Their travels Westward was just as tiring as Sunny thought it would be, if not more. The duo had fought through dozens of Carapace Beasts and other hostile inhabitants of the coral labyrinth, enough of them that they could finally notice a difference in Neph's strength as she consumed their Soul Shards.
Sunny had made leaps and bounds in progress as well, he was finally acclimating properly to his body through the countless fights. He had amassed a small fortune of Shadow Fragments as well, which contributed to an overall good mood for once.
Name: Sunless.
True Name: Lost from Light.
Rank: Sleeper.
Shadow Core: Dormant.
Shadow Fragments: [174/1000].
They had made significant progress in the overall length of the journey, too. A few weeks had passed since meeting up and they had already nearly made it half way to Ashen Barrow — which Sunny was somewhat dreading to reach — with their current pace.
"There are two scavengers ahead burrowed in mud on the right side roughly three hundred feet away, they don't know we're here yet."
Summoning the Azure blade, Sunny broke into a dash forward. Nephis without a word followed his lead and quickly overtook him, this had been their pattern for the last few days. Sunny would spot the enemies, and take the rear while Nephis would use her initial contact with them as bait to allow Sunny the final blows.
This way they could effectively coordinate resources, Sunny receiving the most Shadow Fragments possible and Neph taking the Soul Shards.
Closing in on the two unaware Carapace Scavengers, Nephis summoned her Long Sword. Donning a set of simplistic steel armor with a grey bodysuit underneath its plating — this was one of the few new memories she had brought with her this time — Neph really had no reason to fear the scavengers.
They were simply that to them now, scavengers.
At the sound of Neph's encroaching footsteps, the Carapace Beasts woke from their slumber and immediately a blazing hatred filled their hungry eyes as they locked them onto Neph. Chaotically charging forward to meet her, both of them swung their pincers at her with ridiculous speed.
Sliding under the pincer attack, Neph continued her assault as she sliced the frontal joints of one of the beasts, before shakily deflecting a blow from the other with her longsword.
By now, Sunny had closed the gap between him and the two Nightmare creatures, and swiftly jumped on the injured Carapace Scavenger's back, stabbing deep into its eye and twisting his blade, piercing the Scavenger's brain.
[You have slain an awakened beast, Carapace Scavenger.]
[...Your shadow grows stronger.]
'One down, one to go.'
Quietly humming to himself, Sunny continued and leveraged the dead Scavenger's corpse to jump onto the last living Scavenger occupied by Nephis. Infusing his blade with Gloomy, the Azure steel cut deep into the cavity in the back of the Scavenger staggering it, and he too was felled.
[You have slain an awakened beast, Carapace Scavenger.]
[...Your shadow grows stronger.]
Oh how Sunny loved hearing those wispy, beautiful words.
Jumping down softly from the the now dead Scavenger, Sunny admired his and Nephis' handiwork.
"Not bad, not bad."
Sunny let a small smile play on his lips as he glanced at Neph, who was already harvesting the Soul Shard from each of the Beasts.
"Could have been a little faster with the second one." Neph said with a mildly humorous tone, pulling a Soul Shard out and immediately crushing it.
"I figured you had that handled."
The duo had been lucky enough to avoid any serious threats, including the Carapace Centurions on their journey so far. Though Sunny thought their luck was bound to change soon, nothing always went their way and this had been too easy.
The last couple weeks had made Sunny painfully aware of how much he had missed Neph, as well as his old life prior to severing his Fate. Not that he didn't miss his time in Bastion, or miss training Rain, but there was something simply... homey to the past. Maybe he was just becoming old.
'Or maybe I'm just missing the others company.'
That wasn't far off from how he truly felt either, Sunny had been missing the others dearly. To his luck, he'd be reunited with Kai and Effie at least soon, and hopefully Cass too. Neph and him had theorized that maybe Cassie was left in the Bright Castle, though this theory was mostly fueled by hope.
The two finished scavenging strips of meat from the corpses, and continued on their way. They had set their sights today on reaching a small hill that would barely crest over the dark seas surface, but it would suffice.
Time still favored them with the sun still sitting a few hours away from the horizon, but knowing the unpredictability of the Forgotten Shore, it would be better sooner rather than later to reach their destination.
'The last thing we need is another damn storm.'
Sunny shook his head slightly in dismay to himself as they ran. The amount of cardio they had done over the last few weeks was enough to make him go crazy! Well, maybe he was already a little crazy to begin with.
Who was to say?
Just as Sunny was spacing out in his thoughts, Gloomy spotted another threat. However this posed a problem, as Sunny's hunch had finally proven right. They had finally found an enemy much stronger than the simple swarms of carapace scavengers: the Carapace Centurion.
"Carapace Centurion ahead, isolated right now. Avoid it or kill it?"
Sunny asked politely, despite knowing what Changing Star's answer would be.
With a subtle glance at Sunny, she let a small smile play on her lips and picked her pace up.
"Kill it."
***
It wasn't long before the two reached the Carapace Centurion, it's massive figure was currently feasting on a corpse of a centipede, unaware of the approaching Sleepers. They had decided on how to handle the monster along the way, the plan was relatively simple.
Sunny would be the initial bait to draw out its focus, while Nephis would engage it from behind in order to disorient it. Then, it was up to Sunny to capitalize off of the chaos and land the killing blow. Would it work?
Sunny wasn't so confident.
But they had to use this opportunity to the fullest, and playing it safe was no way to do so. Even with their immense experience of combat, it wouldn't make up for the simple yet established fact that they were Sleepers. No matter the strategy, there was always room for error, especially with so little resources to work with.
But they had been strongest Saints alive.
Glancing at Nephis one last time, he silently nodded to her, before sneaking off to confront the monster.
Mere seconds after moving from the dense cover of the crimson coral branches, the hulking carapace centurion spun around whipping mud everywhere in its wake. Its hungry eyes locking onto Sunny, and a hatred so vast it made the dark sea seem shallow filled its eyes.
With centipede entrails trailing from its massive scythes, the monster surged forward with frightening speed, lunging at Sunny.
Enhanced by his shadow, Sunny was able to deftly parry the massive scythes with his Azure Blade. Despite his skillful maneuvers, he still had to throw himself to the mud in order to avoid the next swing from the Centurion.
'Damnation!'
Without much time to hesitate, Sunny rolled right and narrowly avoided a leg piercing him, and leaped away to create space.
The rage somehow grew deeper in the eyes of the Carapace Centurion, and it screeched out as it charged again. However Nephis was ready this time, and dashed in from the foliage behind the monster, slashing at the flesh connecting leg to body.
It was simple really, no matter the armor there was bound to be soft spots to allow movement, nothing could be too rigid without supple joints to support it.
The Centurion staggered and crashed to the ground, before using a scythe to spin itself to face Nephis. As planned, Sunny took the opportunity to sprint at the now exposed back of the monster. The tricky part was avoiding the countless spikes on its blood crimson shell.
Sunny had figured that in order to kill it, they would have to whittle the monster's limbs down. This was mostly due to their lack of a killing blow, but also it was just... practical. The two of them were only Sleepers, armed with meager weapons. It was safest to take their time severing the limb joints of the Centurion rather than risk going for a killing blow.
Ah, but Sunny was nothing if not petty.
Why not just skip the safe stuff and go for the kill while Nephis occupied it?
By now, she had already wrangled her Golden rope memory around on of the monster's scythes and was leveraging it by using some somewhat sturdy coral foliage for the rope.
All that was left was for Sunny to pierce the monsters head from the disabled side.
Easy right?
Without much more thought to it, Sunny began to sprint to the right side of the Carapace Centurion, while doing so appreciating Neph's bold — or crazy — handiwork in incapacitating the monster's right side.
Jumping up from the ground, Sunny spun in the air and stabbed into the Monster's eye, briefly making eye contact with the creature. That bloodlust, that starved rage was still as depraved as he had remembered facing all those years ago.
The Azure blade connected, and with a twist Sunny dug in. In a wild fit of rage, the Monster spasmed and broke Neph's already weak hold on the Golden rope, freeing its arm. Seemingly ignoring its severed rear leg tendons, the Centurion half-heartedly rose up and with a brutal throw, slammed Sunny against one of the Coral branches.
Sunny felt his body rack with pain, his eyes fluttering in a struggle to stay open. He watched as Nephis quickly regained her posture and threw herself at the monster, blocking the heavy scythe arms seemingly with ease as she traded blows.
In that moment Sunny wasn't sure who was more of a monster between the two.
With a sudden surge, Nephis ducked a beat too slow of a swinging scythe and pierced her blade upwards into the Carapace Centurion's remaining eye, due to its injuries the creature had already been forced lower to the muddy surface making Neph's killing blow that much easier.
With a subdued chuckle, Sunny grinned.
"I think I was a little too greedy this time..."
Gritting his teeth, Sunny tried to stand but couldn't move his legs.
'Ah. It would seem that I broke them, that's rather inconvenient. I need them dammit!'
Nephis rushed from the corpse straight to Sunny, bounding over in a sprint.
"Sit still."
That simple command sobered Sunny a little from the pain, he looked up at her crouching form as she planted her soft pale hands on his cheeks, before moving them down to his ribs. Looking down, he realized they were no longer inside his body, rather they had become some decrepit form of modern art poking out of his chest at different intervals.
'Huh. Neat.'
Then a soothing flow of relief flooded his senses, blocking out all the pain. Nephis closed her eyes and gritted her teeth as she focused.
Sunny was definitely going to get yelled at after this.