Shadow Slave

As the red pollen settled in his lungs, Sunny suddenly sensed something subtly moving inside them. Then, a wave of excruciating pain pierced his chest. With a loud scream, he fell to his knees and grabbed at the Puppeteer's Shroud. A stream of blood escaped from his mouth and splashed on the ancient stone.

In it, tiny blooms were sprouting roots, greedily drinking the crimson liquid and growing with visible speed.

Looking at them with dark resentment, Sunny gritted his teeth and slowly stood up.

By the time he straightened his back, the pain had subsided a little. The bloodthirsty flowers were already turning black and dying, destroyed by the odd blessing of the Blood Weave.

The insidious Nightmare Creature tried to devour him from inside, but really, it just signed its own death sentence. In a few short minutes, it would be destroyed completely by the furnace of his tenacious body.

And even if some part of it survived, Neph's purifying flames were going to finish the job.

…Until then, he would just have to endure this torture.

"Come... come closer, you bastards!"

As the Midnight Shard appeared in his hands, another monster was already climbing onto the shoulder of the walking colossus.

Lunging forward, Sunny brandished his sword and decapitated the foul creature, then kicked it in the chest to send it flying down. A moment later, he jumped back, narrowly avoiding being grabbed by another primate.

Before the beast could even react, the razor-sharp tachi flashed across its body, severing both of its arms.

More red pollen burst into the air. Holding his breath, Sunny shifted his stance and attacked once again in one swift, fluid motion. The Midnight Shard pierced the knee of the massive primate, making it topple.

The creature wasn't dead, but any kind of mobility it once had was pretty much gone.

'Good enough…'

But it didn't really matter. Three other monsters were already there, ready to take the fallen creature's place. And a few seconds later, there was going to be even more of them, and then even more still — until, eventually, Sunny was torn apart by the unstoppable flood of these harrowing fiends.

He would have to think of something before that happened.

'If only I could breathe…'

Fighting through the excruciating pain that was tearing him from inside, Sunny grimaced and dashed forward to face the enemies.

In the next minute or so, he forced himself to cut out all unnecessary thoughts, turning into a ruthless hurricane of steel. The Midnight Shard danced from one Nightmare Creature to another, piercing, slashing, and severing their rotting flesh. The air was soon obscured by a vast cloud of red pollen.

At some point, Sunny gritted his teeth and disengaged from the fight, leaving a carpet of bleeding bodies in his wake. Launching himself back a few meters, he slid on the stone and left the cloud of red mist. Only then, finally, he allowed himself to draw in a deep breath.

Sensing that their enemy was gone, the primates rushed forward. However, a moment later, something glistened in the mist, and a heavy triangular blade suddenly pierced the head of the leading creature.

The Blood Flower did not react to its host being damaged and continued its lunge. But in the next second, the head of the monstrous ape was violently jerked backward, and, losing balance, it fell down.

The string of the Prowling Thorn was coiled around the support pillars of the makeshift battlement, creating an invisible trap. By moving forward with the kunai still stuck in its skull, the unfortunate creature pulled the string taut, causing an invisible net to rise into the air. Entangled in it, half a dozen creatures tumbled to the ground, blocking the others from pursuing Sunny.

Neither the battlement nor the invisible string were going to last long, but at least it bought him a few seconds.

[You have slain an awakened monster, Blood Flower.]

[Your shadow…]

'...Finally.'

The Nightmare Creature in his lungs was finally dead. Spitting out a mouthful of blood, Sunny groaned, wiped his lips, and glanced back.

What he saw made him curse.

The group of monstrous primates climbing the back of the colossus was about to reach the collar of the stone tunic.

Sunny was about to be surrounded. And he was all out of ideas.

'...If I die today, I am at least going to drag as many of you as possible with me into a deeper, darker hell. Prepare yourselves, gangrels!'

Lunging forward, he ran on the narrow stone path and got to the middle of the giant's back just in time to collide with the first of the advancing primates and send it flying all the way down to the distant surface of the Labyrinth.

Unlike the shoulder of the colossus, Sunny had no room to maneuver on the narrow path. In fact, he was having trouble simply keeping his balance due to the constant swaying.

But the primates, with their wide shoulders and mighty frames, were in an even worse situation than him.

On that narrow stone path, one man would be able to stop an entire army.

…Provided that nothing attacked him from behind, of course. Which was bound to happen...

Cursing, Sunny slashed and slashed, sending one monster tumbling down in a billowing cloud of red pollen after another. Despite all his efforts, he had to retreat step after step to avoid being surrounded and killed by the ferocious abominations.

The situation was becoming desperate. Especially so because the creatures that had been slowed down for a bit by the string of the Prowling Thorn finally wrestled free of it, and were seconds away from reaching his current position.

'Damnation!'

Sending a primate that was facing him staggering with a devastating blow of the Midnight Shard, Sunny desperately spun to deflect the attack from the creature approaching him from the back.

However, he was a fraction of a second too late.

Realizing that he won't be able to block or dodge the paw of the monstrous ape, Sunny feverishly tried to come up with a way to minimize the damage, at least.

…But just as the claws of the creature were about to grab onto his neck, a swift shadow suddenly fell from the skies. Catching the primate with its sharp mandibles, one of the locusts easily tore its head off and dashed back, devouring the prey with terrifying speed as it flew.

In the next moment, more Flesh Weavers fell from the skies, aiming at the climbing primates.

The two tribes of Nightmare Creatures were suddenly locked in a ferocious battle, with the six humans hopelessly stuck in-between.