Story Unlocked, Part Seven : 「 The Truth 」
All creatures of Mythris experience this dream.
Those who were not involved IC before will likely be confused or frightened, as they were not aware of anything regarding the situation prior.
Those who were not involved IC before will likely be confused or frightened, as they were not aware of anything regarding the situation prior.
Sleep does not come gently; not like before.
It descends all at once, as though the world itself has released a final, exhausted breath and the wolves of Mythris breathe in the same dream together. The vision grips you without warning.
The Dream Visitor is strangely absent, and you wonder why - in fact, you don't feel his presence at all right now.
Then who is sharing this dream?
The sky darkens in the dream, and an overwhelming sense of impending doom sends a ripple down your spine. Two wolves run, and you hear a cacophony of howls and shrieks close at their heels as the gnarled, disfigured shapes of the aberrations give chase, the warped rhythm of their bodies moving wrong as they near. It is a piece from another dream you've already experienced.
The monsters are wolves only in the broadest sense. Their bodies are stretched to unnatural proportions, bones bending at terrible angles, a myriad of disfigurements and mutations pulling skin too taut in some places while hanging slack in others. Wrathful eyes burn with an azure blue that mirrors the glowing fissures now wreaking havoc in the waking world, and you can hear the wet, splintering cracks of their jaws as they snap together, biting at the air goadingly behind their prey as they rapidly begin to close in.
The two ahead do not look back. They have been running since they were children. There is no life to be had in a world full of terrors.
They run through dead trees and broken stone, ducking in and out of spiraling structures that stretch toward the heavens as if boasting of their own power. Fear laces the wind in their wake, thick and choking, but also something else - desperation, urgency, the knowledge that stopping will mean something far worse than death. The dream presses the feeling into every watching mind: they must not be caught.
The vision stutters. For a moment it seems the dream will follow the pair further into the wilderness, down toward the southlands where the Great Tree resides, where they will one day find refuge against the great cleansing that is yet to come...
Instead, it fades, and the perspective shifts away from the fleeing silhouettes until they become little more than dark shapes swallowed by the horizon.
And then the dream settles... elsewhere.
A narrow crevasse splits the rocky earth, barely wider than a body. Within its shadow crouches a third wolf.
He is trying not to breathe.
Pressed tightly against the great stone walls surrounding him, one hind leg lies twisted beneath him at a wrong angle, the bone clearly broken; every movement sends a desperate shudder throughout his body, but he does not dare cry out through the white-hot pain. The scent of blood is sharp in the confined space.
Outside, the sounds grow louder, closer. The warped claws; the dragging, heavy breaths through foreign lungs twisted by hubris.
The crevasse offers only the barest illusion of safety. The wolf trembles where he lies, eyes wide, ears flattened so tightly to his skull they nearly vanish into his own fur. His gaze flicks toward the distant ridge where the other two had vanished moments before.
Hope flickers there - an anguished, fragile hope.
Then the shadows fall across the opening, and he is found.
Their hideous shapes blot out the thin strip of graying skies above the crevasse, heads twisting sideways, tongues lolling as strange, unrecognizable fingers reach in. One pushes its muzzle down into the crack; its teeth scrape against stone as its grin spreads wider than any living canine's jaws should allow for.
He cannot hold it any longer. With tears forming at the edges of his vision, he sucks in a sharp lungful of air.
They surge forward like the tide. Claws wedge into the tight entrance, tearing layers of rock loose to widen the gap; multiple pairs of jaws clamp into his scruff and shoulder and broken leg, and the wolf screams as they drag him out into the open air, his body scraping violently against the stone as a smear of blood marks his path.
His voice tears across the dreamscape in raw terror.
Two names rip from his throat - two names hurled desperately toward the fleeing shapes that are already too far away, already lost to the distant horizon.
"—! —!!"
The dream does not let you hear the names clearly; only the feeling behind them.
Only the sound of someone calling for those who cannot turn back.
He is dragged away, and the last thing he remembers is the cold bite of metal chains twining around him like coiled snakes before he is shut away into merciless darkness.
You wake to the sound of the Moving Isle. It screams into the endless night, a barely-visible shape through the blur of what has now turned into a continent-wide blizzard. Loud cracks follow its pained cry as the earth is torn further asunder, and you think, this is the end after all, and there was nothing you could do to stop it.
And then you see him before you, a pale spirit with sad eyes, and a long pause settles between the two of you as he looks out toward the Isle.
His voice tightens.
He cannot look at you. The pale spirit keeps his gaze fixed solely on the monstrous shape against the horizon.
The Dream Visitor seems to shrink away from you, but knows he must finish.
At last he manages to drag his gaze back toward you, and the sorrow contained within its depths was like the sea.
A long silence hovered expectantly in the air.
The Dream Visitor lifts his weary gaze, and the air itself seems to pull taut around you as something shifts. Suddenly, from seemingly every direction, you spot all of the Runes - every shard, every glowing symbol pulled from ruin over the past year by the new wolves of Mythris - answer his call. They rise overhead, coming together from unseen places one by one as they spiral inward, circling him in a slow, methodical storm, their rhythmic pulses mimicking that of a steady drum-beat that rattles inside your chest. Their collective light fractures the air in front of you, tearing open three wounds just large enough for you to pass through.
Three doors.
In one, a vast black sky splits down the middle, radiant light seeping through as distant wolfsong chants from within, haunting and resolute as dozens of other voices gradually join in. You see layers of snow stripping away before the unified sound; a sound that drives back the cold and calls down the sun to heal this cold, broken land.
In another, the Great Tree shudders - it is under assault. Its ancient bark bleeds black ooze, every branch crawling with aberrant wraiths that rip and tear into its core, and every moment that passes you feel its protective power begin to fade. The Dream Visitor and his mate's skeletal remains are locked tight beneath a layer of roots, but not for long. They guard something terribly important, something fragile and only just now taking root with the influx of magic as the first hint of green pushes up through the soil, a faint shimmer of gold surrounding it -
The Great Tree must be defended - or the cure will be lost.
And in the last portal, the Moving Isle looms close - its fractured surface ruptured by two vast, glowing eyes that stare unblinking into the dark, watching. You hear a distant roar that seems to originate from deep within the Isle itself, a sound so full of unending suffering and agony you almost scream back at it to drown out the noise.
The Runes fall still, suspended between each door, and the Visitor's voice follows, low and unyielding.
There is no wrong choice, here; you feel the risk inherent in each, and it is up to you to follow the wisdom of your heart. It will take every soul on Mythris to fight back the end of the world and each path is absolutely necessary to this end.
The Dream Visitor waits.
It descends all at once, as though the world itself has released a final, exhausted breath and the wolves of Mythris breathe in the same dream together. The vision grips you without warning.
The Dream Visitor is strangely absent, and you wonder why - in fact, you don't feel his presence at all right now.
Then who is sharing this dream?
The sky darkens in the dream, and an overwhelming sense of impending doom sends a ripple down your spine. Two wolves run, and you hear a cacophony of howls and shrieks close at their heels as the gnarled, disfigured shapes of the aberrations give chase, the warped rhythm of their bodies moving wrong as they near. It is a piece from another dream you've already experienced.
The monsters are wolves only in the broadest sense. Their bodies are stretched to unnatural proportions, bones bending at terrible angles, a myriad of disfigurements and mutations pulling skin too taut in some places while hanging slack in others. Wrathful eyes burn with an azure blue that mirrors the glowing fissures now wreaking havoc in the waking world, and you can hear the wet, splintering cracks of their jaws as they snap together, biting at the air goadingly behind their prey as they rapidly begin to close in.
The two ahead do not look back. They have been running since they were children. There is no life to be had in a world full of terrors.
They run through dead trees and broken stone, ducking in and out of spiraling structures that stretch toward the heavens as if boasting of their own power. Fear laces the wind in their wake, thick and choking, but also something else - desperation, urgency, the knowledge that stopping will mean something far worse than death. The dream presses the feeling into every watching mind: they must not be caught.
The vision stutters. For a moment it seems the dream will follow the pair further into the wilderness, down toward the southlands where the Great Tree resides, where they will one day find refuge against the great cleansing that is yet to come...
Instead, it fades, and the perspective shifts away from the fleeing silhouettes until they become little more than dark shapes swallowed by the horizon.
And then the dream settles... elsewhere.
A narrow crevasse splits the rocky earth, barely wider than a body. Within its shadow crouches a third wolf.
He is trying not to breathe.
Pressed tightly against the great stone walls surrounding him, one hind leg lies twisted beneath him at a wrong angle, the bone clearly broken; every movement sends a desperate shudder throughout his body, but he does not dare cry out through the white-hot pain. The scent of blood is sharp in the confined space.
Outside, the sounds grow louder, closer. The warped claws; the dragging, heavy breaths through foreign lungs twisted by hubris.
The crevasse offers only the barest illusion of safety. The wolf trembles where he lies, eyes wide, ears flattened so tightly to his skull they nearly vanish into his own fur. His gaze flicks toward the distant ridge where the other two had vanished moments before.
Hope flickers there - an anguished, fragile hope.
Then the shadows fall across the opening, and he is found.
Their hideous shapes blot out the thin strip of graying skies above the crevasse, heads twisting sideways, tongues lolling as strange, unrecognizable fingers reach in. One pushes its muzzle down into the crack; its teeth scrape against stone as its grin spreads wider than any living canine's jaws should allow for.
He cannot hold it any longer. With tears forming at the edges of his vision, he sucks in a sharp lungful of air.
They surge forward like the tide. Claws wedge into the tight entrance, tearing layers of rock loose to widen the gap; multiple pairs of jaws clamp into his scruff and shoulder and broken leg, and the wolf screams as they drag him out into the open air, his body scraping violently against the stone as a smear of blood marks his path.
His voice tears across the dreamscape in raw terror.
Two names rip from his throat - two names hurled desperately toward the fleeing shapes that are already too far away, already lost to the distant horizon.
"—! —!!"
The dream does not let you hear the names clearly; only the feeling behind them.
Only the sound of someone calling for those who cannot turn back.
He is dragged away, and the last thing he remembers is the cold bite of metal chains twining around him like coiled snakes before he is shut away into merciless darkness.
You wake to the sound of the Moving Isle. It screams into the endless night, a barely-visible shape through the blur of what has now turned into a continent-wide blizzard. Loud cracks follow its pained cry as the earth is torn further asunder, and you think, this is the end after all, and there was nothing you could do to stop it.
Yia hale witneril dre ludr,the Dream Visitor's presence returns, but it is changed. He is... less, somehow. Almost frail despite the overwhelming power igniting all around you.
Drra ran. Fil an elakil.
And then you see him before you, a pale spirit with sad eyes, and a long pause settles between the two of you as he looks out toward the Isle.
Dre fun lerm sepahiln afil an du.
His voice tightens.
Dudr wialk hale ban laba mircyl,he continued, and the words seem to cause him pain.
Il elnoril lat fonieed; il sepil takil anali ut. Anmade... aln remade.
He cannot look at you. The pale spirit keeps his gaze fixed solely on the monstrous shape against the horizon.
Il sepacame lat yia nie drie weip dre molind itse - kien dre itse sepal an mirefir ile,he says.
Eif utar hul, sepanudr kone aln rit aln dre wilt fier laba sarnoril miln - il sepal kin drire.
Bialn.
The Dream Visitor seems to shrink away from you, but knows he must finish.
Iler natore - lat il sepil, lat eipal wire - koretsidil - ut cialk sepa usil.And as if in emphasis, the Isle howls again, its shriek slicing through the air like a knife. The sound hurts your ears even from this distance.
Fir laba kina, drir klan wirkil. Drio bialn ile ali dre itse aln drrial ile, mydrris' foryl sepil delaed, kila fil fir laba linle lile.
At last he manages to drag his gaze back toward you, and the sorrow contained within its depths was like the sea.
Eip let ile sepa yivril. Eip tolk ile ali wot. Il sepil shielmored; tsie. Eip drialt drio wialk fonie eipal shielkud-!his voice cracked, the first time you've heard it do so; if a ghost could weep, surely tears would flow freely down his cheeks.
A long silence hovered expectantly in the air.
Drire wire an fier eipal teriril sepanudr dre tsut la'al rital. Fil fun sepil tsalkil kuce.Desperate longing colored his tone now, and you could feel a crushing loneliness emanating from some terrible place within his heart.
Eip hale remonil. Kien nie, draral ali yia - drire sepal hoke drat eipal kol eln drial cykre eif lak.
The Dream Visitor lifts his weary gaze, and the air itself seems to pull taut around you as something shifts. Suddenly, from seemingly every direction, you spot all of the Runes - every shard, every glowing symbol pulled from ruin over the past year by the new wolves of Mythris - answer his call. They rise overhead, coming together from unseen places one by one as they spiral inward, circling him in a slow, methodical storm, their rhythmic pulses mimicking that of a steady drum-beat that rattles inside your chest. Their collective light fractures the air in front of you, tearing open three wounds just large enough for you to pass through.
Three doors.
In one, a vast black sky splits down the middle, radiant light seeping through as distant wolfsong chants from within, haunting and resolute as dozens of other voices gradually join in. You see layers of snow stripping away before the unified sound; a sound that drives back the cold and calls down the sun to heal this cold, broken land.
In another, the Great Tree shudders - it is under assault. Its ancient bark bleeds black ooze, every branch crawling with aberrant wraiths that rip and tear into its core, and every moment that passes you feel its protective power begin to fade. The Dream Visitor and his mate's skeletal remains are locked tight beneath a layer of roots, but not for long. They guard something terribly important, something fragile and only just now taking root with the influx of magic as the first hint of green pushes up through the soil, a faint shimmer of gold surrounding it -
- Dre core fir dre Kerasite. Golk tortlehud.He offers the first shade of a smile - had he been an herbalist in his past life? - but it quickly fades.
Ut shienal ban tsieind hire, matorind. Eipal hale nortoril ut cerefunyl - fir ut sepal laba delicate klalk.
The Great Tree must be defended - or the cure will be lost.
And in the last portal, the Moving Isle looms close - its fractured surface ruptured by two vast, glowing eyes that stare unblinking into the dark, watching. You hear a distant roar that seems to originate from deep within the Isle itself, a sound so full of unending suffering and agony you almost scream back at it to drown out the noise.
The Runes fall still, suspended between each door, and the Visitor's voice follows, low and unyielding.
Drra kadral. Fun thace. Dre kadr fier dre hulir, dre kadr fier dre werriir...he trails off.
Ir dre kadr drat ma lab elirydrind fier yia.
There is no wrong choice, here; you feel the risk inherent in each, and it is up to you to follow the wisdom of your heart. It will take every soul on Mythris to fight back the end of the world and each path is absolutely necessary to this end.
The Dream Visitor waits.
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