I tried to utter a scream but my body was frozen. The crack has enlarged as the portal completely formed, a nightmarish figure crawled out. It was a monster with a head of a woman, long jet black hair drape over its head, dark holes where its eyes should be gaze upon me like the darkest abyss it had no nose making its face a little flat, other than its hollow eyes what remained was a wide smile creepily out of proportions, the lack of teeth or lips could be seen clearly on the monster's features, instead a singular large eye crimson in color could be seen inside its everlasting smiling mouth. It slowly crawled out of the portal, my eyes went wide when I saw the body of the monster. Its torso was long, longer than my room, its hair grew on its back like a mane of some animal, it spiraled inside my room using its multiple hands as a means to move, four of its limbs nearest to the head was longer than two meters, it was skin and bone as it rested on the monster's body like a praying mantis.
The monster towered above me as I stared at it paralyzed and terrified, the monster also stared at me. I feel like something was crawling out of its hollow eyes beckoning for death. My chest started to hurt as the monster rested its heavy body on me, breathing became difficult, my lungs could not exert their full potential. I could not scream nor complain towards the monster, all I could do was stare at it, at its wide smile and its hollow eyes as it slowly crawled all over me.
The shadow figures stood by the bedside with their glowing eyes staring right at me. I watched as the monster slowly moved its hand unraveling it from its resting position, the cracking of its bones was audible as it echoed inside my small room, it moved its upper right hand towards its mouth and made a shush gesture over its smiling mouth.
Shhhhhhhhh. My eyes became bloodshot as soon as I heard the monster, the rest of its 3 long limbs moved towards my face and covered my nose and mouth. I wanted to shake it off but I could do nothing, my breathing was getting more laborious as I watched the monster slowly suffocate me to death.
I called for En inside my mind, but I knew he could not hear me since En would go to a hibernation state once I return to reality. Yet I uttered for help hoping for something or someone to reach out and help me.
My consciousness was fading, I could see the shadow figures wriggle with glee as they watched the monster slowly suffocate me.
But moments later I felt a sinking feeling, I gasped like a drowning man finally able to breathe. I rolled over to try and swat the monster but when I opened my eyes, I was back on the grassy plains. I looked at my surrounding carefully as I called for En inside my mind.
"En! En, are you here!"
"Phil! thankfully I was successful in bringing you back here or else you might have died."
"Tell me what happened there!"
"I will but you need to calm down first."
I noticed that I was standing ready for a fight, my eyes were bloodshot and my breathing was irregular. En was right if I do not calm down now then I would not understand what had happened to me even if he explained it to me slowly.
I put my hands towards my chest, carefully feeling my heartbeat which was beating quickly. I breathe deeply trying to calm myself and sat down on the grassy plains. And after a few minutes, I was calm.
"I'm calm now. Tell me what had happened to me."
"Okay. What you had experienced was sleep paralysis. A rare occurrence that may happen if you fall asleep."
"That was sleep paralysis? Why do I feel like I was dying and something was out to kill me? And if that's sleep paralysis, I tell you many normal people would be dead after experiencing that."
"Well, that is not normal sleep paralysis. What you saw at the beginning with the shadow figures surrounding you and looking at you as an exhibit is normal to sleep paralysis, after that, a nightmarish creature would appear triggering your flight response making a person have a difficulty in breathing, it is the brain's way to warn your body that something is wrong but it could not point out where it was. But Lucid Divers like you do not suffer from sleep paralysis since Lucid Divers has some control towards dreams strengthening the brain's tolerance towards nightmarish creatures that it may create. What happened to you was an anomaly, the creature you saw was not a figment of your imagination but a denizen of the abyss."
"What do you mean by that?"
"Phil, the danger is coming. Inhabitants of the abyss could not manifest inside the real world, they would vanish in a puff of smoke mere seconds after they exit the abyss, even the plains of sleep reject their presence and they only thrive inside the abyss. I knew something was wrong when you encountered the nightmare origin inside Annie's nightmare. It was only affected by the miasma from the twilight zone, but the strength of that nightmare origin could be classified as a lower-middle-class in terms of its standing in the abyss after it transformed."
"So what you are saying is that that nightmare origin was not a normal one?"
"Yes. You better hurry with what you want to do inside the miasma or else the power from the sextant would not be enough to travel the abyss and search for your friend's mother."
"Do you think that the worsening of Eric's mother's condition is due to the abyss?"
"I'm not sure since we had yet to travel the abyss. But I'm sure that something is wrong with the abyss."
I was listening to En's explanation when the ground started to shake. Earthquake? I thought at first, but I remembered I'm inside my dream and there are no tectonic plates present inside the realm I created.
"En what's happening?"
"I don't know."
After a few seconds, the shaking disappeared.
I looked all around me and saw that everything was normal.
"Check the plains of sleep. I have a bad feeling about this."
En's voice echoed inside my head as I started to relax and dive towards the plains of sleep. I opened my eyes and arrived at the plains of sleep, I looked around me but everything was normal, that's when I heard En's voice shouting inside my head.
"Look below you! The abyss, its, somethings wrong with it."
I looked down towards the abyss and saw it slowly moving in a circular pattern. I stared at it with disbelief, my jaws were wide open, I gulped as I looked at the abyss.
A huge maelstrom, formed inside the abyss. The miasma swirled as the eye was getting bigger, purple lightning zapped out of its center. I covered my ears as deep rumbling came from the abyss, it shook the whole plains due to its low rumbling, explaining the earthquake inside my dream.
The eye of the maelstrom was getting deeper as it was getting larger, the volume of the low rumbling became stronger, as I stared dumbfounded at what was happening. I could see various nightmares origin inside the wall of the maelstrom's eye, the deeper I look, the bigger and stranger they become. Spider-like nightmare origins like the one inside Annie's nightmare could be seen in droves inside the middle part of the wall of the maelstrom, nightmare origins like the one I saw trying to suffocate me can be seen floating inside the deeper part of the abyss.
I could see the bottom of the abyss now as the maelstrom had grown big enough to uncover what was on the floor of the abyss. The deep rumbling echoed once more as I felt my stomach churning, my head was getting dizzy as blood came out of my eyes and ears. I screamed for En but even I knew he was also in pain, his screams did not help relieve my pain as I wished for the rumbling to stop.
I was convinced that my mind was going to break, that my soul would die never to return to reality again when the sound of heavy chains was suddenly heard.
The low rumbling was replaced by an anguished scream, it was only for a moment but I could feel intense hate coming from the scream as its plans were ruined by the sound of the heavy chains. The miasma came crushing down towards the hole made by the eye of the maelstrom, the nightmare origins that were affected by the event were crushed by the sheer pressure of the miasma, the others that had escaped devoured those who were unfortunate as the abyss started to go back to normal.
I watched as the abyss returned to its former self. The miasma was billowing like a cloud of black smoke. Screams, snarls and growls from different nightmare origins could be heard as the abyss slowly calmed down. And after a few minutes, everything was quiet once again.