Adele was afraid, and despite his brain screaming the warning Uncle David had said to him before throwing him in the darkness again and again, he couldn't be not afraid. After all, how could he when the eerie darkness around him was making his heart jump out any second.
'Breathe Adele… breathe...breathe..'
Adele tried to take a deep breath, while his heartbeat threatened to touch insane numbers. Still he tried to breathe. But alas it did little to calm his frying nerves, when suddenly he felt cold hands touching his panicking heart, along with unlistenable murmurs being whispered into his ears.
Poor youngster's brain grasped at anything it could remember to quell the feeling of approaching death in despair. Fear had crippled him, one emotion that had spiraled out of his control and now magnified so much so that now it was gnawing back at his sanity. But amidst such horror his thoughts were reigning free, still working subconsciously to help him mitigate harm.
'Remember Adele, Dream walking is as dangerous as you can think it could be. So reigning in your emotions is the hardest but foremost step in the process.
Don't let your heart and mind react to anything as Dream realm will manage to expand it several folds. When you fear it, it will spawn horrors beyond your comprehension upon you. You will hate it, it will spawn creatures capable of wringing out your hatred till what remains behind is husk and so on.
It will feed on you, Adele. Dream Realm feeds on your emotions till there is nothing left or…there is no one left to feed on.
We Dream walkers have to balance this act of feeding, by giving it just enough emotions to sustain your survival till you reach your destination or objective to the point where you have to display complete apathy to ensure your safety. Dream realm is no man's land, and we should treat it the same way by never underestimating it.
Remember….always remember…what is around you is always less dangerous than the realm itself. Though sometimes it may appear otherwise, the passive rejection of the dream realm will always win over the acute danger of any creature inhabiting it.
There is no safe space. There is no break to catch, so practice as much you can to control yourself before you start walking. With time, maintaining a mask over your emotions will become your second nature.'
Adele suddenly opened his eyes and nearly fainted as he found a bleeding eyeball as large as himself that was bleeding black ink like blood just a few centimeters before him, likely observing him. His throat choked, but this time he showed unbelievable resolve to not react as he tried to calm his heartbeat down.
Humans are fantastic creatures, one thing they have above others is - insane adaptability when their lives are in danger. Just like living in hell regularly will make a human feel at home in literal hell after sometime, Adele too managed to calm down a little after passage of a few minutes sitting there half-paralyzed.
His heartbeat began to slow down as he stared down at the interactive eyeball before him. Slowly getting over his initial shock, his other senses began to come back to him. First thing he observed was darkness…absolute darkness wrapped around him like he was sitting in the deepest underground cavern where sunlight never breached in centuries.
The eyeball in front of him took a hint and floated back a little giving Adele a little breathing room. It was now, his brain once again began to work according to his will rather than subconscious stirring, making his thoughts under his control again. And first thing he thought was to reassure himself,
'Relax Adele. Relax. It's just my first time. That's why it is looking so scary. I was just not prepared to walk into it. It's easy now I can rest… '
While Adele was slowly getting himself back on his figurative mental feet, he simultaneously began to slowly inch back from the eyeball grabbing the chance that it was no longer looking interested in him. To his relief, the eyeball was beginning to float towards another direction.
Adele was almost over the initial shock, thinking that the worst was already over as he had already got a hold on his emotions but alas he forgot the most important warning written in the rulebook of Umbra Collective, though he may have never read it before.
'Never relax, and underestimate the Dream Realm as it is waiting for you to think so. Dream realm is No Man's land, and it is waiting for you to forget it, even just for a moment.'
Just as Adele raised a death flag by convincing himself that it isn't that bad and he was going to survive this cleanly if he just remained huddled here in the corner without thinking too much about…..
A long black cloth like Shadow having two protruding white human hands with three fingers coiled unseen in the darkness, behind unsuspecting Adele. He who was trying to empty his mind according to the directions of his uncle was completely blind to the thing floating behind him till the last moment…until it was too late.
With a start Adele froze as he felt something brushing his back, a frightful thing was he felt a human skin touch on his back despite him wearing two layers of clothes. Whatever it was, it was caressing him directly, touching his skin through his clothes like they were not even there.
Adele felt chill climbing up his spine as he was aware that there couldn't be a human here but the sensation of his skin on the back was giving him a clear notion that it was a human fingertips that was touching him.
This time Adele wasn't as lucky as before when he found a neutral large Eyeball as his first encounter. It was clearly a hostile creature this time and before he could even scream. The soft touch became sharp immediately, and pierced right through his body to possess his body. His soul shuddered as never before felt cold brushed against it. Last thought before everything froze in his mind was….
'Hot! It is getting hot.'
*****************************
'Cold… No, hot.. Is it cold? No, I can feel my body burning up… Am I burning?'
Just as this thought floated in the mind of Adele, he saw an almost real vision of red flames lunging at him like an open maw of serpent.
Adele woke up with a start, his body drenched in sweat as he nearly screamed but instinctively shutting his mouth upon realizing that scream could be fatal in here.
'In here?... In here.. '
Memories came flooding back but to his dismay they were fractured heavily. He couldn't even make heads or tails out of them…just like a dream even now details were getting fuzzy by each passing second. Until the end, only thing he remembered was he was scared as f*ck in there and finally something tried to attack him and then he blacked out.
Adele felt another pang of mild panic upon recalling half details but soon relaxed after looking around and finding he was in a familiar room.
It was his own bedroom, in his flat where he lives with his uncle. But as he thought back to what happened before he lost his consciousness, he hurriedly jumped out of the bed and checked his body and only relaxed upon finding nothing wrong.
"Did uncle save me? Or I am still in there having hallucinations… "
Before he could spook himself with his own overthinking, the door to his room opened and a woman walked in with worry etched on her face. She was holding an ice pack in her hands and was shocked upon seeing Adele standing there in his room.
"Aunt!? "
"Thank god." Mercy heaved a sigh of relief as she visibly relaxed. She walked to him and pulled Adele to sit back on the bed while hugging him. Suddenly, frown replaced her relaxed expression as she put her hand on the forehead of Adele.
"Why are you standing up? Your body is burning with fever, so much so that I have already called your friend to mark you on leave today."
But as she felt his forehead, she frowned more.
"Huh, no fever? You seem alright now? Just a few minutes you were… "
Adele shook himself out of her grip and instead asked quickly,
"Aunt, how did I come back? Uncle took me back?Is.. Is uncle all right? "
There was a flutter of tension on her face, but she quickly subdued it and showed an annoyed expression.
"Your Uncle… He had gone and injured himself in some beast attack. Don't worry though, he is all right. He is at the organization getting patched up.
You were picked up by Mike as he found you in the Dream Realm, knocked out of wits in the corner. You could have been dragged away or possessed for all we know. I had already warned David…. No, we have discussed this. I won't be talking about this anymore."
Adele put aside his worry about his uncle in relief, mentally noting to ask him about Werewolf when he will come back. But right now he put up his best puppy expression as he held her hand in his grip. He apologized profusely for his Uncle but his Aunt was still adamant as she refused to let his pleadings affect her. In the end, she stood up and gave an angry glance to Adele, making him shut up.
"We have already fought over this issue yesterday night. But your uncle is not ready to listen to me. So I will be staying put on my decision of not talking about it anymore. You both can do whatever you want to do. Go and jump into Vampire Lair for all I care now."
Before Adele could say something, she suddenly glanced at the watch on Adele's wrist and commented while starting to walk back to the kitchen.
"It's still half an hour till the start of your first class. Run if you don't want to miss your first lecture after summer break."
Adele knew that making her Aunt forget her anger is impossible in the short term, moreover with today's shenanigans with both him and Uncle getting injured, it has gotten more tricky. She isn't a typical normal aunt as she is well aware of the supernatural world, not only that she is quite a participating member of this world.
In Fact she is relatively famous in her own circle as an adventurous Human sorceress who is capable of tracking things to the deepest layer of hell if she is determined. She kind of worked as a Paranormal Seeker before getting married. Now she is semi-retired and takes it somewhat easy.
Adele was introduced to her long before Aunt and David were even a thing and fortunately both have hit off since start. At that time no more than six times she had taken him to the adventures behind the back of Uncle David, that were dangerous in their own right. Therefore one thing he was sure of - that if he ever got lost in the Dream realm, she could track him without any error.
But despite her own thrill seeking nature, she was quite resistive of making Adele learn Dream walking by himself with his Uncle. She was against getting him embroiled in the supernatural world without protection and professional guidance from the organization like Umbra Collective who train Newbies with proper channels.
Adele and David desperately wanted her to see things from their side, but she was not easily convinced.