He tried to reassure Cora not to pay any mind to Davies. He told her that as long as if he didn’t deem her strong enough, he wasn’t going to pick a fight with her. Then, Merik went back to his house.

He was going to skip his training today as a reward for himself for yesterday’s strenuous trial!

He was taking advantage of the absence of both Captains, too.

He made sure Cora got to the training, though.

He didn’t need to worry about her since she already knew the basics and he wasn’t going to babysit her, always.

It was a drag.

Training procedures were simple. Mostly meditations.

A lunatic cannot cure a mental problem. If Overseers were to protect the public from the accumulation of mental negativities, they, first and foremost, must be the ones with the strongest fortitude of mentality.

No matter powers, strengths, martial arts or affinities that you have at your disposal, you would just be a child who was just given a revolver without any intelligence or strength of your minds.

“Wishes”, especially, “Unknown entities” can manipulate a person with weak-willed mind a lot more easily. So, be the best version of yourself.

Well, at least these were the same words that Albert taught Merik when he started working here, anyway.

It was a noon, brighter noon than past few weeks. He was carrying his hat in his hand already.

He, from the bottom of his heart, hated the heat.

He lived in the neighborhood so he just got back quite quickly. His house was some kind of a single-story house with minimalistic expenditures.

Next to his house were a similar house like him where his neighbors live. They were a couple, Richard and Stella Green.

Richard was an industrial worker and Stella was an ex-lead actress of a famous play group, which was now disbanded.

Now, there was her. Sitting on a chair in front of her house, smoking a cigarette while staring dreamingly into the distance.

Mary noticed Merik quickly as she just smiled and waved slightly at him.

The husband greeted him in the morning when he left and when he came back, the wife greeted him.

What was he? A child of them?

He smiled and nodded back, slowly approaching his door.

“Scorching weather, huh?”

“Yes, it is, ma’am. Though it was quite pleasant in the morning.”

“---”

“Ma’am, I thought you quit smoking already.”

She took her eyes off the horizon she was gazing at and focused them onto the pale young man in front of her.

Despite being in a worn and old household attire, Merik noticed that her charming nature and a glimpse of her former beauty made the woman, as alluring as she was in her prime.

Her long and darkened hair around her back and the prominent features on her face, especially her straight nasal line, would make anyone stop in their tracks and just at least steal a glance at her.

No one would deny the fact that she was once a lead actress when they saw her.

Her group, Unfazed, was one of Merik’s favorite group, as well. So, no wonder, he was familiar with her.

She possessed everything a beautiful woman would and she looked happy performing on stage. Merik never understood why she stopped working in the entertainment industry and never bothered to ask why.

She put the cigarette onto the ground and crunched it with her feet.

“Yes, I quitted.”

Merik smiled and didn’t reply. After glancing back at him for a moment, Stella asked.

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“Merik, you going to the show this week?”

“Damsel in Distress?”

“---”

“Yes, I hope I will be going there. I was looking forward to seeing it since I saw the posters.”

“Any date you’ll be bringing along with you?”

“Ma’am?”

Merik was surprised and truth be told, a little bit embarrassed. Mary was staring at him with a mischievous smile on her face with her hand resting on her chin. Any man would say that she was flirting with him, but to Merik, she was just someone whom he idolized in the entertainment part.

It was like a big sister teasing him.

“No...no, I will not be bringing any date with me nor do I want to, ma’am. I believe I shall be going alone.”

Mary chuckled. Seemed she was having fun talking with him. She had always been like this, though.

“Would you care to take a lonely woman along with you?”

“Umm, isn’t Mr. Richard going with you?”

“He is a busy man and he said it will be an important week at his work so, he won’t be able to. It’s a show by “Unfazed” so, I would be lying if I said I’m not anticipating it a lot myself. I’m sure he won’t mind even.”

Ma’am, I, myself, is a quite busy man, too, you know.

“I see. Well then, If the time and fate allowed me, I will take the honor of bringing you along with me, ma’am Mary.”

“Please do so, Merik.”

______________________________________________________________________

Merik locked the door the moment he got into his room. He was drained with expending his social energy, especially today.

A short nap might help him get his energy back. He still had to see off Albert in the evening, so he couldn’t nap for long.

“I will wake up on time.”

He needn’t worry because the bells from the cathedral rang once an hour so he could just wake up to the next bell toll. Last time he checked, it was three in the afternoon.

“I seriously need to buy a clock.”

He reminded himself after making himself comfortable on the bed. He was thinking of all kinds of things, moving his bodies left and right. Then, he noticed a certain gem. The gem with affinity to the “Dreams”.

He still had to take it to the garrison. Unlike Albert, Micheal wasn’t going to let him off the hook with just a slight nagging.

Sigh.

He reached his hand towards the gem out of a whim. It was a dark, shining gem that resembled to a crystal.

“Huh, was it shining like this yesterday when I found...”

He fell asleep abruptly. Rather than falling asleep, black space took over his consciousness before finally, slowly revealing a scenery towards him.

It was nothing like he had seen before. It was a blueish-grey ancient place with deserts and ruins and in the middle of this vast otherworldly place, there was a throne. The chilling breeze was blowing all over the place ever so lightly, the night sky, which was the only familiar thing for him was full of stars and without its clouds.

The scenery was breathtaking and dreamy.

“Is someone loving the view?”

With a giggle, a sudden magnetic voice appeared in his consciousness.

Is someone talking in my mind? What the...

“Just look around for a bit more. No one’s talking in your head, child.”

His instinct made him look around instantly and saw a figure. He concluded it as a figure because he couldn’t describe what it really was.

It had a blueish grey humanoid figure of a female with great figure on “its” upper body and on its lower body were... tentacles?

The same tentacles that he just fought yesterday.

The dream monster!

Merik took a step back and instinctively prepared himself for battle. Immediately.

He didn’t know where he was nor what was happening.

He didn’t have his revolver with him as well. If it came to it, he had to use “it” to take down the monster, in front of him.

But was he even capable of that? What even was... her?

Sure, he had read a lot of reports and faced a lot of paranormal cases which mundane people couldn’t believe them even if he were to tell them.

He had had lots of experiences but this... he didn’t even know what situation or where he was, let alone fight the entity, even more, in its own domain.

With the aura it was brimming with, the entity seemed to be a god that could just obliterate Merik with just a flick of a finger.

Use his mysterious powers? The one he could only use as some sort of coating for his bullets and the more he used it, the more insane he became?

He might lose control in the battle and even get his life devoured by his own power, without the entity even lifting her fingers.

Moreover, he wasn’t even adding the fact that the monster could drew his whole consciousness into her own domain just by a touch.

Surely enough, he had no way of defeating such a monster.

“Calling a lady, a monster? I thought you were much more tactful towards older lady than that, weren’t you, Merik Ashenwood?”

He confirmed it. The mon... “she” was able to read his minds!

What a terrifying situation!

“Rather than reading your mind, it’s more like reading your thoughts in a dream since we’re in a dream, after all.”

“Are we in a dream? What kind of nonsense is this?”

The figure in question floated around Merik, looking at him like she was having the upmost fun. The tentacles were smoothly following her around like a fish in a river.

Weird metaphor. Like a tentacle in a river?

“Yes, Merik. You are in a dream. A domain of mine and mine alone. Rest assured as I summoned you here not to harm you. I promise you on my very being.”

“Who... who are you?”

The figure stopped mid-air in front of Merik for him to be able to see her mesmerizing face clearly. The same went for her tentacles.

She slightly nodded in front of him.

“Heed my words, mortal for I am the being that reigns over the endless boundaries of reality and dreams. The one who possesses countless illusions and lies. The Goddess of Dreams and Despair.”

Then the “Goddess” stared straight into the crimson eyes of the young boy, revealing an eerie smile.

“Elis.”