I literally did head off to the dreamland.

I have to say that seeing the phoenix statue in front of me, I felt an unprecedented sense of security.

I still remember the shadows from the afternoon, and felt cold. Me with my memory sealed had no idea, but me in this world knew: it was an existence similar to dark spirits, called Umbras, from this world. How could it appear in my world?

And why was it targeting me? Because I am a dream human?

I reflected on it until Lex appeared a few minutes later.

The phoenix statue was a statue of time and space. Space was about how we had to anchor our souls to different statue nodes, allowing us to come through this “gateway between worlds” and materialized. When we left, our souls were sucked back to the statue and through to our home world, because we anchor a piece of our souls here.

Time was about how the statue—or the maker of the statues if we want to be specific—returned us back around the time we left. ‘Around’ being the key here. I imagined there was some sort of process we had to go through to materialized our souls, though I didn’t know what. However, the time we left this world and the time we went in again was almost negligible to count. For the fox Knight-Warden there, it was probably a few seconds or minutes.

Since time and space weren’t exactly permanently countable, there were slight differences, too, from soul to soul. Our world’s time also influenced it, for some reason. For example, Lex probably left this world / woke up later than I was, then not to mention he also went to bed later than I did, so we came back at different times. It… was like an MMO video game, if I had to say, but with a twist of time, space, and soul.

Therefore, I concluded, our two worlds weren’t exactly parallel, yet the teachers in Academia kept saying our worlds were the closest. I didn’t get it, but I’m no scientist or great wizard, so whatever. Still, this meant the fact that dark spirits I saw earlier in my homeworld was possibly real… after all, if my alive soul could cross between worlds, who’s to say this world’s dead, tainted spirit, couldn’t cross to my homeworld?

But the thought made me shudder.

Lex was startled when he saw my reaction. “What’s wrong with you?” he asked. “I thought I would be early, but you are even earlier than me.”

“I had a long day,” I said, sighing. “Did you see news about the bomb in front of the city library?”

Lex was taken aback. “You were there? Are you okay?”

I spread my arms. “If not, I can’t be here, can I?”

He shrugged. “How do I know? Perhaps when we die, we just live permanently in this world.”

I glanced at him slightly, shaking my head. “Let’s not think about it. What happened after I woke up yesterday?”

“I left just a second after you did,” he said, “so I had no clue. It was really lucky, though. We were about to get attacked.”

“Then where do you think we should go today?”

Lex glanced at the sleeping fox under the statue, then pulled me a few steps away. “I think the we can’t go to the city lord’s mansion, unless we can get coordinates to teleport there.”

“I was thinking we try and find the seniors first,” I suggested. “Maybe regroup with them…”

“I think it’s better if we can go to the seaside area again,” he replied. “Shimhand town, where the Margrave first got cursed.”

“We were just from there yesterday. There wasn’t really anything strange, compared to this city, right?” We went straight to Losrift for the statue, but other than that, our mission was to investigate what happened in Losrift.

“Didn’t you say you feel weird there?” He asked.

I paused. “Yes…” I rummaged through my snakeskin bag. Things that we touched when we travelled through would always follow us, such as clothes and other belongings. This was why our soul bodies weren’t naked as we arrived at this soul transfer node. “Ah, Emma hasn’t arrived yet. I need something from the spatial bag.”

“She is always late.”

Startled, Lex and I looked back to find Ryden, walking from the statue. I didn’t know how his big figure can creep up on us without a single noise. “Ryden, can you make some noise when you come near?” I said, exasperated. “I nearly stab you!”

“Sorry,” he said, then he sat under a tree nearby. “Anyway, she’ll arrive soon, if she’s not lazy today.”

I’ve always found Emma and Ryden’s relationship as odd. They never quite get along. And it wasn’t like the rest of us, who quibbled jokingly—Ryden had always been unprecedently hostile to Emma, and consequently, Emma too was hostile to him. Yet Ryden was almost always quiet except to diss or retort to Emma.

Well, they still worked alright together, so as a captain, I shouldn’t meddle in their personal relationship too much. “Ryden, what happened after Lex and I left yesterday?”

“We ran,” Ryden said, matter-of-factly. “The mobs chased after us rabidly. Wilhelm used his spare teleport scroll to take us away, and then he left.”

I was about to ask what happened then between Emma and Ryden yesterday since he looked particularly annoyed at her today, but a voice cut me off.

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“Ah, I’m rather late today!” Wilhelm exclaimed suddenly as he appeared near the statue.

The fox who was sleeping gave him a rather annoyed look.

Wilhelm nearly jumped. “Sorry, sorry Knight-Warden,” he apologized hurriedly. “I was too excited.”

The fox just snorted and went back to sleep.

Wilhelm ran near us. “Hey, hey, we really shouldn’t provoke Knight-Wardens,” he muttered. “They’re scary.”

I raised an eyebrow. “You are the only one who provoked them.”

“Ah, Captain, you don’t know my excitement. I heard about the bomb in your city. Are the two of you okay?”

“Venelyn was apparently in the city library when it happened,” Lex said when he saw that I didn’t reply. “I was at home, so nothing happened to me.”

“Oh, that’s dangerous,” Wilhelm said sympathetically. “Thank God you’re still alive, Ve. But honestly, today’s world is really dangerous. There’s a robbery in the bank near my apartment, I can even hear the gun shots!”

“A lot of crime happened,” Lex agreed. “Still, we have to focus on our crime to catch.”

“Yeah, we can’t do anything about that, but we can do something about this,” I said.

Emma arrived not long after that. After looking around and found us, she walked towards our direction with the spatial bag I was waiting for.

“Finally,” Ryden mumbled.

Emma ignored him as usual, giving me the bag when I reached for it. I took out the letter of help that we got from Sir Konrad and reread it. It was signed by the Margrave Hinston of Storoughia himself. “I was right,” I said, frowning.

“About what?”

“Look at the date he requested help.”

“Hmm?” Wilhelm shook his head. “Nothing weird about it. He asked for it a month ago, and then the seniors went there to help, right? I still remember Clover came to our room to hug everyone.”

I continued to rummage through the spatial storage and got out another scroll. “This. I’ve read about the weird report from the south... Yes, in Hounsiron. They say an odd illness spread throughout the city and many died...”

“Does it have anything to do with Storoughia Margrave?” Emma asked curiously.

I frowned. “No, not in particular. But Hounsiron City isn’t that far from Losfrift, and the date the Margrave requested help was just a few days from when the happenings in Hounsiron started.”

“That’s really interesting,” Lex said, taking the scroll from me and read it. “Mysterious illness plagued the city and killed half of the population... Hm...”

“I heard some Guardians from the Capital is also dispatched there, to Hounsiron,” I continued. “I thought it would be relevant to know that, since we are to be Brit County’s prime Guardians.” Mytallow Town, where our base was near, was quite some distance from the Capital, but it was placed there deliberately as a means of protection for young, untrained Guardians. With the statue nearby and a Knight-Warden serving as the headmaster, the Academia soon became the main educating force, especially for humans from another world, such as my friends and I.

As the captain of the team, I made myself up to date with every happening of the Guardians. I might have yet to graduate, but I had the authority to do so, therefore I made use of it. This piece of news had bothered me this past month. “I have a feeling that the sea witch has something to do with this. Either we go to Shimhand to investigate, or infiltrate the city to kill the sea witch. So, where do you think we should do first?”

The others looked at each other.

“I vote for Shimhand,” Lex replied after a few seconds. “We need to have all the information we can get before getting to the sea witch.”

“I also vote for Shimhand!” Wilhelm said quickly. “If we go back into the city like yesterday, the sea witch will just command the people to attack us. Wouldn’t it be better to try find out what control the people and avoid needless blood?”

Emma frowned. “I think the city would be better... If we infiltrate the city and killed the sea witch in the dead of the night, the people should be free of her magic, right?”

“You don’t even know much magic, stupid.” Ryden, who sat across from her, sneered. “Shimhand.” He didn’t even elaborate, only gave Emma a dirty glance.

Before Emma could explode in anger, I intervened. “Very well, we will go to Shimhand first, then.”

Once I spoke, Emma buried her anger deep in her heart, though it still showed on her face. I got to say that Ryden was a little bit too much, insulting her like that. But then again, they had been insulting each other since childhood.

We decided to teleport right away to Shimhand. The town was quiet as we walked there in the dead of the night. From the hill we were in, I could see the ships going out of the small harbor.

What happened?

I frowned as we came nearer and nearer to the town. It was chaotic. I saw smoke rising from fire on the west side of the town. “Let’s go.”

We went from the west gate and found many wooden buildings on fire. The west part of the town was a bit of a slum, with houses sticking with each other, so the fire spread quickly. I could hear crying, screaming, and sorrow all around me.

I furrowed my brows, concerned. Fire this big, yet no town guards helping or people extinguishing the fire? It was as if they just let it get bigger...

I had a bad feeling about all of this. Quickly, I walked through the chaotic street of the western district. “Where’s the guards?” Emma said in frustration. “The condition is already this bad...”

“Leave, you leave!” One of the citizens, who was bringing her child in her arms, said to them. “Everyone went insane, there is no need to wait for guards or whatever!”

The woman looked out of her wits, too, so they helped her got out of the chaotic town. A few others, seeing that they seemed quite strong, followed to go out of hell quickly. I intended to ask them for information, but before I could, they all ran away, except for the mother and child who talked to us earlier.

“Thank you,” the mother said with tears in her eyes. “There’s a lunatic who went around setting fire, and the guards even followed. Everyone abandoned the town...”

I felt even more confused. What the hell happened here? It seemed like everyone had went insane for some reason.

“Ve,” Lex’s voice sounded. I turned to him. “Look at that.”

I followed his line of sight and saw some kind of dark fog, from around the center of the fire. It was really vague in the midst of the night. If Lex didn’t point it to me, I wouldn’t even realize it.

Perhaps it was because the bright fire that the dark fog was visible. “Is it some kind of magic?” That was what came to mind, since Lex was our most brilliant wizard. Perhaps he sensed it because of that. The dark fog gave me a crawling, cold feeling, like the shadows I felt during the afternoon...

I narrowed my eyes. “Let’s go there.”

We followed the fog to the source of the fire, back inside the town. Ryden went charging in front of us. I frowned a little bit, but I didn’t get the time to say anything because the black fog suddenly went up and away.

“Where is it going?” I frowned.

Ryden had already followed it, so we had no choice but to go after him. I found myself shuddering as we ran through the chaotic town. The fire was still there, but it no longer spread—still, there was a smell of charcoal as the wooden buildings had burned to ashes.

I tried to ignore it and continued to follow the black fog. Ryden, who was in front of us, suddenly stopped. “Where is it?”

I turned to Lex.

Lex had frowned deeply. We were now in the little town harbor, gazing at the sea. Many ships had already sailed, as if escaping the town. “It went to the sea,” Lex said in confusion. “The feeling is vague.”

I had studied the map of this margrave, and suddenly remembered something. “There is an island a few kilometers eastward,” I said. “Maybe it goes there?”

“Possibly, yes,” Lex nodded. “Didn’t we see an island on the way here?”

I didn’t see because I wasn’t paying attention to the boring, calm sea yesterday. In any case, I said, “Then should we go to the island?”

“Perhaps this has something to do with the sea witch,” Wilhelm suggested. “Is she living in that island?”

“Okay, let’s go there,” I made a decision. []