In some area of the cursed city, a solitary blood fiend stood still, staring into nothingness while its red eyes, reflecting madness, remained eerily motionless.
Not far from the blood fiend, hidden in the shadow cast by a fallen rock, was Sunny.
Having already killed several of these creatures, he had prepared in advance for tonight's hunt. The ordinary rock was already on the other side of the area, several meters from the awakened monster.
With a mental command, Sunny made the ordinary rock speak:
"HEY IDIOT! LOOK BEHIND YOU!"
The creature immediately turned its body to look in the direction of the invading sound shouting at it from the shadows. With a quick leap, the monster approached the ordinary rock.
At that moment, Sunny quickly ran through the shadows with his own shadow wrapped around his body, enhancing all his abilities twofold. Only seconds later, he was behind the blood fiend.
With a quick and powerful slash from the Midnight Shard, he severed the blood fiend's body in two.
"I told you to look behind," said the rock, with the same voice as Sunny.
"This has become too easy."
Sunny's face contorted, and his brow furrowed.
'No, this was a bad line of thought. Arrogance is often the death sentence of strong hunters. I won't be like those idiots.'
Invoking the prowling spine, which he obtained from a porcupine-like creature, he cut the flesh of the blood fiend and searched for the soul fragments within its chest.
Once done, he prepared to hunt his next victim while fleeing the scene.
'I could kill one or two more tonight. Things have become easier since I reached 800 shadow fragments, but I still have to be careful, one mistake could cost me my life.'
Sunny stopped to rest in a safe shadow behind a relatively intact building compared to the ruins of all the other houses in the city, and summoned his runes.
Name: Sunless
True Name: Lost From Light
Class: Dreamer
Shadow Core: Inactive
Shadow Fragments: [837/1000]
Sunny felt excited every time he saw that number increase. After reaching the outer settlement and starting to hunt during the day with the cohort and his solo hunts at night, he had grown much more than during his entire time in the infernal labyrinth.
'Well, it's time to continue.'
Determined to go on, Sunny was about to leave the shadow of his hiding place when a thunderous noise was heard in the distance.
'What the hell?'
Surprised by the sudden noise, Sunny thought deeply about going to see what it was. He had already seen and admired nightmare creatures fighting each other for territory, and it was one of his favorite activities to watch, but such occasions were rare to witness all the time.
For this reason, finally, and against all his common sense, Sunny decided to investigate the source of the constant noise.
He began to run carefully through the shadows, avoiding making too much noise or encountering any terrifying abomination hiding, waiting for a defenseless prey to fall into its jaws.
After running for a while, Sunny could sense three shadows in a plaza he had previously visited; it was the territory of terrible stone specters that annihilated anyone who tried to invade their domain.
Sunny had already seen these creatures take down strong abominations, despite not being the strongest. In fact, they were in the Awakened rank, yet they still managed to defeat several fallen creatures and those more powerful than them.
Sunny avoided this plaza at all costs due to the formidable nature of the statues, not for their individual power, but for their excellent teamwork and incredible battle tactics used to eliminate anyone who challenged them.
When Sunny got close enough to see what was happening, he was surprised by what he found fighting in the center of the plaza.
There, in the middle of a battle between a gigantic spider and a small statue of an armored woman made of stone that looked like iron, was the one who had accompanied him to the shining castle: Jonathan.
He was fighting both monsters at the same time.
The giant spider seemed to have a body made entirely of hard, resistant steel, with sharp fangs and two protrusions on the sides of its horrible mouth that were pointed, and its many eyes looked at him with murderous madness while desperately trying to kill him.
While he covered himself with a full-body shield and slashed with a sinister black dagger, the small statue was giving him constant blows with its heavy stone sword made of the same material as its black armor, both appearing to turn into iron with the strange dark energy surrounding them.
His gaze stopped on Jonathan's weapons and armor.
'Strange, his armor usually reduces when he uses it to make any weapon. Also, it seems like his armor has lost those golden lines that covered some parts of it...'
While attentively observing the fight, which seemed to be going well for Jonathan, Sunny focused on Jonathan's eyes, which quickly scanned between both creatures. His eyes were fast, and his body moved as if he knew where the attacks were coming from, dodging or blocking both monsters.
A moment after blocking the heavy sword of the stone saint and a powerful strike from the spider's legs, Jonathan looked directly into Sunny's eyes.
'What the hell?'
Startled by Jonathan's sudden attention, Sunny stumbled back and hid deeper into the shadows.
'Strange... He shouldn't be able to see me while I'm in the shadow.'
In this timeline, where Sunny wasn't excluded and exiled to the cursed city alone for several months, he hadn't experienced the attack of the fallen demon inhabiting the ancient cathedral of a forgotten goddess.
Therefore, Sunny hadn't yet realized that some creatures could sense or see him while he was in the shadows, so it was very strange to him that the boy saw him so suddenly and directly.
He was surprised once more when he heard Jonathan's shout from the center of the plaza, overlapping with the noise of his battle.
"SUNNY, MY FRIEND!"
He paused for a moment to avoid a cut to his head from the stone saint and took a big step back, dodging another attack from the fallen arachnid beast.
"I WOULD LIKE SOME HELP DOWN HERE!"
After saying that, Jonathan continued his fight without looking at Sunny again, but still attentive to his soul while fighting.
Sunny hesitated.
Then, a torrent of white sparks appeared in his hand, and a few seconds later, the Midnight Shard appeared.
Stepping out of the shadows and commanding his own shadow to wrap around him, he ran to help Jonathan.
'Damn you.'