After dismissing scavvy, Sunny and the others didn't directly approach the walls. That was because Liam, who could see farther away than the rest, told them that there were groups of human soldiers guarding the city walls.
Despite the fact that everyone believed them to be awakened at first glance, they were stopped by Sunny from approaching the city.
Obviously he got backlash for that judgement, started by none other than Caster himself.
"And why are you telling us to wait? I don't see how we would benefit from this. They are the valiant guardians of one of humanity's citadels on this hostile dream realm. Why shouldn't we join them immediately?"
Sunny sighed, the way Caster talked was so annoying, he always tried to act like he was in a fantasy drama.
'It would have been hilarious too, if it wasn't such a disgusting front.'
Stifling his thoughts, Sunny turned to look at him.
"Isn't it obvious already?" Seeing the confused look on his face, Sunny smiled in his mind and continued. "We are in a strange part of the dream realm, a place about which neither do you, a legacy knows and nor do I, someone who has memorised more about the dream realm than anyone in the academy ever did.
There's only one answer for why no one knows where we really are, and its because we are in a place that has never been conquered before.
Humans haven't taken a citadel here at all, that's why no one has returned to the real world and told the rest about it."
Grimacing at his words, Caster tried retorting. "Why would that make us avoid-"
"And the other possibility is even worse. Imagine that this city is actually a conquered human citadel, armed with valiant Awakened and powerful masters.
Sounds good right? Great even, but why wouldn't we know of this place if it has a human influence connected to the outside world? Because it would be hidden away from the general public.
Maybe a secret citadel of a great clan? Or even the government? In any case, if this place is already tamed and still hidden away in secrecy, then the people manning the walls don't want anyone to know about it.
What if they are hiding some big time secret or just running some wild experiments that they want no one to know about?
Who knows how they would treat us if they discovered that we had walked into a hidden location. Sometimes knowledge can cost ones life, we should be vigilant."
At that moment, Cassie spoke up.
"Uh, I think Sunny is right everyone! I feel a sense of hostility from the city's walls. Uh...my aspect is making me feel danger from there...is what I mean.
O-ofcourse, it could just be the nightmare creatures. But still it's better to be cautious."
"Not to interrupt you guys, but what do we do then? The dark sea is about to rise again in a while too." It was liam's turn to question.
Seeing that his cohort was getting anxious, with the exception of Nephis who was silently looking at the dark city, too silently even for herself infact, Sunny decided to lay down his plan to them.
He needed the group to meet Effie in the outer settlement before having to deal with gunlaug's goons first. Ofcourse, whether Effie was even in the outer settlement was not a guarantee.
But deep down, Sunny hoped that she would be.
"We circle around the city from a distance and observe for now, that castle located on that hill has the highest chances of being the citadel within this dark city, so we move away from it. If the city seems like a normal place, we enter."
Finally, Nephis seemed to snap out of her thoughts, without turning away she asked.
"And if it doesn't?"
Sunny sighed. "We will see. In any case we will have to enter it sooner or later."
After convincing the group to not just approach and start climbing the walls directly, Sunny sent his shadows around the area and started moving with his cohort away from the direction of the bright castle.
After half an hour of encircling, the cohort had gotten almost halfway through the circumference, meanwhile Sunny's shadows had scouted the area around, finding no Nightmare creatures at all.
Not even the rock monster that had given him the ordinary rock.
'It will be fine, I will just have to hunt down every single one of the rock golems in this place for a similar memory. But it's amazing how many more humans are manning the walls. There's not a single Nightmare creature in the vicinity of the city either.
They must have already noticed us too.'
Finally he turned to his cohort. "So, as far as my shadows have seen, this place is as good as any to climb inside. Speaking of which, I sent a shadow inside, and it seems like everyone here is just a dormant human. Nobody has escaped this hellhole yet."
Sunny's words brought primarily two emotions to everyone. One was momentary despair as everyone realised that there was no way home in the dark city— however only the non legacies made it show on their faces.
The other was surprise.
"You sent your shadow inside? When?" Nephis was the first to ask.
"Weren't you being the cautious one a while ago? What if there really were Awakened guarding some clan's hidden secret and someone was able to see you?"
Liam followed behind.
"Not to be rude my friend but I think we are all giving the great clans unnecessary hostility, even if such a situation was true, they wouldn't just get rid of us."
Caster however had grown tired of the wariness Sunny was showing the clans, if it continued, his mission would become more difficult.
Nephis...that woman already seemed nearly impossible to kill. Even her true name Undying Starlight seemed to praise her immortal flame lineage.
"Yes, I did send it inside, but from a place where there weren't any guards, after cautiously moving around I realised three things." Sunny answered without paying Caster any attention.
"One, there are no awakened in the city.
Two, there's a lot of people outside the castle, thousands of them infact. It's like a replica of the outskirts.
And finally three, there's also alot of fallen creatures inside the city's streets. The human population is actually just located inside a small area around the castle itself.
We would have to be very careful."
There was a series of awful faces upon hearing the existence of fallen creatures.
"Fallen creatures? You mean like the gryphon and the dark sea creature you fought?" June asked.
"Yeah, like them. Dont worry about them though, we can move while avoiding them."
Soon the group was climbing the walls together to get to the other side of the city.
At first everyone except for sunny had difficulty finding the correct placements for their blades to be shoved into for leverage. But almost instantly Nephis found the correct rhythm and was followed by Caster and then Liam.
Soon, the group found themselves standing on top of the giant Wall and looking down at the place they would be calling home for the foreseeable future.
The city streets were indeed crawling with Nightmare creatures, almost all of them were more terrible than most they had already encountered before.
The only creature they could compare the residents of the dark city to was the spire messenger, or the cursed herald as Sunny had told them it's name was.
None of them really saw the abyssal kraken he had slain, neither did anyone know that the humans here called the cursed heralds, spire messengers.
"So-so every single one of those creatures is like the c-cursed herald you fought sunny!?" Yui, one of the twin sisters yelped in fear.
"Yeah, well not all of them, there's some awakened creatures hidden among them too." Sunny shrugged.
"That doesn't really change our situation though, it's still an even worse world than what we just came out of." Liam frowned.
"Except it does. The fact that there are humans living here means we have a higher chance of survival here." Cassie answered him with an equal feeling of hope.
Before the cohort to dwelve into a proper conversation, Nephis shook it off them.
"Focus you two. We have to get to a stable ground first, we can plan the future later."
Even with Sunny's regression, there were many things he didn't have as a leader, many things that were part of one's nature, things that one did out of habit. In that regard, Nephis was necessary if he wanted to organise thousands of people here in the forgotten shore and even more in the future.
Luckily, leading came as naturally to her as did breathing. Even while seconded by her friend, she found herself taking the initiative to lead these people forward too.
And the years she had spent with Sunny in the real world weren't wasted either, she had learnt how to behave like a normal person from him in that time.
Soon, everyone descended down to the surface.
Sunny waited for a while, using his shadows to scout around, however this time there was no sign of effie or any other hunter.
They would have to traverse this place by themselves all the way to the outer settlement.
Sunny turned to face the members of his group.
"Everyone, stick close to me, we will go through these streets until we come out to the open space further ahead. There will be many awakened and fallen creatures roaming the area, so make sure not to make any strange sounds.
Do not feel fear or any emotion too strongly either, as that can attract the stronger creatures too. And don't look into any creature directly if we encounter an actual being here, it will catch it's Attention."
"What happens if we meet a fallen creature?" Mai asked him, she was trying to control her legs from trembling, but to no avail.
"Then me and Nephis would kill it as soon as we can without attracting too much attention, and carry on."
Sunny shrugged non chalantly.
Noticing the worried looks of apprehension on the girls, Nephis sighed slightly and looked at Sunny.
"You don't really get it do you? Killing a fallen creature as a sleeper is practically unheard of. Almost no one has ever achieved something like that.
Just saying that you'd get rid of any fallen creatures that attack us isn't enough to give guarantee that you actually will. It's a mind bogglingly tough endeavour.
For comparison, the warden of valor was rumoured to have slain one as a sleeper, but even that was with a full cohort.
Compared to that, you killing a fallen monster alone and a fallen devil with just my healing is a singular feat that no one has achieved before.
You are still just a sleeper sunny, no matter how strong, even you would simply die from a direct attack of a fallen, this place is still incredibly dangerous whether we can kill something with full effort or not."
Sunny stared at her.
"Your point being?"
"That everyone is scared. So do your best to avoid everything that lurks here and get us to safety without fighting anything."
"Dont worry Princess, I do hiding better than I do killing." Sunny smiled as he turned away, a realisation setting in his heart.
Nephis had not been talking to him, she was letting the others know that they were in good hands. The best hands even, and with that reassuring speech, their trembling selves would restrengthen.
Weaving through the complicated maze, Sunny brought the cohort out of the mess soon enough. Luckily they did not have to face any enemies in their way.
At the edge of the dark city's complex street system, out in the clearing they were met by a muscular young man.
He had spiky white hair and piercing blue eyes. Sunny could swear he even saw a fang or two protrude from the man's mouth. He had a sleeveless black shirt and white baggy pants.
Before Sunny could even try approaching him, the man looked at them and started talking.
"Huh? Who are ya lot? Dont look much like gunlaug's goons. You guys new to the dark city huh?"
Stepping forward Sunny replied. "Yeah, we just came to the city, we have been wandering the crimson labyrinth for a few days now."
The man tilted his head as a wide grin took over his face. "Must be a powerful bunch then. So what can I do for you?"
***
Eventually, Sunny found himself walking into the outer settlement behind the strangely energetic man. As he passed the various groups of people living in the shabby homes constructed in these slums, he noticed a few things.
Firstly, the number of people in the outer settlement was in the two thousands or so, four times that of the original number.
Secondly, they were doing a bit better than before, despite the vastly larger amount of people, they all had homes. Albiet as shabby as before, but they did.
They were malnourished still, but it seemed like no one was dying of hunger here.
And lastly, perhaps the most important point.
They all had hope burning in their eyes. They weren't an abandoned lot, as if they already had what Nephis had become for them in the past life, a symbol of hope. Through some conversations with the lively man, Sunny discovered that they had a leader.
On his way to meet this leader, Sunny had learnt quite a few things from the person leading him aswell.
As for the man himself, his name was Zeo and he was part of the second ruler's cohort.
Zeo also explained the basic story of the dark city having a first and second ruler.
That had come to Sunny as a shocker, due to whatever machinations, the second ruler was now alive and well in this world.
He was also the leader Zeo was talking about.
Well, he wasn't really well per se, infact he had been doing pretty bad.
Sunny did not know why, but the second ruler had remained alive until gunlaug came to the city. It seemed that in this world there were so many Nightmare creatures that they were attacking the city walls every now and then.
Which caused the constant manning of walls by humans. That was another interesting development.
The way they avoided the fallen ones lurking in the city nowadays and approached the walls to guard them was by using a bridge made out of steel and carapace made out of the corpses of carapace soldiers.
The bridge was primarily made out of carapace tribune steel and covered with the black chitinous carapace of the centurions.
It was actually the masterpiece creation of an artisan who had not been present in the city originally, after being commanded by gunlaug to work on a better way of defending the city, this was how that artisan had constructed his best piece with the help of others bringing him the materials and helping reinforce it.
Just like that, there was a dark medieval looking bridge now connecting the bright castle with the colossal walls of the dark city, used to reinforce the walls facing the crimson spire.
Ofcourse, the city was too wide to be covered completely, only a small portion was actually ever manned.
Anyhow, when gunlaug had initially come here, he was designated as a menial worker because his aspect didn't allow him to do much.
Gunlaug had perhaps experienced being looked down upon by other weaklings while those who came with him were elevated in ranks like Gemma. Atleast that was Sunny's guess.
Zeo did not know why, but gunlaug started hunting in the dark sea, as Sunny had expected that to happen. After that everything went the same way, he obtained the echo of a corrupted being and came to take over the place, using some power hungry miscreants he defeated the second ruler's cohort and threw them out of the castle. Claiming it for himself.
those who could not serve in gunlaug's society were once more stranded on the outer settlement as well.
They were led by the second ruler and his personal cohort now. The second ruler was apparently a young man in his early thirties called Andreas.
As they arrived in front of a relatively better off housing than the rest, Zeo signaled them to wait and went inside.
While waiting, the cohort found itself alone for a while and so the worries began.
"What are we going to do next?"
"Will we join the rebels? The host doesn't look like good people to me."
"It's too early to decide that yet, we have only heard the story from one side."
"I say we join the rebels, the host ticks me the wrong way."
Nephis sighed, Sunny was already engrossed in searching the area with his shadows. He himself in the meantime was waiting for a chance to enter the conversation.
That guy had always been like a hummingbird in her eyes, he moved around insanely fast, never stopping for one thing. And when he needed to, he had a hard time settling into one spot.
He showed up at her door one day, became friends with her in the span of weeks, and spent years growing stronger with her with such fervour that put even Nephis to shame.
He seemed to always be in a rush to grow better than before, it made sense for someone like her to want that because she had a duty to avenge her family, but made no sense for a kid like him.
He also seemed to want to be in control of any situations he was in, as if he was insecure of things going wrong somehow. It wasn't even normal paranoia that most powerful people of her world had, it was like he had already suffered a lifetime worth of trials and refused to repeat them.
But he also had a thing for being hidden away in the shadows, hiding away his powers and slowly growing stronger. That was a curious contradiction.
Even now, when the people he was supposed to be leading were wondering what to do next, he seemed to be unsure of when to interrupt and give his orders.
Nephis lingered on the picture of sunny looking away from everyone, pretending to be thinking something. He was definitely using his shadows to check the area around him, but that didn't mean he wasn't listening.
Her mouth involuntarily turned to a soft smile as she sighed in her head. 'I suppose I have to help him out here, if I don't, who else will.'
With that, she turned around to look at the three girls and Liam, and spoke without emboldening her voice, somehow that made her voice reach them better and they turned silent right after.
"We will meet the leader of this side first and then discuss the future later. Dont worry about what comes later, focus on the present.
And don't feel afraid of being separated from each other, even if we are scattered around, we will try to stick together as much as possible."
Her words seemed to calm the inexperienced members of the cohort down, even Cassie who didn't let it show was relieved deep down.
Just then, the door of the house opened and the white haired man Zeo appeared, at the same time Sunny's eye twitched.
"Alright the leader is ready to meet you guys, come on in." He spoke in a light hearted tone.
"Hey Zeo." Sunny didn't reply, instead he seemed to have a different question altogether.
"Yeah man?"
"Is there night in the dark city?"
"Uh yeah, there's a day night cycle here in the forgotten shore. You don't know that?"
Sunny facepalmed. "Not that, I meant night from nightngale, is he here in the city?"
Zeo's eyes widened in understanding. "Ah you mean Kai, yeah he is one of gunlaug's lieutenants."
A series of whispers overtook the crowd.
"Night is here!?"
"Night as in the singer!?"
"Am I dreaming!?"
The twins seemed to have forgotten all the fear they had, instead they were filled with a different form of terror. Being in the same area as their celebrity crush.
June seemed to have list her flaw of laziness, instead she had her hands on her mouth and was trying to not freak out.
Even Cassie seemed to sway at the news. And Nephis...the last daughter of the immortal flame clan. Once the Star of change and ruin, now the undying light of the stars...
The gateway between the two worlds. The spawn of the profane and the holy.
The one who courted death itself. That Nephis was...was trembling.
Her legs shook ever so slightly, tuny droplets of sweat forming on her forehead. A look of absolute horror dwelling upon her face.
Night was here. On the forgotten shore.
'So that's why there weren't any new albums... because night is trapped here.'
Suddenly, she realised something.
'Wait so Sunny wasn't just awkwardly standing around? He was observing Night somewhere instead!?
He didn't need my help at all?'
Her thoughts were interrupted a second later when Sunny nudged on her shoulder towards the door.
"Cool, lets go meet Andreas."
Suddenly, Nephis came back to her senses, she sighed slightly to cool herself off. In all this thinking, less than a second had passed, they had more important matters to deal with first.
When they got out of the forgotten shore, so would kai. The only problem was making sure he survived. Or else her music would suffer horribly.
But anyways...why was Sunny's hand wrapped around her shoulder now...
"Hey." She hit his diaphragm with her elbow. "What are you doing?" A slight frown appearing on her face.
"Just making sure you have consolation." Sunny smiled mischievously.
To his surprise and fortune, Nephis didn't pull away his arm, instead she just sighed and moved along.
Behind him two people were talking.
"Psst, hey. Who's night again?"
"He is a singer in the real world. Quite famous I believe."
"Wow, legacies really know everything huh."
"My sister has a habit of wasting her time on his songs so I know."
"Suree man, just say you listen to him. I'm not gonna judge you."
"No I don't? (Sigh) What is wrong with you?"