"What? Who?" Harid stuttered in confusion, his lungs still burning after the long climb.

"Tower Master. You." The voice responded promptly.

"Is it some artificial intelligence? Great! Tell me what this is all about." Harid suppressed his tiredness, when he realized there was a possibility to answer all his questions while looking around, finding himself in an extremely spacious office which was clearly supposed to be occupied by just a single person.

"Negative, this preset routine will continue with its next task, a briefing recorded by the previous Tower Master." His hopes had been crushed and a huge screen materialized in front of him obstructing the massive glass table and sofa. In its midst, there was a man with sparkling green eyes staring at him and began speaking the moment their eyes met.

"Finally a successor arrived! Due to a critical situation in other parts of the world I had to vacate the tower and if you are hearing this message, it means I have not returned. In this prerecorded message I will explain the situation you got yourself into. Pay attention, as you will be the key to saving this world and even Earth, as their destiny is intertwined."

Harid continued to stare at the screen not daring to utter a word, understanding that it had to be all a setup, because the man was, again, speaking English.

"This is the city of Karnas, the capital city of the once great Ulyan Empire. Not long ago our civilization entered space thanks to a new discipline you can call dream materialization. It is connected to our sudden progress and to our sudden doom that you at this point should be very familiar with."

  The person on the screen gave him a meaningful look like he could actually see him and Harid shivered. Indeed he was familiar with what the man was speaking about.

"We were fools to not be more careful, but in an information age secrecy is limited and ambitions are always great." The man sat down on a simple chair, a wall of steel behind him before continuing his explanation. A plain, simple setup.

  "When I was young, I have become one of the first Dreamweavers. Men of fame and wealth, magicians that dazed the masses with what they could do, for a time making everyone believe that their own dreams can became reality. Ushering in the age of hope and miracles, we build this city. The spectacular transportation, flying cars, personal vehicles that moved seemingly powered by magic, it was a fairy tale inside of which we could do whatever we wanted." His eyes were no longer focused, remembering a distant place in the past where even sky was not the limit.

"Well, almost. The more sober of us soon realized that there in fact was a limit and a peculiar pattern our power followed. Our visions seemed wild as a dream, but were not as flexible. We could only imagine so much, like we were guided by specific templates. Some of us realized that what we could dream of was far from random and our dreams in fact were not dreams but visions of a far away land with very different rules." His dreamy composure began to change, getting more serious and present.

"I cautioned others to be careful, but we could not stop what have already been set loose. The whole buildings soon sprang into reality out of thin air and out of convenience everyone kept ignoring that their supposedly dreamed of structures had surprisingly only so many styles of architecture. It was glossed over, people saying that everyone was so spiritually connected that they shared their dreams. It is unbelievable how much are people willing to ignore in order not to see an inconvenient truth. The more brutal the truth, the harder it is to accept it."

"Sadly, truth never cares if it is seen or not, or how many layers of paint you put over it." The man loosed his azure robe as if he was getting hot, fidgeting on his simple chair.

"It started with exotic diseases no one have seen before, people looking for terrorists instead of seeing the real problem that was in fact inside all that time. Then the first armored men appeared, brutal and difficult to kill, unleashing chaos upon our world. Claws in the dark gorging on blood and tearing flesh, leaving only red patches on pavements. By the time everyone understood the reason behind the aliens' intrusions, it was already too late. " He touched his right hand that had a visible claw mark, a scar of a struggle that had to be still vivid in his mind.

"However, we have copied too much and it could not be easily undone."

The story continued on and on, making Harid's blood grow cold.

  Listening to the long explanation, Harid imprinted into his memory a story of a civilization similar to humans that had made a shocking discovery when some individuals seemed to be able to connect to the world of dreams and summon those dreams into reality with unexpected ease. As more people started summoning fantastical things, the true nature of the phenomenon became apparent. In fact, they were not summoning anything using dreams, they were copying the reality of other parallel universes, cloning into their universe what had already physically existed elsewhere.

  A boom of construction and technology catapulted the civilization of the huge Ulyan Empire almost to the starts, literally, but there was a hidden danger in their ability no one knew about. Surprisingly, it was not a problem with conservation of energy as an ordinary physicist would guess as the first option, but with information. As their universe pulled information in, others started to pull as well, the information barrier between the universes they copied from thinning gradually.

  When the different universes blended together too much, nothing prevented invaders from other universes from physically crossing over, providing the energy for the transfer was not difficult when the universes no longer differed much. It was especially so, if there was a connection like identical creatures, buildings or other constructs. Like the lemonade originally produced for rebellious beings of the Golden Universe that was shockingly sparkling with exotic green color, had high energetic value and even minor healing properties. It became popular in Karnas and through the actions of the previous Tower Master even on Earth at this point.

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The more different universes became alike, the easier it was to cross over.

Harid's fists clenched when he realized where the whole monologue was going. He had to control himself not to interrupt the speaking image of his scheming predecessor.

"The lemonade will surely be a hit on Earth as well, I have deliberately picked items that are popular with the masses and by the time you are hearing this message, there should be a solid connection between the Golden Universe and Earth, strong enough to share some of our burdensome intruders. The portals cannot be made large enough to enable proper warfare on this side nor we have any means of our own anymore as you can imagine."

"How could you?!" Harid uttered when he realized the real purpose of the tattoos. They were not supposed to help them fight the monsters like superheroes. The real intent behind the tattoos had been to replicate items from the Golden Universe on Earth to enable the golden knights and other foreign monstrosities that had infested the Ulyan Empire to be transported to Earth. He noticed that there were many buildings very similar to those on Earth, but there had been no direct link between the Golden Universe and Earth. Not anymore.

"You fucking.. .!" His words were stuck in his throat when he saw little reddish gold flashes appear throughout the city gradually morphing into circular gates. He could guess right away what was their purpose.

" . .. the means to summon more invaders should be no longer available, all you have to do is to lead a war on two fronts and eradicate what is currently here. Some useful weapons are in the tower's armory, the hope of our civilizations lie with you, Azure Tower Master." He lifted his four fingers in a strange, unfamiliar greeting.

"So why this?! Huh?!" Harid could not hold it in and rolled up his shirt, pointing at a particular tattoo that was known as The Curse, the one that was preventing him and many others from returning home. The main reason he was a part of everything instead of returning to his family a long time ago.

Yet, the screen flashed and disappeared, leaving Harid standing in front of the glass table with clenched fists.

"WHY?!" He shouted until his voice cracked and he fell silent, slowly dragging his body to the sofa nearby where he collapsed with empty expression.

Where did The Curse fit in? Have he been dragged into it just because of a mistake? Was her death a mistake? The others?

  He would probably never know, as the person from the screen must have been dead for a long time. Disappearing along with all his tattoos that began slowly fading away, clearly having no purpose anymore.

  Right, he finally had at least some answers. He was supposed to fight in some intergalactic war because aliens of this place screwed up and got themselves killed. It was a joke. He could not care less about dying in such a war. Instead, he was interested in something else.

"The red portals should lead back home." His eyes sparkled and he decisively stepped back in the direction of the stairs. The way back should be much easier.

"I should find the armory first, just in case." Harid ignored the view, ignored the luxurious office, ignored everything, only the way home that unexpectedly opened in front of his eyes had his full attention.

Yes, down there was the Lurker he had left there.

Then an image of his sister appeared in his mind, his parents.

"I will fuck it up." With determination, he moved down in search of the promised weapons.

  The Cursed were finally returning home, Ashes would glow with life anew, with hope long lost. As for the fate of the world? He was no interstellar government body to be running around saving worlds, there were certainly other heroes eager to do such a task.

* * * *

Present, orbit high above Karnas, the capital city of The Ulyan Empire

"Hmph, arrogant boy, cursing at me in the middle of my address." He had nearly blown his cover and revealed that the transmission was in fact not a prerecorded message.

  Arcadius Behlen turned his head to look out of the window. There was a huge sphere that used to be lit by city lights, even including the oceans, bur at present everything was swallowed up by darkness. The whole planet had been long united under the banner of the Ulyan Empire. Naturally, there wasn't safe anywhere on the surface for decades, the only truly safe place was the UCSS, The United Command Space Station of The Ulyan Empire that was surprisingly under the thumb of Arcadius Behlen. It happened naturally when all the silly politicians and representatives found out that their evacuation ships lacked permission to dock and were forced to orbit the planet until their fuel ran out.

  Of course, before his plan had been executed, he had eliminated all the other Dreamweavers that were able to perform summoning rituals, his most notorious competition being the Black Tower Master, but Arcadius had to suppress laughter when he remembered his ignominious end. At this moment he only needed to monitor the situation and wait until the armies of Earth crush all the invaders from the Golden Universe. He had no doubt about their ability to eventually succeed, because their reproductive abilities were simply mind-boggling. They would simply flood their enemies with numbers again and again until all were eradicated. At least that was how he imagined it to happen.

A few weapons from his arsenal added, there should not be an issue.

  Arcadius Behlen waved his hand and summoned his favorite green drink. At this point he was the only Dreamweaver in existence, as all the knowledge about them had been eradicated along with all the others of his kind, meaning he could allow himself a little luxury of using his powers from time to time. One user made no difference.

  One user indeed as all the tattoos should be disappearing, their powers no longer necessary. Their purpose had been accomplished and their continued usage would only serve to thin the already weakened barrier between their universes and the Golden Universe.

"The stage has been set, now let's watch my puppets dance." He cackled and swirled the sparkling green liquid in his glass before emptying it.