Hello again. Last night when I was sleeping I saw things.

I have never seen things when I slept before. 

First I was back on that sinking thing. I was walking through the corpse riddled halls. Every single dead person was staring at me. As I walked past them their heads would turn to continue to following me with their gaze. Their cold cloudy dead eyes held so much emotion. Joy, fear, anger, shame, and they also seemed to be asking for something. A silent plea. For what I don't know.

Suddenly I was outside. Back on the top floor of the sinking thing. Overhead red clouds of bitter smoke went screaming into the distance. The dead here did not look at me. But rather glared at one another. Regret and rage seemed to form an aura around them. The clouds of emotion lifted their cold limbs and they split into two equal size parties and rush at each other. Mouths open in silent screams of rage.

The ground shifted. Grass growing to cover everything and bulging up into hills and valleys of emerald splendor beneath the unchanging red skies. The dead with their silent cries became young men screaming out howls of rage and fear as their numbers swelled to cover the green fields. As they charged each other there appeared countless flashes of colorful light jumping between the two armies. Young men fell in droves. Their faces holding expressions of surprise and fear mostly. Some seemed angry at being cut down in their prime.

A rare handful of the youths began to glow with all the colors of a rainbow. These ones led others and slaughtered droves of the unilluminated. 

I turned away from the slaughter. Unwilling to look at the bitter death of little more than children. As I turned I caught a golden glimmer from the corner of my eye. I spun to catch a closer look, but as I turned a large black fortress dominated my eyes. It rested upon a hill overlooking the lands of war behind me.

The gates opened and a silent legion in black armor marched out in good order towards me. They made not a sound as they marched. The blank faced helmets hiding away any expression they may have been making. Their column approached me, and my feet started to move without my own will. As I approached the front runners of the black legion my hands rose, and roses of flame bloomed amongst them. Consuming them. As they burned they screamed as if to make their former silence a lie.

I tried to turn. To walk away, to once again find that glimmer of gold I swore I knew, but everytime I tried more and more black legionnaires rushed at me. I cut them down faster. Burning them by the hundreds. rying desperately to recapture what I had lost. I started to run. Hoping to end this as fast as possible. I closed my eyes to their deaths and prayed their screams would deafen me and save me from hearing more.

Finally, there was silence. I opened my eyes and immediately regretted it. Cold stone corridors seemed to be a macrabe mimic of the previous cramped hallways in the sinking thing. Corpses lay strewn about the floor and against the walls. blood dripped from the ceiling, running down the walls in rivers and pooling into sticky seas on the floor. Charred carcasses and hacked bodies littered what was clearly my path.

My shaking hands were clenched onto the handle of something familiar. A similar shiny stick to the one I had taken from the Oddity a...sword? 

Yes, a sword. My sword. My hands shifted. No longer clecnching onto the hilt but cradling it in a comfortable and familiar embrace. Calluses from years of hardwork lining up perfectly along the warm leather wrapping the cold metal hilt. More enemies approached. Just more corpses for my nightmares.

I killed for what seemed to be years. Becoming comfortable with the sight of death and the feeling of blood on my skin. I burned those who fled and cut down those brave enough to face me. Still I wandered this cold black fortress. I had forgotten what it was I sought but knew it to be here. The blood continued to pool and rise. Every life I take raising the level of the red seas ever so slightly. But bit by bit, inexorably, the sea rose. And soon I was drowning. Salty blood flooded my mouth and nose, pouring into my lungs.

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And as I drowned in the blood I had shed I saw it. For one brief instant it was there, the next gone. A smile, all other details lost in gold.

I jerked awake sputtering and flailing to find the waves had swallowed the rock I had slept on, and that I in turn had swallowed them.

I crawled away from the water my mind still half asleep. I saw the waves flicker from blue and frothy to red and gorey. A quick shake of my head turned them back to the gentle but chilling blue. Feeling more tired than I had been when I fell asleep I retreated from the water and backed up into the cliff that had bordered the rocky beach I slept on.

I was barely aware of my surroundings. A dull ringing covered all sound save an all too familiar but distant scream. 

Then Julius bit me.

Reality snapped into place hard. My dreams became locked back into their cage in my mind and I could finally see, hear, and breathe again.

It seems that during my panic attack I had begun squeezing the warm and fluffy Julius in my arms harder and harder until he bit me out of desperation.

I spent the next while apologizing and snuggling a pouty Julius. He finally relaxed and forgave me when I offered him a piece of glowfruit and some orange roots, his two favorite snacks.

By that time the water was up to my hips and showed no signs of stopping. Off on the horizon was a black wall of rumbling clouds. I decided it wasn't wise to stay put and started to climb the cliff.

I tried anyway. The surface of the cliff was mostly smooth making climbing a challenge. The few handholds I could find were formed into sharp ridges that cut into my hands. 

That was my breaking point. Here I was. Tired, scared, confused, wet, cold, and hungry. I was NOT going to let a little cliff and some sharp rocks get in my way!

An unfamiliar but comforting heat rose from the pit of my stomach. Tingles swam and spiraleed around and through this wave of emotion. It rose to my shoulders and rolled down my arms into my hands.

The bones in my hands and wrists began to glow. My hands looked like a setting sun the tips and edges of them bright orange and darkening as the flesh got thicker until they reach the white almost blue core of heat that was my bones.

I slammed my hands into the cliff and the rock gave way like soft sand. Melting and dribbling from the extreme heat I was harnessing. I gae out a scream of equal parts rage and victory, and clawed my way up the cliff leaving glowing holes and melted stone behind. 

When I reached the top of that cliff I saw another and I gave it no thought whatsoever before charging it and scaling it in the same manner. All the while I climbed I was screaming and crying. Don't know why myself. Julius was perched on my head chittering and squeeking in harmony with me.

I kept climbing when brutal winds tried to wrest me from the cliffside to smash on the rocks below.

I kept climbing when rain and lightning fell. Blinding me with steam and harsh flashing light.

I kept climbing until I had no where else to climb. I was on the peak.

Then I turned my attention to the storm overhead. The rain fell and tried to steal my fire from me like it had not so very long ago on the grassy plains of the fallen lands. There was something about rain that isn't the same as flowing or standing water. A repressive and depressing feel that dampened my flames and stilled my tingles within me. Preventing me from expressing them.

But now I was full of fury, and I would not be repressed. I was riding so high on adrenaline and emotion I shrugged off the depressing rain-feel. Rather the opposite. The sensation of something trying to hold me down and cool me off only made me rise faster and burn hotter.

I shot a scorching ray of brilliant heat from my hands into the clouds. Sundering them and sending the remnants into retreat as fast if not faster than they came. Lightning skidded and shuddered around the beam before rushing groundward and striking the mountaintop.

I woke up later to find the mountain was shorter then I remember it being. It was also at this moment that I finally remembered I could fly. Rendering all the climbing I did today super useless.

Well, I do feel a lot better now though. Much more relaxed now that I finally expressed all the rage I didn't even know I had. So I guess it wasn't entirely without benefit.

The sky is clear now. And the stars are shining their calming light on me. 

I gave Julius an extra juicy looking glowfruit for putting up with me today and he is sleeping curled up on my lap. I know he can't smile but I swear he is right now. Today was a weird day. I remeber some stuff. Mostly bad stuff like how to kill and use a sword but I also remember a smile. 

A beautiful smile. Just remembering it sends golden streamers dancing down my spine in joy ad brings a smile to my own lips.

Overall. All the crap I have gone through since waking up in that cave is worth it for that one memory.

Goodnight.