Chapter 29: Bone Bridge
Sunny stretched, the familiar weight of the [Azure Blade] solid in his hand as he settled into a fighting stance. Across from him, Hugo was fiddling with the dial on his wrist, a focused expression on his face.
On the sidelines, Nephis and Cassie sat observing serving as audience for the impending spar which was quite bizzare considering one of them couldn't see.
"Do I really have to be the one fighting you?" Sunny grumbled, unable to keep the the grumpinest from his voice. "Nephis is a far better swordsman, you know."
The Paragon of Purity looked at him with an amused glint in his eye. "Well, that's exactly why I picked you. Nephis is sort of... uhh, how do I say this? Too good. We, on the other hand, are both a bit lacking so Training with each other should be a good experience for you too, right? Sort of like Helping you find your own footing."
Sunny raised a skeptical eyebrow. "You're saying this because you want to test out whatever new transformation you have one me, aren't you?"
Hugo's only answer was a wide, unapologetic smile as he slammed the Omnitrix dial down.
A flash of blue light engulfed him then in a heartbeat, the short Sleeper was gone, replaced by a towering, red-skinned fiend.
The creature was a mountain of muscle, standing significantly taller than Hugo's human form. Its most striking feature was its four powerful arms, each corded with strength. Four predatory yellow eyes glinted above a fierce almost helmet-like facial structure and a black stripe ran from its nose down to its neck. Unlike Hugo's other, more monstrous forms, this one wore a semblance of clothing: golden wrists and ankle bands on each hand and two sashes across its broad chest, lastly it had jet black pants and four fingerless gloves.
A Tattoo-like stripes adorned its red skin, giving it the look of a brutal brawler from before the dark ages.
Noth that sunny has ever seen a brawler but he he was focused on something else right now.
Sunny stared, his grip tightening on his sword. "...How am I supposed to fight against that?!" he shouted, his voice straining to contain his sheer annoyance.
Hugo—now in the body of the four-armed Tetramand—stretched his new limbs, the motion fluid and unnervingly natural. A confident smile played on his alien features. "Oh, come on. A little light spar won't be that bad, You can test out the results of your training with Nephis."
Sunny scoffed, biting back the urge to shout a myriad of slurs at the strange creature.
He launched himself forward.
There was no point in complaining further.
–––
The fight was... certainly a fight.
Sunny pushed himself forward employing the fledgling combat style he'd been painstakingly cultivating under Nephis's tutelage. He darted and weaved, his movements sharp and precise aiming to find gaps in the Tetramand's defense. Yet, to his growing frustration, he immediately noticed that something was off.
Hugo was different. His movements were more precise and balanced, his reactions faster and more experienced then they should have been. It wasn't just the usual burst of raw power he gained when transformed but instead it was a deep, ingrained skill that Sunny was desperately trying to match.
Hugo, for his part, was also learning. Through the Tetramand's enhanced senses and battle instincts, he analyzed Sunny's style. There was something strangly nascent about it, a unique foundation that was entirely different from Nephis battle art.
If he wasn't a Tetramand right now he would have never been able to notice that.
It was unrefined and even sunny himself didn't know of it's existence but it was there—a shadow of a future personalized for sunny alone.
Between exchanges of blows, Hugo was able to offer sharp, practical tips. "Your lunge is too telegraphed! Pivot on your back foot!" or "You're overcommitting !" Although the thing that amused him the most was when he mentioned the nascant battle art that sunny possessed.
he saw it immediately in Sunny's eyes, the shadowy Sleeper fell silent, a storm of thoughts brewing in his mind.
Strangely enough, Hugo felt... Proud? It seemed Tetramand had a soft spot in their hearts for training people and seeing them progress.
'fitting for a race created by the god of advancement...' Hugo thought wondering if something as cruel and vile as war could coexist with something as beautiful and wonderful as advancment and progress.
Later, both of them sweating and breathing heavily, Hugo took a long drink from Cassie's [Endless Spring] and tossed the memory to Sunny, who used it to wash the grime and sweat from his face.
For a while they sat there in silence without saying a word.
"Hey, Sunny, can I ask you something?" Hugo said, his gaze drifting toward the grey grim sky.
Sunny eyed him warily, his voice strangely guarded. "Well, that depends on the question. But sure?"
"After we get out of here and become Awakened... do you have any plans? Any dreams?"
Sunny's eyes narrowed in surprise. He was silent for a long moment, an internal war visible on his face before he finally relented with a tired sigh. "Well, I'm not really sure. I guess... I just want to live a comfortable and peaceful life. Maybe open a shop, or get a safe boring job in Bastion. And yes, I know that sounds stupid and boring but it beats charging headfirst into an early grave against nightmare creatures."
Hugo smiled slightly with a soft genuine expression that didn't quite reach his wistful eyes. "No... I don't think that's a stupid dream at all. It's quite nice, actually."
The response seemed to disarm Sunny more than any of Hugo's transformations ever had. He simply stared at him, trying to reconcile this sudden glimpse of vulnerability with the shapeshifter's usually inscrutable personality.
For a moment, he felt like he was seeing the real person.
Eventually, Sunny just sighed. "Well, what about you? What do you want to do after you awaken?"
Hugo's azure eyes suddenly ignited with a dangerous focused light.
"I'll work on growing my strength as fast as possible and challenge the Second Nightmare."
Sunny wasn't surprised by the answer but the terrifying intensity behind it still sent a chill down his spine. 'He's just like her...' he thought, noitcing that the same burning ambition he saw in Nephis eyes.
"And then what? Live as a Master? You realize that the chances of dying in a Nightmare are incredibly high, right? Even the strongest Awakened can fail their second trial " Sunny pressed, his voice steady. He didn't particularly care if Hugo lived or died—that was his own choice and sunny respected personal freedom more then anything—but he wanted to understand the thing that drove him.
"...Sunny if I don't gain enough power, I will be nothing more than a walking corpse," Hugo stated, his tone flat and final. "What I'm trying to say is, if I want to live long enough to achieve my goals, I need to become an Ascended. No, I need to go further beyond that and reach Transcendance and even beyond that... It's the only path forward for someone like me."
Sunny didn't follow up. He simply let the conversation die there, but he was somewhat glad to have grasped a piece of his companion's driving force. It was an ambition that made Sunny ponder more deeply what he truly wanted from his own future.
–––
[Days Later - Survival Montage]
The scene was one of routine carnage. Hugo, in his hulking Tetramand form—dubbed "Fourarms" by a begrudgingly creative Sunny—stood over the twitching corpse of a carapace scavenger, wiping azure blood from his trident with two of his four hands. The other two hands were already prying open the creature's carapace to extract the soul shard within.
Nearby, Sunny sat on another dead scavenger meticulously cleaning his [Azure Blade]. This efficiency was born from a week of relentless repetition as Their days had slowly settled into a grim rhythm: defend their current cliffside perch, venture down to hunt, let abominations weaken each other, then finish off the survivors.
Nephis moved between the corpses, her movements fast and without wasting a single moment, she collected soul shards. Hugo, with his quadruple limbs could dissect a carcass in half the time so he moved to assist her.
Grumbling slightly, the Tetramand looked towards sunny with an annoyed expression "hey stop trying to look cool and come help us"
Sunny looked down at him from the scavenger body and retorted with a smile
"no"
Hugo sighed, unwilling to reason with the shadow...
He had grown quite... Strange these last couple of days.
Especially after nephis had joined them in their training, their growth was simply monstrous.
Sunny was slowly beginning to glimpse his nascant battle art while improving his physical body in the process while nephis had been growing stronger through absorbing soul shards, her flames becoming more tyrannical by the day.
Hugo's growth on the other hand was the most visually dramatic of the three, His soul fragment count had surged to [253/1000], a quarter of the way to saturation.
The pseudo-trial had granted a massive lump sum and the constant hunts did the rest. This growing reservoir of soul essence not only empowered his transformations but also subtly enhanced his dormant human body, making him faster and stronger even without using his aspect.
This progress sparked a relentless idea in his mind, one so impossible that no awakened in the entire world could even seriously persue.
Natural Awakening.
What separated a Dormant human from an Awakened one was the mastery of soul essence. His transformations granted him a temporary borrowed version of this power.
But what if he could learn to grasp it, to keep a sliver of that knowledge and feeling in his human form? Could he force an Awakening without the help of the nightmare spell ?
His goal for now was quite clear, to become truly Awakened and gain a new Ability of his aspect.
Not to mention that wielding his transformations for longer would be a necessary evolution for his and the cohort survival.
So as they experienced more horrors of the dream realm, the cohort slowly transformed. No longer just lost children, they became a hardened unit of survivors. Cassie, while still unable to fight grew more adept at managing her blindness, her presence becoming less of a burden and more a part of their group's fabric. The enchanted necklace Hugo had given her provided a constant subtle boost to her senses granting her a little more independence.
Their teamwork on the other hand grew into their greatest weapon.
Sunny and Nephis developed a near-telepathic synergy in battle, their movements perfectly complementary. Hugo on the other hand acted as their spearhead and their anvil, his transformations allowing them to engage threats that would have been suicide for regular Sleepers, Whether as the searing Pyronite, the brutal Fourarms, or the overwhelming Chimera, he created openings they could exploit.
They also learned to use the labyrinth's geography and the inherent animosity between different Nightmare Creature tribes to their advantage, luring them into conflicts and mopping up the wounded victors. The goal of reaching the mysterious human castle no longer felt like a hopeless fantasy, but a distant, tangible point on a map they were slowly, bloodily, traversing. They were getting closer.
——
After collecting the soul shards and some crafting materials —and some oil which nephis insisted on taking —, the trio retraced their moves and quickly grabbed Cassie before moving further into the labyrinth.
Their destination was a certain bone ridge that sunny managed to find through scouting.
It was a gigantic part of the labyrinth that was entirely made of bones —hence the name—, Nephis theorized that it most likely was The skeletal remains of a colossal sea monster that was located on an enormous mound of chaotically growing coral, with its arching spine protruding especially high above the ground. It was impossible to say what the terrifying creature had looked like while it was still alive, but one thing was certain — it was gargantuan even by the standards of the dark sea.
'maybe a Titan? But how would a Titan even die?'
The answer was quite simple, it would have died to an even more harrowing abomination.
Hugo thought as they reached the outer side of the bone ridge.
"we'll have to go around" Nephis said looking at the gigantic structure.
It was a logical Conclusion considering they couldn't scale the bones... but Hugo seemed to have a different idea.
"i don't think that would be necessarily"
Hugo said before pressing his Omnitrix and turning into a tetramand.
"sunny please dismiss your echo"
The shadowy sleeper raised an eyebrow before helping Cassie mount off and returning the scavenger to his soul sea.
Suddenly nephis eyes widened as she realized what he was trying to do
"you wouldn't..." She said slightly horrified.
Hugo smiled devilishly as he grabbed sunny, nephis and Cassie, putting the former two on his back and making them hold on for their life while two of his lower hands held Cassie like she was an infant.
Then the Paragon of purity saturated his body with essence, leaping a harrowing distant into the sky before slamming head first into the bone ridge.
Using his two free hands, Hugo scaled the structure with incredible speed, using his unique biology to leap dozens of foot into the sky per jump.
In the span of minutes they reached the very top of the bone ridge without a scratch on them.
Sunny jumped from Hugo back, holding the urge to puke his earlier launch.
"you maniac !"
Nephis simply sighed while Hugo helped Cassie to get back on her feets.
"what, this is better then going through the coral labyrinth and I'm quite tired of dealing with scavengers. They're annoying "
Sunny wanted to retort but his reasoning made sense so he remained silent after mumbling a couple of slurs under his breath
"let's go, there could be some airborne abominations around here so we should be careful"
The trio nodded before silently continuing their journey.
——
[The next day]
Hugo watched the last of the dark sea recede, the black water pulling back from the bone bridge with a sound like a dying gasp. The air felt strangly heavy today, well heavier then most days.
He saw Sunny sit up, his expression sour. The shadow user had been on edge since dusk yesterday and Hugo didn't need a seer's vision to know it was connected to whatever vast shadow Cassie had named. The "Crimson Spire." The name alone screamed of how dangerous the place was.
Nephis was already awake, her posture straight as she opened her eyes. A ghost of white flame flickered and died in their grey depths. She offered Sunny one of her newly practiced slightly stiff smiles. Hugo and sunny both had to give her credit; she was trying. The disgraced heiress was diligently learning to mimic human interaction, studying Cassie's easy mannerisms with the same focus she applied to sword drills.
It was a strange, almost disturbing sight but Hugo understood the drive to reshape oneself for survival. He was doing much the same... But also the exact opposite considering he was training to become a better non-human..
After a quick, silent breakfast of dried scavenger meat, Nephis stood. "Let's study the surroundings."
Sunny just grunted in agreement, summoning his Echo to stand guard over a still-sleepy Cassie.
From this height up here, they could see what was beyond the bone ridge after a little bit of walking west.
What met them wasn't the familiar, endless crimson labyrinth. Instead It was a corpse of a landscape.
The vibrant coral was gone, replaced by a sprawling expanse of grey, brittle, and dead reef. It looked sick, drained of all life and color. Further out, the walls had fully collapsed into a vast, flat plain of ash-grey sand. No movement stirred in the mud below. No scavengers, no centipedes, nothing. The silence was profound and deeply unnerving.
And in the center of this dead zone, rising from a massive, barrow-like hill was a tree.
It was a monstrosity of nature, a tower of black bark that speared the grey sky, its canopy a sprawling, bloody crimson. It was magnificent and utterly terrifying. Then, a glint of light flashed from its base, a bright, mirror-like reflection that winked in and out of existence.
Hugo's hand instinctively went to the Omnitrix. Something deep within him, a primal instinct shared by all his imprints, screamed that this place was wrong. It was a trap. A beautiful, silent, and empty trap.
"What… the hell… is that?" Sunny finally whispered, voicing the question they all shared.
Nephis was silent for a long time, her face a mask of cold calculation. Finally, she spoke, her voice flat. "This is the only way west."
Hugo scowled slightly using his [emerald spyglass] to get a better look of the tree
"So it's a chokepoint. A beautiful, obviously cursed chokepoint."
Sunny grimaced, looking from the ashen wasteland to Nephis. "Are you sure you want to do this?"
Changing Star didn't look at him, her eyes fixed on the distant, glimmering tree. "Do we have a choice?"
"We always have a choice," Hugo countered, his tone sharp. "The choice between certain death and almost certain death. This," he gestured at the dead landscape, "reeks of the latter. Nothing lives there, . Nothing. Not even the mindless scavengers. Why do you think that is?"
"Maybe they know something we don't," Sunny muttered, his shadow coiling anxiously at his feet.
"Exactly my point," Hugo said.
Nephis finally turned her head, her grey eyes locking with his. "Cassie's vision pointed west. The castle is west. To go around this would take weeks, maybe months we don't have. Our supplies won't last and Our luck certainly won't." She paused, her gaze sweeping over the dead coral. "A visible danger is better than an unknown one. At least we know what to face."
"Do we?" Hugo shot back. "We see a dead land and a big tree. We have no idea what's in there. That glimmer? It could be anything."
"And it could be nothing," Nephis replied, her voice gaining a hard edge. "A trick of the light. A piece of crystal. We will not know until we see it. Staying here is stagnation. Stagnation is death in this hellhole."
Hugo wanted to argue. He wanted to list the countless ways this could go horribly wrong. But he saw the resolve in her eyes, the same relentless drive that mirrored his own. She was right, in a cold, brutal way. They were on a clock, hunted by the sea and every abomination in this labyrinth. Playing it safe was just a slower form of suicide.
He let out a long, frustrated breath, his shoulders slumping slightly. "Fine... "
Sunny looked between them, his expression a mixture of dread and resignation. "Well, this is a terrible idea. Let's go be fools, then."
Nephis gave a single, sharp nod. "Let's go."
As they descended back into the labyrinth to wake Cassie and prepare for the march, Hugo couldn't shake the feeling that they were walking straight into the jaws of death.
The silence of the ash sea threatened to swallow them whole.