943 No Way Forward

'Curse it...'

Sunny stared at the dark abyss of the canyon, his mind empty. A second passed in stunned silence, then another. Finally, he turned around and looked back, as though capable of gazing through the armored hull of the Rhino.

Which he was, in a way.

There, behind the heavy AFC, the other vehicles of the convoy had hit the brakes, barely avoiding slamming into each other. They were crowded on the mountain road, snow dancing in the narrow beams of the headlights.

And behind the convoy, the flood of darkness was rushing forward, stretching its tentacles in their direction.

They had maybe a minute before the mass of dark beetles reached the rear vehicle.

...This time, Sunny was not going to be able to protect it.

He might: manage to destroy hundreds, or even thousands of the ghastly insects, but: it would be like a drop in the ocean. None of his attacks would be able to deal the titanic wave of darkness any serious harm... especially because, as Sunny suspected, the beetles were not technically alive.

Not only did he not hear the Spell announcing the kills while slaying the few that had crawled into his armor, but the mere fact that the damned creatures traveled with him through the shadows meant that they were somehow akin to inanimate objects - Sunny was only able to carry those with him through Shadow Step, after all.

What good would it do to kill a bunch of bugs that were not even alive, to begin with?

"Captain! What... what do we do?! "

Sunny glanced at Luster, then said in a hoarse voice:

"What else? Run... we have to run..."

Then, he silently disappeared into the shadows. A moment later, Sunny was standing at the edge of the broken road, looking into the bottomless abyss below. The biting cold of the polar night caressed his skin, and the strong winds instantly tried to push him down.

Behind him, the tide of black beetles was devouring the cracked surface of the road, getting closer and closer, and the mountain continued to quake, erupting with a flood of darkness.

The canyon was somewhere between one and two hundred meters wide, with steep vertical slopes that stretched far, far down. There was no secondary road to skirt its edge or descend to its bottom, only the broken bridge and the vast schism separating the fleet from the opposite side.

Sunny gritted his teeth.

There was not much time to think, so he did the first thing that came to his mind, without even stopping to consider if it was possible to pull off.

If it was impossible... he would just have to change that.

His essence surged, coursing through his veins with tremendous speed, and then flowed outward. His face paled as his eyes turned into two pools devoid of any light.

Just as the darkness disgorged by the mountain moved, the shadows covering its slopes moved, too. The deep murk drowning the deep canyon boiled, rushing upward. Two black pillars suddenly broke through the snow covering the sides of the shattered road and rose into the sky, growing taller and taller with each second.

At the same time, the tide of shadows rushing from below reached the edge of the broken bridge and bent, freezing for a moment above the bottomless canyon like a wave that was about to break.

But, instead of breaking, the shadows continued to spread forward and solidify, as if forming a dark path above the abyss.

...If there was no bridge for them to cross, Sunny would just have to build one of his own.

'Argh...'

He was expending so much essence that his soul felt as if it had come under strain. However, instead of slowing down, Sunny doubled his efforts.

On the far side of the canyon, two more pillars rose, and another surge of shadows stretched into the air, growing meter after meter to meet the first one. Long tentacles of darkness shot from the tops of the pillars, turning into unbreakable chains. From them, dozens of smaller chains fell, fusing into the black surface of the growing bridge.

Sunny was not concerned with how much essence. he had, however, he was worried about the structural integrity of the hurried construct, and the speed with which he would be able to connect the two parts of it.

There was not much time left...

But there were very few people in the world who knew more about forming connections out of chains. After all, he had spent so much time in the ruined Kingdom of Hope, traveling from one island to another across the heavenly chains that bound them together.

Chained together... inseparable... and stronger for it...

There was probably some philosophical lesson to learn from it all, but Sunny was too preoccupied to care. With a groan, he stepped aside and waved to Luster, who was staring at him through the windshield of the Rhino.

"Drive!"

The young man looked at him with wide eyes, then glanced at the eerie black road that hung above the abyss, connected to nothing and only supported by dozens of swinging chains.

Then, with trembling hands, he sent the APC rolling forward. Its massive wheels soon abandoned the cracked asphalt of the broken road and touched the black surface of the shadow bridge.

The manifested path of shadows shook slightly... but held.

it bore the full weight of the Rhino, and then that of the next vehicles that drove onto it. And then, the next.

Soon, the whole fleet left the solid ground and entered the aerial road built by Sunny. He grabbed the metal handle on the hatch of the last vehicle and allowed its momentum to pull him with it, then climbed onto its roof and crashed down on the cold alloy.

After several seconds, Sunny glanced back, at the approaching wave of darkness.

It was already so close... too close.

Somewhere ahead, the Rhino almost reached the end of the growing road of shadows. The ABC was moving faster than Sunny was capable of making the bridge manifest itself, but luckily, the second part of the path was already close.

The two sides of the black bridge connected and fused with each other just a few seconds before the massive Rhino rolled over the invisible seam and continued to speed forward without pause.

Soon after that, Luster let out a shaky breath as the wheels of the Rhino touched solid ground on the other side of the canyon.

Sunny was feeling like he was on the verge of fainting, but forced himself to remain absolutely focused. Behind him, the myriads of dark beetles were already crawling across the shadow bridge. The wave of them were almost halfway across, putting so much pressure on the chains that a few of them were on ready to snap.

'Bastards...'

It was at that moment that the vehicle he was riding on shuddered as it passed between two tall black columns.

Looking back, Sunny grinned.

'...this is a toll bridge. Pay up or die.'

...On second thought, just die.

With a quiet groan, he released the mass of shadows that had followed his will, allowing them to return to their natural immaterial form. A sense of profound reprieve almost sent him stumbling off the roof of the moving vehicle.

The shadow bridge suddenly turned ghostly, collapsing into shapelessness, and then dissipated into the night. Myriads of dark beetles plummeted down, and even more of them continued to flow front the slopes of the battered mountain, plunging into the abyss of the canyon like waterfalls of pure darkness. But the fleet was safe.

It continued moving forward, putting more and more distance between itself and whatever it was that had dwelled in the network of old tunnels.

Sunny let out a heavy sigh, and then sprawled Iistlessly on the roof of the military vehicle, looking at the distant tapestry of cold stars.

'...No more tunnels. Damned ever. I... I hope.'

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