The water was murmuring softly as the strong current pulled the makeshift raft forward. The mist was slowly growing less thick, but Sunny still couldn't see or feel anything in it.
When he grew thirsty, he summoned the Endless Spring and drank from it, looking at the clear water around him with suspicion. When he got hungry, he summoned the Covetous Coffer and took out some rations from inside it.
'I should have stocked up before leaving the siege capital.'
To Sunny's disappointment, his supplies were already running low. He had kept the Coffer well stocked while serving as an army scout, but after becoming an envoy to Clan Valor, there was no need to anymore. So, there had not been a lot of useful things left inside the bottomless chest at the start of the Nightmare.
It was hard to tell how much time had passed since Sunny entered the Nightmare, too. The dim twilight permeating the mist never grew brighter or darker. However, he felt as if it had not been more than a couple of days.
He had spent most of his time numbly staring at the wood grain of his makeshift raft. For some reason, it looked strangely familiar. The strange sense of familiarity was driving Sunny crazy...
But then again, perhaps it was the fact that he had gone crazy that caused the irrational sense of familiarity with a random piece of flotsam.
After all, there had to be a reason why the spirit of the Sin of Solace was suddenly much more clear, frighteningly real, and even able to appear without Sunny summoning the cursed sword. The less stable his mental state was, the more substantial the presence of the apparition was supposed to be.
Sunny did not feel particularly insane, just numb, heartbroken, and emotionally drained. However, which lunatic knew of their madness?
The Sin of Solace, meanwhile, was behaving rather strangely. Sunny was painfully aware of his many failures, so he had expected the apparition to barrage him with mockery and contempt. Did you want to protect the people of Antarctica? Did you think that your pathetic self was capable of protecting anything?
Stuff like that.
Hell... after that last conversation with Morgan, Sunny knew that the waking world was more or less doomed. He didn't even know if Rain would be okay. The Sin of Solace could have used that fact to drive a nail into his heart, too.
But the cursed sword mostly remained silent.
At some point, Sunny glanced at the apparition, which was still standing in the spot where it first appeared, and raised an eyebrow:
"Hey... aren't you going to mock me? Don't you want to remind me how pitiful and pathetic I am?"
Sunny's perfect copy stared at him for a few moments, then looked away with indifference.
"...That grew old ages ago. I can't be bothered."
Sunny frowned.
"Come to think of it... why is it that you haven't moved a single centimeter in all this time?"
The Sin of Solace scoffed.
"Where am I supposed to go? This raft is not that large... well, I might as well stand on water, true. But why should I?"
Sunny studied him for a bit, then shook his head.
"No... I think you're hiding something."
His hallucination laughed.
"Oh, yeah? So, now you are paranoid, too?"
Instead of answering, Sunny rose from where he was sitting and took a step toward the Sin of Solace. His copy frowned.
"What do you think you're..."
"Get lost."
Sunny pushed the apparition aside, forcing it to take a step back and sway dangerously at the very edge of the makeshift raft, almost falling into the water.
The Sin of Solace cursed, but Sunny paid him no attention. Instead, he stared at the spot where the hallucination had been standing all this time.
'...Interesting.'
There, a single rune was roughly carved into the wood.