"Phil I think we have gone deep"
I was looking at my surroundings when I heard Eclaireuse's voice echo inside my mind. The golden bubble that once surrounded me by 10 meters has now shrunk to 5 meters, the visibility inside the abyss had gotten worse, the miasma was thicker and the creatures roaming inside of it were getting more significant. Instead of being scared by the golden bubble, some of the nightmare origins were actively trying to weaken it while some were a distance away ready to pounce at me at the time the bubble wears off.
We have gotten to the point where we can see walls heading down towards the deeper abyss. A deep trench that I saw when the maelstrom had formed, merely the beginning of the middle parts of the abyss. Multiple holes on the walls had become home to various strange nightmare origins, they kept the stranded inside to protect it from being stolen by other nightmare origins. I even wondered, what if Eric's mother is stored inside one of these holes, how could we find her.
The abyss rumbles around me signifying its depths, small insistent whispers of madness could be heard even inside the bubble. It whispers to go deeper, to seek truth, and to seek power, it whispers temptation to whoever hears it and be dammed by its false promises. The deeper you go the louder the voices, the more you feel yourself turning into insanity.
I stopped in my tracks the sextant was floating near my chest, a foreboding feeling made me agree to Eclaireuse's suggestion, whatever it is that lives deeper from this point, I am not ready to encounter such creatures.
I turned back and made my way out of the abyss, out from this horrifying mist. The whispers cursed at me for my cowardice, for my inability to go deeper, but I did not mind them. Thanks to Eclaireuse's bubble, the whispers did not affect the way of my thinking, they only produced an annoying buzz inside my head.
The journey out of the miasma this time was thankfully uneventful. It may be due to Eclaireuse's bubble or because of what just happened a week prior when the being that caused the maelstrom was successfully re-contained.
Back inside my dream. I entered Annie's house and rested inside, the sextant, Eclaireuse had expended a large amount of its energy and needed to replenish it. She lay on the table asleep and quite like a normal sextant.
The room was quiet and I was getting a little lonely. Without Eclaireuse to talk to, En's disappearance was being magnified. Then suddenly I heard a voice inside my head.
"It seems you were successful in bringing an artifact inside your dreams, Phil. I congratulate you."
"En? Where have you been?!"
En's voice echoed inside my head, I could not help but smile for the return of my companion.
"I'm sorry for making you worry, but I realized after the maelstrom we had seen inside the abyss, that times are running out. I made a bargain with the being that had given you powers so that you can start learning to control and make your powers your own."
"Really? Then can I start now? As you can see, I am preparing for an expedition to dive deeper inside the abyss. Eric is getting more desperate, I don't know what he will do if I don't at least help him."
"Unfortunately I can't. There will be another being that will teach you and it's not gonna be me. But if your mission is to explore the abyss and not to conquer it, then I can help you with that."
Hearing what En has said made me a little confused at first. Questions like who's going to teach me and how ran inside my head, but by the time En has said that he was able to help me with the expedition, a smile had bloomed on my face. I was not going to depend on my powers in the first place but rather on the bubble that Eclaireuse creates so starting to train now made little difference with my current situation.
"Then can you help me solve some of the problems I had noticed when we were traveling inside the abyss?"
"Sure, ask and I will try to answer to the best of my abilities."
I could picture him smugly standing, his chest puffing out, his hand in a fist on his chest, and his chin up inside my head. It's great having En back and having someone to talk to inside this quiet dream.
"Okay, first things first. I noticed when we went deep into the abyss, the bubble which protected me from the miasma was getting smaller. Do you have a solution so that it won't shrink that much?"
"There are multiple solutions for that problem. One is for the long-term and the other is for the short-term. The long-term solution for that problem is to upgrade the artifact to a higher level, making the artifact's soul force stronger, in that way the barrier will be stronger as well. The short-term solution is that you will provide the artifact with your energy, making the artifact expend much less energy in maintaining the barrier.
"That's another problem En. How can I replenish my energy inside the miasma when I don't have anything to consume. I tried bringing some of the food that was inside the pantry but whenever I go out of my dream they would dissipate in a puff of white smoke"
"Yes, that's what would happen whenever you bring things out inside your dream. Just like the nightmare origins inside the abyss, the plains of sleep dissipate the existence of things that originates inside of your dreams. Only artifacts brought from the real world can remain tangible inside the plains of sleep. That's why I want you to get as many low-level artifacts in the real world and turn it into a battery for you to store your energy so that you can use it in your future expeditions."
"Wait, I can store my energy?"
"Yes, you could."
"Since when?"
"Since the beginning."
"Why didn't you tell me."
"There were no situations that it would prove useful before. That's why I'm only telling you now. And oh, if you're thinking of using this method to store energy so that you can use it in the real world, I'm sorry to say, just like the plains of sleep the real world will erase the artifact into a puff of white smoke whenever it detects your power inside of it."
I was disappointed upon knowing that my plans to use my power stably in the real world were crushed just like that. Then I realized a problem upon hearing what En has said.
"Isn't that bad if ever some of my power will remain on Eclaireuse?"
"It won't be. Artifacts like Eclaireuse had already developed a strong soul and can be considered as part of nature in the real world, just like animals and people. For example, the marble that had sacrificed itself to save you had a budding soul and won't be deleted when a part of your power remains inside of it, but if you infuse your power inside a newly produced marble, it would be deleted if even a little of your power remains whenever you go back to reality."
"Then how can I store a lot of battery whenever I decide to use it to replenish my energy inside the plains of sleep when it will dissipate whenever I return to reality? Do I need to use every battery I made during the time I stayed inside my dream?"
"No, you can leave it inside your dream."
I furrowed my brows, unable to comprehend what En has just said.
"Wait, I can do that? How does that work?"
"As a Lucid Diver, this dream you had created became a part of your soul. You can enter it whenever you want when you are asleep or you can opt not to enter it and experience dreaming in a normal way. But at the time you had encountered the void and created the grassy plains, this dream has already become part of your soul. You are its owner and creator, thus giving you the ability to store things in it however you want on the premise that you can bring it inside your dream of course."
"But how does that work? What will happen to the item that I stored that came from the real world? I noticed that whenever I wake up trying to bring the sextant inside my dreams, it remains in my hand and would not vanish."
"I don't know the rules as well, but it just works I guess. Whenever you want to store it and at the point, you want to store it, the item you want to store inside your dream will just disappear in the real world and be stored inside your soul. And whenever you wake up from your dream, it becomes a part of your soul just like this domain. And that goes whenever you want to get a thing out of your dream. You enter your domain, get the thing you want to return to reality, will it to return, and it will somehow appear in your hands. It's that easy, just don't think on the mechanics on how it works, even I don't know that far."
"Then is there a limit on the things I can store?"
"Of course there are. One, the artifact or thing should be perfectly replicated inside the dream. For example, the notebook you brought last time was an imperfect copy and won't be stored inside the dream. Two, there is a limit on a person's soul force that can fit inside the physical body in the real world. You can't just perfectly replicate a house and store it inside your dream so that you can release it and transfer the physical house into another place. That would result in a heavy burden for your soul and might damage and tear it, so be careful about that. Lastly, for the limit, you can store. The total height of things stacked on each other should not exceed you and the total weight of things should not exceed your weight as well."
"Isn't that too limiting? Unlike the things on novels like storage rings and such, this ability is too complicated."
"It's because you are not using a medium but directly using your soul as a vessel that is why it's too limiting. You can create storage rings whenever you like it when you master your powers so don't be discouraged."
I was happy to hear what En just said. I realized that my power has great potential that I can even create a storage ring in the future. I just need to master my power and practice hard.