The sea was receding.
The black, opaque water surged and seethed, as though a living creature desperately trying to hide from the pale light of the coming dawn.
The circular stone platform he had taken shelter on used to barely protrude out of the waves, but now it looked like a small cliff.
The bizarre phenomenon was eerie and somewhat breathtaking.
It was something Sunny had already seen many times, but he still got a headache each time he saw it.
Sunny sat down in the middle of the platform. He tried to arrange the sequence of events in the novel.
Night-1 Flee from monster, get stuck in statue
Morning-1 Scout, found corpse of giant shark
Night-2 Light in the distance
Morning-2 Scout even more
Night-3 Storm
Morning-3 Move to meet Nephis, kill monster
He wasn't actually sure if a storm happened in night-3, but he remembered a storm happening.
For today, Sunny will scout the surrounding areas; even if he had scouted it in previous loops, he still needed to do it, or his actions would be suspicious and his flaw might wreck him in the future.
Commanding his shadow to separate itself from his body, then taking command of it, he moved it to the edge of the platform.
The shadow suddenly stopped and looked back at him.
'What? Gravity doesn't affect you; just jump.'
The shadow slightly grumbled.
Moving from one shadow to another, he began his descent. It felt like he was playing a VR subway surfers.
It was cool.
The labyrinth was vast and multi-layered. The paths between the pillars were sometimes narrow and sometimes wide. There was no sequence in the design of the labyrinth. Some paths went underground, turning into tunnels.
Soon, he circled the strange cliff. The scene in front of him was gruesome and grotesque.
The corpse of the giant shark-like creature was lying there, half of it missing, with innards spilling out the terrible wound of the existing half. Around the corpse, hundreds of small monsters were scurrying, tearing away, and devouring its flesh.
The Carapace Scavengers.
They had four pairs of long, segmented legs that ended in scythe-like protrusions. At the front, a human-like torso was protruding from the carapace, also clad in thick chitinous armor. The head, if it was even the appropriate word, was situated directly on top of the torso, with no neck in between. It had two narrow eye slits and a viscous-looking mouth with several slimy mandibles. Instead of hands, the monsters had two enormous pincers.
He wanted to move his shadow straight into the party, make it jump around, cause a commotion in between the monsters, and maybe make them kill each other.
He dismissed the intrusive thoughts, caring about his shadow's mental health.
The shadow turned back and looked above, taking in the sight of the strangely shaped cliffs.
The cliff was man-made. The ancient colossal statue was at least two hundred meters tall. The statue was of a knight clad in elaborate plate armor, with seven stars carved in the breastplate. An enormous sword lay in his hands, pointed to the ground.
Of course, the head was missing.
For the next few hours, he scouted his nearby areas, particularly in a single direction, without making it obvious.
Slowly, the sun started to set.
As soon as the sun touched the horizon, a deafening rumble was heard. After a few minutes, the first waves of water could be seen. The volume of the black water grew quickly, and soon an apocalyptic flood devoured the labyrinth.
Sunny, on the other hand, was already lying on the stone surface.
"Wake me up if something happens."
The shadow nodded.
Sunny closed his eyes, trying to fall asleep. His consciousness didn't take much time to fall into the sweet embrace of the darkness.
In the middle of the night, he was suddenly jolted awake. The shadow pointed in a particular direction.
A few kilometers away, an orange light could be seen. It was shimmering in the darkness. Soon, it disappeared.
Saying thanks to his shadow for waking himself up, he went to sleep again.
As soon as the morning came, the carapace scravengers crawled back from their hiding spots and rushed to the giant carcass to continue their feast.
Sunny watched them for some time and then walked to the opposite side of the platform to take a look in the direction where he had seen the mysterious light the previous night.
At a considerable distance from the headless statue, five or six kilometers away, the ground rose naturally and formed something akin to a hill. On top of that hill, an especially massive coral pillar rose to the sky.
From the looks of it, its upper branches were just high enough to stay above water at night.
He sighed and urged the shadow to wrap itself around his shadow.
Then he started to climb down from his shelter.
Already memorizing the best holds and indentions with the help of his shadow, he touched the ground pretty quickly.
Then he moved in a particular direction, taking a path left to the direction of the orange light. The black mud slowed his movements a little.
His shadow left his body and went to scout ahead. Sticking to the shadows, Sunny followed it.
His steps were silent and light and produced no squelching noises----- as long as he stuck to the shadows.
After some minutes, he was already past the area his shadow had scouted yesterday. Now relying on his loop knowledge, he followed a particular direction.
His shadow soon noticed something unusual. Hiding in a chamber that is hard to notice with naked eyes, a wounded-up Carapace Scavenger was lying.
Not the one Sunny got Azure Blade from, a completely different one.
Since he will meet Nephis tomorrow and he has already finished scouting, Sunny decided to hunt some lone monsters he found in his previous loops.
Instead of confronting the monster directly, he moved around. After a couple of turns, he was facing the place where the crabbie was hiding from a corner.
Sunny summoned his arrow and bow. Without hesitation, Sunny notched an arrow in his bow and took aim at the beast.
He remembered his lessons from Awakened Naomi. Taking a deep breath, he released the arrow.
AN- Hi guys, another chapter done. As always thanks for reading, the support from you guys was awesome.
A question. Do you think the pace is good? Will I slow down or speed up a bit?
Anyway, add it to your collection and leave a review if you liked it.
Keep the powerstones flowing..............................