Ever the late sleeper, I awoke to the smell of smoke and cooking meat. It was a bizarre,
almost surreal sensation in the middle of the Crimson Labyrinth.
Blinking the sleep from my eyes, I saw Sasrir crouched over a small, contained fire he'd
made from some dried, brittle coral. Skewers of tough-looking Scavenger meat were propped
over the flames, sizzling faintly. "Morning," I grunted, pushing myself up. The shadow-cloth
clothes were still perfectly comfortable. "Since when do you cook?"
"Since I acquired taste buds and a functional digestive system," he replied, not looking up
from his work. "Just because I don't need to eat to survive doesn't mean I want to miss out on
the... local cuisine." He turned one of the skewers. "It's a new flavour. I'm curious."
I couldn't help but laugh. "You're a weirdo, you know that?"
The scene was almost peaceful. The sky above was a soft, hazy orange, the constant whisper
of the Labyrinth a low background hum. "Kind of tranquil, in a messed-up way."
"Don't get used to it," he said, but there was no real edge to it. He handed me a skewer. The
meat was charred on the outside and surprisingly palatable, if a bit gamey. We ate in
comfortable silence for a few minutes, just watching the strange sun climb in the sky. Once
I'd finished, curiosity got the better of me. I walked over to the edge of the plateau where the
statue's head should have been.
It ended in a jagged, brutal stump of stone—decapitated. A post-mortem act of vengeance
from the Crimson Terror, according to the lore. "Alright, let's see which unlucky hero we're
bunking with," I mused, leaning carefully over the edge to peer down the statue's broad back,
looking for any identifying marks on the stonework below. "My money is on the Knight,"
Sasrir called from behind me, still tending his fire. "Sunny found him first, and we seem to be
carving the path he would walk. Statistically, it's probable." "Maybe," I said, squinting. "Or it
could be the Slayer. That would be fitting, considering my company."
I leaned a little further, trying to make out the details carved into the stone shoulders. "Come
on, give me a clue... a symbol, a weapon hilt, anything..."It couldn't be the Knight of course, because that would mean we were near the Ashen Barrow,
with the Soul Devourer Tree, but that thing couldn't be seen for miles. It wasn't the one where
the First Lord vanished to either, that was near the Hollow Mountains. So...the Priestess? The
Builder? Which Statue was the one wandering around the Crater again? Damn, my brain was
too fuzzy to remember.
"Loose robes, a dagger held close to the chest, the other hand on its hip. The robes look like
they're made of flowing shadow," I summarized for Sasrir. "No other markings."
Sasrir studied the statue for a moment. "The hidden blade and the posture suggest a single
purpose. This is the Slayer."
"An assassin," I said, the name making our lofty perch feel a little colder. "Charming."
"His choice of statue implies a high vantage point was a professional necessity," Sasrir noted.
"It remains a sound tactical decision for us."
"Right. Tactics." I walked back to the fire. "Let's just hope our luck is better than his targets'."
I had just sat down when Sasrir looked at me and asked, "Well? Are you going to go after the
Moonlight Shard?"
The thought made me freeze-of course! Each Statue wasn't just decoration, it marked the
location of an Oath Key: and the terrible monster that guarded it. "Merely a Fallen one"
Sasrir reminded me. "With the Unshadowed Crucifix and myself, we might just be able to kill
it. The Slayer was guarded by living weapons, yes? At least that's the impression I got from
Quiet Dancer. The Sun Pathway is excellent at dispelling poltergeists and wayward souls."
"You actually want to hunt down a Shard Lord?" I asked with a short laugh, tempted and half
terrified at the thought. "Alright, so you can kill an Awakened monster easily enough, but you
yourself said your Shadow Curse won't work on anything above that Rank."
"I can still slow and delay it," he said, "plus all my weapons deal soul damage, even if small.
It might be driven into a shock-induced coma long before we actually kill it."
"I don't know..." I hesitated, teetering between greed, desire and mortal fear.
"Adam"
Sasrir looked me dead in the eyes and spoke, his voice calm as a lake. "We must take risks to
survive. What reason would Gunlaug have to take us in otherwise, to allow us to climb his
ranks until we can influence the stage that is this land? When Nephis arrives, do you intend to
be just another corpse she steps across on her self-righteous crusade against the Spell? Who
do you hope will save you?" He leaned in closer now.
"No one will. Only me, and only yourself."
I stilled, my mind wheeling as it tried to deny his words. 'I don't need to take this risk!' I
argued.'Yes you do. Gunlaug won't place any importance on you otherwise. How else will you
impress him, show the Unshadowed Crucifix? That tyrant won't allow the existence of
another Transcendent Memory, not after his own made him king. We can't use that, what
other cards do we have to play?'
I couldn't tell whether the thoughts were mine or bleeding over my Sasrir. My body
instinctively rejected facing such a terrible foe, since the novel had hammered it into me time
and time again the discrepancies between Ranks. 'Yet, that didn't stop them, did it?'
...yes. If Sunless, that mangy dog with Stockholm Syndrome, and Nephis the IQ Burner could
break G3's own system, why couldn't I? I didn't even belong here for Christ's sake, I was
practically...an error.
...No, I was a Visionary.
...Or was it the Hanged Man?
....No, none of that. I was....
è̸ ͛ ́ ̍͌̋̍̈ ́ ̋ ́
Or... or....
ṛ̵ ̒̇ ̉ ̾̂̂̑̾͆̍̆ ̉ ̓ ̀ ͒̔̌̄̎̈ ́ ͑ ͝ ̏̑̓̈͝ ́ ̓̊ ̀ ͑̇ ̀ ̈ ́ ̋
̒͐ ̉ ͐ ̀ ̈͊̔̐͌ ̏
̇̊̽̄͌̂̎͛͂̒̋ ̀ ̎̔
͒̒̐͑̈ ́̌͝ ̏̆̑͝
͌
̓ ̀ ͂̔
̌ ̀ ̌͊͒ ́ ͌ ̏ ͗̒̐͛̓̇͛̐̽̍̓̂̊͊͆̇̍
́ ̓̅
̓̆͐͋͊͛̊
̍
ȓ̸ ͑̔ ́ ̐ ̃̀ ̍
̿̎̓̊ ̃ ͌
͘
͘
̛
ŕ̶ ̐ ̛ ̔̇̈͘ ̕
̸̛̓̚ ̃̈͠ ́ ̅ ̕ ̓͌̈ ́ ̒͐ ̈͗͂͌͒͆̑͝
̚
̚
̛
ṙ̶ ̅̇ ̛̓͌̕͝ ̾̌͗͝ ̉ ̾ ̉ ̌̎͋̄
͘
̒̂
r̴ ̉ ͛̐̑ ̃ ̒̅͛͛ ̃ ͊͑̔ ̏ ͒̊ ͗̌̅̌̆̋̍̒͛̍̎̊̆̊̓̑̓̊̽͋͂̋̐̐͠ ́ ͛͊ ́
̎̒̾͑͛̓ ̂͆͝ ̽͛̊͝
̋̐
͌͗̆͊ ̀̉ ̄̄
̓̿ ͝ ̃ ̄̎
̄͋͛̿͠ ́ ͗͒ ͑̾̈̓͌͝ ́ ̄ ͐̒̒̔͝ ́ ̈ ́ ̓̑̅͒̋̋͆̈͌ ͝
͊
̛
̕
̕
ŏ ̷͂ ̚ ̅̅͆ ̃ ͑ ̛
r̵ ̓ ͝ ̛ ͆͐ ̃̀ ̓͒̈ ́ ̊̐̎
̶̓̎͑͆͂̈ ́ ̊͛̅ ̂̽̎͊̈͝ ́ ̈ ́͝ ̏ ̑ ́ ͑
͠
͑͆̎̔̍̍̈
r̷ ̈ ́ ̓ ̃ ̓̋ ̉́ ̋̑̊̂͑̈̈ ́ ̈͊͒ ̏ ͒̇̇̓͛ ̒͝
̒̓ ́ ̂̄͐̎͛ ̀ ͛
̆ ̀ ̈̓ ̏ ͒̈ ́ ̔̒ ̉ ͂
͝ ͌͑̌̓͠
ŕ̶ ̀ ̒͒̓͗̊̈ ́ ͂̿̋
o ̵͌͊ ̃̀ ̍͋ ́ ̆
͈̹ r̶ ͗̂̾̄̓̑͆̌̆̂͌̋̔̿
̨̢̢̨͕̤̮͈͖̱͖̦̻͈̭̬̫̟̮̖͓̠͚̻̩͎̻͈̰̬͖̪̮̰͉
̭ ̣ ̨̡̢͓̙̬͎͎̫̳̘͉͖̯̻̻̟͍̮̺̟ͅ
̢̖͙̱ o ̷̯̩̝̳̞̙͍̜̺͈̖̱̳̩
̬ ̣ ̠̙͈̳̦̯̥
͜ͅ
ȩ̵ ̫̖̺͎͙̝̝̹̦̗͎ ̣ ͕̘̘̝ ̣ ̼͇
̺͖ ̣ ̢̯̪̤̰͇͎̱̫̲̺̲̗͚͚̪͉͖͙͚̳ ̣ ̡̭͔̗ ̣ ̤̳̭͔̻̮̬̠̙͖̲̖̻͙
͜ ͜
̧͍͈͉̻͙͓ ̣ ̡̡̨̲̥͎̙̬̳̯̫̜͕͉̱̫̙͎ͅ
̬͙ ̣ ̡ ̢̢̲͓̻̱͖͇͔̲͍͔̩̤̮̫̪̯͉ ͚͜
̡̩̪̘̱̼̯̥̘͓̺͙͚͈͓̲̥̩̘͖̮ ̩͎̱͜ ̣
̚ ̨̜͎̫͖̬̲̠̗̖͓ͅ ̱͙̪͜ ̣ ̧̬̱̘̜̻̟̳̱̗̺̪̗͓̝ ̣ ̨̜̝͉̘̦̪͕͖̗̮̗͉̖
̚
͘
̛
̛ ̚
̛̕
̕
̧̡̠͍̺̲̟̭̺̳̲̱̞̥͔̦̭͔̥͍͉̭ ̣̣ ̪͎̙̦͓͙̜͚̫͎͔͈̼͖̟ͅ ̼͍̱͍͚͉͚͜
e̵ ̜͇̞̜̱̳̗̻͓̟̼̜̜͚͔
͜
͖̘̖̭̤̯̱̪̥̩͖̺̞̭̺̠̲̤̙̹͓̜̗ͅ ̨͕͙͔͜
̨̨̮̫̺͕͉̥
ͅ
͙͚̹̭͓͈̬̦͕̥̤̱͖̰̻̲̜̫͉͚̦̭
"ADAM!"
The voice was followed my a painful slap, jolting me out of...whatever the hell that was. I
looked up in shock, nursing my reddened face, to see Sasrir kneeling only afoot away,
concern etched into his face. "What the hell happened to you? You started zoning out, then
your eyes rolled up and you began convulsing on the spot. Nothing I did except for the slap
could get you out of it.""I...I don't know" I confessed, rubbing the bridge between my eyebrows. "My thoughts just
became static, and everything faded away. But..." I took a deep breath. "I've decided you're
right, we have to bend the board to our will if we want to survive here. We're outsiders, and
the rules of this land have no purchase on us. This," I held up the Unshadowed Crucifix, "is
the best proof, as are our very bodies."
Sasrir stared in silence for several seconds before nodding and moving back. In that case, let's
start hunting while we still have the majority of the day behind us. Grab onto me, I'll bring
you down." With that, he transformed into a shadow layer again, and I found purchase in his
folds. That sounded wrong, actually...
We swiftly moved down the Statue and began to circle around its' feet, looking for anything
that stood out. Sunny described it as a glade full of broken swords and weapons, so it
shouldn't be too hard to find. Lo and behold, after close to two hours and spreading out our
search radius with the Azure Blade's help, we spotted it.
The glade was less a meadow and more a grim, metallic graveyard. Dozens—maybe a
hundred—rusted and broken steel weapons were thrust into the hard ground like headstones,
a silent testament to countless Legionnaires that had presumably followed the Slayer and his
Cohort to bring back their sun. And at the very back was the guardian we had to slay.
It wasn't a creature in any normal sense. It looked like someone had taken an entire weapons
factory and smelted it into a single, horrifying mass of jagged steel, twisted edges, and
broken blades. It vaguely resembled a monstrous, golem version of the Iron Throne, hunched
over and utterly still. It seemed inactive, dormant.
But Sasrir's face was set in a deep scowl, his body tense. The constant, maddening whisper of
the Labyrinth was clearly worse here, concentrated around this... thing.
"A Fallen Monster. Use the Crucifix," he ordered, his voice tight. "Buff us. Now."
No arguing. I summoned the Unshadowed Crucifix, its weight solid and comforting in my
hands. Focusing my will, I channelled not its destructive power, but its supportive light. A
soft, golden radiance spilled from the relic, washing over both of us. I felt a surge of strength
and clarity, my senses sharpening. Next to me, Sasrir let out a sharp breath as the holy energy
likely dampened the worst of the psychic static screaming in his head.
The Unshadowed Crucifix, I had found out, was a pure Sequence 4 Characteristics-meaning,
it lacked all previous Sequences. It could still use the powers, of course, but if I had
Envisioned Aucusces as a Saint then he would be stronger than this Memory. Still, it would
do the job here.
Sequence 9-Bard: A melodious and clear tune vibrated from the Crucifix, causing the glade
to rustle as the various blades, and the monster at the back, began to stir.
Sequence 8-Light Supplicant: A golden glow settled on both me and Sasrir as the blessing
took effect, instantly easing his expression as the negative influences were blocked out, and
his shadow seemed to grow darkerSequence 7-Solar High Priest: As the majority of the blades in the glade had now unearthed
themselves, and the steel golem in the back had turned its' face-a real nightmare, that-I
quickly recited a quick prayer, directly boosting Holy damage and defence.
As a result of stacking three buffs from progressive Sequences, the spikes on the Crucifix
suddenly surged and impaled my right hand. A wave of dizziness overpowered the pain as it
felt like all the blood in my arm was drained away instantly. Funnily enough, the process was
quite similar to the Radiance: while still present, the Essence drain was actually less than the
blood cost.
Sasrir waved his hands and a scimitar of shadows appeared in one, while a jambiya knife, but
with a more elongated blade, appeared in the other.
He rolled his shoulders, a predator readying itself. "Good. Let's see what a blessed shadow
can do to a pile of scrap."
The fight erupted not with a roar, but with the shriek of grinding metal. The glade, a moment
ago a silent graveyard, became a whirlwind of rust and sharpened steel. The unearthed blades
shot toward us, faster than any Dormant Beast had a right to be.
Sasrir met the charge not with a stand, but with a fluid, disorienting dance. One second he
was a solid form, a scimitar of solidified shadow parrying a frenzied spear; the next, he was a
smear of darkness on the ground, flowing under a sweeping axe only to solidify behind it and
drive his merlin dagger into its hilt. He was a phantom, blurring the line between man and
shadow.
He used the environment masterfully. A wall of pure darkness erupted from the base of a
coral pillar, blocking a volley of daggers. Spikes of shadow shot up from the ground,
impaling a charging sword and holding it writhing like a pinned insect. He yanked a massive,
shadowy maul from the air and brought it down on a mace, not cutting it, but bludgeoning it
into the dirt with sheer, concussive force.
But it was a defensive battle. The shadows were a shield, a distraction, a tool for control—not
for destruction. His weapons, for all their soul-damaging properties, simply couldn't find
purchase on the animated metal. They scraped and sparked, knocking the weapons back,
stunning them for a moment, but failing to break them. The sentient blades were too fast, too
numerous, and unnervingly coordinated. They came from all sides, harrying him, testing his
defenses.
A flicker of hesitation, a shadow form that solidified a fraction of a second too slow, and a
rusted short sword darted in, slicing a deep gash across his shoulder. Another blade, a
wickedly hooked falchion, caught his leg as he phased, drawing a line of dark blood. Within
minutes, his dark clothes were torn and slick with it. He was bleeding from a dozen shallow
cuts, his movements growing just a hair less precise.
Yet, he was learning. He couldn't break them with force, so he targeted their movement. He
wrapped tendrils of darkness around a flail, tangling its chain and sending it crashing into a
broadsword. He solidified shadow in the joints of a suit of animated armor, locking it in placelong enough for him to deliver a powerful, two-handed shadow-smash to its helmet. The
helmet crumpled, and the armor clattered to the ground, inert.
His first real kill was a desperate one. A rapier, blindingly fast, had slipped past his defenses
and was aiming for his throat. Sasrir didn't block it. Instead, he embraced it, his form
dissolving into shadow and flowing *up* the blade itself, against its momentum. The shadow
engulfed the hilt and the space around it. There was a sound like a high-pitched, shattering
crystal, and the rapier exploded into a thousand motes of silvery light that winked out of
existence.
He'd found the key. He couldn't break their bodies; he had to overwhelm their animating
spirit directly with his own shadowy essence.
He repeated the tactic twice more, at great cost. To consume a cleaver, he had to take a brutal
kick from a nearby animated greave that cracked a rib. To devour a war scythe, he left
himself open to a slash across his back that would have severed the spine of a mortal man.
Each victory was announced by that same sound of shattering glass and a shower of dying
light. Four blades destroyed.
But the cost was too high. He was slowing, his breaths coming in ragged gasps I could feel
echo in my own chest. And we had run out of time. Despite the buffs I had stacked, he was
surrounded on all sides by foes and his shadows lacked the physical presence to shatter them
properly.
The ground began to tremble. The great hunched form at the back of the glade, the monstrous
amalgamation of a thousand weapons, was moving. It uncurled with a deafening screech of
tortured metal, its faceless head—a mess of fused daggers and axe-heads—turning toward us.
It took a step, then another, each footfall shaking the earth. It wasn't fast, but its progress was
inevitable, a glacier of sharpened death. The remaining lesser weapons scattered, pulling back
to give their master room.
Sasrir stumbled back to my side, his shadow-scimitar flickering weakly. Blood dripped from
his fingertips onto the crimson coral. He looked from the approaching golem to me, his
expression grim.
"The small ones were just the welcome party," he panted, his mental voice strained. "The real
fight is here. The Crucifix... now would be a good time for that 'demigod-level' wrath you
mentioned."
"Ah fuck," I muttered to myself before applying the Horror Immunity buff at the cost of
another few drops of blood. I would need to eat an entire Scavenger's worth of meat to
recover from the blood loss.
"Fire of Light!"
At once, the dull and mottled bronze cross peeled back a layer, not quite revealing the golden
sun I knew lay beneath, but still teasing at its' existence. A curtain of warmth and radiance
shot out, covering the entire glade. Sasrir had had the sense to flee the second I spoke,coming up behind me and out of the sun's wrath. It was the smart thing to do, based on what
happened next.
The Light Flames burst into existence out of nowhere, covering the closest monsters before
they could react. A terrible shriek shook the glade, making my eardrums vibrate, but it died
down after several seconds. Where a dozen sentient blades had been, there were now only
bubbling, silvery pools of strange, liquefied steel, hissing as they cooled on the crimson coral.
The Spell's notifications tried to flash at the edge of my vision—kills, a Memory—but I
violently shoved the awareness aside. There was no time.
Because the Golem was still standing.
The holy fire had hit it, yes. The outer layer of its monstrous body glowed a fierce, angry
orange, the steel turning semi-liquid for a moment before cooling back into a new, jagged
shape. It hadn't melted; it had been tempered. Angered. And with a speed that was utterly
horrifying for its size, it had lurched forward to deliver a killing blow that would have
pulverized me.
Sasrir, now standing slightly ahead of me with two more shadowy tentacles lashing out from
his form to whip against the Golem's leg in a futile but furious retaliation, had been the only
thing between me and a messy end. "The light!" he shouted, his voice strained. "It's
disrupted!"
He was right. The brilliant, protective field generated by the Unshadowed Crucifix had
flickered and died with my near-death experience and the break in my concentration. And
into that newly darkened gap, the remaining sentient weapons flowed like a tide of rust and
sharpened death. They had been held at bay by the holy radiance, but now they saw their
opening.
The Golem took another earth-shaking step forward, its faceless head of fused blades
seeming to fixate on me. The lesser weapons—a storm of animated daggers, swords, and
axes—swarmed around its legs, a protective, buzzing escort for their master. We were no
longer just fighting a monster; we were fighting the entire glade.
Sasrir backpedaled, his form flickering between solid and shadow as he desperately tried to
re-establish a defensive perimeter. A wall of darkness shot up, blocking a cluster of throwing
knives. A spike impaled a leaping short sword. But for every one he stopped, two more took
its place. He was being overwhelmed, his movements growing more frantic, the cuts on his
arms and torso bleeding freely.
Sasrir lacked the regeneration of a Rose Bishop: my Sun Pathway abilities could accelerate
his recovery, but only after we had escaped danger. Cursing yet again, I forced my entire
hand down of the Crucifix and dragged it across. The blood flowed out easier than it should,
drawn by the illuminating light slowly becoming more prominent.
Sequence 6-Notary: "God says light and shadow are more effective, God says metal and steel
are weakened!"The effect, in fairness to the blood price paid, was immediate. The Steel Golem instantly
froze and stuttered, as the already somewhat-cooled metal suddenly cracked and warped, its'
heat capacity lowered to be less than the remaining temperature inflicted upon it. At the same
time, the speed of the flying weapons dimmed to a noticeable degree, and Sasrir managed to
strangle the life out of six straight after he realised this. Seeing that more than half the blades
remained though, I bit my lip until it bled (the blood flew off my chin and into the Crucifix) I
made up my mind and shouted towards Sasrir.
"You focus on the Golem, I'll handle the minions!"
He paused and look at me in concern, my skin already paler than healthy and posture
wavering. Still, he trusted me and didn't argue, instead crafting a magnificent war hammer
from shadow and swinging it directly at the Shard Lord's kneecap. The metal didn't shatter,
though it did warp with an ominous groan, causing the monster to tilt. It seemed it still hadn't
recovered and adjusted to its newfound state of weakness.
When Sasrir turned his back on them, the sentient blades hadn't focused on him, but rather
turned their attention to me. I didn't know whether it was their intelligence singling me out as
a bigger threat, or maybe they didn't care about the Steel Golem. It was only a Monster, not a
Tyrant, so these weren't it's actual Minions, just fellow residents. Regardless, I was now faced
with around seventy bloodthirsty blades.
Churning my Soul Cores, I made the risky decision of going all in-I poured two whole Cores
worth of Essence into the Unshadowed Crucifix and then, with one fluid motion, stabbed it
through my hand. It punctured the flesh and bone with ease, sticking out the other side, and
the pin nearly made me collapse on the spot. Still, the effect had been achieved. For while my
Memory preferred blood as the price to operate, it still accepted Essence on the side. With me
pouring so much into it, the Memory went into overdrive and I managed to offset the blood
price enough to avoid hypovolemic shock.
"Sequence 5-Priest of Light: Purification Halo!"
For comparison between this and the Sequence 7 ability, this blast of light was like turning on
your phone after just waking up, to having a flashbang stabbed into your eyeballs and the pin
being pulled. An ocean of light spread out around me in 360-degrees, sweeping up everything
around me. Sasrir and the Steel Golem weren't spared either, as he let out a scream through
gritted teeth as the light scorched his back. He had positioned himself well though, and it was
the Golem who caught the most of it, his entire back steaming and flowing off his like water.
The Monster still seemed to be alive though, and its' blows were no les dangerous. Due to its'
inorganic nature, perhaps only destroying the soul core directly would kill it. But I had no
such problems back on my side.
All seventy of the living weapons had been hit by the light, and sixty five had been erased
from the face of the earth. They were only Awakened Beasts after all, and the Priest of Light
was definitely at the higher end of Ascended. The Spell poured down praises on me, and I
actually got four more rewards ,but the price had finally caught up to me and I could no
longer stand. Worse still, five of the Nightmare Creatures were still alive, albeit half-melted. Igave one last look over to Sasrir, seeing him drive his scimitar right through where the heart
would be on a normal Human, before my legs gave out ad my vision followed.
Chapter End Notes
We never got an actual description for some of the Seven Statues, so I'll be trying to
make them fit as best as I can from the vague titbits we got. Also, trying to figure out
which Statue is where on the map, and the status of the Shards by the time Nephis got
them, is literal fucking torture, so I might just make stuff up to make it easier for myself.
Finally, my first fight, probably not very detailed or quite glossed over, still working on
that. We also saw the bloodthirst of the Unshadowed Crucifix: for reference, this fight
only lasted three or four minutes, and Adam would probably die if the fight went on for
another thirty seconds. Arrogance and greed have their priceChapter 16: Dream Realm IV-Godhood made Flesh
Chapter Notes
See the end of the chapter for notes
Consciousness came to me suddenly and without warning. One second there was nothing—a
blank, empty void—and the next I was just… here.
Wherever here was.
My head was full of static. Trying to remember how I got here was like trying to grab smoke.
I had a flash of… a glade? Rusted metal? A searing light? The memory dissolved before it
could fully form, leaving behind only a vague sense of panic and exhaustion. I couldn't hold
onto a thought for more than a few seconds before it just… slipped away.
I was standing. That was the first solid fact. My feet were planted on a surface, but it wasn't
ground. It was… a sea. But not water. It was this impossible, shifting expanse of turquoise
and lime green, like someone had mixed tropical ocean colors with neon acid. It was semi-
translucent; I could see down into its depths, where the colors swirled into darker,
unknowable shades. A distant, hazy bottom was visible, miles below.
And running through it were rivers of pure, liquid light. They coiled and twisted like
rainbows on spilt oil, shimmering with every color I could name and a few I couldn't. They
moved with a purpose, these rivers, flowing in currents I could feel more than see.
I looked up. There was no sun, no sky like I knew it. It was like looking up at a ceiling made
of a veiled, gossamer cloth, with those same impossible rainbow hues filtering through from
some immense light source above. It was beautiful and utterly terrifying.
Mist pooled at the edges of this… place, thick and obscuring, hiding whatever lay beyond.
But it thinned the closer it got to me, like I was my own little pocket of clarity. Within about
ten feet of me, the mist just vanished, as if repelled. And in that fog, at the very limits of my
vision, I saw things. Shapes. Vague, humanoid shades that flickered into existence for a
heartbeat—a figure reaching out, a face contorted in a silent scream, a running form—only to
dissolve back into the colourful haze a second later.
"What the…" I mumbled, my voice sounding small and lost. The words didn't echo. They
just got swallowed by the immense, silent weirdness of it all.
I was standing on a psychedelic ocean under a veiled rainbow sky, surrounded by ghostly
glimpses in the mist, and I couldn't remember how I got here. This was, without a doubt, a
new kind of problem.
Right. Okay. Standing here gawking wasn't getting me anywhere. I picked a direction at
random—toward where one of those rainbow rivers seemed brightest—and started walking.
Or, I tried to.My legs moved, my feet pressed down on the strangely firm, colorful surface, but nothing
changed. The shimmering river stayed exactly the same distance away. I stopped, turned, and
marched decisively in the opposite direction, toward a particularly thick bank of mist. Same
thing. I could have been on a treadmill. The fog maintained its perfect, ten-foot bubble
around me. The haunting figures within it flickered and danced, never getting clearer, never
getting further away.
A jolt of pure, cold panic shot through me. I was trapped. Stuck in this silent, insane postcard.
But the panic didn't get a chance to take root. It was there, a lightning bolt of fear in my
chest, and then… it was just gone. Snuffed out. Not like I calmed myself down. It was like an
invisible hand just reached in and flipped a switch off.
The shock of that was even worse than the panic. What the hell was that? I tried to summon
up the fear again, to feel anything about this terrifying situation, but it was useless. A blank,
emotionless wall had slammed down inside my head. I couldn't feel anything. Not
frustration, not curiosity, not dread. I was just… a camera recording this bizarre scenery, with
all the emotional depth of a rock.
A weird, nagging itch of familiarity tickled the back of my mind. This feeling… this cold,
absolute neutrality… I knew this. I'd felt it before. But the thought was like a fish in murky
water—I could see a vague shape, but the moment I tried to focus, to grab it, it vanished into
the haze clouding my memories.
So I just stood there. On a sea of impossible colors. Under a veiled, rainbow sky. In a bubble
of perfect, enforced calm. Waiting for something, anything, to happen. Waiting...
-
-
-
-
How much time passed, I didn't know, but suddenly the sea began to experience change. It
could have been just a few minutes or maybe years, I couldn't tell the passage of time, and
my memory was one blank tape of film. I knew I was a person, the noun of it, but my name
and identity were lost. A general sense of oppression had begun to take root in me at some
point, pressing down through the mental block in my head, causing a cold and empty feeling
to begin swallowing me up inside. I would have panicked, had I been allowed to, but I was
stuck in detached observation mode. So, the changes in the sea were welcome, even if it
meant getting devoured by some colossal fish thing.
It wasn't that, though. Instead, what I came across was...an island.
A stark, pure white against the vibrant turquoise and lime. An island. It was a bleak,
minimalist thing, utterly barren, composed of a substance that looked like a cross between
fine white sand and polished marble. The only features were a circle of slender, uprightstones—like fingers pointing at the veiled rainbow sky—and a series of intricate, swirling
symbols etched into the ground between them.
This was definitely the source. The hum was a physical pressure here, a steady pulse that
resonated in my bones and pushed the water away from it.
My own emotions were still locked down tight, a distant curiosity buried under layers of
unnatural calm. There was no fear, only a blank, procedural need to investigate. I stepped
onto the white shore. It was cool and smooth underfoot. I moved toward the central pattern,
my mind a quiet, empty room.
I knelt, my shadow falling across the nearest etching. The symbols were impossibly complex,
geometries that hurt to look at for too long.
The moment my fingertips, more on instinct than intent, brushed against the cool white stone,
the symbols ignited.
A soft, white light bloomed from the grooves, not a violent explosion but a rapid,
overwhelming unfurling. It wasn't just light; it was a torrent. A flood of… everything.
Emotions that weren't mine—a sudden, sharp grief, a burst of irrational joy, a deep-seated
envy—slammed into me. They were followed by fragmented thoughts, whispers of
conversations I'd never had, and memories of places I'd never seen. A marketplace smelling
of spices, the feel of cold rain on a stone balcony, the weight of a child's hand in mine.
It was too much, too fast. It was like someone was hammering another's life into my skull.
My knees gave way and I slumped to the ground, a low groan escaping my lips. My head
throbbed, scrambling itself while trying to accommodate the knowledge, the sheer pressure of
foreign consciousness pouring in. My vision swam, the white island and the colourful sea
tilting crazily.
No. Too much. Off. Turn it OFF!
It was a primal, desperate thought, a plea from the core of whatever was left that was me.
And somewhere deep inside, a switch flipped. A mechanism I never knew I possessed
engaged with a soft, mental click. It was like the slamming of a bulkhead, sealing off the
flood and allowing me to force the rest of the noise out my my ears. It took a few seconds
longer for me to stand though.
I lay there for a long moment, panting, my forehead pressed against the cool, white stone. My
mind felt raw, scoured. Most of the deluge was already gone, my brain having automatically
junked the vast majority of the data to protect itself. But a few pieces, like the most vivid
fragments of a dream upon waking, remained for a few seconds.
A name: Elara.
A place: The Dark City
And underpinning it all, a profound, aching sense of longing. A deep, homesick yearning for
a warmth and a safety that felt galaxies away.The clarity was fleeting. The cold, analytical part of my mind, the part that had just saved me,
identified these fragments as non-essential. Emotional artifacts. With a quiet, internal sigh
that wasn't really my own, they were scrubbed away, deleted from my short-term memory
like corrupt files. The echo of the feeling vanished, leaving behind only the sterile knowledge
that something deeply personal had just been erased.
Then the island shuddered.
A network of hairline cracks appeared in the white marble-sand. With a low, grinding rumble,
the entire landmass began to sink into the colourful sea, dissolving at the edges. The
monoliths tilted precariously.
Adrenaline, real and sharp and mine, finally broke through the numbness. I scrambled
backward on my hands and knees, then launched myself into a stumbling run. I threw myself
off the dissolving edge just as the last of the standing stones was swallowed without a splash.
I landed on the resilient surface of the sea, the impact jarring my knees. I turned back, heart
hammering against my ribs—a feeling that was terrifying and exhilarating in its familiarity.
The island was gone. The sea was perfectly calm, showing no sign it had ever existed. I was
alone again, adrift in the silence. But now the silence felt different. I had been violated,
scraped empty, and then saved by a part of myself I didn't understand. And the only traces of
what I'd found were the ghost of a feeling I could no longer remember, and the cold, empty
space where it had been.
Yet something had been triggered, or maybe my time in solitary was up: the veil covering the
sky parted, and light fell through, descending onto me. Closing my eyes at the brightness, I
felt the world shift and fall away around me-or rather, felt myself ascend higher. Before I was
completely pulled through the veil however, I forced my eyes opened and took in the full
realm I had been trapped in. The sea seemed to stretch forever, and I saw what was possibly
other islands dotted around it, some pure and white, others blackened and overflowing
polluted filth into the sea. On the very horizon of my vision, I noticed what seemed like a
large gathering of white islands, but then...I saw it.
It wasn't part of the sky. It was suspended in the space between, a silent observer. A
grotesque, greyish-white object that looked like a monstrous fusion of a human brain and a
galaxy, all convoluted folds and swirling, nebulous matter. And floating directly in front of
this thing was a single, massive pair of eyes.
They were golden, with vertical reptilian pupils. And they were utterly, terrifyingly
emotionless. They weren't looking at the sea or the islands. They were simply observing.
Taking in all of it with a cold, dispassionate gaze. This thing was the overseer of this entire
insane dimension.
A cold that had nothing to do with temperature shot down my spine. My ascent halted. I just
hung there in the air, staring.
And as I stared, the eyes moved.The vertical pupils contracted minutely, and then the entire orbs rotated with a slow,
deliberate precision until they were fixed directly on me.
The moment its gaze locked with mine, it felt like a thunderclap inside my skull. A psychic
storm of pure force ripped through my soul and my mind. It wasn't an attack of rage or
malice. It was worse. It was the indifferent, overwhelming pressure of an ocean depth applied
directly to my consciousness. The pain was instant and indescribable—a white-hot agony of
being known, being measured, and being found infinitesimally small by something vast and
ancient.
I would have screamed, but I had no air. I would have convulsed, but I was frozen in its gaze.
And as the pain threatened to shatter me completely, information was forced into my mind.
Not a flood this time, but a single, sharp, precise injection. It wasn't a memory or an emotion.
It was a cold, hard fact, a fundamental law of this place etched directly onto my being:
Psychiatrist
Main Ingredients:
The fruit of the Tree of Elders and a pair of eyes from a Mirror Dragon.
Supplementary Ingredients:
50 millilitres of Mirror Dragon's Blood, 15 grams of Tree of Elders Bark Powder, 10 drops of
Foxglove essential oil and 9 strands of infant hair.
Hypnotist
Main Ingredients:
60 milliliters of a Black-hunting Giant Lizard's spinal fluid and the fruit of an Illusory Chime
Tree, or the complete pituitary gland of an adolescent Mind Dragon
Supplementary Ingredients:
80 milliliters of blood from an adolescent Mind Dragon (or black-hunt giant lizard), three
scales from an adolescent Mind Dragon (or 3 pieces of bark from the Illusory Chime Tree),
one belladonna fruit and a mirror kept in one's own room for over three months.
The words weren't in any language; they were the concept itself, branded into me.
Then, as suddenly as it had begun, the pressure vanished. The eyes turned away, dismissing
me, returning to their passive observation of the sea below. The connection was severed.The release was so abrupt I almost fell out of the air. The ghost of the pain echoed in every
nerve ending, a deep, psychic ache. But beneath the pain was that new, unshakable
knowledge. I knew where I was. And I knew I had been seen.
I didn't wait for another look. I turned my face upward and willed myself to ascend faster,
desperate to put as much distance as possible between me and those golden, judging eyes. I
had to get out. Now. And when I was embraced by the veiled sky of colour, I couldn't deny
the deep-seated relief I felt.
*****************************************************************
Consciousness returned slowly, like a fog reluctantly lifting. The first thing I was aware of
was a dull, all-over ache, a deep-seated exhaustion that felt like it had sunk into my bones. I
was lying on something hard and cool—the familiar stone of the Slayer's statue.
The second thing I saw was Sasrir.
He was sitting a few feet away, his back against the stone, idly spinning a dagger between his
fingers. It wasn't one of his shadow weapons. This was a real, physical blade, beautifully
forged from a dark, starlit ore that seemed to drink the faint light. He noticed my eyes were
open the moment I managed to pry them apart.
He didn't startle. He just stopped spinning the stiletto, set it down carefully, and moved over
to a small, dimly burning fire pit he'd built. He speared a piece of cooked meat with a
sharpened stick and came to kneel beside me.
"Don't try to move," he said, his voice low and even. "Just eat."
His arm slid behind my shoulders, helping me lean forward just enough. Every movement
felt jarring and wrong, like my spine was disconnected from the rest of my body. I was a
puppet with cut strings. He brought the meat to my lips, and I took a small, tentative bite. It
was gamey and tough, but warm. I managed a few more bites in silence, my jaw feeling stiff
and unfamiliar.
The question must have been blazing in my eyes because he didn't wait for me to try and
form words.
"The Golem is dead," he stated, matter-of-factly. "I managed to shatter its core after your
light show weakened it. We got the Shard."
He gestured with his chin toward the beautiful stiletto on the ground. "That's it. The Midnight
Shard. A useful tool."
He fed me another piece of meat before continuing. "You, however, pushed too far. The blood
loss and Essence drain sent you into systemic shock. You've been out for four days."
*Four days.* The thought tried to form, but it was slippery and hard to hold onto.
"I've been nursing you," he continued, his tone clinical, as if reading a report. "Feeding you
protein-rich meat from the Scavengers we hunted. I also shattered every Soul Core we hadand channelled the raw Essence directly into you to accelerate your body's natural healing
processes."
He paused, and a flicker of something that wasn't quite annoyance crossed his features. "I
also... bled myself on the Crucifix. It seems our connection allows my vitality to supplement
yours when channelled through the Memory. It was... inefficient, but it appears to have
worked."
He looked at me, his dark eyes assessing. "Your body is recovering. Your mind, however,
seems to have taken its own trip. You've been... elsewhere. Muttering things that made no
sense. About a sea of colors and... eyes."
He fed me the last piece of meat. "The important thing is you are back. Now, rest. We are safe
for now. The hard part is over."
I did so silently like a good patient, feeling the genuine concern and worry Sasrir had for me
despite his calm and collected exterior, along with...guilt?
'Ah yes, of course he would guilty. He was the one who talked me into going after the
Midnight Shard after all, he probably blames himself.'
I gave him a weak, reassuring smile and closed my eyes. The thing I had experienced while I
slept was surreal to even think about, but I wasn't so muddleheaded anymore to not know
what had just transpired. I had, somehow, entered the Sea of Collective Subconsciousness,
also known as the Mind World for short, where every sapient being is represented as an
Island and the collective deeper ego of Mankind was the Sea. The Sky was a Spiritual veil
that led to the Spirit World, and the entrance/exit for those not of the Visionary Pathway.
Then that would make the bizarre godlike thing at the end...
Biting my lip at the thought, Sasrir put his hand on my shoulder. "What did you see in there?"
he asked directly, blunt but worried.
"I think...I just had a face-to-face with the Visionary Uniqueness" I confessed, causing
Sasrir's eyebrows to furrow and then widen. "You talked with it?!"
"No, no, God no," I waved my hands to explain myself. "I was stuck in the Mind World while
you were nursing me, and my ego kept being bled from me by the Sea. After walking for
some time, I found a Mind Island and I guess I tapped into it, because I felt like I experienced
the entire life of someone. Shortly after, I was called back here, but on my way out I saw a
creature that was a mix between a brain and a galaxy, with the golden Dragon eyes of a
Hypnotist. After locking gazes with it...I think I got the Potion formulae for Psychiatrist and
Hypnotist from it."
"...Well, that does align with what happens in the story with Klein" Sasrir admitted, but he
was still watching me suspiciously. "Anything else?"
I took a shallow breath, focusing on relaying the facts, keeping the lingering, indescribable
terror of that gaze locked away. "It gave me the formulae. For the Visionary Pathway.
Sequence 7, Psychologist. And Sequence 6, Hypnotist."I recited them flatly, the knowledge surfacing in my mind with cold clarity:
Sasrir absorbed the list, his expression unreadable. "Interesting. A direct download from the
Uniqueness. Efficient." He then voiced the obvious, practical problem. "But these
ingredients… 'Tree of Elders'? 'Mirror Dragon'? Do such things even exist here? This isn't
the world these potions were designed for."
As he said it, the information in my head… shifted.
It was instantaneous. The names of the flora and fauna didn't change, but their definitions
did. The knowledge rewrote itself, adapting to the new reality.
"They do," I said, the new understanding settling in. "But not like that. Not anymore." I
focused, reading the updated entries now burned into my memory. "The 'Tree of Elders' is a
Gloomwood Mangler, a 'Mirror Dragon' is a Reflective Wyrm, the 'Illusory Chime Tree' is
a Whispering Madness Bloom, while the 'Mind Dragon' is a Thought-Devourer."
I looked at Sasrir, a plan forming from the cold, logical part of my mind that was now
running the show. "The formulae have adapted. The core components are the same, but the
sources are creatures of the Dream Realm. And we have the perfect tool to harvest them
without the risk of spiritual contamination."
I tapped my chest where the Unshadowed Crucifix was stored within my Soul Sea. "We use
this. Its purifying light can incinerate any lingering corruption or madness from the materials
as we extract them. We can make these potions. We can advance."
A slight frown creased my brow. "There's just one problem. I know the names it gave me…
but I don't actually recognize the Nightmare Creatures they correspond to. I know what we
need to hunt, but I have no idea where to find them." I let out a short, frustrated breath.
"We're going to need a bestiary. We'll have to wait until we get back to the Waking World
and get our hands on a proper Academy monster encyclopaedia."
"Alright then...now onto the most important part: why the hell is the Visionary Uniqueness
inside your soul?"
I was quiet for a long moment, the pieces finally clicking into a terrifying, coherent whole.
The answer had been in front of us all along, written plainly in our status screens. We just
hadn't understood what it truly meant.
"I think... I am the Visionary Uniqueness," I said, the words feeling both absurd and utterly
true. "Not just a holder of it. I am it. Brought to life, given a human form and a human
consciousness. Just like the actual Adam from the story was."
I met his dark eyes, seeing my own realization reflected back at me. "Our powers were
sealed, reduced down to the level of a starting Sequence. My Flaw, 'Justice'... it's not a flaw.
It's the Godhood of the Uniqueness itself, the cold, absolute logic of a divine function,
forcing its way to the surface and grappling with my... my original self. My humanity."The theory unfolded with a dreadful clarity. "If I'm right, then the more Sequences I climb,
the more I awaken the true nature sleeping inside me. The influence of the Uniqueness will
only deepen. The Flaw will become less of a 'flaw' and more of... my default state. My
humanity will be the thing that's flawed, the inconvenient noise in the system."
It explained everything. The vague, constant discomfort I'd felt since arriving in the Dream
Realm—it wasn't just fear. It was the Uniqueness stirring. Spirituality, Essence, was more
potent here, and it was revitalizing the divine spark at my core, making it stronger, more
restless.
"And that blackout... right before we fought the Golem," I continued, a cold knot forming in
my stomach. "When I called myself an 'error'. That was it. That was the Visionary
Uniqueness, briefly conflicting with the mortal self-identification layered on top of it. A tiny,
fleeting identity crisis between what I was made to be and what I was born as."
I let out a slow breath. "The Curator didn't just give me a Pathway, Sasrir. He didn't just give
me a cheat code. He made me a God in a mortal coil. And our Attributes... they've been
telling us the whole time." I could almost see the runes in my mind's eye: [Uniqueness of
Visionary] and [Flame of Divinity]. How could mere Sleepers possess such things, before we
had even properly become Dormants, before passing the First Nightmare?
"We're not just Sleepers with fancy Aspects. We are Uniqueness' made flesh. We are Gods,
dressed up to be human."
Sasrir went perfectly still. The usual sardonic glint in his eyes vanished, replaced by a deep,
unsettling stillness. The revelation didn't just surprise him; it seemed to fundamentally shake
his understanding of his own existence. He was silent for a long time, the only sound the faint
crackle of the dying fire.
When he finally spoke, his voice was low, stripped of its usual dry mockery, and carried a
weight I'd never heard before. It was dark, serious, and edged with a sliver of something that
sounded dangerously like fear.
"Then what about me?"
The question hung in the air, heavy and cold. He wasn't looking at me anymore; he was
staring at his own hands, as if seeing them for the first time.
"Will I also be eroded by—" he cut himself off, correcting the phrasing with a grimace, "—or
rather, reclaim the Divinity of the Hanged Man Pathway?"
He finally looked up, and his expression was stark. "That doesn't spell well for me, Adam.
The Hanged Man's divinity isn't... cold logic. It's not a function. It's sacrifice. It's enduring
endless pain. It's madness borne from ultimate suffering. It's the meaning of suffering in life."
He stood up, pacing a short, tense line on the stone. "You speak of your 'Justice' becoming
your default state. What becomes my default state? Eternal agony? The compulsion to bear
the sins of the world? A bottomless hunger for sacrifice?" He stopped, turning his dark gazeback on me. "The Hanged Man's Uniqueness isn't something you 'awaken' into. It's
something you are consumed by."
The truth of it hit us both. My path was one of becoming an increasingly distant, calculating
god. His was one of becoming a vessel for a specific, terrifying kind of torment.
"You don't know that!" I cut across him. "The True Creator is an irregularity, and "He" was
more or less stable during the Solomon Era anyways, only descending further into depravity
after losing all "His" anchors and followers. If I can fully come into my Psychiatrist powers,
keeping you stable should be completely doable. Don't give up just yet, we still have
possibilities left to us. And most of all, we're still Human now. We can still feel, still make
ugly decisions, still love and care and protect what we know. Don't be so willing to throw that
all away just yet."
Sasrir looked at me in deep silence before sighing and sitting on the ground. "Alright.
Alright."
After Sasrir conceded, I suddenly didn't know what to say next, an awkward bubble forming
around us. After several seconds of no one saying a word, Sasrir spoke up first. "So...now
knowing what awaits us at the end of the road, and our true natures in this world, do you
think you can manifest the Uniqueness physically? Like a King of Angels or True Deity?"
I frowned and didn't answer straight away, instead focusing on my hand. After nearly thirty
seconds, a grey mist began to seep from my skin, and a brain-like object suddenly appeared
in my hand. The Uniqueness, or a decorative representation of it, at least. Seeing that Sasrir
didn't collapse screaming and then explode, I figured it lacked any Godhood or knowledge
wand was just a sculpture. "Kind of ugly looking" Sasrir commented in front of me, and I
agreed with him in my head. The next second, the Uniqueness exploded into a puff of mist
and when it cleared, the brain had become a feather quill.
"Now that's more like it!" I laughed at the iconic sight, twirling the quill daintily between my
fingers. Sasrir looked on in amusement before closing his eyes and also putting on a
concentrated look. Under my expectant gaze, his shadow suddenly wiggled and grew bigger,
before for more heads popped out, two on each side of the original. "The five-headed shadow,
the Uniqueness of the Hanged Man Pathway from the novel" Sasrir acknowledged with a
glint of recognition.
"Not going to change it?"
"Into what? I think this fits quite well for now, maybe I'll do so later."
The cheery talk washed away the remnant stress and anxiety built up, and I decided to voice
something I had been thinking of for a while. "Hey, actually, I have something to say. I
mentioned I fond a Mind Island while randomly exploring, right? Well, I also saw a very
large gathering of them near the end too."
Sasrir narrowed his eyes. "You think..."
"I think that was the Dark City."