Besides the initial horror of facing down a Fallen Tyrant, this trip had been something akin to a vacation for Gehrman. The crack of lighting across the abyssal sky signaled the end of this reprieve.
Beneath, a giant stone statue was approaching. Its grandeur was only diminished by the fact that it didn't have a head. Instead, a flat platform was where its neck was cut off. A perfect place for a bunch of Sleepers to take refuge.
The thundering steps that the colossus took reverberated through his chest. The sheer scale of it was breathtaking, and its power awe inspiring. It wielded a giant hammer that invoked a sense of security and strength. He couldn't help but wonder what rank and class it was, or if it had one at all. The statue didn't exhibit the malice toward humans that other Nightmare Creatures did, but he couldn't fathom how it moved if it wasn't being puppetered by a strange Nightmare Creature. The mysteries of the Dream Realm felt endless, and it gave Gehrman an empty feeling in his stomach. He put into perspective this reality against his own, and once again found himself sorely lacking. The incomprehensible nature of The Blood was an absolute in Yharnam, but in the Dream Realm, such a thing would only be a fraction of what this twisted world had to offer.
Gehrman shook his head, snapping out of his train of thought. The deafening crashing of the waves allowed him to ground himself. With a burst of power, he circulated his blood faster and forced himself to complete the jump onto the approaching neck stump. Even with the heavy Kirkhammer on his back, he still made it (though only barley).
The statue slowed down as it approached, allowing the cohort to hop onto it. Indeed, whatever this thing was, it wasn't hostile. This miraculous discovery was thanks to the seer Cassia, and it was only the first of the many helpful visions she received.
As they all climbed up to the top of the neck, Gehrman started to nervously look around. The water of the Black Sea was rising at its usual tyrannical pace. Ordinarily, this wouldn't be an issue for this giant, but at the moment they were in a deep canyon. This canyon proved to be the main issue in traveling southward. Its depth and width were so monstrous that it would take more than 24 hours even for Gehrman to cross it. And that was not including the time it would take to climb in and out…and it also handily ignored the inevitable rise of the Dark Sea. This very ocean was now threatening to pull them under.
"...Now!"
A voice called for them to brace. Each Sleeper dug into the stone to get a solid hold. Gehrman tightened the block on his back and dug its slim blade into the stone. Then, they were all shocked with the cold submersion into the water. The horrors of the depths aside, actually surviving this time without air should have not been that big of an issue. All of their physical capabilities had gone well past what peak humans were capable of, and their endurance was no exception.
Even still, the pressure combined with the stress they were all under made it incredibly difficult for most of them. Near the end, Kai even started to fall off, but was caught by Sunless. After a couple of minutes, they finally tasted the sweet oxygen of the surface again.
The stone colossus had climbed out of the canyon.
But they were not safe just yet.
"We have a passenger," the hollow voice of Changing Star rang out. And a cold dose of reality hit them.
Gehrman expanded his [Sixth Sense] and took in the aquatic Nightmare Creature. It seemed to be weak by the Dark Sea's standard, in other words it was Fallen. What truly excited Gehrman though was the size of the thing. It's strange eel-like skin wrapped around a good chunk of the statue.
Even without his Aspect, Gehrman felt his blood pumping faster.
"Dibs," was all he said before unstrapping the Kirkhammer and jumping down onto the statue's shoulder.
Now that they were out of the canyon, the water had receded to far below the statue's waist. The Fallen creature–who was wrapped around its chest–was completely exposed. Even before lunging downward Gehrman had summoned the [Portable Blood Imbiber].
He quickly and efficiently emptied several vials, taking in 4 doses of Awakened blood and applying his last vial of Fallen blood to the newly summoned [Uncanny Saw Spear]. The Awakened weapon had lost a lot of its utility lately as it had been simply outmatched by the Ascended Rank scythe and hammer. However, there was one thing it was simply superior at: making the enemy bleed.
The serrated nature of the Saw Spear allowed it to produce absolutely garish wounds on whatever enemy it could sink its teeth into (so long as it was made of flesh). With Gehrman's steeled resolve, its power was augmented significantly. However, now that it had Fallen blood seeping into its blades, it was given an extra edge.
Using that edge, Gehrman let himself drop down toward the massive sea beast and cut into it with a strong swing. A satisfying tearing sound ripped throughout the dark night, and a great amount of blood came free. The second it did, the droplets froze midair, and then coalesced into more small, sharp blades.
This initial onslaught was so devastating that the Fallen creature nearly fell off the statue right then and there. However, the strange abomination was no less malicious and stubborn than its land-walking counterparts.
It sent one of its tentacle-like appendages slamming into Gehrman, who grappled onto the stone statue, digging into it with claws made of the Fallen blood in the air. The thrill of this daring game joined with the large number of vials he had just ingested to quickly push him past his average level of sanity.
Gehrman cackled wildly as the powerful creature was made humble by the oppressive Hunter. Even though it outclassed the human by a large amount, it was simply unable to adequately fight back in this environment.
With some more eerie wailing, the creature seemed to loosen its grip, the humans who had attracted it were not worth risking its life. This creature was either a Demon or a Devil, and thus had a bit of intelligence. It knew when to give up.
Gehrman did not.
Even as the creature started to let go, Gehrman quickly switched Memories. With a terrifying glint, the large sword form of the [Burial Blade] took in the surrounding Fallen blood. Then, it extended even further. The blade was made massive and with a force that nearly popped his shoulder out of its socket, Gehrman cleaved one of the creature's arms off.
It made one final squeal before toppling back into the sea, but not before Gehrman made makeshift ropes with its blood and snagged the severed appendage.
Just like that, he had filled [The Portable Blood Imbiber] full of Fallen blood, and he had secured a powerful meal for the next couple of days.
…
The reactions of the cohort were a lot more muted than before. They had started to accept Gehrman as an outlier, even among the most elite of Sleepers, he was a cut above the rest. Perhaps only Gunlaug with his Transcendent armor could kill him. However, Gehrman himself recognized that Changing Star and her Soul Flames could likely kill him as well.
However, that might not have been the case by the end of this journey.
Blood Fragments: [101/3000]
In just one week, he had managed to accumulate a good number of Blood Fragments. Despite hunting less, the boon offered by the creature of the Dark Sea (which had been a Fallen Devil) was great. This was especially true due to a strange quirk that he had finally confirmed.
After all this time, he had finally come to a conclusion on the exact amount of Blood Fragments each prey would get him. He developed a formula to ascertain the exact value that killing a single creature would get him.
(R + C) * L = BF
The "R" stood for Rank. Its value doubled for each rank the creature was above Dormant. For that reason, the total consumption of an Awakened Beasts blood would get him 2 Blood Fragments while the blood of a similar sized Fallen Beast would give 4. This number was then given an additional boost by however many cores ("C") the creature had in comparison to Gehrman. As a demon, consuming anything that had three soul cores or less would not give him any additional rewards. However, taking in the blood of a Devil would give him an additional Blood Fragment, while a Titan would give him an extra 4. This addition might have seemed negligible, but it was actually a huge boon after taking into account the final factor: the milliliters of blood consumed.
This last part took Gehrman the longest time to figure out, mostly because he rarely had the chance to test it. Usually Nightmare Creatures had around the same amount of blood that the average human body had (around 5 liters). The [Portable Blood Imbiber] and Gehrman himself seemed to somehow consume this large amount with no issues at all. The corrupted blood would be compressed, and then turned into Blood Fragments upon entering his body.
However, after partially consuming the "passenger" who had stuck themselves onto the statue, Gehrman noted the dramatic increase in his Blood Fragment counter and came to a realization: the amount of blood (and thus the size of the creature) mattered. The "L" at the end of the formula represented the 5 L that would make up the average human body. However, if Gehrman had consumed 10 L of the same creature's blood, the initial rewards would be doubled.
During the recent fight, he had consumed a good amount of blood on the fly and also drained the tentacle after he got back on top of the neck. The amount of blood in that tentacle was just about 10 L, and the [Portable Blood Imbiber] handily sorted this into two different vials for him, despite only stabbing it once. The process took much longer than usual due to the nature of the Fallen blood, but it still offered him a total of 10 Blood Fragments when consumed. Gehrman also gained 10 other Blood Fragments during the fight (as he had consumed both the Awakened blood in his vials and the Fallen blood right from the creature's wounds).
So in a matter of minutes Gehrman had gotten 20 Blood Fragments. This was why the Dark Sea was such a game changer for him. The sheer amount of quality blood was an irreplaceable boon for him.
However, the threats they faced atop the statue did not only come from the sea.
…
"I think…I think a storm is coming."
These words from the blind seer caught Gehrman off guard. At that moment, he had been laying flat on his back, looking up at the rising sun. His sanity was just below 50% and he had thus become a bit of a rambling mess for a while.
However, these words sobered him up to an extent. He had grown accustomed to giving great consideration to everything Cassia said. Her abilities as a seer had only been improving throughout this time. Though her growth was more subtle, it might have been the most monstrous of the entire cohort. She had effectively become their alarm system. And at that moment, the alarm was going off.
"Wait. There is something else…It's like a rustle," The cohort didn't know what to make of this observation, but one member acted before the rest. It was Kai, the handsome archer who seemed to be the least experienced, who had acted with the most prudence. Drawing his bow, he brought down a flying abomination from the sky. It came down easily. The creature was a mere Awakened Beast. However, Gehrman knew this beast.
His pupils dilated and nostrils flared. The familiar blood that had drenched him so completely all those months ago had returned with a vengeance. The storm arrived, an army of Awakened creatures moved loudly through the sky.
With a wry grin he summoned the Blunderbuss and pushed a good amount of blood out of his veins and into the gun. Bullets rapidly formed, and a loud rushing ran through his body. The familiar, shattering sound reverberated from atop the moving statue.
[You have slain an Awakened Beast, Flesh Reaver.]
Gehrman grinned at the rain of massive locusts. The familiar words of the Spell that had been drilled into him at his lowest point had brought something out of him. He clenched his fist with extraordinary hatred that was enhanced further by his notable madness.
"Hell yes!" Gehrman yelled with the cruelty of someone much older than 14.
He fired the [Blunderbuss (Sealed)] as quickly as he could. The Ascended weapon took his blood greedily and broke messy holes into the bugs. If the cohort was surprised by its power, they took no time to show it. Each of them had shifted into battle mode, shutting out everything but killing the enemy.
And that enemy was not just the storm of Flesh Reavers either.
"Below!" Sunless called out.
Gnashing his teeth, Gehrman took note of the strange primate-like Nightmare Creatures climbing the statue. There were at least a hundred of them. Of course, they were all at the Awakened Rank as well.
Both of these creatures came from the different tribes that claimed areas of the Forgotten Shore's Crimson Labyrinth. The Carapace Legion and the spider creatures were examples of these warring factions. They were supposed to control different regions and stay away from each other for the most part.
Somehow, two different groups decided to gang up on them at once.
"Bastards! Like it will make a difference!" Gehrman was on a power-high after maiming the Fallen Devil and meeting his old locust friends again. The blood splattered in the air froze as the corpses fell downward. Gehrman thought of using their own blood to push them towards the climbing primates, but Sunless and Changing Star both went down to the statues shoulders, he was sure no primates would reach them.
Instead, he sharpened the blood into a circular disc with blades jutting out of them. These teeth were not unlike those of the Saw Spear. And they were nearly as fast as if Gehrman was swinging them himself. It cost a good amount of Essence, even as a Demon he could only keep this up for 10 to 15 minutes. But until then, a dome of death kept any Flesh Reavers from coming close to the cohort.
The voice of the Spell whispered his kills again and again. They blended together into a soothing melody. Gehrman felt positively giddy. All the while he drank more and more blood, it took a decent amount to form the bullets, so he replaced it with Awakened blood as soon as possible. As a result, he was dropping into madness fast.
Then, he started to notice something odd. The swarm…was not attacking as ferociously as before. It took him a moment to realize that the number of Flesh Reavers had not diminished, but rather they were targeting something else.
Killing two more locusts, he shifted his gaze downward…and saw a Flesh Reaver tearing the head off a primate. Well I'll be damned. That's helpful. The primates seemed to be stronger then Gehrman had originally estimated, given how they were able to reach a considerable height on the statue, they were probably Monsters, not Beasts.
Growling, Gehrman dismissed the blood disc and quickly drank it all himself. The salty tang made him gag, even though he had long become accustomed to it, the amount was overwhelming. It should have filled his stomach to the point of bloating, but his Aspect made short work of it, turning it into strength and madness.
Turning his attention downwards, he fired the Blunderbuss one last time towards a bug, and then dropped off the edge of the statue.
The first primate he killed took two shots, confirming his theory on their Class. But that wasn't enough to stop them from being slaughtered. Again and again the monsters exploded with holes, the Blunderbuss tearing through them without mercy. Then their blood would rise to the murderer, acting as ammunition for the mounting madness.
The battle turned into a blur, and several things happened at once.
Cassia fell from the top of the statue.
Kai flew down to catch her.
The pursuing Flesh Reavers stopped.
All the abominations fled.
And a doom storm wall solidified in their path.