But where was his promised freedom? How was Soul Weave supposed to break the shackles of fate?
Sunny pursed his lips, unsure of what exactly was happening.
Had Cassie been wrong? Had she…
But then, something distracted him from these thoughts.
From the corner of his eye, Sunny noticed an ominous detail. Looking down, he stared at the Guiding Light, which had rolled away from him when he fell down, and was now laying to the side of the stone sarcophagus.
The crystal at the top of the sacred staff was still shining.
However, it wasn't pointing at the sarcophagus.
Instead, it was pointing into the darkness behind it.
Sunny slowly looked up… at that moment, it felt as though a ripple spread through the world. His surroundings suddenly felt less substantial, as if reality itself was slowly dissipating.
His eyes widened.
'The Nightmare… it's starting to collapse!'
Somewhere far away, Nephis must have delivered a fatal blow to the First Seeker.
But Sunny could not concentrate on that thought for too long.
Because just then, he noticed something moving in the darkness.
A hunched, towering shape that filled him with indescribable horror.
'H—how did I not notice… before…'
A giant creature had been hiding in the darkness of the vast cavern, hidden completely from his sight, his nose, and even his shadow sense, despite being the size of a hill. It had a hunched back, a disheveled mantle of messy black feathers, a terrifying beak, and mighty wings that were vast even when folded, hiding its gaunt body.
And a vile soul filled with more Corruption than he had ever seen, spreading outward from six grotesquely giant nodes.
'A… a Cursed Terror…'
Horrified, Sunny took an involuntary step back.
And just as he did, a pair of round, utterly insane eyes pierced him with a demented look.
A terrible pressure crashed into him, making it hard to breathe.
The Cursed Terror that had been hiding behind Oblivion's grave… was a giant, mad, and unmistakably vile bird.
'D—damnation!'
Sunny took a step back, but at the moment, the vile bird lunged forward, its demented eyes igniting with avarice and greed.
Before he could even react, he was drowned by its loathsome shadow.
And then, its talons plunged into his chest.
Sunny gasped.
However, the talons did not rip his flesh apart. Instead, they dove much deeper, finding their way into his very soul.
If he had time to enter the Soul Sea at that moment, he would have seen the shapeless form of the Vile Thieving Bird's Spawn being snatched by the crooked talons.
And yet, they did not stop there.
Passing through Sunny's soul, the talons dug even deeper, into the depths of his being he had not even known existed.
And there, they grabbed onto something else.
Onto countless strings that were wrapped around him tightly, surrounding him like a chrysalis.
Or like the strings that held up a marionette.
Straining itself, the vile bird struggled for a few moments… and snatched those strings, too, somehow ripping them away from his existence.
Sunny opened his mouth, trying to scream, but no sound came out of his mouth.
There was another sound, though.
The voice of the Spell, whispering into his ear as the Nightmare collapsed around him:
[Your nightmare is… your… you nightmare is… is…]
It never finished speaking. Instead, the familiar voice broke and abruptly grew quiet, leaving him in utter, lonely, and terrifying silence.
'What… the hell… is h—happening?!'
And then, everything disappeared.
The heart of the Estuary was gone. The beautiful tree and the sarcophagus resting beneath its branches were gone, too.
The harrowing bird plunging its talons into his chest was nowhere to be seen.
Sunny found himself in utter darkness.