Chapter 1228 Unattainable Mirage

Chapter 1228 Unattainable Mirage

Sunny had gone through many chilling trials in his tumultuous life, but the Nightmare Desert was, perhaps, the most harrowing ordeal of them all. Lost in a true Death Zone, pursued by a Great Nightmare Creature, and running out of time... he saw little hope of making it out of this tribulation alive.

Nevertheless, there were two paths he could take.

The first one was to follow Morgan to the Tomb of Ariel, and the second one was to follow Mordret into the Third Nightmare.

Both paths were equally lethal and veiled in uncertainty, making it hard for him to choose.

In the end, Sunny made the most prudent decision — he postponed making a choice by a few days.

After all, there was a time limit set by Morgan in her daring attempt to reach the black pyramid. Four days... if they did not arrive at the daemon's tomb in four days, Summer Knight was going to take her back to the waking world, leaving the rest of them behind.

So, Sunny was going to put his hopes in the Princess of War, and if she failed to accomplish her goal, he would answer Mordret's invitation and follow the only remaining path into a Seed of Nightmare.

The Prince of Nothing was not very happy with the delay, but he had no other choice except to agree with Sunny and wait patiently. He really needed the strength of Changing Star's cohort if he was to challenge a Third Nightmare... especially one that he knew nothing about, and would be entering without any preparations.

Masters were the best of the best among the warriors of humanity — unlike Awakened, who had no choice but to face the trials of the Spell and survive them, each Master had chosen to venture into their Second Nightmares voluntarily. Only the strongest and most resourceful survived and Ascended.

And out of those strongest, hundreds and hundreds had attempted the Third Nightmare in the last few decades. Yet... only a few dozen humans returned, thus becoming Saints.

That alone spoke about how deadly the Third Nightmare was.

Needless to say, Sunny was not very enthusiastic about venturing into the Third Nightmare at the ripe age of twenty. Maybe if he was a titan with seven fully saturated cores and another decade of experience behind his shoulders, he would consider it. But now...

He desperately hoped that Mordret was either lying or wrong, and that Morgan would be able to lead them to the black pyramid. Having to make a deal with the Prince of Nothing was the worst-case scenario.

'Gods. How did I end up being forced to put all my hopes in these two?'

Sunny did not know, but he felt that every time they had to escape from the Skinwalker's pursuit, it was rapidly becoming harder and harder to shake the abomination off.

Everyone was... tired.

Everyone was spent, battered, frightened, and slowly starting to fall into despair. The gauntlet of the Nightmare Desert was just too cruel, too harrowing, and too hopeless.

And worst of all, despite it all, the ominous silhouette of the black pyramid seemed just as distant as it had been at the start of their arduous journey.

Even Morgan, who had never allowed herself to show doubt or weakness before, was looking less and less indomitable with each passing day. The perfectly maintained facade of a fearless princess of the great clan was coming undone, revealing the face of a brave and ambitious, but ultimately fallible and human young woman.

She was spent, battered, frightened, and desperate too.

The difference was...

Morgan still had a way out. While the rest of them didn't.

Just like that, the fourth day arrived — once it passed, they would have been in the desert for a full week.

Emerging from an underground ruin, the members of the group shielded their eyes from the blinding sun and looked at the distant, unattainable mirage of the Tomb of Ariel.

Sunny's face was grim.

'Mordret said that it is impossible to reach the pyramid... but he is wrong. Asterion was unable to get to it, but someone else did. The sybils... they reached it. They even went inside. So there's still a chance.'

Morgan's face was motionless. Her eyes were sunken and tired, but still burning with sharpness. There was no hint of being dulled in their vermilion abyss.

Grimacing, she took a step forward and said hoarsely:

"Come. We have not failed yet."