Цагаан Чулуу

A huge cloud of snow and stone debris rose into the air. Hitting the ground with a muffled yelp, Sunny rolled and tried to maintain the shape of his odachi. Luckily, his training had not been in vain, even after being startled by the earth-splitting fall of the Tyrant and jolted by the sudden collision with the slope of the mountain, he did not allow the shadow sword to unravel.

'Argh… damn…'

Slightly disoriented, Sunny sat up and looked around, expecting to see monstrous insects rushing to finish him off. To his relief, the soldiers of the stone hive were in a similar position as him, despite possessing six legs and a center of gravity that was much lower to the ground relative to their height, they were all sprawled on the cold rocks, trying to get up.

Actually, there were surprisingly few of them around him. Those that were alive, at least… crushed corpses littered this particular stretch of the slope, flattened so thoroughly that it was hard to recognize the shape of the chitin-clad abominations.

Sunny strained to regain his wits and frowned.

'...Did I do that?'

The damage seemed too exaggerated to be done by Sunny or his shadow tentacles. He couldn't see very far, either, because a wall of white stone was blocking his view.

'Where… where did this crag come from?'

If he remembered correctly, there were no large boulders or tall outcroppings near where he had fought. Had he rolled that far down the slope?

As Sunny was trying to understand why a wall of rock suddenly appeared in front of him, a stream of inky black liquid flowed down its smooth white surface.

Then, the wall of stone slightly moved.

...His eyes widened.

'Oh… crap…'

Craning his neck, Sunny managed to get a better look at the thing that he had assumed to be a stone cliff. Of course, it was not.

Instead, it was the carapace of the Corrupted Tyrant that had been thrown into the mountain by Sky Tide's vicious attack. The creature seemed battered, with its milky-white chitin cracked in several places and leaking viscous black blood… but very much alive.

In fact, at the same time as Sunny looked up at it, the jade beetle's expressionless black eye shifted and peered directly at him. Its terrifying mandibles move slightly.

'Oh, crap!'

Sunny jumped back at the same time as one of Tyrant's legs came down, shattering the mountain slope and sending another tremor running through it. He was only saved by his quick reaction and a bit of luck.

The shadow odachi whistled through the air and struck the white chitin, only to bounce off of it without dealing any damage. The jade beetle stared at him with its unfathomable black eyes and moved, slowly rising. It opened its maw, where a cloud of black ash was already swirling, ready to be spat out.

Sunny knew that if that ash enveloped him, something very bad was going to happen.

For a split second, he was paralyzed by fear.

Then, the familiar weight of the Cruel Sight calmed Sunny down. The somber spear finally finished manifesting itself into reality, and he instinctively caught it by letting go of the hilt of the shadow odachi with one hand.

'What difference does it make?!'

Sunny stared at the domineering Tyrant in horror, and then did the only thing he could think of, infusing some of his last drops of essence into the Cruel Sight to imbue it with an elemental property, he threw the spear again, only a moment after being reunited with it.

He did have enough presence of mind to put some thought into what type of elemental damage to choose, though. Neither divine flame nor soul damage would do much in this situation, so…

'Ah, that might work… I think?'

The somber spear disappeared into the cloud of darkness wreathing in the creature's maw without a trace. A moment later, the Tyrant suddenly shuddered and let out a shrill, deafening shriek. Its movements slowed down for a second or two.

…That was more than enough time to give Sunny a chance to run away. Turning around, he dashed up the slope with as much speed as he could muster. The cloud of ash shot to chase him, but quickly dissipated due to the fact that the jade beetle was distracted by torturous pain.

The element Sunny had chosen was not the most destructive, but it was insidious, persistent, and extremely painful… that element was corrosion.

To be more precise, it was a special kind of wicked corrosion that the [Dark Mirror] had memorized after Sunny inhaled a lungful of Wormvine's poisonous miasma back on the Shipwreck Island.

Blood Weave had overcome it without any trouble, so he did not expect to deal much damage to the Tyrant. However, it had hurt like hell to deal with it, so Sunny hoped that the damned monstrosity would be distracted for a few seconds, giving him a chance to retreat.

'That's right… retreat with dignity. Not run away in panic!'

As he swiftly… retreated… Sunny felt a cold shiver running down his spine. The jade beetle had to be preparing another attack.

At that moment, a shadow fell from the sky. Saint Tyris, in her human form and wielding a saber that seemed sharp enough to cut the fabric of the world itself, flashed through the air and collided with the Corrupted Tyrant somewhere behind his back.

Sunny, meanwhile, finally saw the battlefield through the cloud of snow that had been thrown up by the jade beetle's fall.

The Irregulars were slowly rising to their feet, and so were the soldiers of the stone hive. Only one figure appeared to have withstood the earthquake and used the shock of it to her advantage.

Some distance away, Master Jet landed on the swaying body of the last Corrupted abomination and thrust her glaive deep into its flesh. A vicious smile appeared on her face as the creature shuddered and fell down.

The battle formation of Awakened warriors was broken, but Soul Reaper was finally finished with her dreadful task. Despite how much she must have exerted herself to slay a score of Corrupted beasts and monsters, as well as a couple demons, she seemed to be still brimming with essence. Master Jet would be able to join the main line of the First Irregular Company soon.

The flanking force that Sunny had been holding back, meanwhile, seemed to be all but destroyed by his own efforts and the devastating fall of the Tyrant. What little remained of it was currently being torn to pieces by the furious confrontation of the jade beetle and Sky Tide.

…All in all, the situation was not too terrible. The scales definitely tilted in the favor of humans now.

They just had to capitalize on that advantage.

Running terribly low on essence, battered, and exhausted, Sunny let out a silent groan.

'Damn it... damnation! This is just day two…'