Yeaia's consciousness drifted, unmoored in the vastness of slumber. The transition was seamless—one moment, they were closing their eyes in the Sea of Ruins, and the next, they were somewhere else entirely. A world woven from the remnants of thoughts, desires, and the echoes of what once was.
They stepped forward, feeling the shift beneath their feet. The ground wasn't solid in the way reality was. It pulsed with something ephemeral, shifting between textures as if unsure of its own nature. One step felt like walking on polished marble; the next, it was as soft as mist. The air carried a strange weight, thick with whispers and distant laughter.
Yeaia glanced around. The dreamscape stretched endlessly, a mixture of sprawling corridors, vast plains of color that bled into the sky, and towering structures that defied conventional architecture. Some were familiar—fragments of places from their incomplete memories—while others were wholly alien.
Is this... the joined dream? Yeaia thought, reaching out toward a nearby floating staircase. It twisted in on itself, leading nowhere and everywhere all at once.
A pulse ran through them. A sensation of recognition, yet without clarity.
I have been here before... haven't I?
They began their exploration, moving through the dream as if guided by an unseen force. Every so often, they'd glimpse flickers of figures in the periphery—faceless forms drifting in and out of existence, echoes of people who had once dreamed here. Some reached out, but their hands passed through Yeaia like wisps of smoke.
Memories surfaced in fragments. The Sea of Ruins. A battlefield where gods clashed. The remnants of divinity left behind, staining reality itself. A power that came from someone called The Ancient Sun God. The power of the Evernight Goddess saturating the night, twisting the dream world into something both alluring and perilous.
I know these things, Yeaia realized, a thrill of unease curling in their gut. But why do I remember them now? How do I know this? Was I involved? Or.....
A thought stirred. The deeper one ventured into the dream world, the closer they came to forgotten truths.
Is that why I'm here?
They continued on, letting the dream guide them.
'I hope that wherever this dream will lead me, I can get some answers...or at least some kind of knowledge of what I really am...'
---
The Black Cloister
Time passed in an indistinct blur. At some point, Yeaia reached a vast black cloister, its corridors endless, its doors countless. They hesitated before one, feeling the pulse of something powerful beyond it.
A whisper curled around their thoughts: "Step through, and see."
'Does this thing think I'm a fool? Why would I even try to look? I may be curious but not that much...being somewhat 'born' only today doesn't mean I'm naive...' they lampooned.
They turned away. The dream itself was sentient in its own way, teasing them, testing them. Instead of opening the door, they continued deeper into the cloister, their footsteps barely making a sound against the dream-warped stone.
As they moved, the walls shifted. Scenes played out in the periphery of their vision—shadowy silhouettes acting out past events like echoes left behind. Some were mundane: A sailor muttering a prayer before sleeping, a noblewoman whispering secrets to an unseen presence. Others were more... disturbing.
A figure kneeling before an altar, eyes hollow, lips moving in silent devotion to something unseen.
A man screaming, clutching his head as golden light bled from his eyes.
A child laughing, her form distorting, stretching into something that should not be.
A woman dressed in ceremonial robes, standing atop a spire, her arms outstretched as an unseen force pulled at her very essence, unraveling her thread by thread.
Yeaia stopped, staring as the visions flickered and faded.
What happened in this place? Everything feels and looks eerie and scary...
They reached a door unlike the others. It was larger, older, carved with symbols that pulsed faintly with golden light. They reached for it instinctively, but the moment their fingers brushed the surface, an overwhelming force pushed them back. A distorted voice rang out in their mind, incomprehensibly yet filled with weight.
They gasped, stumbling away. A boundary... No, a prison?
Something was sealed here.
And the dream did not want them to see it.
'But why...?'
---
They took another step, and suddenly, the dream shifted.
A flood of sensation. Voices. Light. The scent of salt and something burning.
Yeaia gasped as their surroundings changed. No longer in the cloister, they found themselves standing in the midst of a vast battlefield—one they instinctively knew was long past. The Sea of Ruins, not as they had seen it, but as it had been during the Cataclysm.
Flashes of divine power tore through the sky, crashing against the ocean and carving the land into the wreckage it had become. Gods fought here. Their remnants lingered still, twisting the very fabric of reality.
A figure stood at the center of it all, bathed in radiance, their form indistinct yet overwhelming. An ancient presence, a power lost to time. Their voice rang in Yeaia's mind, distant yet familiar:
"Remember."
Pain lanced through their skull. They fell to their knees, clutching their head as fragments of something—memories?—poured into them. Names they did not know, places they had never seen, emotions they could not explain.
Then, as suddenly as it came, the vision shattered.
They were back in the cloister, panting.
'I'm remembering... but why now? Why here?'
'If I'm remembering all of this...does that mean I was really involved in that fight? No...that doesn't seem to be the case...' their head is still throbbing from the pain as they rubbed their temples.
'Let's stop thinking about this and just continue exploring, thinking too much won't give me any answers..' Yeaia sighed.
---
They steadied themself and continued forward.
Then, a flicker of movement caught their eye.
A figure.
At the far end of the dreamscape, half-shrouded in mist and shadows.
Yeaia stilled, their breath catching. Something about this person pulled at them, a deep curiosity sparking in their chest. The way they moved—deliberate, yet weightless—suggested they did not belong to the dream. Not entirely.
Was this another dreamer? A shade left behind? Or something else entirely?
They took a cautious step closer, but the figure turned ever so slightly, as if sensing them.
Yeaia froze. 'Oh..'
'I should probably hide for now...'
Instead of revealing themself, they chose to remain hidden, watching, waiting.
The dream had yet to reveal its secrets, and Yeaia was in no hurry to disrupt its flow.
For now, they will observe.
And soon, they would understand.