Sunny raised an eyebrow at what Alucard had just read aloud.
"Well," he said dryly, "that's certainly not a bad omen for the future."
Alucard chuckled, though the sound lacked its usual energy. His voice carried a layer of exhaustion now. Between the endless chaos of the Forgotten Shore, the strange game of cat and mouse he seemed to be playing with half the horrors of this cursed land… and whatever that flying whale monstrosity had been… his nerves were stretched thin.
"Oh, don't worry," Alucard said with a lazy shrug. "At most it's probably just a Great Terror."
He waved a dismissive hand.
"Maybe a Tyrant if we're lucky."
Inside his head, he added the part he didn't say out loud.
Though realistically it's probably at least a Cursed Abomination.
But there was no need to scare Sunny like that.
Unfortunately, Sunny didn't look reassured.
He simply sighed and rubbed his temple, clearly already calculating escape routes in his head.
"Ah yes," Sunny muttered. "A Great Terror. Nothing too horrific."
He glanced sideways at Alucard.
"If you don't mind me asking… how long do you think it would take us to run away if something bad happened?"
Alucard actually considered the question.
He placed a hand under his chin and pretended to think deeply.
"Realistically?" he said slowly. "About twenty minutes."
Sunny nodded.
Then Alucard added:
"Though if Effie carried you, probably less."
Sunny shot him a glare.
It would have been intimidating.
Unfortunately for Sunny, the height difference ruined the effect completely.
From Alucard's perspective, Sunny just looked like a small, very angry child pouting at him.
If only he knew, Alucard thought with amusement. Actually… no. I'd rather not tell him. This is way funnier.
"Hey," Sunny snapped. "What's that supposed to mean? I run faster than you!"
Alucard tried to respond seriously.
He really did.
But halfway through his explanation he started laughing.
"Oh, come on Sunny," he said between bursts of laughter. "It's simple. You have very short legs. That means if we run long distances you'll get tired much faster."
Sunny stared at him in stunned silence.
He was genuinely impressed.
Alucard had an almost supernatural ability to irritate him.
For a brief moment Sunny even considered stabbing him.
Just once.
It would probably be fine.
Unfortunately for Sunny, Alucard's armor was a ranks higher than any weapon Sunny currently possessed.
So the assassination would have to wait.
Preferably until Sunny acquired an Ascended Memory.
---
After that, Alucard returned to studying the carvings on the walls.
Piece by piece, he began reconstructing the story they told.
It wasn't particularly difficult.
The people of the Forgotten Shore had once lived peacefully under their king.
Then the king went mad.
His son took the throne.
And that son made a deal with a mysterious entity.
After that deal, everything changed.
Darkness spread across the land.
The sun disappeared.
Corruption followed.
Nightmare Creatures began appearing everywhere.
Eventually, seven heroes rose up and restored the sun by building the Crimson Spire.
And… that was basically it.
Alucard leaned back from the wall and crossed his arms.
"…How anticlimactic."
Still, he had learned a few useful things.
For example, that strange skull worn by the Nightmare Creature they had encountered earlier apparently belonged to an Angel.
Now Alucard wasn't the type to judge beings based purely on appearance…
But that thing absolutely did not look like an angel.
It looked like a demon.
Though perhaps the fact that it had nearly killed him with a single glance was influencing his opinion.
Another interesting detail was that the Crimson Spire—and all the vast crimson coral covering the land—had not existed originally.
At some point, unimaginable quantities of blood had flooded the land and crystallized into coral.
Alucard briefly wondered what kind of event could produce such an absurd amount of blood.
Then he decided he didn't care enough to think about it.
Out of the seven heroes mentioned in the story, he recognized one.
The Cursed Woman.
The one referenced in the description of the Starlight Cloak.
Based on that description, she definitely had not volunteered for whatever happened to her.
Apparently she had been sacrificed.
For what purpose, Alucard didn't know.
But the Spell had described it as a fate worse than death.
Alucard considered the story for a moment.
Then shrugged.
It might sound cruel, but he simply didn't care.
This had happened thousands of years ago.
Probably way more.
To people he had never known.
Why should he mourn their fate?
To grieve for strangers was pointless.
At least in his opinion.
Alucard cared about very few things in the world.
But those few things…
He would protect them with everything he had.
As for everyone else?
He could not care less even if he tried.
---
Eventually the group continued deeper into the tunnels.
Some time later they entered a vast circular chamber carved into the heart of the mountain.
At the center of the hall yawned a massive vertical shaft.
It descended so far into the darkness that even Sunny couldn't see the bottom.
It looked less like a mine shaft and more like the gates of the Underworld.
Thousands of years ago there had been wooden ladders, platforms, ropes, and pulleys lining the walls of the shaft. Miners had once descended into its depths to extract precious ore from the mountain.
But time had destroyed everything.
The wood had rotted away.
The ropes had long since disintegrated.
Only fragments remained.
Alucard stared down into the abyss.
Then he sighed and looked at Nephis.
"We're climbing down, aren't we?"
Nephis nodded without hesitation.
She secured a golden rope and began descending.
Alucard grabbed the rope as well, muttering under his breath.
Above him, Sunny simply floated down using his shadows.
Alucard glared upward.
Unfortunately he couldn't glare for long.
Something slammed into his face.
Effie's boot.
She had nearly kicked him while climbing down.
Alucard lost his grip for a second before catching the rope again.
He looked up to yell at her—
And immediately regretted it.
Underwear didn't exist in the Dream Realm.
It was a rare luxury.
Effie wore a simple loincloth.
That sight was enough to completely destroy Alucard's concentration.
He slipped.
"Gods damn it!" he shouted as he began falling.
Why is that damn wench allergic to basic decency?!
Mid-fall, he reacted quickly.
Blood surged from his palm, forming a sharp crimson claw.
He slammed it into the rock wall and used it to slow his descent, sliding down the shaft while carving long gouges in the stone.
It took several minutes before he finally reached the bottom.
Sunny was already there.
Of course he was.
That bastard.
Alucard stepped away from the wall and looked around.
In front of Sunny lay a massive, grotesque Nightmare Creature.
Alucard instantly raised one hand, ready to either fight or run.
Sunny shook his head.
"It's dead."
Alucard narrowed his eyes.
"Dead dead… or undead dead? Because those are very different things, Sunny."
Sunny hesitated.
"…I think it's long dead."
Alucard sighed.
He already knew he was going to regret this.
But he activated Envy anyway.
The moment his perception expanded, he felt the creature's blood.
Still present.
Still manipulable.
Which meant…
"It's actually dead," he muttered in surprise.
Apparently it had been a Fallen Beast.
Alucard carefully extracted what little blood remained inside the creature's bones.
It wasn't much.
Maybe enough to fill a few soda bottles.
Still, it was Fallen blood.
And better than nothing.
More interestingly, the blood carried a venomous property.
A hallucinogenic toxin.
How did he know that?
Because Gluttony had immediately tested it.
And now his Arch Sin of Gluttony was enthusiastically rambling in his mind about filling Saint's "cracks" with its tentacles.
Alucard chose to ignore that.
Soon the rest of the cohort reached the bottom of the shaft.
Together they continued exploring the tunnels.
Not far from the corpse of the massive worm-like creature, they discovered something else.
An abandoned campsite.
A crude firepit had been built on the stone floor.
Five large rocks had been arranged around it to serve as seats.
A short distance away stood a low barricade made from piled rubble, clearly meant to protect the camp from wandering creatures.
The signs were obvious.
The lost expedition had been here.
Since the cohort had already spent most of the day walking, climbing, and running, they decided to rest for the night and continue exploring in the morning.