The village of Ravin lay in uneasy silence, the faint glow of dawn brushing the horizon like a promise half-kept. But for Lior, the calm was a lie. Beneath the surface of this fragile peace, something rotten pulsed and spread like a sickness, seeping into every corner of his waking world.
Mira and Rhéa stood at his side in the clocktower's highest chamber, watching the village with guarded eyes. The black glass shard lay between them, a fragile thread to a dream long forgotten.
---
"It's spreading faster," Mira said, voice taut with worry. "The shadows creeping through the streets aren't just echoes anymore. They're real."
Lior nodded, the weight in his chest growing heavier. The boy who looked like him—the shadow-boy—had disappeared after last night's confrontation, but the damage remained. Buildings flickered in and out of existence, people's memories blurred, and the very fabric of Ravin seemed to unravel.
"How do we stop it?" Lior asked, voice low but fierce.
Rhéa shook her head. "We can't. Not without waking Elara. She's the source — the First Dreamer — and the only one who can mend the fractures. But to reach her, you have to step fully into the dream."
Lior's heart pounded. "What does that mean?"
"It means," Mira said, "you'll leave the safety of waking. You'll enter the raw, endless dreamscape, where nothing obeys the rules of reality. Where your deepest fears—and hopes—can shape everything. And where the Bleeding One waits, hungry for a soul to consume."
---
Lior swallowed hard, the chill of the unknown creeping up his spine. But he didn't hesitate.
"I have to try."
---
The clocktower's ancient gears turned once more, grinding softly as a portal shimmered into existence—a swirling mirror of shadow and light.
Steeling himself, Lior stepped forward.
The world dissolved.
He fell through a void where colors danced and twisted unpredictably, where time bent and stretched like a living thing. Faces flickered in the mist—some kind, some lost, some twisted by despair.
And then, a whisper called his name.
"Lior..."
He turned to see Elara, her eyes sad but steady.
"You came."
---
Together, they journeyed through the fractured dreamscape. Everywhere they went, echoes of the Bleeding One's corruption gnawed at the edges—a sickness that consumed hope and fed on fear.
"Every world born of a dream," Elara explained, "faces this darkness. It's the price of creation. But it's also the key to its undoing."
Lior listened, desperate to believe.
---
Suddenly, a wave of black shadow surged toward them, a living void that swallowed light and sound.
The Bleeding One had found him.
It reached out with tendrils of darkness, whispering his worst fears: failure, loneliness, loss.
But Lior stood firm.
"This world matters," he said, voice echoing through the dreamscape. "I believe in it. I believe in the people I love. I won't let you win."
The shadows shrieked, recoiling, but did not vanish.
Elara touched his shoulder.
"Your belief is the strongest weapon you have. But it's not enough. You need to remember why you dream."
---
Lior closed his eyes again.
Memories flooded in — laughter with his friends, the warmth of sun on his skin, the promise of tomorrow.
He opened his eyes with renewed determination.
"We fight," he said. "Not because the world is perfect, but because it's ours."
The Bleeding One snarled, retreating into the dark.
---
Back in Ravin, the village began to heal—the cracks mending, the shadows receding.
Mira smiled, hope blooming in her eyes.
Rhéa turned to Lior.
"This is only the beginning."