The mory Sunny had created was, of course, a ssage to Nephis. The [Shadow Bond] that connected them was an innate Ability of his Aspect, and as such, existed outside of the Spell. It did not matter that the convoy was isolated from the Dream Realm... their tenuous link remained active. Sunny knew it because he himself was still able to see Neph's runes, so she should have been able to see his, as well.
'Well, that's done...'
The only question was how soon would Nephis see the ssage, and how long would it take for her to co up with a response. Sunny suspected that he was going to have to wait for a while.
Morgan's Warbow proved that forgemasters of clan Valor were capable of naming the mories they created. However, he did not know how high Changing Star's standing in the great clan was at the mont, and if it was possible for her to charge them with forging a specific mory for her, let alone do it quickly.
In any case, he was sure that she would co up with sothing. Nephis was a frighteningly resourceful person, when she needed to be.
...Kind of like Sunny himself.
'It won't be fast, though.'
With a sigh, he glanced at Professor Obel and Beth.
"The ssage is sent. Now, we just need to wait for a response."
The convoy continued its aningless march. Hour after hour, the small column of vehicles drove through the overflowing darkness, their sense of ti and direction slowly disappearing. The dark tunnel was just too eerie, inexorable, and unchanging. Everything there seed like a strange, foreboding dream.
From ti to ti, one of the vehicles would break down, forcing them to stop for quick repairs. The Rhino was operating on an advanced spelltech engine, which ant that its fuel was soul essence. Luster was more than capable of keeping the APC moving indefinitely. The military vehicles had primitive spelltech batteries serving as a backup energy source for their hybrid systems, so he was able to help the soldiers, too.
The civilian transports, however, were entirely mundane in nature. Their fuel cells were immaculately designed and possessed a vast charge capacity, but were going to gel exhausted sooner or later. Although it did not seem like it, Sunny knew that the convoy was on a clock.
They drove for the rest of the day, and then made camp.
The next day went by in the sa manner. Sunny spent it on the roof of the Rhino, staring at the entrances to the side passages that would sotis appear in the stone walls of the tunnel.
By that ti, they had traveled more than a thousand kiloters inside the tunnel. If this place was abiding by the laws of nature, the convoy would have been passing under Erebus Field, their final destination, right about now. With no mountains to climb and no Nightmare Creatures to fight, only the straight road and no obstacles ahead, the distance that Sunny had hoped to cover in weeks was traversed in a few days.
He doubted that it would translate to the sa amount of covered ground in the real world, though.
...Two days after he had sent his ssage, Nephis finally responded.
Sunny had actually not expected to receive an answer so soon, but there it was. He habitually summoned the runes to check on Neph, and then blinked a couple of tis, noticing that the list of her mories seed much longer than it had been before.
Ever since Changing Star joined hands with Valor, her soul arsenal improved by a lot. There were certainly benefits to being an adopted daughter of a great clan, so she would occasionally receive a mory or two. It seed that she was being provided with a constant stream of soul shards, as well, even if their influx had slowed at so point, most likely to hide the fact that Nephis possessed multiple cores.
'I am not envious at all... yeah... I am not regretting my decisions... even a little bit!'
Sunny maid at the dismal walls of the dark tunnel, then at the battered convoy, the desperate people who clung to what little warmth they could find inside the ramshackle vehicles, and sighed.
Then, he looked back at the runes, which showed that Nephis had gained fifteen new mories in the Span of a couple of days.
Even if she was being nurtured by a great clan, that was too many.
Frowning, he read the nas of the new mories:
'Faint Glimr, Ire Hearth, Nebulous Veil, Dire Warning, Haunting Eversong, Eager Cut, Altar of Denial, Rust Reaver, Testant of Malice...'
And six more.
None of them seed to have been created by the forgemasters of Valor.
Sunny scoffed.
'...Clever.'
Smiling faintly in the darkness, he read the first letter of each mory in order.
What he ended up with was a concise ssage:
FINDHEARTCUTRUN
'Find heart... cut... run.'
The aning was quite clear. He had to seek out the heart of the true darkness that drowned the tunnel, destroy it, and then run as fast as he could. The first two parts did not promise anything good, but the last one was downright ominous.
Sunny did not know what Cassie had seen or learned, but she would not have included the word "run" if the consequences of destroying the mysterious Heart of Darkness were anything short of terrifying. However, how was he supposed to find it? And if that thing was so frightening, how was he going to destroy it?
'Really now, would it have killed them to be more specific?'
He shook his head with a bittern expression.
Well, it must have not been easy to scrounge up fifteen new mories, let alone ones with nas that could be arranged into a simple cipher. So, Sunny thought that he should be thankful.
'Yeah... thank you kindly.'
Regardless of how he felt, the course of action was rather clear.
As Sunny stared at the walls of the tunnel that flew by, a dark entrance to a side passage appeared in view. What little of it could be seen showed a narrow road that sloped down at a steep angle.
He quietly grimaced.
'I guess I won't be able to avoid crawling deeper underground, in the end... how unexpected.'
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