Sunny approached the heavily reinforced door and tried to sense if something was moving on the other side of it.
There was nothing.
It didn't feel as though something dangerous waited for him inside the treasury. On the contrary, with how fresh the air was and how clean the floorboards were, the treasury looked almost… inviting.
He wasn't entirely convinced, though.
Sunny lingered for a bit, then commanded one of his shadows to separate itself from his body and slide under the door. It was going to remain very close, so he was willing to risk weakening himself for a bit.
'How do I even open this thing?'
A moment later, Sunny grimaced and covered his face with a palm.
'...When did I become this stupid?'
Looking through the eyes of the happy shadow, he saw the armored compartment in its entirety.
It was a large room, with a high ceiling and three heavy chests standing in its center.
The entire back wall of the treasury, though, was missing, letting in a flood of sunlight through the jagged edges of a massive breach.
'Of course it's missing!'
The Chain Worm had to have gotten inside somehow, after all. Sunny doubted that the demon could have fit through the door of the treasury, let alone politely lock it behind itself after leaving.
He sighed, then shook his head and decided to attribute this momentary lapse of judgment to the taxing nature of having to endure the pain of being poisoned.
No one was there to witness him making a fool out of himself, anyway!
Regardless, there was no terrifying Nightmare Creature laying in wait on the other side of the reinforced door. Nothing was going to attack him if he entered.
Sunny considered climbing back on top of the hull of the ship and finding a way to enter through the breach in the back wall of the treasury, then simply stepped through the shadows and appeared inside. He was too excited and impatient to waste any more time... not to mention that the more times he spent here, the more chances there were of something going terribly wrong.
If there were really hundreds of coins in one of those chests, though… that would be a trophy to put all other trophies to shame. A find of a lifetime.
Sunny waited for a couple of seconds, letting his eyes adapt to the bright light of the sun, and then studied the three chests standing in the middle of the armored compartment.
All three were open. Two stood empty, but the third…
His eyes widened in shock.
The third chest was long and adamantine, its dark wood reinforced by strips of dull metal. It was large enough to fit an adult man…
And filled to the brim with heavy gold coins. Some spilled out of it and were laying on the floor in a tantalizing pile, showing either the beautiful face of the mysterious charmer or the reverse depicting the ancient ship.
'Thousands… there are thousands of them!'
Sunny felt his heart skip a bit and swayed slightly.
In front of him was a treasure that would take him all the way to forming a third core, and then some. With this many miraculous coins, Sunny would be able to annihilate the gap between himself and Nephis… maybe even overtake her.
'This… this can't be true…'
He instinctively wanted to think that it had been far too easy… but it wasn't, really. He had almost died while fighting the Mirror Beast, allowed Saint to be injured in a fight against Sailor Dolls, walked through the poisonous darkness of the ancient wreck… if it wasn't for the Blood Weave, he would have been already dead.
How many people out there could boast about carrying the legacy of a daemon in their veins? For almost anyone else, this trip would have been fatal. Not to mention that very few could have made the series of discoveries and logical conclusions that would lead them here.
So no, it wasn't too easy to get to where he was currently standing. It wasn't easy at all. And anyway, Sunny was due for a bit of good luck. Recently, nothing had really gone his way… take this whole Mongrel fiasco, for example. Or everything that had happened in the Crimson Spire.
…The heavy chest stood silently, surrounded by sunlight. The golden coins shined in the bright radiance, inviting him to come and take them.
Sunny gulped. This sight was so beautiful. His eyes gleamed with avarice.
'Don't mind if I do…'
Taking several steps forward, he approached the chest.
'Gold is heavy. How am I going to carry all of this back to the Sanctuary? Damnation! I won't be able to enter the shadows with all that burden, too. That is a problem.'
He reached for the coins… but then stopped suddenly. His hand hovered just outside the invitingly opened chest.
Something… wasn't quite right.
Sunny frowned.
'What is it… huh, maybe a can bury the chest and make several trips… wait, no, what's wrong here?'
His frown deepened.
There was no danger inside the treasury. Nor was there anything moving outside of it. The terrifying creature that had been slumbering in the cargo hold of the ancient ship was still asleep. There were no Sailor Dolls wandering nearby, too. So what was disturbing him?
'The… the Chain Worm…'
The Chain Worm had swallowed several coins. He also had a piece of the chest in its stomach, the wood splintered, the strips of metal torn…
Sunny had even thought how lucky he was that the demon decided to feast on the metal reinforcing the chest and bit a chunk out of it, swallowing the coins in the process.
So, if he had torn a piece from the chest… why wasn't the chest missing a piece?
And what had mortally wounded the Chain Worm, anyway?
Confused, Sunny glanced at the two empty chests. They were perfectly whole, with no parts missing. Then, he looked back at the large, heavy chest in front of him, his hand still hovering a few centimeters away from the pile of gold inside.
The chest had all its corners, too.
…One of them, though, was of a slightly different color. Like a patch of new skin that had grown over a wound, and didn't quite match all the rest.
Since when were chests capable of healing?
'What the h...'
Before Sunny could finish the thought, though, the chest seemed to have sensed his hesitation. It suddenly lurched forward, and as massive jagged teeth suddenly appeared from beneath the gold, its heavy lid closed on Sunny's hand with a sickening sound of breaking bones...
As golden coins moved, revealing several rows of terrifying triangular teeth, Sunny recoiled… but it was too late. The heavy lid of the chest suddenly came to life and closed with astonishing speed, another row of fangs appearing from behind its edge.
'What…'
Just a fraction of a second before the creature sunk its teeth into his forearm, Sunny's other hand shot forward. The blade of the Cruel Sight slid between the falling guillotine of the chest's lid and the fabric of the Puppeteer's Shroud. A moment later, the chest closed, and Sunny screamed.
Because of his quick reaction, the creature failed to bite his whole hand off. However, its jaws turned out to be horribly powerful. With a sickening sound, the bones in his arms shattered. Neither the leather vambrace of the Puppeteer's Shroud nor the augmentation of the shadow managed to resist the terrible strength of the gluttonous chest.
Sunny found himself caught in the abomination's crushing maw, with the blade of Cruel Sight laying flat on top of his broken arm and protecting it from being pierced by the sharp teeth that protruded from the lid of the chest. From below, several triangular fangs were slowly sinking into his vambrace. There was no obvious way to free himself...
'What the hell is that thing?!'
As several coins fell out of the creature's mouth and rolled on the floor, the chest pressed down harder, making Sunny shriek from blinding pain.
"B—bastard! Let go of me, you vile piece of rotten wood!"
Instead of doing that, the chest moved closer, forcing Sunny to fall to his knees. Something wet and coarse touched his hand, and a disturbingly long and wide tongue emerged from beneath the golden coins, sliding across his arm and dripping with viscous saliva.
Then, the tongue moved toward his neck.
Sunny stared at the horrid sight in outrage, then screamed:
"What the Spell?!"
As the second shadow wrapped itself around his body, gifting him a vast boost in strength, Sunny tried to pull his broken arm out of the abomination's maw, but its bite was just too damn overbearing. All he accomplished was almost knocking himself out from the pain of bone shards scraping against each other.
"Argh! Crap!"
As the unnaturally long tongue of the chest almost reached Sunny's neck, he growled, and then commanded the Cruel Sight to turn into a spear. At the same time, he activated the [Dark Mirror] enchantment with a burst of shadow essence, embuing the silver blade with soul-destroying power.
The Memory extended inside the creature's mouth, hitting it in the back of the… whatever it had instead of a throat. The tip of the spear sunk into the adamantine wood only by a centimeter or two... the wound was by no means serious, but it must have hurt the chest a lot, because it suddenly let out a shrill shriek, and then spat Sunny's maimed arm out.
Sunny fell to the floor and rolled away, then rose to one knee.
'Yes!'
Before he could celebrate getting his freedom back, however, the chest suddenly swayed… and then rose into the air, revealing a gaunt and revolting body hiding beneath. More coins rolled on the floor.
The abomination must have been a masterful contortionist, because at its full height, it was almost three meters tall. Sunny had no idea how the creature managed to hide all that bony flesh inside the fake chest, even if the chest was large enough to swallow a human whole. Its long and emaciated limbs unfolded with repulsive cracking sounds, and then, it towered menacingly above Sunny, the long tongue dripping with saliva.
'Oh, curse it a…'
Before he could even react, the creature moved one of its long legs… and kicked him in the chest with the force of a derailing train.
Sunny's body shot back, smashed through the reinforced door of the armored compartment, and rolled into the corridor outside.
He tried to groan, but all the air had been knocked out of his lungs by the terrible collision. His skull seemed to be in one piece, as was his spine… barely. It did feel, however, as though his entire body had recently suffered from being stomped on by a whole herd of elephants.
In his disoriented state, Sunny couldn't help but think confusedly:
'...Elephant… what the hell is an elephant?'
Then, however, all thoughts disappeared from his head, because he noticed the vile creature falling on all fours, and then launching itself forward, the lid of the chest rising for another bite.
When the abomination landed, though, there was nothing to bite into. Sunny had used Shadow Step and fell out of a shadow ten meters further into the corridor, then landed awkwardly on his broken arm and whimpered.
'Oh, damn… that hurts…'
The toothy chest hovered in the air for a couple of moments, as if bewildered, then slowly turned to face him.
Sunny sighed, then picked himself up from the floor and tried to stand up.
His first attempt failed.
Gritting his teeth and hiding how much pain he was currently experiencing, Sunny threw a furious glance at the creature and growled:
"Come here, you bastard!"
With that, he used the Cruel Sight to help himself stand up, and then pointed the spear at the creature.
The chest tilted to the side.
'How come… it seems as though the bastard is grinning? How can a chest even grin?!'
But there was no mistaking it — the abomination was mocking him. It became especially apparent after a grating, high-pitched giggle escaped from somewhere inside it.
The sound of it was so offensive, both to Sunny's pride and his ears, that he would rather have his arm broken all over again that listen to it.
'Funny, is it?'
Sunny smiled, then unhurriedly lowered the spear…
And thrust it into one of the thick brown vines sprawled on the floorboards in front of him.
The abomination's giggle abruptly stopped.
It froze and stared at Sunny, as if utterly stunned.
…And then trembled.
'Not so funny now, huh?'
A moment later, the entire ship trembled, too.
Whatever it was that slumbered in the cargo hold of the ancient ship did not like one of its vines being damaged, let alone having its soul cut by a sharp blade. As the whole wreck trembled, a strong gust of warm, pungent wind hit Sunny in the back, tousling his hair. The air became even murkier than it had been before.
The chest creature froze, staring at him with something that resembled a mortified expression. Even its tongue stopped swaying in the air and retreated back under the pile of golden coins.
Now, it was Sunny's turn to grin. An evil gleam appeared in his eyes. Retrieving the Cruel Sight, he said:
"Goodness gracious. How clumsy of me."
The abomination lingered for a few moments, gave him a hateful look, and turned slightly toward to door of the treasury. Then, however, it halted.
'Don't tell me…'
Faced with the terrible danger of facing the awakened master of the wreck, the creature was still hesitating. The prey was right in front of it…
To Sunny's misfortune, he and the bizarre monstrosity shared one fundamental character flaw.
Both were very, very greedy.
Before he could even blink, the abomination suddenly turned back and lunged at him with a shrill giggle rumbling from somewhere in the depths of it. All Sunny could do was spend more essence and use Shadow Step again, appearing on the spot where the creature had been a second ago.
As he slipped on the debris of the shattered door and fell, the abomination shot through the air and crushed into the wall of the corridor, pulverizing the wooden boards and getting entangled in the vines covering them. It huffed and puffed, then tried to extricate itself from the mess of glistening vines.
…However, they wouldn't let go.
In fact, as Sunny watched in horror, the whole corridor moved. The reddish-brown mass that it was overgrown with rippled, and the thick vines crawled toward the trapped creature, long thorns suddenly appearing on their vernicose surface.
The abomination giggled again, this time nervously, and doubled its efforts to free itself, slashing at the vines with its talons and biting into them with its terrifying teeth. As sickeningly pungent juice flowed into its maw, the creature shuddered.
'Crap, crap, crap…'
Turning on his stomach, Sunny lunged himself forward and rolled into the treasury. Here, there were no vines and no moss, only two empty chests and a scattering of gold coins gleaming on the floor.
As he hesitated, thinking of what to do next, something crashed with a deafening noise in the corridor behind him, and a moment later, the tall silhouette of the gaunt monstrosity appeared in the doorway.
Sunny's eyes widened, and he brandished the Cruel Sight, preparing to defend himself.
The abomination, however, did not pay him any attention anymore. Jumping over Sunny, it landed in the middle of the armored compartment… and then ran as fast as it could toward the breach in the back wall.
Without stopping even for a second, it reached the breach and dove through it, escaping the awakening wreck. Sunny followed its escape with his eyes, and then blinked.
'...Huh.'
Then, his gaze fell on the floor of the treasury.
The coins were still there, glinting in the bright sunlight. They didn't disappear or dissipate after the creature had run away. The coins… were real.
'They're real…'
As the ancient ship shook and trembled, and the mass of vines crawled toward the treasury, Sunny gritted his teeth and lunged toward the coins, grabbing them and pushing them into his pack.
'Real, they're real…'
He was in such a hurry to gather all the coins that he even cut himself slightly on the piece of mirror that was still stored in the pack.
"Ouch!"
'If these coins are real… then the rest of them inside that damned chest are real, too.'
Perhaps there weren't as many as he had thought, since the chest turned out to have a false… everything, but just the top layer that was visible to the naked eyes had to contain a thousand or more coins, at least.
As Sunny hunted down the last shiny golden disk left in the treasury, his attention was elsewhere.
It was concentrated on his shadow — the one he had hidden in the abomination's own shade when it jumped over him. Now, the shadow was following the bizarre creature as it ran toward the edge of the island, its gangly arms swaying in the air.
Sunny expected it to be assaulted by the Sailor Dolls, but the menacing wood wraiths seemed to be retreating from the wreck themselves. Some even dropped to the ground, turning back into piles of debris.
…The ground was moving.
'Well, what do you know…'
He thought that the Dolls learned to fall apart and reassemble themselves as a way to combat the Crushing, since many Nightmare Creatures on the Isles had adapted to its harsh reality in one way or another… but maybe, this peculiar ability had initially been just the means to hide themselves from the being that inhabited the wreck.
In any case, he couldn't let the chest escape. Not when a thousand shadow fragments were hidden inside the abominable thing!
Palming the last coin, Sunny threw the pack over his shoulder, then picked up the Cruel Sight and stood up. A determined expression appeared on his face.
The abomination was already halfway to the edge of the island.
"Where are you running, bastard?"
Diving into the shadows, he expended a large burst of essence and appeared out of his own shadow right in front of the creature. Since he could only use one hand now, the weapon Memory had turned back into a shortsword.
Before the abomination could react, the Cruel Sight lashed out and bit it into its thigh. The silver blade went all the way through, escaping from the back of it in a rain of black blood.
The chest let out a startled shriek… and then the monstrosity tumbled to the ground, rolling over its head and sending pieces of moss and mud flying into the air. The force of its crash was so fearsome that the ground trembled.
Or… was there another reason?
Before Sunny could do anything, brown vines shot from under the moss, wrapping themselves around the body of the bizarre abomination.
One of them, however, slid around his leg instead.