once it fully awoke, Sunny didn't want to know.
Another twisting pillar… limb?... suddenly shot from the mass of bones, blindly striking at the empty space behind the giant abomination. Sunny gritted his teeth, his ears ringing from the thunderclap of its impact against the wall. What followed was a deafening noise of thousands of ancient bones scraping against weathered stone.
The massive pillar whipped left and right, then fell to the ground and slowly retreated back inside the body of the Lord of the Dead.
Meanwhile, Nephis was back at her feet. Dashing toward Kai, she pushed one end of the golden rope into his hands and pointed to the breach in the dome of the chamber. In the next moment, the archer soared into the air, flying to his destination with incredible speed.
With a terrifying scraping sound, the whole white mountain rippled once again, and several devastating pillars of bone shot to intercept him.
However, Sunny had no time to check on Kai.
Because the Lord of the Dead had extended two more limbs in his direction.
Diving under the first one, Sunny felt a wave of fetid air rush past him. Knowing that he only had a second left to live, he then strained his muscles and jumped with all his shadow-augmented might. Sunny's body flew several meters into the air, avoiding the rushing bone tentacle only by a few centimeters.
Landing in a roll, Sunny cursed and got back to his feet.
'What kind of an infernal jumping rope game is this?!'
The Lord of the Dead was slowly coming to its sense. More bone tentacles appeared from the mass of corpses, each moving with growing precision.
But Kai was already standing on the palm of the giant stone hand, the golden rope looped around one of its fingers.
Cassie was the first one to climb up. With the flying rapier loyally hovering over her shoulder, the blind girl effortlessly moved up the rope, reaching the distant ceiling of the underground chamber less than ten seconds later. It was easy to forget that she had absorbed as much soul essence as the rest of them. Her delicate arms hid much more power than one would assume. frёewebnoѵel.ƈo๓
…However, back on the ground, those seconds were a real hell. The mountainous creature was waking up, making it hard for the rest of them to stay away from its blindly thrashing limbs.
They needed to get out of here fast.
Effie was the next one to take the rope. The huntress practically flew up, pushing herself with agility and herculean strength worthy of an ancient hero.
Then, it was Caster's turn. Effortlessly dodging a pillar of bone with his incredible speed, the Legacy grabbed the rope… and turned into a barely visible blur. A second later, he was already landing on the giant stone palm.
Nephis and Sunny were the only ones left in the reach of the Fallen Tyrant. Glancing at Sunny, Changing Star yelled:
"Your turn!"
…However, Sunny did not respond.
His eyes were fixed on the base of the gargantuan abomination, where, amidst the ancient bones…
A weak golden glow emanated from a small, partially concealed object.
Sunny lingered for a moment, his thoughts moving with incredible speed. He knew that he was a greedy person by nature, and one cursed with insatiable curiosity, too. However, first a foremost, he was someone who put a tremendous amount of value on his own survival.
That's why, right now, his reasoning was cold a sober.
It was a question of risk and reward, as well as his ability.
Would he be able to reach the object shining with the light of divinity and come back alive, or not?
A second later, he looked at Nephis and answered:
"You go. I'll be just behind you."
...It would be a shame to go through all of this and not receive anything in return. He had to try.
With that, Sunny turned around and dashed toward the Lord of the Dead.
The decision was made, and now all that was left was to execute it.
Summoning the Prowling Thorn, he threw it at the mountain of bones. Of course, Sunny didn't hope to wound the tyrant. He just wanted to lodge the kunai in its body.
Just as the throwing dagger pierced the mass of bones, a white limb suddenly shot in his direction, obstructing everything with its repulsive expanse. Commanding the invisible string to contract, Sunny jumped high into the air and flew forward as though launched from a cannon. freeweɓnovel.cøm
Landing on the other side of the pillar, just a few steps away from the unencompassable mass of bones, he gritted his teeth…
And then thrust his hand inside the Fallen Tyrant's body.
A moment later, his fist closed around the concealed object, and with some effort, Sunny pulled it out in the clatter of breaking bones. A sharp pain pierced his forearm.
Opening his fist, he saw… a small, intricate iron key. It looked almost ordinary, if not for the ethereal golden glow emanating from within it.
In the next moment, Sunny suddenly staggered, feeling a wave of weakness washed over his body.
Rotating his forearm, he stared blankly at it for a split second, trying to comprehend what he was seeing.
And when he did, his eyes widened in terror.
Chapter 203 Corpse Eater
Glistening in the dim twilight of the underground chamber, an enormous leech was attached to his forearm. The creature was about a meter long, its slimy skin slightly translucent and red as dried blood. fɾeewebnoveℓ.co๓
It was indescribably repulsive.
…What's worse, though, was that its sucker had effortlessly broken through the leather vambrace of the Puppeteer's Shroud and sunk deep into Sunny's arm, splitting open his skin and muscles.
Currently, the leech was gorging on his blood, its belly slowly ballooning as crimson fluid rushed into it with frightening speed.
'Ah… ah… aaaah!'
With a sense of disgust and horror, Sunny slammed his fist into the spongy flesh of the revolting monster. Augmented with the power of shadows, his punch was powerful enough to easily break a human skull.
The abhorrent slug, however, did not even react to it. It just continued sucking out his blood. All Sunny achieved was sending a wave of pain rolling through his body.
'Not good…'
Instantly summoning the Midnight Shard, he enhanced its edge with the help of the shadow and hacked at the leech, putting all his strength behind the strike. The blade of the tachi was as sharp as a razor, and with the augmentation provided by shadow, it…
…Slid helplessly off the leech's skin, not leaving even a scratch on it. The slug wasn't affected at all. It was still drinking his blood, consuming a dangerous amount of it with each second.
Sunny stared at the disgusting creature, dumbfounded. His body was already starting to suffer from blood loss, a sickening weakness slowly spreading through it. There wasn't much time left until it would cause him to lose consciousness.
And then, inevitably, die. fɾēewebnσveℓ.com
'Think, think…'
The leech had broken through his tier-five awakened armor without any effort. It was immune to the damage done by the Midnight Shard, which had never failed to cut down any monster he faced before. This could only mean one thing.
The damn slug was a Fallen Beast.
Sunny blinked in disbelief.
'That thing is a Fallen One? Are you kidding me?'
If this was true, then nothing he could do would harm the leech. Maybe if he was at the very peak of his rank, there would be a chance. But with his core mostly empty and his Aspect Ability focused on versatility as opposed to pure might, like Effie's, there was none.
The gap between their ranks was just too wide.
…Stone Saint could probably wound it. But it would take several seconds for the taciturn monster to appear and take action. Seconds that Sunny didn't have. By the time she was able to do anything, he would already be dead, either sucked dry by the abominable slug or crushed to death by the Lord of the Dead.
That left Sunny with only one option. If he couldn't get rid of the leech…
He was going to have to cut off his arm.
Maybe Nephis would be able to grow him a new one.
Or not. In any case, he had to do it in order to survive...
Raising the tachi over his head, Sunny gritted his teeth and hesitated for a moment. Despite understanding that this was the only way, he was still struggling with the idea of crippling himself so terribly.
'Don't think! If you want to live, just do it!'
With a desperate resolve, he forcefully brought the Midnight Shard down… but then stopped it at the last second. The sharp blade hovered mere centimeters away from his skin.
This was not due to the lack of determination, but because Sunny noticed a subtle change happening to the leech.
Its belly, which had been expanding rapidly as his blood filled it, stopped ballooning at some point. Now, strange spasms were running through it.
'What the…'
In the next moment, the vile creature suddenly convulsed. Letting go of his arm, it dropped to the ground and writhed in agony. Through the translucent film of its skin, Sunny could see the innards of the giant slug bursting open. It was as though it was being torn from within by some invisible force.
No, not a force… it was being killed by his blood. The damn leech got poisoned by it.
…It seemed that Blood Weave was far more odd and tenacious of an Attribute than he had thought.
A second later, the whole body of the Fallen Beast simply ruptured, spilling blood everywhere. Sunny stared at it with a blank expression.
Bringing him out of the daze, the voice of the Spell whispered:
[You have slain a Fallen Beast, Corpse Eater.]
[Your shadow grows stronger.]
'Huh.'
[You have received a Memory.]
As his eyes grew wide, Sunny shook off his astonishment and lunged forward. He still had to escape from this damn place.
Grabbing the bloodied soul shard from the eviscerated remains of the abominable leech, he turned around and sprinted to the golden rope.
Dodging a bone tentacle that burst from the body of the gargantuan tyrant to pursue him, Sunny rolled on the ground, jumped over a pile of broken bones, and finally reached his destination.
As soon as he grabbed the rope, it began contracting, bringing him out of the underground chamber.
When Sunny was nearly reaching the hand of the stone goddess, a deafening roar thundered from below, washing over his body in an almost palpable wave.
The Lord of the Dead was finally awake.
But it was already too late. His prey had escaped.
***
Climbing out of the mud, Sunny fell to his knees, and then tiredly lowered himself to the ground. The breath was escaping from his lungs with laborious, raspy sounds.
Weak. He felt so weak. And tired.
But it was so good to see the sun again…
The wounds he had received in the catacombs had finally caught up with Sunny. With adrenaline gone, he was now in a sea of pain. A quiet groan escaped from his lips.
'That... that was not fun.'
While Sunny was contemplating this, a shadow fell over him. Looking up, he saw Nephis glaring at him with a dark expression. She was bloodied and battered, with a deep frown contorting the graceful lines of her usually calm face.
"...What?"
Kneeling beside Sunny, Changing Star grimaced and said:
"Are you insane? Why did you do that?"
He tried to chuckle, but ended up twisting in an excruciating coughing fit. When Sunny was finally able to breathe again, he said weakly:
"Yes, no? Maybe. I don't know. I just… saw something shiny."
With that, he opened his fist and showed Changing Star the glowing crystal of the ascended soul shard he had scavenged from the corpse of the vile blood-sucking leech.
She stared at it for a few moments, and then sighed.
Without saying anything else, Nephis placed her cool hands on his chest and closed her eyes.
A moment later, the purifying white flame spread through his body like a warm embrace, repairing any damage done to it.
Even knowing how much pain this cost her, Sunny couldn't help but be happy to feel its touch again.
Soon, his pain disappeared.
With his head cleared of the fog, he realized that they had done it.
They had successfully escaped the Dark City.
Who knew it would be so hard?