I spent the whole evening thinking about how to save my dad. Olympus was going through his memories, trying to find the spell for the shabti spell.
As I lay on my bed and anxiety washed over me in waves and I couldn't stand it anymore.
"Olympus, are you there?" I called out telepathically and he hissed.
"Tch-I told you not to interfere with me during this period. What I'm doing is delicate "
"Huh? Will you blame me? I have a huge fight coming up this night and you expect me to just lie down and do nothing." I complained flailing my arms around
"Oh, I forgot to tell you in order to seal the vengeful ghosts, we need to enter the plane where they are most powerful."
"What plane is that?"
This was starting to sound dangerous.
"Think of it, the ghosts can't attack your dad in the physical realm, so where do you think they can do that?"
It suddenly clicked
"In the dream realm!"
No wonder he complained of them attacking him in his sleep. Their attacks in the dream psych was manifesting in the physical realm.
"You get it now? And there's still one issue though."
Olympus said with a concerned look on his face.
"What's the problem?"
"For you to enter the dream world, you need the sand of Morpheus."
"Huh? Tell me you're kidding, please. " I said in an amused tone but Olympus wasn't laughing "Wait, are you serious? I thought the sand thing was just for the movie."
Olympus sighed.
"Apparently, it's not. The sand should probably still be in the dream realm. But the problem is, the dream realm isn't what it used to be anymore. It's now filled with wraiths and nightmares."
I almost peed myself listening to him. But this is something I need to do to protect my dad.
"So, how do I get to the dream realm? "
"I can take you there." Olympus said dryly "Once I finish getting the spell."
He forcefully disconnected the psychic connection and I was alone again on my bed. I stood up and began walking around the room. I checked my time and it was 7:00 p.m. My dad sleeps by 9:00 p.m, which means I had to get to the sand in two hours.
As I was pacing around the room, my mom called me that dinner was ready and I went down to eat.
"You seem restless, what's the problem?" My dad asked not taking his eyes away from his food.
How did he even… never mind.
"Nothing much really. I was just thinking about today and what you did to that man."
"No assassination talks at the dinner table, please." My mom cut in looking slightly annoyed.
"Oh sorry, I forgot about that rule." I bowed slightly.
After dinner, I went outside to meet my dad as he was leaning on the rail of the veranda.
"You see this ring I'm putting on?" My dad said raising his right index finger. "It has a small blade if you push it out"
He demonstrated and pushed the pointy blade out.
"You stabbed him to death with that little thing?" I asked feeling confused.
"Of course not. Don't be ridiculous. This blade is coated with a poison that has been in our family for Generations. It's a lethal killer. One small scratch can cause ventricular tachycardia which eventually leads to ventricular fibrillation and results in cardiac arrest."
"Um… Okay?" I pretended as though I knew what he was talking about.
"This cardiac arrest kills within one minute. In a place like a street, the chances of finding a doctor is zero to none."
Wow, my dad really thought this through, didn't he?"
"What kind of poison kills someone that instantly just from a scratch?"
"That poison is made by combining lethal poisons from different animals and catalyzing them with a certain compound."
My head was already spinning from the Plenty chemistry and biology.
"So does this poison have a name?"
"Yes, it does. It's a name you are very familiar with." My dad said with a nasty smile on his face. Scary!
"Huh, what name is that? "
"Ashiadite… Ash for short."
Eh? what? Eh?
"W-What? You named me after a poison?"
My shock knew no bounds. I remember telling you guys that you shouldn't ask what Ash was short for, that's because I didn't know myself. I've asked countless times but no one would tell me. It was a sour topic for my mom anytime I try to bring it up. Who would be happy to name their son after a lethal poison?
My dad's stretched himself and started walking into the house. When he reached the door, he stopped.
"I gave you that name because I wanted you to be as lethal as the poison. Although you haven't shown me any such qualities yet, there is still hope for you."
He walked into the house.
Eh?
At that moment, a voice called out in my mind.
"Ash, can you hear me?"
"Olympus?"
"Finally, I got through to you. What the hell have you been doing?" He sounded a bit annoyed.
"I just got the worst revelation of my life." I said absent-mindedly.
"That can come later. I'm done with the preparations. We have an hour left before your dad goes to sleep."
"Huh…." I replied distantly.
"Hey fool, pull yourself together! The land of dreams is not a place where you can enter absent-mindedly. If you go there unprepared, the nightmares will rip you apart piece by piece till there's nothing left of you.
The thought of that alone was enough to bring me back to my senses.
"Sorry, how do we go about it?"
"Are you going to stand here? Let's go to your room where it's more private."
I went back to my room and closed the door so that no one can come in till I'm done with whatever I was about to do.
"Okay, what's next?"
"Once you lie down and close your eyes, I'll transport the both of us to the dream realm. But know that from the dream realm, we'll be entering your dad's dream psych directly."
"Okay, I'm ready."
"Are you though?" Olympus rolled his eyes.
"Fine! I'm not ready! Who in their right senses will be ready for something like this? Stuff like this only happen in movies."
This time I really had an outburst. What have I gotten myself into?
"Ash time is ticking. If we are going to do this, it has to be now."
"Alright then, let's get this business over with." I said trying to sound confident, but I was squeaking in my boots.
I laid down on my bed and closed my eyes. Olympus placed his hands on my forehead. The world around me started spiraling into nothingness and I almost lost my stomach somewhere along the line. Oh I forgot, It's my subconscious traveling, not my actual body.
In no time, we arrived in a land of ruins. It looks as though a great cataclysm occured here.
"This place looks awful." I said, feeling sad about the environment.
"Yeah, when the age of the gods ended, a lot of things went wrong." Olympus said in a low tone,
"Wait! If my body is empty right now, what's to stop and evil spirit from possessing me?" I asked in panic.
"You are just realizing that now?" Olympus placed his hand on his temple and sighed "Don't worry, I put a barrier over you. Nothing is going to possess you."
I looked around the whole place and marveled. The dream world puts the laws of physics to shame because gravity was off in so many ways.
"I'd like to get this over with quickly and get out of here. Where do we start?"
"There used to be a palace here, but with the way things are right now, I don't think it will still be standing." Olympus said, and thought for a while, "Maybe the ruins of the palace is still around, follow me."
I followed Olympus as we walked through the barren land. At some point, I felt as though we are being watched, but I dismissed it as my imagination. After what felt like hours of walking, we arrived at what seems to be the ruins of a once magnificent palace.
"Whoa! These stone pillars are huge!" I exclaimed.
"Yeah, Morpheus was quite the extravagant god." Olympus said in a nostalgic tone.
"So do we start searching the rubbles for the sand?"
Olympus looked at me as though I was crazy.
"What? No. Even if you search from now to the next year, you won't find it."
"Huh? Then how am I supposed to find it?" I asked feeling as though this was a wasted trip. Thank goodness time works differently in the dream realm.
"You have to call out to it and if it finds you worthy, it will come to you."
This sounds like some green Lantern BS.
"How do I call out to it?"
"Use your mind, Ash. The mind is a very powerful tool."
I close my eyes and emptied my thoughts of everything. I learned how to do this because of the meditation lessons my dad usually gave me. As I emptied my thoughts, words started flowing in my mind and I started speaking them out.
I Ash, commands you in the name of the god Morpheus,
reveal yourself to me.
Suddenly the space near the throne started shimmering and a small pouch dropped to the ground. I hurried over to it, and picked it up.
"Now we can get out of—"
Before I could finish my sentence, something knocked me so hard I flew backward and crashed into one of the stone pillars. It literally knocked the wind out of me.
"Ash!" Olympus called after me.
Creatures dressed in tattered black robes were swarming around us in their numbers. Olympus ran to my side and helped me get up.
"W-What are those?" I asked, still struggling to fill my lungs with air.
"Those are nightmares, whatever you do, don't let them sense your fear."
"Stranger who wandered into our world, to what do we owe this pleasure?" They said together in a distorted echoing voice.
"Don't listen to them! We have to get out of here!"
We started running as the nightmares chased after us.
"Leaving so soon? Don't you want to hear about the death of your father?"
I stopped dead in my tracks. At that split second, fear crept into my mind at the mention of my dad.
"Got'cha!" The nightmares said and one of them passed right through me.
It felt as though someone carried me to the top of the north pole and left me there for one month. My whole body was frozen and I couldn't move an inch.
"Ash, no!" Olympus yelled out "I warned you not to listen to them."
The clouds turned dark and the entire landscape was being covered by shadows.
"Oh no! The wraiths are coming!" Olympus cried out.
Apparently, the work of the nightmares is to fill their victims with fear and freeze them in one place for the wraiths to come and suck out their souls.
Creatures that look like the grim reaper with skull faces were flying towards me. All I could do was watch in fear as they flew up to me. Olympus couldn't do anything unless I commanded him to, and right now we were in the dream realm. There was no telepathic conversation.
One of the wraiths held my face and started sucking out something from inside me. They started fighting each other as they took turns sucking the life out of me. My consciousness was fading and I was losing myself in a flash. I felt it was the end and was about to surrender myself when--
"Ash you fool! Have you forgotten what you came here for? Have you forgotten your purpose? Are you going to fall here in a barren land? How pathetic can you get?"
All those questions.
I smiled. Olympus you bastard. Even when trying to motivate someone he still can't use nice words to do them.
"Awaken Olympus." I said softly and immediately, Olympus disappeared and was absorbed into my body "Light of Apollo"
There was a solar outburst from my body. It was as though I released all the sunlight that has been touching my body since I was a child. It burned the nightmares and wraiths away, warming me up and reviving whatever was sucked out of me.
"Ash!" Olympus exclaimed happily.
I poured a bit of the sand from the pouch onto my palm and let it fall to the ground with a clear detail of where I wanted to go. The sand swirled around me and in the blink of an eye, I was gone from the dream realm.