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[Sunny's perspective]
"Damnation! Why is it so noisy?"
Sunny was enjoying his sleep at his secret base atop a cathedral in the dark city. But he was rudely awakened by some loud noises coming from below.
"Did another stupid monster enter this cathedral to die?"
He got up from his luxurious bed, rubbed his eyes and yawned with his hand in the air.
"So why didn't you woke me up?" He asked his shadow who was strangely, also yawning.
His shadow shrugged its shoulders as if it was nothing important.
"Nothing important you say, you bastard? Admit it that you were just lazing around instead of keeping watch." He shouted at his shadow.
His shadow didn't respond, ignoring his accusations.
"Bastard." Sunny cursed under his breath and moved to see what the commotion was about.
He was currently at a high balcony barely visible behind the goddess statue. From here, he had a perfect view of the whole cathedral hall below.
In the grand hall, a fight was ongoing. Strangely that damned bastard of a knight was fighting a sword this time.
"Is that a Nightmare creature?" Sunny saw the sword moving on its own, attacking the knight from different directions while floating in the air.
The knight was putting up a tough fight, but neither side was gaining any advantage over the other.
The knight wasn't able to deal significant damage to the flying weapon and the flying sword either wasn't able to penetrate the strong armour the knight was wearing.
"Is it just me or does that bastard look a bit weaker than usual?" He asked his shadow.
He was familiar with this knight's strength. He had spent many hours studying this bastard. He knew his attack patterns, his strong moves and his overall strength.
Because one day he was going to kill him. He was going to kill this bastard for what he had done to him.
So he observed this fight too, hoping that both parties would weaken each other significantly so he would get a chance to finally take his revenge on this bastard.
But he didn't get the chance. The sword that was fighting the knight fiercely until now suddenly disintegrated into countless sparks.
The fight was over.
"Did that bastard kill it?" Sunny asked himself. "No, it looked like it just disappeared into sparks, similar to how memories do."
"So there are monsters who could just disappear like that? Damnation. I hope I don't face something like that."
He watched the knight as that bastard continued his patrolling as if nothing happened.
....
Sunny returned to his chamber. It was already noon. He had slept till noon because he was tired. He had faced a Fallen just a day before.
He killed it. Barely. But that didn't matter. At the end of the day he was the one left standing. Nothing else mattered.
"I should look for something to eat." He said as he moved out.
....
Sunny was moving from one rooftop to another. His shadow was scouting ahead looking for a suitable meal.
Suddenly he felt a figure in the range of shadow sense.
"Is that a human?" Sunny became cautious. He sent his shadow to check the situation.
"He is just a human." He said, "I should change direction."
He didn't want to interact with people. That's why he chose to live here alone.
"But why is that man wandering alone in this dark city?" He was curious. But he didn't wanna get involved. So he moved away from him.
Soon he found a suitable target. It was an Awakened rank monster. Weakest of the creatures of the dark city. He stalked it. Looking for a perfect chance to strike.
He found one. Midnight Shard appeared in his hands.
One strike. That's all it took. The monster was down. But he had to hurry. Before the smell of blood attracted anything worse.
He took out its core. Very familiar with the process. Then he collected some good parts from the monster and swiftly left the area.
He was moving towards his base. The huge cathedral was in sight.
But something was different. On the roof of the cathedral a figure could be seen. A lone man was sitting there watching the city below.
'Isn't he that guy from before? Why is he sitting there? Don't tell me he's looking for me?'
But his fear turned out to be true. The man suddenly turned towards him as if he had sensed his presence. He looked a bit happy when he saw Sunny as if he had found what he was looking for.
"Damnation!" Sunny cursed and moved towards the man who was now waving at him with both hands.
....
"So what do you want? ....And why are you smiling like that?" Sunny asked the man who looked like some beggar.
Yeah, a beggar. His face was okay, better than Sunny's own. He had silver white hair. But the man looked like he hadn't touched water in weeks.
His clothes were in tatters, if they could still be called clothes. They revealed his strong physique. But despite everything the man was smiling.
'Creepy' thought Sunny.
"Well, I'm just happy that I finally found you, Sunny. You are Sunny right? You look a bit shorter than I had thought." The beggar said.
'Short? Did this bastard just call me short?
on my face, even?' Now Sunny was angry.
"So what do you want from me?" Asked Sunny, wanting to be done with this already.
"Well, actually, I want you to help me with something." Said the beggar.
"What? Bastard, do I look like some charity to you? If you want food and clothes, go and bother those bastards in the camp outside the castle." said Sunny, a bit angry.
"No, no, no, my friend, you got me wrong. I don't want food and clothes, well, I actually do want some clothes, and some food too if it's cooked, no, that's not the point. What I want from you is—"
Sunny was glaring at this guy. He wasn't getting to the point.
"Man, why is this so hard, even after all the practice I did in my mind. All those hours I spent thinking of cool dialogues. Ahh!" The beggar said looking at the sky as if in pain.
"Ok." The beggar turned towards Sunny and said with a new resolution.
"I have a deal for you. A trade."
'So this man still has some dignity left, hah?' thought Sunny.
"Look at this—" the beggar summoned a Memory. A floating Rapier.
"Isn't that...?" Sunny was surprised. He didn't expect that what he had thought to be a nightmare creature fighting the knight earlier was this guy's summon.
'Is that a memory? Or this guy's aspect ability?'
Sunny thought a bit cautiously.
"This is Prisma. My travelling companion. Isn't she just cool?" said the beggar, a bit proud.
"I'll ask you one last time, what do you want from me?" Sunny said with a cold voice.
"Hey, hey, hey, chill dude, no need to get angry. I was getting to that part. So, you see, Prisma is an Echo I got from the spell, an Awakened rank Echo. But I like her so much that..."
Sunny turned around, not wanting to listen to this madman anymore.
"Hey, wait, let me explain. I want you to upgrade it, to turn her into one of your Shadows." the beggar said hurriedly.
Sunny stopped.
Stunned. He turned towards the guy. Looked at him cautiously. A bit wary too.
He summoned Prowling Thorn in the hand that was behind his back. Away from the stranger's eye.
"In return, I'll give you knowledge. Knowledge of the future. You see, because of my special condition, I know a bit about past, present and future. You know what they say, knowledge is power. I'm sure you have heard of it." The beggar said.
"So you are a seer?" Asked Sunny, understanding the situation a bit.
"Yeah, something like that. So what do you say, nice deal isn't it? So do you agree?" asked the beggar, a bit hopeful.
"Sorry, not interested." Sunny said a bit coldly. He continued, "Whatever you are going to tell me, I don't wanna know. And just so you know, a friend of mine is also a seer. And I bet she is ten times better than you."
"Oh, I'm sure she is. But did she tell you that that knight will open your stomach with his sword? I bet she didn't, right?" said the beggar while pointing at the cathedral.
"How did you..."
"How do I know? Didn't I tell you that I know a bit of past, present and future?" He paused then continued, "So, now that you know how good I am at this, do we have a deal?"
Sunny didn't reply. He was thinking. It didn't make sense. 'This man knows me. He knows my abilities. And he had even seen me getting gutted by that bastard? This doesn't make any sense.'
"So what kinda knowledge are we talking about?" asked Sunny, prying a bit.
"Oh, anything you wanna know. If I know it I will tell you, my knowledge isn't absolute but I think it will be far more beneficial to you than going somewhere blindly. And let me tell you, you won't be disappointed after making this deal. So what do you say?"
"Ok, I agree."
" so what are you gonna tell me about my future?" asked Sunny.
"Anything you like. Do you wanna know the name of your wife, or do you wanna know names of your children,"
Sunny was getting a headache from talking to this guy.
"Or maybe you wanna know the name of your slaver?"
Before Sunny ever understood what was said, a kunai was flying from his hand towards the beggar's face.
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