641 Dream Battle

Sunny and the diabolical steed of the fallen Shadow Lord battled across an endless tapestry of nightmares. Both were possessed by an insatiable desire to destroy the other, burning with bloodlust, fury, and relentless killing intent.

Their blood flowed across a hundred harrowing dreams, dissolving into the crimson rivers that had been spilled in the Kingdom of Hope across the centuries. As the weaker of the two, it was Sunny who bled most of the time… but every time he was torn apart and killed, he made sure to at least leave a mark on the stallion's tenebrous black body.

No matter how many times the damned horse killed Sunny, he had to share in the pain. Sunny was not only being hunted… no, he was a hunter himself. What did it matter how many deaths he experienced, what ghastly torments the nightmares held in store for him? In this realm of terrors, he was as immortal as the stygian steed. Every time he died, he was reborn anew.

And every time he was reborn, there was a chance of becoming someone — or something — that the infernal stallion would not be able to defeat. When that happened, their roles reversed, and it was the black horse that had to suffer, be broken, and die by his hand.

Every kill filled Sunny's soul with jubilant, dark glee.

He didn't care about dying over and over again, about witnessing atrocious horrors and experiencing the worst cruelty a person could imagine. He wasn't even sure that he was a person, after all. But no matter who or what he was, Sunny was content to endure as much agony as there was, as long as he could make the dark courser feel it too.

Neither of them could die in the dream, so this battle was going to be decided by the tenacity of their wills.

They were going to see whose spirit would break first…

Sadly, the opportunities to really hurt the shadow steed were few and far between. Across all of the history of the Kingdom of Hope, there were not that many creatures that could challenge his vicious strength, and even less that Sunny was fortunate enough to inhabit in their darkest moment of despair.

That was not to say that his hunt was without success.

After giving in to madness and abandoning faith in the reality of the nightmares, and of his own memories, Sunny was left with a gaping emptiness in place of where his identity was supposed to be. He knew very few things about who he really was, and didn't really care to know more. It held no meaning for his goal of tormenting and killing the black horse, over and over again… nevertheless, a few constant things soon revealed themselves.

His aching heart, his gift of gazing into the very souls of living beings… and his name. That was the only thing he managed to remember…

Lost from Light.

That was his name, and that was who he was.

After Lost from Light managed to remember his name, it acted as an irresistible anchor that slowly pulled other things from the darkness of oblivion that shrouded his true self. Not actual memories, but far more useful things… skills, fragments of knowledge, insights, patterns of thought…

Just like a body had a memory of its own, a soul had one as well. Knowing one's name, the true name, was a key to unlocking it.

So, he wasn't completely helpless against the infernal steed.

What's more, Lost from Light discovered that he had a strange aptitude for this harrowing dream battle of theirs. Waking up in a new body after each death — be it a man or a woman, a child or an elder, a human or a beast, a mundane creature or an Awakened one that possessed unique and unexplainable powers — would have been utterly confusing and debilitating for any warrior. How could one fight if they didn't know themselves?

But his mind possessed a remarkable flexibility to it, an insidious ability to adapt to any circumstance almost in an instant, as though it was formless and shapeless by nature, and thus easily molded to fit any situation.

Lost from Light found out that he could masterfully wield a large number of weapons regardless of whom he was reborn as, as though he had fought in countless battles before. He was able to learn to wield any other by simply observing his enemies for a few moments. He could easily peer through their technique and intentions, and use that knowledge to destroy them.

When he was reborn as a fearsome creature, he could almost instantly understand how to use his bestial body to rip the enemies to shreds, as though he had lived countless lives as countless monsters.

But, most importantly, he found out that fighting against those who were stronger than him was his second nature. Lost from Light's mind was full of treachery and cunning, which he could use to deliver terrible wounds to the fearsome stallion even when their might was vastly incomparable.

And so, they hunted and killed each other through numerous nightmares, waiting to see which one would break first under the weight of hopelessness and neverending suffering.

Lost from Light wouldn't break.

...But the damned horse refused to break, too.

The black steed was as resilient as he was, as stubborn, as willful, and as ruthless. It endured the endless stream of wounds and deaths Lost from Light delivered upon him with the same unbreakable determination, his hatred and murderous fury only growing stronger.

The courser possessed an evil will and a devious mind of his own. He was ready to suffer terrible torment for eternity, too, as long as it meant destroying his enemy over and over again. Not caring about the agony, the stallion seemed darkly content to share it with his feral prey, as well.

The black steed was as mad as Lost from Light was.

Neither of them gave up, no matter how many times they were mangled, mutilated, ripped apart, and killed.

Neither of them broke.

…So, in the end, it was the neverending nightmare that had to fracture and fall apart instead.