Upon jumping into the unknown and landing on unfamiliar ground, Dream was instantly confronted with his biggest weakness: water.

He felt the cold water envelop him as he struggled to keep afloat. Panic gripped his chest as he desperately kicked his legs and thrashed his arms, trying to reach the surface. But no matter how hard he fought, the water seemed to pull him deeper into its depths.

He gasped for air, but all he inhaled was water. His lungs burned, and his vision blurred as darkness encroached upon his senses. It was a nightmare he couldn't escape. Every ounce of his being screamed for him to resurface, to breathe, to survive.

Then, in a brief yet very strange moment of lucidity, Dream turned his skill down, and the next thing to happen was his body being pushed out of the water. Bursting through the water's surface, Dream desperately gasped for breath as his vision cleared, allowing him to see the muddy ground solidifying beneath him. He had narrowly escaped the clutches of drowning.

Cautiously, he got to his feet and looked around at the unfamiliar surroundings. As he looked up, he saw the side of the ravine extending beyond the fog that thoroughly clouded the place. Allowing the threads to appear, Dream saw the golden threads expanding vertically, showing no great fluctuation or whatsoever. This suggested that while the valkyries and Men’ma had undoubtedly reached the edge from which he took his leap, they themselves hadn't made the jump yet. However, he was in no mood to stick around and find out when they were going to follow him down. He had this feeling that they would.

Clutching tightly onto his wounded shoulder, Dream declared, "It's time I get moving again," his face wearing a morose expression.

***

Gray and barren.

Hours passed, and Dream came to realize something. If there were two words to describe the place Dream landed into it would be those two words: Gray and barren.

The place, whatever its name was, was filled with bone-like dead trees scattered at irregular intervals. The ground had an ash-like hue, with occasional boulders strewn here and there. The sky was filled with gray fog, obscuring any glimpse of the normally blue expanse, providing no relief to the monotonous color scheme.

Nexus Alert:

Odo Balancing in progress…41,4%

A not-so-unfamiliar notification, but one he hadn't seen in a long time, appeared before him. Dream cast a glance at the wound on his right shoulder and, with a wince, muttered to himself, “I need to find a safe place to let this heal on its own, but first, I have to find somewhere for my reserves of Odo to fill up.”

Paying close attention to what was behind him, Dream threaded across the strange place he had landed. After some time, he came to a halt upon taking notice of something. At first, it sounded like just a singular reverberating "thud," but it soon came to Dream's attention that the sound wasn't singular at all. Instead, it was a series of multiple thuds, which he soon recognized as footsteps. The source of the footsteps seemed to be in front of him, and through that one fluctuating thread connected something beyond the gray fog up ahead, and it was coming his way.

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Considering his current condition, a battle was something he absolutely wanted to avoid. So, Dream, spotting a large gray dead trunk in a corner, went on to position himself out of view from the owner of the footsteps. Whatever it belonged to, it certainly wasn't something he wanted—or was in shape—to deal with himself, at least not at the moment.

The creature approaching, emerging from the gray fog, revealed itself and just as the loud footsteps foreshadowed, it turned out to be a large creature. Taking a peek, Dream saw a sloth-like being with eyes that were dark and lustrous black. The creature had a thick, gray hide that seemed almost stone-like, with sharp spikes protruding from its back and long nails.

Name

H.P

P.P

Threat

Stoneclaw

22

1024

Fiend

Surprisingly agile despite its sloth-like appearance, the creature eventually reached the spot where Dream had stood earlier, and it began sniffing around as if picking up Dream's scent. “Please, as much as I'm interested in those big H.P and P.P of yours, not now,” Dream internally begged. However, the creature insisted on sniffing out the area, only to move forward as if nothing had caught its attention. Dream heaved a sigh of relief, but it was short-lived.

“What the—” the creature had not taken more than ten steps when it suddenly heard a loud hawk-like scream emanating from the gray fog above. A large shadow emerged from the fog, diving straight towards the sloth-like creature. A rapid yet intense scramble took place.

The next thing that happened was the shadow flapping its multiple wings, soaring up into the air. Dream still hadn't caught a good view of the creature, but finally, he saw the four-winged bird-like being. In its grasp, the bird-like creature held the beheaded and mutilated corpse of the sloth-like creature.

Name

H.P

A.P

W.P

Aspect

Lesser Aspect

Skyshrieker [ Lvl. 3]

47

467

0.25

Elemental Arcana

Aqualis

Silica

The sloth was dead, its stats now available for Dream to steal. Yet, even Dream, who was bolder than most, didn't dare to use his blessing of the guardian dragon on the Stoneclaw. If the creature had been an enlightened beast, he would've dared, but now it was an awakened beast. Should he absorb it, the creature's body would disappear, and that would undoubtedly drive the bird-like being crazy.

Dream watched as the Skyshrieker flew high up into the distance, its thread attached to it extending beyond the fog along with thousands of others.

Casting a glance at what little remained of the sloth-like fiend-ranked threat awakened beast, which in just a few blows was defeated like nothing, Dream found himself muttering, "What kind of hellhole did I find my way into again?"