"I had more visions than I told you about."
Cassie's voice was quiet, almost hesitant, as she sat beside Sunless.
Nephis frowned slightly. "Okay… and?" she asked, tilting her head, waiting for her… friend? Teammate? She wasn't sure. But she wanted to know what Cassie had seen.
Cassie let out a sharp breath, her fingers curling into fists. "What do you mean and?!" Her voice cracked, raw with emotion. "I hid my visions from you. I didn't trust you. After everything you did for me… I—" Her breath hitched, and suddenly, tears were slipping down her pale cheeks, falling from those sightless cerulean eyes. "I was afraid."
Nephis stilled.
"I thought that if I told you… if I didn't keep what I knew a secret… that maybe I could change fate," Cassie whispered, her voice barely holding together. "But only if I knew. No one else. I convinced myself that sharing my knowledge would cause the visions to come true. So I kept quiet. I locked it all away, convinced it was for the best." Her shoulders shook, her breath ragged. "And then—then Sunny… Sunny trusted me. He told me his Flaw. And now I—" She choked back a sob. "I feel so guilty."
Before Cassie could say more, Nephis had already moved. She sat beside her, wrapping Cassie in an embrace—awkward, unsure, mirroring the way she had seen Sunless comfort her before. She hated this. Hated seeing Cassie suffer, hated feeling powerless to fix it. She searched for words, for something to say. But they wouldn't come.
So she turned to Sunny.
He always had something to say.
"Hey… hey, Cassie." His voice was calm, steady. "I understand. You don't need to feel guilty about it."
Cassie's head snapped toward him, her wet, red-rimmed eyes wide with surprise. That was not what she expected. She thought he would tell her she had made a mistake, that she needed to make up for it.
Sunny held her gaze, unfazed. "It must have been hard for you. But let me tell you something about fate." He leaned back slightly, his tone lighter, almost casual. "The rune for 'fate' has never been translated by a reliable source. So we don't actually know if it even means fate the way we think of it."
Cassie blinked. "But… the spell?"
"The spell isn't exactly a perfect translation tool, Cassie." Sunny smirked faintly. "Did you know that the rune for 'destiny'—which should be interchangeable with fate—can also translate to choice?" He shrugged. "But the spell doesn't translate deeper meanings. It just approximates. Think about it. It's another language entirely, one we barely understand. There's no guarantee it's a one-to-one match."
Something in Cassie's expression shifted. A slight unwinding of tension. Nephis exhaled, relieved. It seemed Sunny was getting through to her.
But Sunny wasn't done.
"And even if it does mean fate," he continued, his voice taking on that familiar, knowing edge, "I'll let you in on two little secrets I've learned about it." His smirk deepened, as if he was telling a joke only he found amusing.
Nephis watched Cassie lean in slightly, hooked.
"The first?" Sunny held up a finger. "Everything has a flaw. Even gods. The dead gods are dead for a reason. And in my first Nightmare…" His expression darkened for a fraction of a second. "I learned that even death has a way around it."
Nephis stiffened. He was telling something about his first Nightmare. Something most Sleepers guarded with their lives.
Cassie's lips parted, stunned.
Sunny barely paused before holding up a second finger. "The second thing… and this one's important, okay? You really need to keep this a secret."
Cassie nodded, transfixed.
"Just like fate, Weaver was fickle," he murmured. "That was something I picked up. Julius,my teacher ,He mentioned the Deamon once—casually, while interviewing me about the Shadow God. But that's not the important part." His eyes glinted. "The important part is that people in the Dream Realm have been calling fate fickle for a very long time. And what does that mean?"
Cassie swallowed hard. "...That it can change?"
Sunny grinned. "Exactly. Also, you don't need to tell us every single vision you have. I mean, I don't tell you every nightmare creature we avoid thanks to me, right? Just do what you think is right."
"*"
Training, fighting, hiding, and running.
That had been the rhythm of their days as they pushed toward the Bone Ridge. Repetitive, brutal, and unrelenting. If Sunny had been the kind to tempt fate, he might've complained about how dull it was getting—but he wasn't an idiot. The moment you called it easy, the world bit back.
He and Nephis had grown bolder with each passing skirmish. With his Echo shadowing Cassie like a silent wraith, watching over her without rest, he could fight freely. *[Twins Bane]*, a third-tier weapon, allowed him to cut from a distance with terrifying force. It made them untouchable when paired with Nephis' precision. Not much could stand in their way. And thanks to *[A Stubborn Legacy]*, Sunny was gathering shadow fragments even when he didn't land the final blow—just a scratch was enough to earn his share.
They'd covered a shocking amount of ground in just over a week and a half.
Cassie, riding steady, shifted slightly. "Did those centipedes show up?" she asked, puzzled by her steed's sudden halt.
Through their time in the labyrinth, they had come to learn that scavengers weren't the only nightmares lurking in the crimson forest. During the night, horrors hid within the reef's twisting structures. But by day, they came out to feed—each one more grotesque than the last. There were colonies of intelligent, carnivorous worms that tunneled beneath the black mud and attacked from below. Flowers that lured prey close with beauty before strangling them with blood-hungry vines. And worst of all, a massive two-headed spider, squishy and gleaming, that had ambushed them like a living nightmare.
Sunny still felt itchy just remembering it.
**[You have slain an Awakened Monster: Thrashing Swarm.]**
**[Your shadow grows stronger.]**
**Shadow Fragments: [176/1000]**
Not a bad haul. Between that and the Memories Nephis had received, it could almost be called a success.
"No," Sunny grumbled. "The spell just said I killed a Thrashing Swarm."
Cassie tilted her head. "Did you get anything?"
His jaw tightened. "No."
The frustration in his voice was thick enough to choke on. Despite the spell acknowledging his contributions—crediting him for most of the kills—he hadn't received a single damn Memory.
Nephis, of course, had scored *two*.
The first had come from the nightmare spider. A strange, translucent web that shimmered with faint power. She said it was a tool—stretchy, sticky, and possibly useful in some kind of trap. They hadn't figured out exactly how to use it yet.
The second had come after a particularly brutal encounter with one of the carnivorous flowers. It had grabbed Nephis with a dozen red tendrils, squeezing and cutting into her armor, feeding off her slowly while she struggled. Cassie had screamed when she heard the tearing sound—but before any of them could react, Neph ignited the flower in a sudden blaze. The thing died with a shriek, and when the flame vanished, she stood in the smoke, free. In return, the spell had rewarded her with a weapon: a set of wicked Bagh Nakh, claw-like blades that slipped over her pointer and pinky fingers, with three curved edges pointing outward.
The weapon was unnervingly effective—every strike seemed to draw flesh toward it, the steel pulling like it was thirsty. Best of all, it didn't get in the way of her swordplay.
Sunny had been fuming ever since.
Cassie could feel his annoyance radiating off him, which made it all the more satisfying when she turned her head and said, in a sing-song voice, "Aww, if you keep sulking like that, Sunny, you're going to go home empty-handed."
He could practically hear the grin on her face.
Changing the subject, she added, "Anyway… once we get filthy rich, I'm going to buy myself a house. No—scratch that—I'm going to have one built. From scratch. It's going to have a bath so huge, you could swim laps in it. Maybe even waterfalls. Oh! And one of those soap dispensers that never run out."
Sunny raised an eyebrow. "That's oddly specific."
Still he understood why her head went there, they all were covered in blood,grime,sweat and mud. They needed to shower.
"It's a dream," she said proudly. "I'm allowed to be specific."
He chuckled. "I'm just going to buy one of those little heated tables."
Cassie sounded genuinely disappointed. "That's it?"
Sunny shrugged. "Of course not. That's just the start.picture this, I'm going to buy my own amusement park. One that only I'm allowed to enter, so I never have to wait in a line again."
Cassie giggled. "Why do I *actually* believe you'd do that?"
"Because I'm the most honest man in the world," he replied smugly. "Two worlds, even."
Their laughter carried across the crimson forest, bright and out of place against the unnatural silence of the labyrinth. But they didn't care. The blood, the shadows, the horrors ahead—none of it could touch this moment.
They planned to reach the Bone Ridge by evening.
For now, they had time to laugh. Time to dream.
Time to just be.
'*'
Alice was picking at her fang again, one claw delicately scraping along the edge like she was trying to floss with a dagger. She looked very tragic and very cute about it. The gigantic, rotting remains of a leviathan sprawled around her like some kind of *gross gothic Staiey*—seriously, the kind that charges cleaning fees but still smells like wet socks and sea trauma.
The Mist swirled all dramatic around her like it thought it was in a music video. She gave it a side-eye. It was not serving.
Her boredom had reached maximum saturation. Like, if you bottled her current vibe and gave it a scent, it'd be called *Eau de Existential Yawn*.
*"If I get any more bored, I'm gonna just lay down and let the rot eat me. At least that would be interesting,"* she thought with a sigh so heavy it could've fogged up a mirror. If there was a mirror. Which there wasn't, and honestly? That was, like, the *real* tragedy here.
She flopped dramatically on a rib the size of a fancy chaise lounge and stared up into the misty nothing. Her nails were chipped. Her hair was doing things it should not. And the only thing that sparkled was her sheer will to remain adorable in this trash zone.
The first two nights here? Total disaster. Full-on sobbing, sniffling into Puffy's soft, marshmallowy floof, whispering tragic things about how unfair the universe was and how she missed bath bombs. No signal. No snacks. No serotonin.
But then—because she's, like, actually amazing—she got it together. Spent three whole days turning the nasty leviathan corpse into her own cozy lil corpse-core hideout. It wasn't a castle, but it was home. With bones! Chic in a deeply haunted kind of way.
After that? Survival mode, baby. She let Puffy do his cute little adventures while she kept the nest safe like a responsible queen with main character energy.
But now?
Now she was back in the claws of pure, unfiltered boredom.
So she did what any chronically cute girl in an apocalypse would do: opened her runes and read them again for, like, the sixteenth time. Maybe seventeenth. Whatever. Runes didn't judge.
---
**Name: Alice**
**True Name: ——-**
**Rank: Dreamer.**
**Soul Core: Dormant.**
**Soul Fragments: [ 470/1000]**
**Memories: [Evening grace], [Essens of ecstasy] [passion of the night]**
**Attributes: [Missed] [Veilborne tithe] [Hunter]**
**Aspect: [Mistres from the Mist].**
**Aspect Rank: Awakened**
**Aspect Description:**
*A noble lady, trapped within the mist-veiled walls of her manor, moved through her world as though it were a silent prison. Yet, though bound by its fog, her spirit remained untamed. She faced each challenge with quiet dignity, her pride unbroken as she pierced the mist with a grace that would not be denied. In time, she knew the fog would lift, and her heart,yearning for a true home,would be free.*
**Aspect Ability: [Lady of the House].**
**Aspect Ability Description:** the denizens of the Manor shall be at your beck and call.
**Flaw: [Heart of a Beldam ].**
**Flaw Description:** *Your denizens are beloved.*
---
With a rustle and a shiver, she adjusted her cloak—[Evening Grace], thank-you-very-much—which fell in soft, glowy layers all the way to her ankles. It shimmered like forest mist and luxury spa lighting, shifting from green to gold to rainforest dream depending on how she moved. Honestly, it was doing *more* to keep her alive than her actual survival instincts.
*"This would go sooo good with my Lusher's pink polish," she thought, wiggling her fingers and sighing at the tragic state of her manicure. Every chipped edge was a personal betrayal.
Her skin? Sad. Dry. Parched like a forgotten lip gloss. And her hair—ugh. Dull brown, zero bounce, full flop.
She held up a limp strand and pouted at it like it owed her money.
"Okay, so like, bleach again? Or maybe pastel pink? Or silver-glow-princess vibes with a bit of glitter on the ends? Ugh, this is a crisis."
She was spiraling fast into a full glam-related breakdown when Puffy bonked into her like a fluffy cannonball. He was the size of a baby and roughly the consistency of a sentient marshmallow, so the impact wasn't dangerous—but it was very dramatic.
"Oof—Puffy! Baby, what are you—"
Before she could finish the sentence, he was flapping and squeaking and basically panic-vibing all over the place. That's when she saw them.
Shapes. Four of them. Moving through the mist with serious we're not here for skincare tips energy.
She blinked. Then squeaked. Then ran.
"Okayokayokayokay!" she gasped, scooping up Puffy like an emergency handbag and making a beeline for the nearest hidey-hole. The gap between two of the leviathan's massive teeth yawned open like a smile that knew too much, and she dove in without hesitation, her cloak flaring behind her like an animated magical girl transformation moment.
Inside, it was dark and damp and totally un-chic—but it was safe.
She pressed herself into the shadows, holding Puffy tight like a sparkly little teddy bear.
*"You are so getting a treat. Like, a whole snack altar. Or a tiara. Ooh! A snack-dispensing tiara!"*
The shapes passed outside, slow and creepy and drippy. But Alice? She was holding it together. Kinda.
Still, even curled up in the jawbone of doom, she made it look cute.