Chapter 9: Dream
Days bled into each other, swallowed by the inky shadows.
They sat, not thinking of nothing, but of everything too much at once. Each breath echoed in the void, amplifying the gnawing uncertainty.
"Do we really have to go to the first circle?" Marcellus asked again, he felt something urging him to do so.
Ayden responded with uncertainty, "Yes... no, I'm not sure. It seems like the correct course of action, but there's no telling how much longer. the flow of time itself is convoluted. "
Occasionally, they would pace about, restless in their contemplation.
Marcellus would steal glances at Aiden, his eyes lingering on the cryptic symbols scratched into the weathered notebook, then shake his head, the gesture tinged with despair.
Finally, his voice crackled with unease, "Strange things we're caught in, in this twisted land."
Ayden nodded, understanding the weight of their shared burden. "I fear we are already dead, I remember my old life, fragments," Ayden whispered.
Ayden's smile held a hint of bitterness, like a wilted flower clinging to a memory of bloom. "A limp, a gilded cage," Ayden muttered, eyes clouded with a storm of emotions.
"Highborn, they called me, yet the ground itself seemed to reject my steps." The dissonance between his past and present hung heavy in the air.
"A limp they would whisper, a constant companion, a title draped upon my like a gilded shroud – noble... highborn. what a joke!" The words tasted foreign on Ayden's tongue, echoes from a life as distant as the stars.
Marcellus's eyes blazed with a long-dormant fire. "Memories," he rasped, his voice tinged with both joy and sorrow. "I remember too, fragments of The Priestess, her beauty like sunlight on water, her voice a whispered song as she trained me with the blade. She was my first teacher, and then... I ran away, a shadow fleeing the sun.
The panic of training became too overwhelming. But in the emptiness that followed, I waited. There was no pursuit, no echo of her anger. Why did she let me go? What did she know? What did I leave behind?" His voice quivered with pain, a tremor of hurt resonating through the silence.
"She never came. Why?"
The question echoed in the cavernous space, a hollow drumbeat against the silence.
Fourteen, he'd been, a foolish boy blinded by adolescent adoration. His love for her blonde hair, as unwavering now as it had been then, felt like a festering wound, raw and open to the air.
What had possessed him to run? What darkness had whispered in his ear, driving him away from the only light he'd ever known?
"Ah, seems the Priestess wasn't just a pretty face," Ayden chuckled, his humor a balm to the lingering sting of Marcellus's raw emotions. "Those years of training must have left their mark, eh? that's why you're good with the sword".
The teasing drew a smile to Marcelus's lips, though it still felt fragile.
"Maybe," he replied, a hint of wonder in his voice. "She was my sun, guiding my hand when I least expect it." He flexed his fingers, feeling the phantom weight of a sword. "Though sometimes, I wonder..."
The thought trailed off, a question hanging in the air. Ayden, sensing Marcelus's turmoil, offered a reassuring grin.
Ayden said, "Well, unlike you, I don't long to go back. But if we do end up returning, promise to find me, okay? Remember my proposition? I might be of help to you, and maybe I can assist you with your quest regarding the priestess as well."
Ayden's lightheartedness did its job. Marcellus laughed. "deal"
Burdens they hadn't even realized they carried began to shed, peeling away like withered leaves.
Secrets whispered, regrets confessed, fears thrown into the wind like unwanted baggage. Ayden confessed their noble status, Marcellus his gnawing self-doubt.
Each syllable, a thread unraveled, a knot untangled, leaving them lighter, rawer, closer to the marrow of who they truly were.
As their tale reached its climax, their laughter filled the room, drowning out the darkness. In that shared moment of mirth, their worries were temporarily pushed aside.
The storm subsided, leaving behind a breathless calm.
Unknowingly, Ayden and Marcellus had stumbled upon a method to circumvent certain restrictions imposed upon them in this dream realm.
For instance, they had been unable to directly question the nature of this realm, such as whether it was a dream or reality.
Yet, just as they had unconsciously done for the past years, they inadvertently broke this rule again. Even though they had discovered a way to discuss their true identities, their breach of the rule persisted because they were initially unaware of its existence.
Ayden, gazing intently at Marcel, "Marcellus, have you ever questioned the nature of our actuality here? The fabric of this world seems... malleable, almost like a…"
A chill crept into the air, sending a shiver down Marcellus's spine.
Marcelus, interrupting, puzzled by Ayden's sudden philosophical turn, narrows his eyes in contemplation. "What do you mean? Are you suggesting that this isn't real? I actually… killed people that died."
Ayden pauses, choosing his words with deliberate care. "Not exactly. It's just that, sometimes, things around us may not be as they appear. My senses and perceptions could be deceiving me."
Marcelus feels a shiver down his spine as he absorbs Ayden's words, a sense of familiarity creeping into his thoughts, as if he had this exact thought before. "So, you're saying we could be in some kind of illusion, or a fabricated…?"
Ayden nods slowly. "Perhaps. Think about it, Marcelus. The surreal events, the seemingly impossible feats we've accomplished, the strange nature of the citadel. Doesn't it all feel a bit... unreal? Like fragments of a fantasy pieced together?"
Marcelus's mind races as he tries to digest this notion, the idea that their reality might be a carefully constructed illusion unsettling him.
However, almost as quickly as the conversation began, it faded away for thought.
The profound nature of their exchange becomes a fleeting memory, seemingly erased from their conscious thoughts.
It was as if the conversation never happened.
For the past few years, ever since they woke up, it had been a torturous loop of recollection, repeating the same conversation about the nature of their reality here, only to forget it shortly afterward.
The conversations were detonations.
Each time they discussed the nature of their reality, the ground beneath their feet trembled.
Walls of perception cracked, revealing glimpses of an unsettling darkness. But then, this time as the cracks appeared, it did not seal shut, leaving them in darkness.
The darkness was utterly terrifying and worse empty.
Fear tightened its grip on their senses as the room seemed to shape.
Marcelus's heart raced as he fumbled in the darkness, desperately trying to locate the exit as darkness engulfed them.
Panic flared in Marcelus's mind; He could not feel his form.
Uncertainty's icy grip still clung to Marcellus, the oppressive darkness a shroud woven tight. Then, like a crack of lightning in a storm-black sky, a voice.
"Congratulations are indeed due!"
Deep, ethereal, the same that had ushered him into this strange reality – Lancel!
"You've done well."
"Your defiance against the current has been quite fascinating. Alas, it's regrettable that your awakening will mark your end."
Marcellus reeled from the revelation, his suspicions about their doomed fate in this realm now confirmed.
"This place... this realm it's a tapestry woven from our subconscious minds, yes- a dream".
Lancel admitted to performing a ritual that birthed this realm, a surreal landscape shaped by their collective consciousness and imagination.
More crucially, he unveiled a startling truth: "from the moment they awoke on the first day, everything they encountered was a projection of their deepest yearnings and fears."
In essence, Lancel suggested a chilling possibility—if, deep within, they harbored a resignation to death, their experiences in this realm would mirror such a bleak acceptance...
What does it all mean? Marcellus was confused.
The intricacy of their predicament dawned on Marcellus.
It wasn't just about succumbing to death; their subconscious would craft scenarios steering them toward their fatal end.
Marcellus's experience in this 'dream' was a case in point.
Pervaded by pessimism and cynicism, his mind attracted misfortune. Unlike his companions, who received beneficial weapons, Marcellus was burdened with a cursed blade—yet he never thought to seek an alternative.
Similarly, while others found nourishing food, he consistently chose unsatisfying fare.
This pattern repeated itself, underscoring how their environment mirrored their collective psyche.
Intriguingly, Marcelus's outlook began to shift, subtly yet significantly, under Ayden's influence, who emerged as a pivotal figure for his survival in this realm.
Marcellus absorbed Lancel's words with intense focus.
"Yet, every journey must have an end, and sadly, yours begins with your deaths. As I previously stated, your deaths are imminent once this ritual concludes, and you return to reality." Lancel explained.
He went on, separating together truth and fiction.
The existence of the Harmonious Nexus Path, a knightly breathing technique, was not mere fantasy.
However, Lancel was quick to temper their expectations: in reality, this technique would not bestow them with tenfold the strength of an ordinary human, as exaggerated in this realm.
"If you steered clear of the first circle, then celebrate your achievement—you've attained enlightenment, known as pulse condensation, and mastered the sword," he announced.
The reward he alluded to be a brief divine intervention, the specifics of which he left unexplained.
"The exact reason for your impending deaths remains unknown to me. Just hope it's something physical, because if it's not, survival is unlikely."
What Lancel implied was stark: every individual in this realm was on the brink of death.
If the cause of their mortal peril could be countered with physical might, then they were fortunate, having trained for years. However, if their demise was to be brought on by means such as drowning, they would most certainly drown.
Marcelus's consciousness began to waver, like a candle flickering in a windstorm enveloped in the impenetrable darkness.
The last vestiges of Lancel's foreboding words echoed in his mind, mingling with a growing sense of unease.
"Wake up, dreamers, wake up and smell the ashes"!
Abruptly, the world around him changed, a disorienting sensation gripping him. His thoughts became muddled, a swirling vortex of confusion and fear.
The darkness felt tangible, a heavy cloak that wrapped around him, suffocating and dense.
Marcellus tried to call out, to cling to the fading threads of awareness, but his voice was lost.
Then, without warning, his consciousness slipped away like sand through his fingers. The darkness consumed him wholly, pulling him into an abyss of nothingness.
All that remained was the engulfing silence of unconsciousness.
Time seemed to stand still, an undefined interval passing in this state of void.
Then, as sudden as his descent into darkness, Marcellus's senses jolted back to life, more precisely reality.
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***
In the hull of a ship, Lancel, with brown hair and a face adorned by a thick, full beard that cascaded down his chin, exuded a rugged aura. He possessed a burly build, with a heavy chest, and he caressed an eye-shaped artifact that appeared to hold the stars within its depths.
Muttering to himself, he recited names as he caressed the artifact, "Leon, Elena, Marcellus, Ayden, Tellervo, Millicent, and Günther." An intriguing smirk was unfolding.
CREATORS' THOUGHTS 
Pretentious_writer
Pretentious_writer Indeed, dreams can often be perplexing and filled with symbolism. Transitioning from the dream world to reality, let's continue the journey in the real world of clarity and reality.
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