[Sleeper! Prepare for your Second Trial]
Sunny heard the spell.
'What...?'
The world turned black, and a familiar voice whispered in his ears, orange runes shimmering to life as his eyes widened.
'Shit.'
[Brave one... Welcome to your Second Nightmare!]
He had accidentally entered a Nightmare Seed.
'Ah, it's just one hell after another with you, isn't it?'
Fate was a bitch.
Some buildings breaking and then being rebuilt, the rebulding only around the place which once used to be outskirts, and well the outskirts again being rebuilt.
What he was witnessed next could never be described until...
Some distance away, around a forest there were piles of bones lying.
'Maybe because of the sacrficies?'
Perhaps that was it. Nothing less, nothing more.
—Splash—
'What the hell— again!??'
Sunny rose out of the quagmire, gasping for air as he shivered. Wet mud clung to his skin, imitating a breeze phased through.
_"Hail Weaver, Daemon of Fate!"_
But he did not have time to lament, for a sudden, deep voice broke him out of his reverie. Sunny panicked, but held himself together as he turned to face the speaker.
_"...firstborn of the Unknown."_
A dark robe, and Weaver's mask. His stature and body was hidden within the baggy clothes, with his face hidden just as well.
There was nothing Sunny could infer... not even if the creature was human.
And more importantly...
'Who the hell starts a conversation like that!?'
Escaping the Mountain King had been less scary!
"Ah another unfortunate soul treaded in places they shouldn't be in, like a cockroach. That too in the stables." another voice said, this one sounding like a girl in maybe around her teens, again wearing Weaver's mask.
'S""
o many divine memories...' Sunny's jaw droped open in surprise.
Sunny looked into their souls and realised he was surrounded by a Master and an Awakened but he couldn't look into the weave of Weavers mask.
"So carrier of Spell, tell me how'd ya end up here!" The girl said, her voice was quite intimidating sending shivers down his spine. Sunny didn't realise the sweat on his face until it reached his lips.
'What the hell!? She knows the Spell!? Oh maybe she does since they probably had to do trials like us too', but the way she said it felt like she shouldn't have known about it.
It felt wrong.
"Uh I was going through a Library for searching for a different citadel, which I'm assuming you know since well you know the spell, you see my frie..."
Sunny paused trying to stand up, only to realise he couldn't.
"My companions betrayed me and left me to die alone."
The body he was in was, well, almost like his own except it wasn't human nor was it as weak as his own. His reasoning for the body not being human was simple , he had 3 cores. He couldn't point out any other differences between this and how own until... 'Wait! Is this an artifical body? Just to withstand my cores? That's convinient'
"Say what are the odds that this sorry soul is infact him?" The female said.
'What?'
"Unlikely... Just kill him quickly and atleast make his death easier. Remember child, Weaver never makes any mistakes."
"B-but what if it is indeed the person? Remember this was a contingency plan and he was supposed to break fate, so well, it could be just that right now."
A pause.
"Should we atleast ask the High Priest?"
'huh? What the hell is happening?' He indeed did want to break fate so maybe he could get answers, and 'since they probably worship him maybe I should mention [Blood Weave]? What's the wors-'
"No, just kill him we can't waste the High Priest's time on this kid." the man said, walking towards him while summoning a memory.
"W-wait I h-have blood wea-" Sunny was facing an overwhelming pressure of killing intent and stuggled to speak. As soon as the Memory was summoned the sword, in a moment of flash, reached his forehead.
CLANG
He heard a sword, the sword being held by the girl shattered in the next moment and proceeded to cut his leg as a flash of pain filled his mind.
"He mentioned blood weave" the girl said, "we can't risk it. Stay calm" then, turning to him, "I'm sorry child"
'Child! Child!? He was probably older than the girl!! Stay calm Sunless stay calm!'
"The fuck you mean child? You may have saved me but I'm older than you!" He immediately regretted it 'why am I having an outburst like this... No, but why was he called a child by someone younger in his first conversation. She should know I'm older if they expected me dammit!'
The girl giggled
"Gods! You are a dormant talking to an awakened who's very close to becoming a ascended, you really have some nerve! And you are short."
'what is this? Some cliche or anti climatic or whatever the hell it is called novel webtoon!? And she called me short!'
"Im not sh-"
Suddenly he felt a bliding pain inside him due to his flaw.
"PFFT can't even dent it"
The girl walked closer and leaned close to him, putting a hand on his back.
"Anyways you are healed come with me"
'ah feels good to have someone heal me...'
He did own a healing memory, but he still had to rely on blood weave, because it was only awakened rank of tier two. He got the memory from fighting a relatively weak awakened monster but it fought in true darkness, a place which countered his aspect, and it didnt help that he was caught by surprise! He was quite injured and had blood which covered half his right cheek, but managed to master [Shadow Dance]'s second step after luring out the creature out in the opening. The pain that followed after consuming the [Drop of Ichor] was NOT worth it since blood weave devoured the lineage.
'Damn you Weaver! S-s-such injustice!' He was going to survive with his spite. Like he did in the Nightmare. In the Dream Realm. The world wouldn't beat him... Except of course, the world already beat him by killing his sister, not that he knew about about it. He was still blissfully unaware about it.
"Right take this towel and wipe the mud off, you stink" the girl ordered.
He suddenly felt a blindfold being put on him.
'Wh great maybe I lived to be used for whatever it is again, or a prisoner.'
The blind fold wasn't going to work on him since his shadow sense existed so atleast be could get a rough grasp of his surroundings.
They walked around for about an hour and he was sure they took the bigger route and many unnecessary turns, atleast that's what he would have done.
"Just a suggestion: if you have an augmenting aspect augment yourself." A sweet voice said, who was, somehow, completely unaware that he already was augmented. For the pretense he summoned the [Mantle of Underworld].
He felt his blindfold be removed and he saw a tall, dark building, with a big, pale light green, wooden door. The second it opened he felt a massive precesne, one he never felt before, and instantly felt all his bones crushed into basically nothingness, only his important bones and the area around his jaws, perhaps to let him speak and look around or just a coincidence. After a second he felt his heart beating quicker as if it would escape his chest, his lungs tried its hardest to help him breathe which barely helped him.
He looked up with a pained expression and saw a person wearing a dark mantle... The height, width, collar length, size feeling eerily familiar. It took him two seconds to realise that it felt quite familiar to the corpse he saw in the cathedral, the person who he picked the Weaver's mask from. He tried looking into his soul... The soul core was one beyond what a master would have... He couldnt guess it's rank. It could be a saint, knowing his luck it probably was, since that was the maximum a second Nightmare could have. 'But i cant sense any killing intent... How the hell am I lying on the floor with my bones crushed! That makes no sense...'
There was an overwhelming difference. He would simply die if the person showed even a little killing intent.
Was this the difference between an Ascended and Transcendent? Or was it higher...
'T-This is the Nightmare?' he despaired.
"The High Priest of the Spell greets the child of Weaver!"
"What?"