[You have slain a Corrupted Demon, Attendant of Darkness]
[You have received a Shard Memory: Starlight Shard]
[Your shadow grows stronger]
[Marble Saint is evolving]
Spell's words bombarded Sunny as he kneeled on the ground, looking up at Saint. It seemed like she was absorbing the darkness that had made up the black blob — liquid, inky blackness seemed to envelop her like a second skin. At the same time the ruby-red light in her eyes dimmed, becoming a faint ember.
Saint was going to slumber again, it seemed. Sunny could scarcely contain his joy.
What would Saint look like when she woke up? What new powers would she command? And, most importantly, how much easier would Sunny's own life become as a commander of such a powerful fighter?
Sunny bit his tongue. As if my life would ever get easy.
More importantly, he now had the thing they had been looking for: Starlight Shard, last of the shard memories. On that account Sunny mostly felt relieved. They were one step closer to the ultimate goal
He dismissed Saint and walked to Nephis. She was kneeling on the ground, looking perhaps more exhausted than Sunny had ever seen her, even compared to the time she had guarded their sleep for many hours straight. Nephis had numerous little wounds on her, but they didn't seem to heel. She had dismissed Weaver's mask, so perhaps Nephis just preferred the pain of a few wounds to the pain of her Flaw.
Which sparked th question — just how painful had the last ordeal been for her?
"What did you do?" Sunny asked.
Nephis looked at him blankly.
"What do you mean?"
Sunny was at a loss. Nephis was… he didn't really have words anymore. Perhaps she was just so out of it after the battle that she didn't have the energy to converse.
"I guess you used your awakened ability, right?" Sunny said after a moment. "But it definitely shouldn't be that potent… "
Nephis nodded. "You can check my runes… "
Sunny was perplexed, but nevertheless summoned Nephis's runes in front of him. At first glance, nothing seemed to be amiss. But then he looked at the counter right at the top of the runes.
[Soul Cores]: 1
[Soul Fragments]…
This…
"You blew up your own soul?" Sunny asked in a composed tone.
"Pretty much."
That's possible? Can I do that? Not that I'd want to…
"You're... actually, I'm not going to say it anymore... Anyways, I have the shard memory. We should probably go back before others get mad."
Sunny started to walk towards the entrance, only to realize that Nephis couldn't keep up with his pace. He looked Nephis quizzically. She furrowed her brows (quite cutely, he had to say) like she was about to say something embarrassing.
"Could you… support me? I think my leg is broken." Nephis limped couple of steps towards him and grimaced. "And my back too, maybe? At least a little bit?"
Sunny felt like he was dreaming, but nevertheless offered Changing Star his right hand in what he supposed was gentlemanly fashion. Together they proceeded slowly out from the hall and into a long corridor. Nephis smelled of blood, smoke and metal. She was much taller than Sunny, so their escapade was a little comical-looking, Sunny thought when he looked at them through Gloomy.
Nevertheless, he found that Nephis's weight on him wasn't as uncomfortable as he had expected - quite the opposite, in fact. He frowned.
Is it possible that I don't hate her anymore? he thought. That's pathetic...
But then, it was difficult to hate someone who would willingly go through pain and torment to make up for what they had done.
After a corridor they got to the the entrance hall, where they found a familiar group of people with weapons in their hands.
"Doofus! Princess! Are you alright?"
Apparently their friends had come to rescue them despite their warnings. Too bad they were minutes late, or they would have witnessed a very impressive lightshow.
"How does it look? Of course we are alright!" Sunny shouted from the hallway, revealing a bloody smile. "As always!"
Effie smiled.
"But… how? It hasn't even been half an hour", Kai asked.
"You might have to ask Nephis for details", Sunny said. "She basically dropped a nuke on that monster… whatever those are. But I was the one that killed it in the end."
"Technically, it was — " Nephis started, but Sunny cut her off by a loud cough.
"Let us not get into technicalities. All is good! We have this… beautiful cloak that just so happens to be the final shard memory. I say we should celebrate."
Sunny summoned the Starlight Shard in form of a long white cloak. It looked suprisingly good on him, contrasting strikingly with his pitch-black armor and Crown of Ice, which was of silver.
"And how should we celebrate that, exactly?" Kai asked.
Sunny shrugged. "No idea. At least I want to eat something."
Effie laughed. "Indeed! I am of the same mind." Then, a solemn expression fell on her face. "It is true… we might finally get to escape this place… Ha! I never thought I would see this day. Princess, I have to thank you!"
"Don't thank me yet", Nephis warned.
Kai looked at her with concern. "You seem tired. Let's find some place where we can rest, right?"
*******
As it happened, their resting place today were the castle's kitchens.
They were easy to reach, safe from monsters, and contained multiple crude ovens as well as pans, kettles and cutlery. It felt almost luxurious after their long journeys through the Forgotten Shore. Effie and Kai provided the cohort with food and they ate slowly in companionable silence.
After everyone was fully refreshed, they decided to return to the Cathedral. Nephis assured everyone that she was fine and ready to host a meeting with Gunlaug and other leaders. Sunny saw that she was putting on a facade; she couldn't have been fine when her soul had been forcefully destroyed. But she was an awakened, so she would probably bounce back relatively soon.
They did not make haste, though. Kai even took a detour to find his guitar from his own chamber in the castle. Miraculously, the instrument had survided everything that had happened since his departure.
When the sun was midway through the sky they left the castle, and after couple of hours of traversal, they entered the Cathedral Plaza once more. There were people on and about; most of them didn't know what the cohort had been up to during the day, and so did not realize the importance of their return. Seishan, meanwhile, looked like she had seen a ghost.
A worthy amount of awe, Sunny thought gleefully. But she is only looking at Nephis. I was the one who deal the final blow...
Seishan came running down the stairs of the Cathedral and stopped in front of them. Sunny thought her eyes were glistening, but maybe it was just a trick of light.
"You actually succeeded? Did you get the memory?" she asked in a hoarse voice.
Nephis nodded.
"Then we need to hold a meeting."
*******
It didn't take long until all the leaders of Forgotten Shore had gathered in one place — that place being Nephis's and Cassie's hut. The cathedral itself would have provided them with more space and grandeur, but unfortunately that came at the cost of privacy. And they couldn't use the upper quarters since they had been invaded by Seishan's handmaidens.
Gunlaug was there with his strongest lieutenants, Teshai and Gemma. The golden monarch had dismissed his armor echo so its effect wouldn't disturb the other people in the meeting — he looked quite a lot small and younger than before, although he was definitely still older than most of the populace of the city.
After Gunlaug there was Seishan with Kido as well as Nephis's whole cohort. The comparatively small hut was full to the brim.
Nephis herself was still feeling quite weak and dispirited. The battle had taken a toll on her, more so than any other in this lifetime of hers. She seemed to be experiencing a phantom pain emanating from her soul — a curious sensation that she could hardly describe, except that it made her feel lethargic and irritated. Her wounds had not all been healed yet, either, and her bones, nerves and muscles felt raw and frail
Nevertheless, Nephis wanted to hold this meeting as soon as possible.
She let her eyes glide over all the participants in the meeting, giving them the feeling that her words were of utmost importance. This was a trick she had learnt when conferring with officials of Great Clans.
"You should all know by now what this day means", Nephis started. "We have acquired final piece needed to form the Oath Keys. With them we can open the gates of the Crimson Spire and seal the Dark Sea inside. This is done by the oath of the seven heroes whose statues the memories correspond to. I don't think there's anything else that needs to be said about the mechanism; we just need to decide on the specifics of our plan."
Seishan nodded among the first.
"It seems to me that we have real hope after many years of scraping by, hoping that we'll still be able to see the sun on the next day. Even if that hope is small, we must seize it with both hands."
She looked at Nephis. "We are in your debt."
Gunlaug wasn't convinced. He had claimed one the only stairs in the room (unlike Nephis herself, who opted to stand tall instead), and seemed irritated by the fact that he had to look up to her.
"I cannot deny that you have given people hope… " Gunlaug started. "But aren't you still forgetting something? Do you have a plan to deal with the actual reason we're still locked in this hell? To get out we need to beat the terror of the spire and defeat all the minions it has — which is hundreds by your estimation. And we have barely two hundred sleepers, all weaker than the abominations we'd have to fight."
"Do you think we must sit back and watch that number dwindle even further?" Effie asked. "Anyone can see the risks involved… but if it means just a sliver of hope that some of us will make it back home, I'm willing to try. In fact, this is what it has been for me from the beginning: reaching for the impossible because of that one-percent chance."
Teshai laughed.
"And I suppose it is because you think you'd be among those few who make it back? You and your whole cohort, marching through the gateway over the corpses of others?"
Nephis looked sternly at him. "Let us not quarrel. Yes, it is true that this path will be hard and not all will make it. But staying here, doing nothing, watching as our hope becomes smaller day by day — that is even worse. Regardless, the situation is not as hard as you think it is."
She then proceeded to tell the leaders about the Nameless Sun and its light carried a soul attack within, only tempered by the Curse of Darkness that balanced it out. She met many (understandably) disbelieving faces and sighed internally. It was not their fault to be cynical… they did not know the future and she could not tell them that she knew it. In the end she gave a vague explanation that she had formed her hypothesis based on different historical records in Forgotten Shore, mainly those that were under the Hollow Mountains.
In the end it doesn't matter… they will follow me even if my plan seems a bit dubious, she thought. And that is because there is no other plan.
"The crux of the situation is that we don't need to fight all the minions of the Crimson Spire", Nephis concluded. "We just need to seal the Dark Sea. When it is gone, a massive soul attack will descend on all of the Forgotten Shore, and at that point we just need to run to the cover of the Spire. The abominations will die by themselves."
She smiled faintly. "I know it seems far-fetched, but ask yourself: what do you have to lose?"
In the end, there wasn't much.