Andie’s heart pounded in her chest, and her hands involuntarily tightened their grip on her sword. Adrenaline blurred the line between fear and determination as she watched Dyllan’s Nightmare pull a long, cleaver-like, rusty, blood stained, sword out of its mouth.

It could use Dyllan’s Vice. Shit. Fuck! This was bad. If it had the power of Dyllan’s shadow -

Wait… Why had she ever thought it wouldn’t have the power of Dyllan’s shadow behind it? Of course a dreamwalker’s Nightmare would essentially be a hulked out version of their shadow! She should have seen this coming!

The glow of Andie’s sword flickered and wavered as she staggered backward. She knew for a fact she couldn’t defeat a shadow. There was no way in hell she could take a Shadow Nightmare.

This story has been taken without authorization. Report any sightings.

Andie caught herself before she took another step back. Yes, she had made a huge mistake. Yes, she should have gotten her Grandpa’s help instead of blindly charging into the doom vortex like some kind of idiot. Yes, her impulsiveness had almost certainly doomed her and her friends.

None of that mattered right now. Beating herself up and panicking could only make things worse. She could apologize ‘till her face turned blue once this was all over… right now she had to do what she could.

Andie ran her finger along the edge of her blade, stabilizing and brightening its glow.

“Tear it apart, my Rage!” The shadow thrust its new weapon down into the concrete beneath it, letting out a spiteful and dusty chuckle as crimson energy flowed through the mindscape’s many cracks. “S U F F E R.”

Enormous obsidian spikes erupted from the glowing cracks. They were mostly charcoal black in color, but had patches of dark red mixed in - giving the appearance of splattered bloodstains. Their jagged edges tore through everything as they rapidly grew in number, each spike sprouting closer to Andie than the last.