Shadow Slave

Limping across the dark expanse of still water, illuminated gently by the pure radiance of the Guiding Light, Sunny stared at his battered reflection. A dark grin twisted his lips into a crooked line.

"Look at us... nearing the finish line, and not anywhere near dropping dead."

The situation was quite unfamiliar. Usually, Sunny would have been at the very doorstep of death, or even past its threshold with one foot by now. But he was strangely in one piece. Sure, he had been mauled and mangled by plenty of dreadful Nightmare Creatures on the way to the Estuary —however, his state was nowhere near as rough as the norm in such moments.

Had he been lucky, or had his tenacity finally reached such an unreasonable level that it was simply too hard for anything to truly bring him down without outright killing him?

"Well, in any case... I'm not complaining. Let's finish this, then..."

His reflection did not answer, leaving Sunny in tranquil silence. He was momentarily unnerved by the lack of a mocking retort, but then remembered that the Sin of Solace was gone. His mind was free of the voice that had haunted it for so long with maddening whispers.

It felt... very strange.

'Sort of... peaceful?'

Now that the curse that had plagued him was gone, Sunny realized that he had been under constant pressure without even noticing it. His mental resistance had prevented the insidious whispers from truly driving him mad — but the act of resisting the loss of sanity itself had been putting a burden on his mind.

That burden was no more, filling him with a sense of levity.

However, he was also exhausted, drained, and deeply shaken by the secrets he had learned. It was a strange mixture of emotions.

'One step at a time.'

Sunny continued walking toward the vague shape rising from the water in the distance. As he did, he wondered about himself and the Mad

Prince... about all the versions of himself and the Mad Prince that had reached the Estuary in the previous cycles.

How was it that Sunny — the current him — was the only one who had made it that far?

'I guess it's simple, really.'

It was already indescribably hard to find the entrance to the Estuary within the Source. Beyond that, though...

To get to the heart of the Estuary, one had to possess three things. The first one was a soul that was free of Corruption — made possible by the Estuary Key. That requirement itself demanded that he succumbed to the Defilement, invaded another cycle of the Great River, and spent centuries accumulating power and knowledge.

However, it was also the easiest of the three.

The second requirement was the ability to pass the stone maze that served as the border of the inner lake without falling back into the cycles of the Great River. Sunny did it without much trouble, but that was only because of the Guiding Light and the True Name that Torment had delivered to Cassie. How many cycles had it taken for the duo of conspiring Plagues to learn that True Name?

was the story of the gradual accumulation of knowledge. The more cycles the Mad Prince and Torment had survived, the better they had been able

the most dire one, and depended entirely on that accumulation. It was to have no desire to turn back and start

had no reason to... because the Mad Prince and Torment had already arranged for the Nightmare to end perfectly, with every member of the cohort

taken before they learned to manipulate all the events of the cycle in their favor? Too many to count, perhaps. And it was for that reason that Sunny was

In short...

the inheritor and beneficiary of all the countless past versions

that he could only reach the heart of

little bit

clearly. As it revealed itself, a strange expression

the darkness. Its rough slopes were almost

the dark mountain looked lonely and

a palpable pressure, making Sunny groan and

hell is

lingered for a few moments, staring at the peak of the mountain and wondering if he would have to scale it. But then, he noticed a wide vertical crack at the

like an

threshold, he plunged into the

water rushing beneath his feet, flowing to somewhere deep inside, and

'Not creepy at all.'

consecrated place — a place more holy than any temple he had ever

been able to enter it because of the

time, the sacral nature

Light and ventured deeper into

— before the walls of

as

He suddenly turned blind.

Guiding Light was swallowed by darkness, and he lost the ability to see through it. What rattled Sunny the most,

he was still surrounded by deep shadows, which were like family to him. It was just that these shadows did

his shadow sense was

—

the coils

Light and lowered it slightly, ready

was then that a harrowing voice resounded from the

"Turn back."

almost overwhelming desire to kneel under the cold authority of that

Guiding Light for support. A tortured groan escaped from his lips, but in the end, Sunny somehow managed to remain

'Damn it...'