Defenders of Dreamland

Where's Kirby?
I need a hero!

Notes

The Sound
of Silence

"We have arrived to the Neutral Grounds," the artificial intelligence on-board the Myrmidon stated.  Looking out the window, Anastasia and Taliya were baffled.  This was the place they called home for a long time; a place where the Isayev Heavy Industries was based; a bustling city that thrived on industrial achievements and movement of goods and services.  However, as the two flew over the city, it appeared to be dead.  Everything was frozen in place as if walking into a snapshot of time; entering a photo where they were the only ones able to move.  

The fact that the entire industrial city had come to a complete stand-still was eerie.  A feeling of fear crawled up Anastasia's spine; a feeling of being spooked out from the creepy imagery she was beholding.  "Bring us in for a landing, George," Anastasia said with the artificial intelligence replying with "Compliance."  The airship came for a landing on a helipad just out behind the building of Quantic Dreams Incorporated.  Upon exiting the Myrmidon, Anastasia and Taliya made their way towards the door only to be welcomed by the woman in the letter; at least that was who they expected to see.  

The engine of the Myrmidon spooled down as the woman approached Anastasia.  She had long red hair, wearing a white coat and a visible red tie.  "You're Anastasia Isayev?" the woman said as Anastasia nodded.  "Yeah!  And you're Karla Dunham?" Anastasia asked.  "Yeah!" the woman responded.  Looking over the woman, Anastasia spotted her credentials upon her breast that showed a picture card with her name on it.  The card was attached to her jacket, tethered by a retractable line (mainly for use to access certain areas as a key-card).  Her eyes returned to the woman before the trio started to make their way inside of the building.

Upon entering the building, there was silence.  An eerie silence washed over everyone as the building had no activity going on.  "It seems that everyone where I was at had fallen asleep as well," Anastasia stated only for Karla to nod her head.  "Yes, it was a bad assumption that distance would matter when the dimensions are starting to blur.  My apologies making that assumption," Karla said as she readjusted her hair.   "Follow me, please," she said as she started to escort the two throughout the building.  The halls were empty and through the glass walls, they could see scientists unconscious at their desks.  

This caused Anastasia and Taliya to shiver.  It was quite a spooky sight to behold.  "So they just instantly fell asleep like that?" Taliya asked.  "Yes, it seems that way.  The dimensions between the land of man and the land of beasts began to merge, so it's not surprising that they would get taken into the land of dreams.  Seems like the King of Dreamland is busy at work, hm?" Karla asked.  There was no reply from Anastasia or Taliya, not being able to take that fairy tale becoming reality very seriously.  

Karla removed her card and swiped it over a sensor, causing a green light to appear on the doorknob with a subtle 'clunk'.  She grabbed the doorknob and opened the door.  "Normally, this place is only authorized for a certain number of people, but I think with the current situation, I can allow a pass," she said as Anastasia and Taliya walked through the door before her, closing the door behind as the three of them walked through.  There was yet another hallway for them to go down; this time the hallway was pure white with no labels on the doors other than the room numbers.  

"This is the Dream section of Quantic Dreams," Karla said as she walked into a room labeled "07" only to see one of the people she was studying laying there for a moment.  "This is Marco Santacruz.  He is may fiancee`.  He was one of the first to fall into the Dreamland," Karla stated, pointing at all of the wires attached to his head.  "Those wires pick up delta waves coming out of someone's brain.  That's how I know someone's going through a nightmare," she said as Marco started to convulse violently.  His heartrate quickened to a very dangerous level.  Jumping into action, Karla opened up a dresser and pulled out a syringe, quickly injecting Marco with it.  Moments after she injected him, he calmed down.  With a sigh of relief, she dumped the syringe into the 'sharps' container.  

"Those who have been sent to the Dreamland go through nightmares on a regular basis.  I haven't done enough research, but constant exposure to these nightmares may cause damage to their psyche.  This is why I called for you to help me.  I didn't know who else to turn to for this mission," Karla said as a single tear welled up in her left eye.  A single swipe of her palm wiped the tear away before turning to look to Anastasia.  "So, I want you to become a Dream Warrior and free these people from their bondage and defeat the King of Dreamland," she said.  Anastasia took a step back and looked to Marco for a moment.  

"You have a way of sending me to Dreamland safely?" Ana asked cautiously.  A nod was given her way.  "Yes.  I will have to put you to sleep, however, I cannot chemically induce sleep for this.  You will have to fall asleep on your own.  Chemical induced sleep screws with the Delta Waves, making your ability to dream unstable," she said.  "So, will you help me?"

Anastasia thought for a moment before looking towards Taliya.  "Keep an eye on her," Anastasia whispered before Taliya nodded her head.  Turning back towards Karla, Anastasia accepted.  "Good, let's get you set up," Karla said as she left the room to be followed by the two, entering the room labeled "03" where a bed is set up and all the wires to monitor her vitals were set up.  A C-PAP machine is also installed to maximize a person's ability to breathe so they can remain in REM sleep for a lengthened period of time.  A robe was placed on the bed for Anastasia to dress in.  

"Get dressed in that.  We'll give you a couple minutes to get dressed," Karla said leaving Anastasia alone in the room to get dressed into the gown.  After a few minutes, Anastasia is laying in the bed, under the covers.  Karla entered the room and started to hook up the C-PAP machine to her and then started to plug wires onto her head, turning on the machines to start reading her vitals and brain activity.  Another machine was hooked up to her separately.  

"What's this?" Ana asked.  "This is a machine that allows you to have lucid dreams.  Basically, you are able to control what happens in your dreams, giving you the advantage over those in Dreamland," Karla explained.  Calming down, Anastasia laid back down and allowed her to hook her up into the machine.  "Now, we will wait for you to go to sleep.  Just be aware that we NEED you to fall asleep for this to work," she said as she turned the C-PAP machine on, launching air through her nostrils to clear a path for her to breath easily.  

"Now, we wait on you," she said as she leaves the room with Taliya towards the observation room.  She flips a switch which puts on very soothing music.  With the music playing, Anastasia slowly drifts off into Dreamland.  

Notes

In Dreams
We Find Peace

Anastasia fell into a dream, falling downwards.  The sinking feeling was unsettling, normally something that would cause her to awaken.  Anastasia reached up to what appeared to be the surface of the water with a little bit of light remaining.  Anastasia took a deep breath in, feeling like she was drowning only to let out a deep breath, seeing bubbles form as she continued to fall down the darkness in the abyss.  As she continued to fall through the abyss, she saw dark figures swimming through the water.  Dark figures that she couldn't see the definite shape to it, swimming towards her and nudging her to the point of ping-ponging her around.  She felt no pain, only pressure.  However, one of the creatures didn't attempt to nudge her, this one opened it's mouth and swallowed Anastasia whole.While inside of the creature's stomach, a wide assortment of colors assaulted her with various noises and sensations.  The colors assaulting her senses was psychodelic in a rather brain-washing manner.  She didn't want to look at it, but at the same time, she wouldn't be able to look away.  She was once again falling, this time instead of falling through water, she was falling into a tunnel of light.  If this was her dream, or that of dreamland, what does this all mean? Why is she being assaulted with colors when she's asleep?  Is this someone's idea of a cruel and sick joke?  It was Anastasia's belief that dreams happened as a means of sorting out the information stored in one's brain.  She never believed that the things she saw were things belonging to another dimension.  
The colors wore off and Anastasia found herself falling upwards into the sky.  This caused panic in Anastasia as she started to fall upwards into the sky.  "What the hell is going on?"

Back in the lab..
Anastasia's heart rate started to accelerate to a very dangerous rate.  Taliya stood up in her seat to go towards Ana's room only to have her tail pulled by the scientist with a firm shake of her head.  "Let it happen.  Entrance into Dreamland isn't a safe journey, but she's strong enough to make it," Karla simply stated, only for Taliya to sit down.  Taliya folds her arms over her plentiful chest and crosses her legs, bouncing them in nervous anticipation.  "What is it like in the Dreamworld?" Taliya asked.

"Dreamland.  Well, I don't know, I've never been there myself.  According to the tales, Dreamland is where everyone once resided; man, beast, spirits, everyone co-existed in this place once-upon-a-time.  Men aspired for something better, something more for themselves.  They were expelled from paradise to live in the World of Man.  The spirits and dream-manifestations, however, were bound to Dreamland.  Men, however, were allowed to visit Dreamland every night when they slept.  However, some are forbidden from entering Dreamland while others are tormented for entering Dreamland.  Those are what we call.." Karla explained the story of Dreamland to Taliya, only to be interrupted by her.

"Nightmares?" Taliya stated.  "Yes, Nightmares.  The King of Dreamland is still angered about Man leaving paradise and thus torments Man by giving them nightmares on occasion," Karla explained.  Taliya burst out into laughter and wiped a tear from her eye.  "That's funny, Karla," Taliya said, still not believing the story told to her.  Karla looked Taliya dead-pan in the face.  "Why would I lie to you?  I have no reason to lie to you.  If you don't want to accept what I tell you as the truth, fine.  You'll just have to ask Anastasia when she gets back, I suppose," she said before leaning back in her chair for a moment.

"I'm going to grab some coffee, do you want some?" she asked Taliya.  "Naw, I'm good, thanks," she responded.  Karla stood up and left the room as Taliya looked towards the monitor with a video-feed of her sleeping with her vitals appearing on the screen.  

Back in Dreamland..
Anastasia found herself collapsed on a very soft ground.  Slapping the ground a couple times caused puffs of white to poof upwards.  She pushed herself up to find herself on a white colored ground.  It wasn't snow.  Standing up, she looked up to see a pristine white castle ahead of her.  This wasn't like a place she had been before.  "Wake up to yet another strange place huh?  I think Karla might've duped me with this crap story she made up about Dreamland," she said as she rubbed her forehead, feeling it pounding as if she woke up from being drugged.  

As she looked around to survey her surroundings, she noticed that the land dropped off.  She walked over to the edge only to find herself high in the air, upon the clouds.  She fell backwards as a way to protect herself from falling forward and to her imminent death.  "Holy crap!  Maybe I wasn't kidnapped.  Maybe her 'Dreamland' shenanigans was real?" Ana asked out loud.  Anastasia was an avid dreamer, enjoying having dreams of fluffy bunnies, candyland, and other things that women who oppress their femininity would dream of.  Deep down, she really was quite girly.  

Standing up, Anastasia began to walk towards the pristine white castle; still in absolute awe of where she was and the majesty of the bright white castle that stood before her.  She had been to a myriad of different worlds, whether it be off-planet of Earthland or to a different dimension.  She, however, has never fully thrust into the world of dreams.  She was always plagued by nightmares of the past from the Pirate Kings to seeing her friend, Almyra, tortured from her village being destroyed.  While she did experience dreams, she didn't experience anything like this before.

Approaching the castle, she was met by 2 guards who crossed their spears in front of her to block her path inward.  The guards appeared to be cartoonish in appearance with strangely shaped bodies and a colorful palette, contrasting the bland white that they lived in.  "Stop right there, Man-Person," the guard on the left said.  

"Excuse you? I'm a woman," she said.  "I'm here to see the King of Dreamland," Anastasia said with the guards growing more and more angry.  "You have come to the wrong place if you wish to speak with the King of Dreamland.  That man is a horrible monster!  This is the castle of the new king of Dreamland!" one of the guards shouted out.  This caused Anastasia to recoil a bit.  "Well, excuse me for being expelled from paradise," Ana said.

A squeaky voice called out to her.  "That's perfectly fine!" said a bright pink ball.  With the words, the soldiers all took a knee to the small puff of pink.  "All hail the future King of Dreamland!" the guard shouted out as they took a knee.  The other guard noticed Anastasia not taking a knee and whispered.  "Take a knee, you idiot," he said.  Anastasia looked at the guard for a moment and then back to the king.  With a quick lunge towards the future king, she wrapped her arms around him.  

"Oh my god!  You're so CUTE!" she said as she started to swing him about while hugging him.  The guards stood up only to be motioned to calm down, allowing Anastasia to release her 'cute aggression' for a moment before sliding out of her grasp with a comedic 'pop' noise.  Clearing it's throat, the future king said.  "So, you must be the Dream Warrior, are you not?" the future king said.  

The guards looked at Anastasia, stunned.  "This is the Dream Warrior?" they said before they take a knee to the Dream Warrior.  At this time, the future king also took a knee in front of Anastasia.  A blush came over her face as she shook her hand.  "Well, that's what Karla said.  But please just call me Anastasia (or just Ana).  No need to kneel to me, please," she said as the fluffy ball of pink stood up and nodded.  "Very well, Dream Warrior Ana.  I am Flamphy Aulorious Pufferton.  Or you can just call me Flappy.  It's what everyone else calls me," he said as he waved to Anastasia with it's little stubby arms.  

Anastasia couldn't resist and brought Flappy into her arms once again and swung him around.  "Why are you so CUTE!!!" she said before Flappy popped out of her grasp once again.  Clearing her throat to regain her composure, a little "sorry" could be heard from her.  "Well, come with me Dream Warrior Ana.  I have a job I need you to do," Flappy said as he turned around and started to walk through the white castle with Ana in tow.  

Notes

In Dreams
We Find Peace

Anastasia followed the future king, named Flappy, throughout the castle only to stop at the audience chamber.  The little ball of pink went to go site in his throne while Anastasia stood at the bottom of the stairs leading up to the thrones.  "Well, now that we have you here, Dream Warrior Anastasia, let me begin to explain to you what's going on.  For thousands of years, the current King of Dreamland appointed himself king and made a decree that Men (those of your race, not your gender) were not allowed into the kingdom of dreams unless they were asleep.  However, since the spirits started to turn their backs on Dreamland, missing the company of Man, they started to turn their backs on Dreamland.  And, of course, a King is nothing without his subjects.  There are also those that don't believe in the King of Dreamland's ambition; that's where we come into play.  We believe the current King's rule is oppressive to spirits and Man alike," Flappy said.

"So, basically you guys are rebels?" Ana asked.  Flappy turned around, with an uncomfortable look crossing his face.  It appeared he didn't like that moniker.  "Well, i suppose you could call us Rebels.  I'd rather we be called 'Freedom Fighters', thank you very much," Flappy said attempting to cross it's stubby arms across his chest, only to fail due to how short they were.  Anastasia's longing to hug Flappy until he is smashed to little bits started to take over.  However, that's not a way to treat a king when he's acting in an official capacity.  

"The very fact that you're here is also a blessing.  The coming of the Dream Warrior to save us from this oppression came to us in a prophesy," Flappy said.  "Of course," responded Anastasia, knowing these tropes.  Anastasia flipped some of her long blonde hair over her shoulder, thought being a 'hero of prophesy' in Dreamland wasn't the first place she was the 'hero of prophesy'.  She protected a group of tribes people from Smirnoff, of all people and awakened the great Lion.  So this 'you are the hero of prophesy' business is old to her, but it still felt nice.  Not that she ever got any of that attention in the land of the awakened.  

"Anyway, let me get to the bulk of the story.  The King of Dreamland had captured 10 people and turned them into captives, ways to break out of this sleep spell that's happening in the Land of Man.  We have come to know them as 'Dream Sages'.  Anyway, your job is to look for all of these 'Dream Sages' and free them from their nightmare," Flappy said before bouncing around on the throne.  The urge to rush Flappy again to squeeze him arose in Anastasia, but once again, she suppressed her desire to do so.  

"So what you're telling me is that I have to go out and save 10 Dream Sages, break them out of their nightmares, and wake them up.  Doing that will break the nightmare that is happening in the World of Man?" Anastasia asked, as if to confirm the task she is to undertake.  This was probably the first epic journey she is about to undertake; having to save a large amount of 'sages' to break the curse.  She assumed that after her adventure of freeing the sages from their nightmare, she would have to fight against the final boss; the King of Dreamland.  After defeating the King of Dreamland, the new king, Flappy would take over and become a fair and just king of Dreamland.  

Flappy waved it's hands over it's head and then nodded.  "Yes, that's exactly what you need to do.  After you free the 10 Dream Sages, we will lead the charge towards the King of Dreamland and we will fight him.  We will fight him and we will win.  Oh!" Flappy said as he turned to look at one of his soldiers and nodded to them.  "Get it for me please," Flappy said as one of his guards disappeared for a moment.

"Since this is a dream, you can technically use whatever weapon you want, but due to the strange influence of the merging of our worlds, the way you believe dreams to work doesn't work the same way.  We now have restrictions similar to restrictions in the World of Man.  Normal magic that you might have there won't work here.  So I'm going to give you something to help you defend yourself," Flappy said as the guard returned with a scepter in hand.  The scepter has a large blue ball on top of it.

"This is the Scepter of Dreams.  You can put your magic into this scepter and shoot out your magic in the form of either a beam or a high powered ball of energy.  It's also pretty sturdy, so you can CLONK enemies over the head if you need to.  You can also teleport by using the high powered ball of energy.  Take this," Flappy said as he handed the weapon over to Anastasia.  Ana stepped up the steps to grab the weapon, feeling a huge surge of energy flow through her; like a rush of exhilaration running through her.  A big smile came across Anastasia's face as she held the scepter.  

"I can feel the power running through this thing.  This is incredible!" Anastasia said as she looked down upon Flappy.  Flappy simply smiled and nodded.  "While you're out on your adventure, rub the magic ball at the end of the scepter and you can communicate with us.  Please tell us every time you free a Dream Sage so we can keep track of when we need to mobilize for the assault on the black castle," Flappy said with a nod.  Anastasia smiled and nodded to Flappy before running up to him and hugging him firmly, swinging him from side to side.  "I'm gonna miss you, FLAPPY!" she shouted out before Flappy popped out of the grasp on his own.  The benefits of having an amorphous body.  Shaking a bit, Flappy fluttered away from Anastasia.

"Well, now it's time for you to go, Dream Warrior Anastasia!  Go and become the hero that we need!" Flappy said before Anastasia was quickly teleported outside of the pristine white castle.  Blinking, Anastasia looked around confused.  She didn't understand that she was forcefully ejected from the castle due to her obnoxious attitude towards the future king of Dreamland.  But that's a secret between us, don't tell Anastasia.  With the Dream Scepter in hand, she noticed green pillars of light emerge from the ground, up to the sky.  There was a total of 10 pillars. "Well, it seems like the path to becoming a hero has been laid out for me.  Time to take on these dungeons and free the Dream Sages!" Ana said as she raised the scepter in hand and started to run towards one of the dungeons holding one of the Dream Sages.

Notes

Nao
Part 1

Finding herself outside, she found herself standing in the middle of a group of 10 pillars of light.  "So those are the 10 temples that I need to conquer, huh?  Temples of Nightmares that the 10 Dream Sages reside?  Alright!  Let's get to work then!" she said as she gripped the Scepter of Dreams in her hand tightly.  She looked around, feeling a strange feeling of overwhelming horror that she is about to embark on.  The fact that she has to take on so many people's nightmares may cause some emotional trauma upon herself.  However, the world depends on her to take on this burden for herself.

Walking towards a particular pillar of light landed her at the edge of the cloud, looking down, Anastasia shook her head and stepped back.  "Yeah, even if this is a dream, I'd rather not fall down there.  Ugh!  How do I get across?" she asked.  From where she stood, she saw one of the temples with a light shining upwards even higher.  That temple, however, resided upon a black cloud.  The entirety of this place covered in white was surrounded by the darkness, as if it was ready to strike.  This gave Anastasia a very uncomfortable feeling; a feeling of unease.  Stepping back further, Anastasia looked at her Scepter of Dreams and put quite a bit of her magic into the scepter and swung it upwards.  From the staff, a 'rainbow bridge' appeared from the side of the white clouds all the way to the side with the black clouds.  "Bifrost?" Ana asked herself.  This was quite unusual.

Looking upon the rainbow bridge that was formed, Anastasia hopped onto the bridge and started to walk her way across the large chasm.  She started to walk across the chasm upon the imitation Bifrost.  The walkway was quite narrow, being nearly 3 feet across.  Anastasia's heartrate started to elevate, using the Scepter of Dreams as her means of keeping her balance, holding it upright and out in front of her.  She'd use it as a balancing beam, but the big orb on the top would throw her balance off.  So she held the lop-sided weapon out in front of her as she slowly, and wobbly moved her way across the bridge.

"Be calm, Anastasia, you can do this!  Don't let the height bother you," she said as she continued her way across the bridge until she made it all the way across towards the dark-side.  As soon as she stepped foot upon the darkened clouds, the dazzling rainbow bridge vanished into thin air.  Anastasia leaned over to catch her breath.  "Holy crap!  I hope I don't have to do that again," she said as she stood up and looked around.  It seemed that all of these temples were in a ring around the main island where the white castle stood.  Off to the edge, near one of the curves, resided the black castle where the current King of Dreamland resided.  Narrowing her eyes at the castle for a moment, she turned to make her way towards the first temple.  

Anastasia found herself in front of a temple with a massive clock on the outside of the temple.  The clock didn't have an hour or minute hand.  The second hand of the clock, however, started bouncing around everywhere without any precise pattern or route of movement.  It seemed completely random until the bells of the clock struck.  Massive bells were struck, counting off 35 times.  Each ring of the bell sent shocks of pain into her eardrums, forcing her to block her ears until the clock stopped.  "The clock struck 35 times?  What the hell kind of time is in this place?" she asked herself.

"Right, I guess in a place like this, time has no meaning," she said as she looked to the massive clock for a moment more before walking into the temple.  The temple was worn out, as if taken over by time, itself.  Things had crumbled and everything had decayed.  "Why would a place like this be in dreams?" she said as she walked in, her voice reverberating throughout the entirety of the temple. Walking towards the altar, Anastasia noticed a rusted pocket watch.  Picking it up, she looked at the watch-face.  This watch had a working watch face.  

She shook the watch a bit only to hear nothing, which means the watch was still in-tact.  Playing around with the pocket watch, she moved the hour hand to a three before hearing a click.  This caught her attention as the sound came from somewhere within the temple.  Remembering hearing 35 rings of the bell, Ana moved the minute hand to the 5 and there was another click followed by something moving.  A sound of grinding, stone against stone, could be heard in the distance.  

Pocketing the watch, Anastasia moved to where she believed she heard the grinding of stones.  She found that, near the back of the temple, was a false wall.  The smell of stale air rushed out of the hole as Anastasia saw a flight of stairs spiraling downward.  Grabbing a firm hold of the Scepter of Dreams, she put a little bit of magic into the Scepter and caused it to emanate light from the bulbous head.  The scepter let off a clean blue light to illuminate her way down the narrow flight of stairs.  The stairs were slippery from water dripping from the top down.  This forced Anastasia to keep one hand upon the wall while the other held her 'torch' as she descended.  After about 150 steps, Anastasia found herself inside of an atrium, a center piece that lead into smaller areas.  This place appeared to be a catacombs of sorts.  

She held her hand, the one holding her 'torch', she headed towards the center of the atrium only to find a crystal floating upon an altar.  Curious, Anastasia extinguished the light from the scepter of dreams as the crystal gave off it's own light.  She approached the crystal closer only to notice Nao being stuck in the crystal.  She covered her mouth with her free hand, looking on as Nao remained in suspended animation.  "Why?  Why are you one of the dream sages?" she asked in a muffled tone.  

The hand that she held the scepter in began to shake.  It began to shake out of fear and anger simultaneously.  Her demeanor went from one of dread to one of anger.  Ana lowered her hand down to her side, gripped the Scepter of Dreams firmly in her hand and scowled upon seeing the crystalized Nao.  "Screw this world and screw the King of Dreamland.  I don't care about the title of Dream Warrior.  This place made this personal," she said as she touched the crystal, only to be bathed in light.

Notes

Nao
Part 2

Anastasia was bathed in light for a brief moment, finding herself in a derelict building.  The inside of the building appeared to be a laboratory of some sorts.  Lights flickered on occasionally, leaving the majority of her time there in darkness.  Flickering the Scepter of Dreams on, once again, Anastasia illuminated her way.  She held the scepter up into the air so it would light everything around her, lighting up a further distance.  She moved her way through the abandoned facility, seeing everything pushed around to the side and several things broken and shattered upon the ground.  It seemed there was a struggle here.  

Ana continued her way through the facility, seeing a myriad of dead bodies laying in place, half decomposed with multiple holes inside of their body.  Black marks that appeared to be dried blood smeared the walls in what appeared to spread from the glass walls all the way to the person's final resting spot.  Drag marks at the site of the wound dragged against and along the glass before sliding downwards.  Anastasia just observed this for a moment before turning to walk away from this grisly scene, making her way down a dark hallway.  The same grisly view can be seen in each and every room, causing her to simply walk passed it all.  

Anastasia made it to the end of a hallway where there was a door behind it.  Anastasia reached for the door and opened it only to see as single room lined with Naos everywhere.  They were residing in test-tubes.  There were hundreds of test-tubes, if not thousands of them, lining the room, filling the room.  There were rows of tubes with a sign upon them.  The words upon the sign were some cryptic language; one that Ana has never seen before.  It wasn't a language that actually existed, but a language that the mind of the dreamer made up due to the impertinence of what was written there.  The light flickered on, illuminating the entire room.  Ana lowered the Scepter once again, extinguishing the light coming from it.  

A familiar voice could be heard somewhere in this room.  It was Nao screaming extremely loud at someone.  Anastasia tilted her head and made her way towards the source of the noise.   The closer she approached, the louder Nao's voice got.  The words that came from Nao's mouth became more and more audible, but due to the dream distortion, she wasn't able to really make out too much of what he was saying.  Every few words was what he was able to make out.  However, the tone stayed in tact, allowing Anastasia to know that whatever Nao was screaming at, the more and more angry he became.  

Anastasia approached Nao, seeing that he wasn't distorted in appearance, but the person he was screaming at appeared distorted.  A general appearance of the person in question could easily be seen and the words this person was saying was in complete disarray.  They sounded like audible distortion from a dying speaker.  The strange blurred out face of the person Nao's looking at was unsettling.  She pulled out the pocket-watch she found at the beginning of the temple and looked at it.  The time on the watch was spinning out of control, going backwards and then forward.  Perhaps what she's seeing is a fear that wasn't based off of something that happened, but a generalized fear.

The problem with this is, Anastasia can't figure out what Nao was afraid of or how this was a nightmare.  As she looked on, she watched as Nao started to get more and more aggressive as a woman opened up a box that had a bright red button upon it.  She then heard a completely audible sentence coming from Nao as he turned to look towards her.  "Hey, are you going to give me a hand!?" Nao shouted out before Anastasia nodded her head and with a quick dive in, she jumped on the blurred person before they could press the button.  Ana struggled with the blurred individual and struck the figure with her fist, knocking it unconscious.  Standing up, Anastasia looked over to Nao, holding the scepter in her left hand.  

"Interesting weapon you got there," Nao said with a smile upon his face.  

Anastasia looked at it for a moment and laughed.  "I know, right.  It was given to me for this quest.  Of all of the weapons I could have used, they gave me the mage's weapon.  Funny that," she said as she considered herself more of a warrior type instead of a mage.  

"So what is it with this... uh.. Nightmare?" Anastasia asked.  She looked puzzled.  


"Well, that person you just," Nao said as he looked towards the person Anastasia had previously knocked out to no longer see the person where they were.  He looked around to find the blurred person standing in front of one of the tanks with one of the clone Naos.  That person had the red button in their hands.  Nao reached out towards the person as they pressed the button.  With a muffled laugh, the person vanished into thin-air.  As the person vanished, the many Nao versions started to fall apart within their respective tanks.  Their limbs and head started to disconnect from the main torso before their body started to dissolve.

Nao began to break down and scream, seeing all of the clones begin to break down into the most basic molecules.  While Nao began to have his breakdown, Anastasia dove to her knees and put her hands upon Nao's shoulders to shake him. "This is only a dream, Nao!  Wake up!  None of this is real!" she said as Nao swung his arms to disarm Anastasia of him.  "Shut up!  All of them are dead!  Dead!" Nao said before she lunged in to grasp him into a warm and tight hug.  

"This is just a dream, Nao.  Wake up and this nightmare will go away.  Trust me," Anastasia said to him softly before Nao's body went limp but his breath could still be heard.  "This is just a dream.  Just a dream.  I will wake up from this and everything will be fine," Nao said in a defeated manner before vanishing from Anastasia's grasp.  Anastasia fell forward before being bathed in light once more.

Anastasia found herself back in the temple, this time, however, the temple appeared to be in pristine condition as the bell rang once again.  The bell sounded lively and full of hope.  The temple was clean and full of life, as if it was still being used.  She looked to the pocket watch that she had and the pocket watch looked pristine and new.  Removing her grasp from the pocket watch, she placed it back upon the altar where she got it originally and then walked out.  She noticed a bridge permanently attach from the White Castle towards this temple.  The cloud beneath also turned a pristine white color around the temple as well.  

Anastasia looked towards the scepter and rubbed the top of it to speak to Flappy.  "Flappy, this is Ana, come in," she said as she saw the fluffy pink ball wave at her in the crystal ball.  "Oh, hi Dream Warrior!  How is it going?" Flappy asked.  "Doing good.  I just liberated the first Dream Sage," she said as Flappy waved it's arms in the air.  "Good!  Keep going!  I could already feel the grip between this world and the world of man weakening.  Keep doing what you're doing, Dream Warrior!" Ana said as Flappy cut off communication once again.  

Anastasia looked downwards and took a deep breath.  "Poor Nao.  I hope he wakes up and has pleasant dreams," she said before turning her eyes towards the next temple, which was within walking distance, but still wasn't all that close to begin with.  "Well, time to work on the next one," she said as she started to walk with the Scepter of Dreams in hand to the next objective.

Notes

Mudkip
Part 1

After her run-in with Nao's dream, it was her turn to free the next Dream Sage.  Walking from the newly acquired light-colored clouds, she stopped at the boundary between light and dark, remaining on the side of the light.  The place she just liberated looked friendly, kind, and caring.  A place were good dreams go.  After a moment's hesitation, Ana stepped into the darkness once again, leaving the light behind.  The place instantly grew darker, more ominous, in appearance as she crossed over.  The sounds of screams could be heard, nightmares of those caught in this curse started to rush in through sound only.  Goosebumps formed upon Anastasia's skin as she approached the second temple.

The second temple was lined with statues of terrifying creatures; those you would see in a nightmare or even worse.  These statues were extremely life-like, feeling like they would jump out at you at any time.  The feeling of fear continued to creep up on Anastasia as she walked through the gauntlet of these terrifying figures.  The temple, itself, was carved with the images of terrifying monsters on the outside, with a stain-glass window of a ball that was half-red and half-white.  Anastasia noticed the ball and tilted her head, having seen something like this before.  

The doors of the temple were wide open, allowing her to pass through the temple unhindered.  She grasped the Scepter of Dreams tightly, noticing torches still lit around the entire temple.  It was large and hollow with no chairs, no nothing on the inside other than an altar.  Anastasia approached the altar to notice the red and white ball, similar to what she saw on the stain-glass window sitting comfortably upon the altar.  If this was anything like the watch that she had seen in the first temple, she knew it would have some significance to the dream.  She took the ball and turned to look up towards the stain-glass window to see light shining through it.  The light shined a beam in the color of the red-and-white ball towards a portion of the floor within the temple near the middle.  

Approaching the part of the temple, Anastasia stood above the light, trying to figure out what it was trying to tell her.  Something scurried along the ground, frightening Anastasia to the point she dropped the ball, hearing a strange and hollow thud.  This thud didn't sound natural at all.  Tilting her head, she bent over to pick up the ball and saw the space between the tiled floor was emptied, as if this was used to cover something.  Putting the ball into her pocket, she put her fingers into the hole of the floor and started to pull up to notice a hole with a staircase moving downwards.

Holding the Scepter of Dreams firmly, Anastasia walked down the stairs only to see the same crystal that Nao was captured in.  This time, it was a small creature encapsulated within.  Anastasia laughed a bit and shook her head.  "This is the second Dream Sage?" she asked in disbelief before clearing her throat and touching the crystal.  Everything was bathed in a white light.

Anastasia awakened in what appeared to be a vehicle of sorts, to a ringing and buzzing in her left butt pocket.  She reached towards the butt pocket and pulled out a PDA of sorts.  She looked at her hands, noticing something very different about them.  However, she turned on the PDA to see an older man talk to her about the world she lived in.  He mentioned something about creatures that they'd be friends with where they work together, live together, and play together.  After the speech on the PDA, the vehicle came to a stop and Anastasia jumped out of the vehicle.  

She was greeted by a woman who smiled at her.  "Hello Anastasia.  Was that a long ride?  Well, good to see you got here in one piece.  Today's the big day!  The local professor asked to see you.  Go find him in his lab just next door.  Don't worry about the boxes, I'll have these creatures help me unpack," she said as she referred to the large, muscular humanoid-creatures that were helping with the unloading.  Anastasia nodded, "Um, Okay mom," she said uncomfortably before running towards the lab.  "Where am I now?" she asked herself.

Someone walked out of the lab, it was a boy about the age of 12 and he came to a full halt upon seeing Ana.  "Oh!  You must be Ana!  The girl who moved in.  Right, well, my father is the professor of this village and he went out that way," he said as he pointed towards the north.  "You should probably go see him, he's out doing research and he gets carried away sometimes; even though he knew you were coming.  We'll be here, okay," he said with a big smile before walking back in.  

"So north now?" she said as she walked through the small town before hearing a scream.  Rushing towards the sound of the noise, she saw a man running in circles away from a dog-like creature.  "In the bag.." he said as he passed by Ana the first time.  "Grab one of those balls.."  he said as he passed again.  "And help me!" he said.  There was a satchel laid out away from the man she identified as the professor.  In the bag, there were 3 balls.  Instinctively, Ana chose the one on the right.  It felt like the correct thing to do.

"Now throw it at the creature!" he said as Ana picked up the red and white ball and threw it at the creature.  As she threw the ball, the same little creature she saw in the temple came out of it, shouting "Mudkip!" After the creature was summoned, Anastasia had it attack the creature until it passed out.  Being saved by Ana and her mudkip, the professor smiled at her and nodded, collected his things.  "Let's go to my lab!" he said as he ran off once again.

Meeting the professor back at his lab, his son, the boy she met before stood behind him.  He picked out one of his own balls and the two had a battle.  The battle between a green gecko and Ana's mudkip flared up before the boy's green gecko knocked Ana's mudkip unconscious.  She rushed to the mudkip and held the creature a bit.  "Don't worry, little guy.  I'll help you out," she said before the professor gave it a potion, bringing it back around.  As it returned, it's eyes darted straight towards the green gecko only to get swatted away again.  It was frothing at the mouth in anger at the green gecko before Anastasia recalled the Mudkip back into the ball.  

This was the beginning of Anastasia's journey into the Mudkip's dream and her turn to become a Monster Champion!

Notes

Mudkip
Part 2

Anastasia started her journey with Mudkip, after having returned to her 'mother' and resting up a bit.  The first thing the next morning, Anastasia packed up her stuff and left.  However, before she was able to make her way through her adventure, she was encountered by the son of the Professor once again.  This time, he handed her a bunch of those red and white balls.  The intention of these balls were to allow her to collect even more creatures similar to Mudkip.  Going through her way to the next town, she caught a bird and dog-like creature.  Whenever she encountered a bug-type creature, she'd let the Mudkip handle it.  Her bond with her three creatures started to have her form a bond with them.  This was like collecting Einherjar, but slightly different.  The style of battling was much different than usual.  

Anastasia made her way through the Rock-type arena, clearing it easily with the Mudkip.  Making their way towards the next city, where the next arena was, Ana and her team ran through a large patch of grass where something ambushed them.  Responding to the ambush, Anastasia threw out her Mudkip only to discover that what they encountered was what was called an 'electric type'.  The little yellow mouse let out a bolt of electricity out towards the mudkip, getting struck by the electricity and falling back.  "Mudkip!" she shouted out.  The creature stood up and shook off the attack, but looking the creature dead in the eyes caused fear to well up within the Mudkip.  Instead of attacking as Anastasia ordered, it started to cower from the yellow mouse.  It did everything in it's power to avoid the bolts of electricity, crying out in fear of the electricity.  

Holding the ball out, she recalled the Mudkip only to finish off the electric mouse with the dog-like creature.  Afterward, she pulled the Mudkip out, still seeing it shake.  Any little noise caused it to recoil and run away.  It began to run away towards the next town, which Ana pursued before running into the Professor's son once again.  Ana and Mudkip ran by the boy with him saying, "Okay then.  Maybe the next town."  

After pursuing the mudkip, she gave it a pep-talk and returned it to the ball.  She rushed the group to the Healing Center and healed her pokemon.  Afterward, it was time for the second arena.  This time around, she let Mudkip relax and let the bird handle everything with the 'Fighting Type' Arena.  After the bird made quick work of this Arena, they made their way to the third town.  With the third town in sight, she was encountered by the Professor's son again, walking out of the Arena.  

"Oh, took you long enough, Ana," he said with a look of confidence in his eyes.  Raising a brow at the boy, Ana waved him off.  "Don't worry, one day my Mudkip will get stronger and we'll wipe the floor with you," she said in absolute confidence before the boy laughed and nodded his head.  "Whatever helps you sleep at night.  Anyway, me and my green gecko are going to the next gym," he said as the mudkip jumped out of his own pokeball and shouted 'mudkip' really loud.  

"Seems like your Mudkip really doesn't like my Green Gecko, huh?" he said as he looked at the mudkip before shrugging his shoulders.  "You should've evolved that thing by now.  Guess he's just stubborn," he said as Ana barked at him.  "He doesn't need to evolve to whoop you, you snotty brat!" she shouted as the boy started to walk away.  "Good luck in the Arena, loser," he said before walking away.

"Don't worry, Mudkip, we'll whoop him the next time we see him," she said as she gave him a comforting smile.  All the creature could do was shout out mudkip before returning to the ball.  Nodding her head, she entered the Arena.  She gasped as she entered the arena, realizing that she entered the Electric Type Arena.  Ana did the best she could to avoid the trainers in here until she was met with a big and jolly looking man.  

The man slapped his belly a couple times before starting the battle. Ana lead off with the dog-like creature and the arena boss lead off with what appeared to be a magnet.  With a couple swift bites and electrical currents going through the dog, the magnet fell only for a circular orb to come in.  Giving the very last of it's strength, the dog-like creature felled the little round ball as well.  However, the Arena Boss came out with what appeared to be the first creature, but with three of them stuck to one another.  It outsped the dog and knocked it out.  

Ana recalled it only to send out the bird.  The bird got off a quick attack before a surge of electricity knocked it out.  Hesitating, Ana looked at the final ball to see Mudkip being in it.  She knows of the Mudkip's fear of electricity, but threw it out anyway.  "Do your best mudkip!" she said as the mudkip flew out of the ball and looked the trio of magnets in the face.  The look of fear and dread came across it's face as it started to run around the arena to avoid the electricity.  It began to scream extremely loud before getting struck with a bolt of electricity, sending it flying away from the arena.  Knowing that Anastasia wants it to keep fighting, it stood back up with the last ounce of it's strength and cried out in place.  It was like a child that was terrified of what's going on.  

The Arena Boss commanded the magnets to deliver yet another bolt of electricity before Ana threw in the towel.  Seeing that the electricity wouldn't stop, Ana ran towards the Mudkip as it cried out in fear and used her body to block the electricity from striking her buddy, the mudkip.  The fat man looked on in horror from what he saw and recalled the magnets back into the ball.  He rushed over to Ana  and turned her over to see a smile and a thumbs up. She protected Mudkip from getting struck by electricity; the cries of the creature filling the entire arena.  

"You should've evolved it," the Arena Boss said as Anastasia sat up and shook her head.  "He didn't want to.  He wanted to remain a mudkip the whole time I was with him so I respected his wishes," she said as the fat man slapped his belly a couple of times.  "I see!  You love your creatures so much that you'd want to see how they fared in an Arena even at that stage eh?" he said as he burst out in jovial laughter.  


Anastasia looked to the Mudkip and placed her hands upon it's face.  "It's over now, Mudkip.  Our journey is over okay?" she said as she shh'd him as if to lull him to sleep.  Strangely enough, it worked.  "Now wake up, Mudkip.  The world needs you to wake up," she said as the Mudkip vanished from the world with her.  Everything turned completely white before Anastasia found herself in the basement of the temple, once again, holding the scepter in one hand and the red and white ball in the other.  The Mudkip was no longer in the crystal holding him before; just like how Nao vanished.  She rubbed the scepter's ball to communicate with Flappy to tell him about her accomplishment, putting the ball back where she got it.  After she cut off communication with Flappy, she made her way to the third temple.

Notes

Julius
You are Not Alone

Anastasia went to the third temple, finding it in state similar to the last two.  She found herself within the third dream; the dream of one of her guildmates, her apprentice, Julius.  As she entered the dream, she finds herself in a place of darkness where there was no feeling, no sound, no light, no nothing; just an empty void.  "Julius!?" she shouted out trying to find him.  

She started to hear a disembodied voice come around.  "Don't hate me.  Don't turn me down.  I swear I can help!  I'm not useless!" she heard Julius' voice call out.

"Don't be foolish, Julius!  You're a proud member of Black Sails.  We're all equals, I promise you!" she said as the disembodied voice called out again.

"I promise, I can do something useful!  Don't forget about me!" Julius said once again before the world turned into bright and vivid colors.  It appeared she was viewing things through Julius' eyes.  A seat appeared a distance away.  Looking at the seat, she walked over and took a seat this time around.  This time, she was a viewer, not a participant.  She observed multiple instances of Julius being denied starting from petty little things such as a first date to job offers to other things.  These were quite petty, but the longer she watched, the more painful each of these got to watch.  

The more she watched several instances, most of them unlikely to happen in the real world, the more and more depressed she got and the more she began to pity Julius.  She continued to watch rejection after rejection after rejection.  She also heard the disembodied voice grow more and more saddened, frustrated at being rejected for very minor things; things that Julius couldn't help.  It wasn't until she saw herself did she start to panic.  "No!  Julius!  I would never reject you like this!  Be reasonable, Julius!" she said to his mind as she turned to observe the going-ons in this dream turned nightmare.

"I-I would like to join the West Fiore Trading Company," Julius said timidly as the Anastasia in Julius' dream just looked him over for a moment and with stone cold eyes said, "Why would I need someone as pathetic and weak as you.  You would get yourself and the crew killed with how utterly weak you are.  I'd rather have a blind person fighting along side me than have a weakling like you at my side," she said as Ana shook her head.  

"No!  I'd never say that to you, Julius!  Don't think this way!  You're better than this!  You have VALUE!" she shouted out as the images she was seeing winded up with Julius on his knees and sobbing into his hands.  This fear of rejection brought tears to her eyes, causing her to cry as well.  "Why, Julius?  Why do you think people will do this to you?" she said as she continued to weep a bit before the scene changed once again.  Wiping her tears from her eyes to watch, she froze in fear of what she was seeing.  

"No, not again, Julius!  Why me?  Why do you fear me doing this to you?" she asked as she noticed that where the dream took them was to the Sun Tower, where Julius became Captain for the day.  The scenario being played out was when she gave him the responsibility of taking charge of the fight, giving him the ability to dictate the flow of battle and call the shots.  What was being shown was the Sun Worshippers on the floor dead with the leader holding a bloodied knife in his cold-dead-hands.  The girl they were there to save laid on the ground, covered in her own blood.

"This is what happens when I put a loser like you in charge!  Look what happens, Julius!  Because of your incompetence, you couldn't save a single girl.  If you couldn't save her, how could I trust you with the rest of the guild!  You are hereby vanished as of this moment.  Don't worry about your crap, you won't need it any more.  Now get out of my face, you loser!" the Anastasia in the nightmare said to Julius.  

"I would never do this to you, Julius, please believe me," she said as she started to sob into her hands once again.  The thought that someone could feel so bad about themselves and fear something that happens to everyone so bad that she would be painted as the boogyman for someone.  The sound of sobbing could be heard over her cries as she looked forward to see a small, young Julius sobbing his eyes out, watching the events that unfurled itself in front of him.  
Wiping her eyes with her hands and sniffling a bit, she walked over to the child-like Julius and sat in front of him and threw her arms around the boy.  "It happens to us all, Julius!  I've been rejected so many times in the past before.  I know how much it hurts," she said as tears continued to well up in her eyes as the child Julius began to sob into her chest.   "There are people out there that want you to succeed.  There are people out there that want you to become better than you are now.  If I didn't see that in you, I wouldn't have allowed you to join Black Sails and I wouldn't have taken you under my wing.  You're not alone in this, Julius.  You don't have to be strong, you have me and you have Black Sails to support you.  We have your back and we will support you through all of this.  Don't feel bad about anything, do you understand?" she asked as the child looked up and sobbed, his eyes swollen from the crying.  

The child hit her chest with his hands as he continued to cry.  The child Julius vanished and the world returned to normal.  She wiped her hand over her face to feel the dampness of her tears.  "Even in this world, I'm crying.  These dreams are almost too much to bare," she said as she contacted Fluffy once again before moving off to the next Temple.  

Notes

Elspeth
Why are the birds so big!?

Anastasia found herself in yet another dream, this time holding the scepter in her hands as she finds herself in a strange forested area.  The flora here in this dream was nothing like she had seen before.  She walked through the the new place, only to stop and see a massive earthworm.  She squealed and ran away from the massive earthworm.  After creating some distance between herself and the earthworm, she heard extremely deep talking from up above.  Noticing the voice, she looked for a clearing in the vegetation before looking upwards to see people sitting.  They were HUGE!  Anastasia jumped up and down to try to get their attention only to no avail.  Stamping her foot, she walked back into the vegetation to think of what's the point of this dream.  

"Maybe someone has a fear of being small and being squished?  I mean, I've had dreams similar to this, but.." she said as a female spider-like creature came out into the area in front of Ana.  With a shrill scream, Anastasia started to run from the she-spider only to re-encounter the earthworm, letting out another shrill scream.  She continued to run until she ran back into the she-spider only to fall down to her knees.  "What the hell?  Where am I?" she asked the spider woman as she looked around.  "Where do you think we are?  We are in a garden.  I come out here to think," she said calmly as she smiled down upon Anastasia.  "But why are we small?" Ana asked.  The spider shrugged her shoulders.  This wasn't like a normal spider; it was more humanoid than it was creature.  

"Ah, man, it's about to rain," said one of the larger humans as they decided to go inside of their house, locked inside by a sliding glass door.  She turned to look towards Elspeth only to see her shaking a bit.  "Something wrong?" she asked the spider-woman.  "Rain.  Rain is dangerous when you're this small.  We must find a place to hide.  You, come with me, I'll keep you safe," she said as Ana raised a brow before a giant drop of water fell to the ground, landing directly next to her.  The splash of the rain drop completely soaking her.  "Holy crap!  You weren't kidding!  I'll follow you!" she said as Elspeth turned and ran towards a giant plant that was in the garden that would work as a roof over their heads.  Upon finding their way there, multiple bugs sought refuge under this leafy roof.

A chill ran up Anastasia's spine as she saw different bugs huddled underneath this massive leaf; a leaf the size of a dinner plate kept everything relatively dry, being strong enough to hold up even when pelted by the rain.  Shivering, Anastasia felt something warm wrap around her only to realize it was the spider woman that did this.  She had another chill go up her spine out of fear of these creepy crawlies in a single place, but felt comforted by the embrace.  

Once the rain let up, from out of the ground large earthworms popped out of the surface and shouted.  "Air!  Get some air!" before one of them was picked off by a bird.  "Holy crap!  What!?" Anastasia shouted out before Elspeth whispered into her ear.  "We need to leave, now.  Those birds are going to eat us," she said calmly.  Even with as calm as she was, it was easy to tell that she was shook up from the rain and the birds but kept a calm demeanor; an almost motherly demeanor so those she considered children would be safe.  

As the duo fled, the creepy crawlies began to get picked off one by one with a constant barrage of birds.  They ran into the thick grass for a moment to take a breather.  "We should be safe here, hopefully," Elspeth said before a raven landed just a couple feet away from them.  "We need to found our way into the house before the birds find us," she said in hushed tones before they slowly started to move away from the thick grass.  A loud caw could be heard as Elspeth grabbed Ana and began to run.  With a quick throw, however, Elspeth threw Anastasia to the side as she got picked up by one of the birds.  

Gasping, Anastasia held the Scepter of Dreams in her hand and shined a light in the raven's eyes, causing it to let Elspeth go before more ravens attacked Elspeth, this time tearing her extra limbs from her body.  Shrieks of pain started to come from Elspeth before Anastasia bonked the ravens, causing them to flee.  Returning to Elspeth's side, she cradled her as her additional legs laid about, dismembered from her body.

"This is only a nightmare.  You need to wake up.  The world needs you to wake up, alright?" she said as Elspeth nodded her head.  "Sure, dear," she said before vanishing.  Waking up back in Dreamland, Anastasia shook her head and cleared her throat.  She contacted Flappy.  He said that the next destination was the Two-Towers.  This tower housed 2 Dream Sages.  Good, a two for one deal.

Notes

The Oshiro Family
The Two Towers

Anastasia found herself in front of a pair of towers connected in the middle to look like a massive ladder moving skyward; a giant's ladder reaching up towards the heavens.  In the middle of the ladder, towards the base of the towers, was a single entrance that Anastasia walked into.  Inside, there appeared to be mirrors everywhere.  In order for her to traverse through this temple, she'd have to find her way through the fun-house of mirrors.  However, without needing to do much, she had a cheat that could help her through this labyrinth.  Holding out the Scepter of Dreams, she asked it for the path through the labyrinth only for there to be a beam of light shining from the Scepter, bouncing off of the mirrors towards the end of the labyrinth.  Even while following this beam of light, showing her the proper way, it still took nearly a half-hour to navigate through the entire thing.  If she didn't have this scepter, she would have been in that labyrinth for who-knows-how-long.  

Upon reaching the end, she noticed two crystals this time; one holding a boy and the other holding a girl.  These crystals were connected, but at the same time, rotated about at different speeds.  She looked around to find the Temple's artifact only to find nothing to aid her in this nightmare.  She touched the crystals and was instantly transported into a burning building.  Anastasia coughed and took a knee, trying to keep low.  Anastasia was quickly introduced to the boy in this nightmare, Kenji Oshiro.  He walked up to her in a crouched fashion.  "When did you get here?" he asked as he shook his head.  "Where's Misayo?" he shouted out.  "Where's MISAYO!?" he said as Anastasia shouted back that she didn't know.  

"Well, you're going to help me find my sister in this inferno.  We can't let her die, do you hear me?" he said as Anastasia nodded her head.  They walked through the burning building as Kenji shouted out "Misayo!  Can you hear me!?" Kenji shouted out, hearing no reply.  "Spread out and we'll find her.  We aren't going to leave her here!" he said as the building started to moan, as if it was ready to crumble and fall.  

The two spread out as they were looking for Misayo on this floor.  The heat of the fire starting to burn into her flesh, making the sweat that came from her pores burn her skin.  Ana noticed a girl passed out under some heavy rubble; rubble that came from the ceiling above them.  "I found her!  I need help!" Ana said as she went to try to pull the rubble off of her, the fire burning her flesh and causing intense pain.  Kenji quickly joined and saw that the girl was, indeed, Misayo.  "Misayo!  No!  Be alive!" he said as he moved his ear to her mouth to see if she was breathing.  "She's breathing, but we need to get her out of here," he said as he helped Anastasia move the heavy rubble off of her body.  

Anastasia moved forward and placed the girl upon her back only for Kenji to shake his head.  He took Misayo off of Anastasia's back and placed her upon his own.  "Alright, let's get out of here now," he said as the two started to make their way down the stairs.  Apparently they were stuck in a large building.  The building moaned once again and started to shake violently.  "We need to get out of here, now!" Anastasia said right as Misayo slowly woke up.  "Ken... ji?" she said weakly.  

"Don't worry!  We'll get out of here," Kenji said.  "What's that noise?" Misayo asked referring to the moaning from the building.  "Don't worry about that, Misayo," Kenji said.  "We're almost out of here.  Don't you worry about a," Kenji said as he lost his footing.  The floor that he had stepped on was weak and was starting to give out.  He threw Misayo further ahead before falling into the hole.  He hung on to the stairs for a moment before looking to Anastasia.  

"Look out for her, alright?" he said as the floor gave way underneath him, causing him to fall into the burning abyss.  "Kenji!" Anastasia grabbed a hold of Misayo and started to move her away.  She resisted, wanting Ana to go back for him.  "If I don't get you out of here now, you will meet the same fate.  So let's get out right now," she said as she grabbed Misayo and ran her out of the building.  

"You stay here, I'm going back in for Kenji, alright?" she said as she set Misayo a safe distance away from the building.  "Don't follow me in there, do you understand?" she said as she ran into the building.  The screams for Kenji could be heard from outside of the inferno before the building began to collapse.  "no!  No no no!  Don't fall!  Please hold up! Kenji is still in there!" she said as if to plead to the building.  The building began to quake and moan even more before the top of the building started to implode, pancaking downwards.  

"Get out!  Please!" she said as she watched the floors pancake downwards towards the ground.  Misayo shouted out in agony as the building fell completely flat, all the way down to the basements, leaving a massive cloud of dust in it's wake.  "Why?  Kenji," she shouted out in defeat.  "Why?  Why does this have to happen like this?  If he just left me inside of the building, he could be alive right now," Misayo said as tears fell down her face.  Another explosion could be seen as Anastasia is holding Kenji over her shoulder, floating out of the wreckage.  This was a dream after all, and Ana knew how to manipulate things within a dream.  

Placing Kenji on the ground, he appeared to be safe from harm.  Her tears of fear turned to tears of relief as she looked up to Anastasia.  "How?  How did you?" she asked as Anastasia shook her head.  "Don't worry about that. What I need you two to do is to wake up.  You are having a nightmare, do you understand?  The world needs you to wake up so the world can return to normal.  This, what I'm saying, isn't part of a dream or a nightmare.  So you need to wake up," she said as she tapped the two of them with the tip of the Scepter, causing them to vanish and for Anastasia to return to the two towers back in Dreamland.  

"These dreams are starting to get more and more intense," she said as she rubbed her face.  

Notes

Aerwyna
Let's all be friends

Ana found herself in yet another black space with a chair again.  "Another observational nightmare this time?" she asked as she took a seat and the eyes open once again.  The person she was observing this time was a female, being able to sense everything they are sensing and feeling everything they were feeling.  The mood was light and whimsical.  The night was cold, but that didn't stop the person she was observing from lighting a sparkler.  From the right side, Ana heard voices coming by and there was a jovial time.  Alcohol was common in this get-together as two faceless individuals started to raise a ruckus.  

These two people were loud and things were starting to heat up around the campfire.  Emotions began to flare as the person she was observing started to get up and walk over to the couple, shouting and asking them to stop.  Things continued to flare up with the person she was observing trying to get in the middle of the spat only to get pushed away.  The faces on these two individuals appeared to be blurred out, not being able to clearly see any facial features.  "Stop it!  Please!  No more!" the voice called out.

"You wanted this to happen?" called out one of the two that were getting into a fight.  

"I didn't want this to happen but you drove to doing this!  If you hadn't slept with Brad, this wouldn't have had happened!"

"So you got revenge on me by sleeping with Emily?  How could you!  You're a piece of shit!" the female of the duo said before pushing the male away.  

"How do you think I felt when you slept with Brad?  You didn't ask, you didn't tell me!  Brad was the one that came to me and told me!" he said before being pushed towards the fire, side-stepping it entirely.  

"Bitch!  What are you trying to do to me?  Are you trying to kill me?" the guy said in a very angered tone.  The girl that Anastasia was observing tried getting in the middle of it again, this time tears in her eyes.  Anastasia felt her cheeks, feeling them dampen.  These weren't her tears.  These were the tears of the one she was observing.  

Ana shouted out to the screen.  "Stop fighting!  Things can get better if you talk it out," Anastasia said as she screamed into the screen.  Things erupted into violence as the female slapped the man before he grabbed her hair and started swinging her around.  The others at the get-together did nothing, almost as if they don't see anything happening.  "Stop it!  Please!" shouted the voice of the person she was observing.  The fight erupted until the woman grabbed a knife and plunged it into the man's throat, causing him to gargle blood before falling into the fire and burning up.

Tears continued to fall from the girl's eyes, with Anastasia's eyes mimicking it before the screen turned black.  "Why?  Why were those people fighting?  It didn't have to erupt into something so crazy like that," Ana said as she wiped her eyes before the screen returned once again.  This time she was a small child right outside of her parent's room.  

Everything was dark except the light coming from inside of their room.  There were loud shouts coming from a man and a woman from behind the door.  Rubbing her eyes, the young Aerwyna walked up to the door and slightly opened it, allowing half of her face to look into the room.  Upon opening the door, the loud shouting grew louder and much more clear.  

"Aerwyna should be entitled to do anything she wants to aspire to be.  If she wants to be--" the feminine voice stated before a more commanding and authoritative voice shouted out "Shut up!  She's a princess and she will do what she is expected to do.  If the time comes, we will marry her off, that's all there is to it," the man said.

"No!  She will love whoever she wants.  She shouldn't be a pawn in your sick political game!  She should have the freedom to live how she wants and to love whomever she wants," the woman said before the man gave a firm backhand to the woman's face.  The young Aerwyna flinched upon seeing that and started to cry out loud.  This caught both of her parent's attention.

"You!  It's because of you!  Get the hell out of here and go back to your room," the man said as he started to move towards Aerwyna only to be stopped by who is assumed to be her mother.  With another backhand, the man approached Aerwyna once more only for his leg to be caught by the woman once again.  "Let me go, bitch!  I need to put her in her place," the man said as he kicked the woman in the chest causing her to gasp for air.  

Fear began to develop in the young Aerwyna, which quickly translated to fear within Anastasia.  "Aerwyna.  Run.  Don't let him get near you.  Wake up, Aerwyna.  Wake up!" she shouted out as the man approached Aerwyna, bent over and grabbed Aerwyna's arm.  "Look what you made me do!  This is all your fault!  If only you had been more obedient, I wouldn't have had to do that," he said as he shook Aerwyna a bit.  The woman started to stand up and rushed at the man, hitting him a couple of times on the back.  The man removed his grasp from Aerwyna and proceeded to harm the woman who dared interrupt him.  

Aerwyna crumbled and closed her eyes, covering her ears, and squatted down.  "Stop it!  Stop it please!" Aerwyna said as Anastasia visibly shook where she sat; still able to feel the same emotions that Aerwyna could.  "Wake up, Aerwyna!  Wake up and this nightmare will stop!" she said as the world turned to white for a moment.  Everything vanished, including Aerwyna.  The world was white for a brief moment before she found herself back in the temple, sitting in a chair.  She wiped the tears from her eyes and shook her head.  

"I don't know if I can take much more of this," she said to herself before pulling up the scepter and notifying Flappy of her progress.  "Good, you only have 3 more Dream Sages to liberate.  You can do it!"  

Notes

Ai Daiki
Don't Starve Together

Ana woke up to find herself in a decrepit cell with a familiar face.  The woman looked ragged and worn out.  This woman was named Ai Daiki.  Ana had encountered her on a job she did with Ashelia where the two had to pose as slaves while the third acted as a slave owner, selling the other two into slavery.  The one thing that stuck out with this one was her lack of emotions.  Sitting in a corner, looking to the side as a rat feasted on a bit of food, she turned her eyes towards Ai for a moment, seeing her lick her lips.  "What are we doing here?" Anastasia asked.  Ai's eyes turned to look towards Anastasia for a moment and she began to spoke.  The reason they were here was stated, but it seemed to be jumbled about, as if someone was intentionally scrambling words.

"Oh," Anastasia said, not having heard anything she said due to the mysterious scrambling. This wasn't the first time she noticed strange scrambling.  She witnessed this in Nao's dream and she also witnessed this in Julius' and Aerwyna's dream.  Is it the brain leaving out specifics to protect the owner or was it something external influencing it?  Regardless of the reason, she was stuck in this dream now.  A loud sound of keys could be heard as two bowls were slid into the cell only for Ai to rush towards both, only for both of the bowls to disintegrate instantly, along with the contents of the bowls.  A look of sadness and disappointment came from Ai before she returned to her corner.

This process repeated several times over the next few days, eventually with Ai giving up and allowing Anastasia to eat.  "What's going on?  Why can't you eat?" Anastasia asked as she finished up her food; as little as what was given to them.  "I don't know and I don't like it," Ai responded, hearing her stomach turn and groan from pain.  Ai's eyes turned to see that rat once again only to attempt to catch the rat.  With the rat firmly in her grasp, she attemptedd to take a bite out of the rat only for her teeth to bounce off of the rat, not harming it at all.  She sighed and let the rat go before returning to her corner.

This continued for a few more days.  Ai is visibly skinnier from the lack of food consumption.  The little bit of water given was all she was able to put down, but anything that could be considered food was either destroyed when she touched it or she was unable to eat it.  She laid in the corner during the next feeding, not even bothering.  "Ai, it's time to eat.  Maybe you should try it.  You know how birds eat right?  Maybe we can try that?" Ana asked.  Certainly it wasn't something she would normally do, but Ai wasn't able to eat so this was one of the last alternatives she could think of.

"What's the use. The food will just slip out of your mouth and not even touch my tongue.  What's the point?  I'm just going to die like this.  I don't want to die like this," she said as she just laid there in obvious pain and in utter defeat.  Several days passed where food became more and more scarce; with some meals being completely skipped altogether.  The two only subsided on water for the time being.  Ai laid in her usual corner as still as a corpse when food was finally brought out after being deprived of it for a couple days.  "Ai, food's here.  It's something solid.  Maybe you could," she said as she didn't notice Ai responding.  She crawled over towards Ai and shook her by the shoulder weakly.  "C'mon, wake up.  Don't die on me.  Not like this," she said as she grabbed one of the biscuits and put it in her hand.  She turned Ai over and pressed it against her lips, as if to force it into her mouth.  Something stopped the food from entering her mouth, even in this shape.  

"Wake up, Ai," she said, still seeing her chest raise up and drop from breathing.  "Wake up," she said once again, moving her hand up to her face and slapping it a bit to help her return to consciousness.  Her eyes opened slowly and weakly.  "Not like this, Ai.  Not like this," she said before hugging the once voluptuous girl a bit.  "This is only a dream, Ai.  You aren't actually starving.  Wake up. There's plenty of food for you when you awaken," she said as the door opened up, displaying a buffet before them.  "Look, Ai, see that!  That's food.  Let's go and get some alright?"

Ai turned her eyes to see the smorgasbord of food and her lips began to water.  With Ana's help, Daiki stood up and the two of them left the room only for Anastasia to be the only one to make it across the threshold, finding herself back in the renovated temple.  Taking a sigh outwards, Anastasia shook her head.  "Two more..."

Notes

Summer
I ain't afraid of no ghosts.  Actually, I am.

Anastasia woke up to find herself in the second to last temple after touching the crystal containing the next Dream Sage.  She woke up to find herself seeing the Crystal was gone and nothing else had changed.  Standing up inquisitively, she grabbed the Scepter of Dreams and walked around a bit.  Nothing seemed to have changed in this dream at all except for the loud shriek she heard outside.  Reacting to the noise, Anastasia saw a girl sitting against the altar with a look of dread in her eyes.  Another shriek came out, this time from Anastasia as she held out the scepter and shined a light, causing the specters to vanish from view.  

"You made them go away!  Yay!" the girl said as she stood up and went to go hug Anastasia.  Clearing her throat, Ana looked to her and tilted her head.  "How did you get out of the crystal?" she asked Summer before an equally confused look crossed her face.  "What are you talking about?  I was told to stay in this haunted house for the night.  I didn't think this place was ACTUALLY haunted!  And I can't even go outside.  Something's stopping me from leaving," she said as Ana pointed the scepter towards the door and shined a beam of light, only to see it stop at the door.  

"Well, that's stupid.  Guess you and I are stuck here for the night huh?" she said with a fake smile upon her face.  Now she realized that this was the nightmare; so much for being tricked by the mind about this being a dream within a dream; one of those dreams that feel too much like reality.  "I have something I need to tell you," Anastasia said before Summer let out a shriek before ghosts started to form all around them.  Their sounds of groaning and moaning became loud and pronounced.  Anastasia turned around only to be jumpscared by a ghost directly in her face, screaming back at Anastasia.  She swung the scepter and caused the ghosts to go away for a moment.  

"I don't like this spooky ghost crap.  Why do I keep picking jobs with this crap?" Ana asked as Summer looked to her.  "You hate ghosts too?" Summer asked and Ana nodded her head.  "Yeah, I absolutely hate them," she said with an uncomfortable laugh.  And then another jumpscare from these ghosts sent Ana over the edge, to the point where she took the scepter and bonked Summer over the skull.  "This is only a dream! Wake your ass up right now!  I don't want to be stuck in this crap any more!" she said as she got jumpscared once more, clubbing that ghost with the scepter and then clubbed Summer once more, only for her to vanish once more, re-appearing in a pristine version of the temple.  

Anastasia fell to her knees and started to breathe heavily.  "This is stupid.  I'm tired of all of these nightmares.  Just... One more..." she said before wiping her brow, standing up, and making her way to the final temple.

Notes

Euphemia
The Final Nightmare

Anastasia awakened in the final dream to darkness.  She couldn't see anything around her, she couldn't see her hands or anything else.  She was left groping in the dark.  Searching for a place to go, she got upon her hands and knees and started to feel the ground.  She lost track of the Scepter of Dreams and started to look for that.  That would be her primary light source.  While she was looking for the Scepter, she heard screams of fear.  A familiar voice rang out to her. "Euphemia?" she asked herself.  "EUPHEMIA!" she shouted out only for there to be no answer.  "Euphemia!  Hold on, I'm coming!" she said as she looked around for the scepter.

Euphemia was strapped down into a chair, seeing only a single light shining in her eyes, making everything else appear dark.  Her wrists, elbows, ankles, knees, waist, and even head were strapped down into place as she heard shuffling.  They were speaking in a strange and indistinguishable language before shuffling once more.  The sounds of clanging could be heard before the light was moved.  

Euphemia saw strange, gray-skinned creatures with large black eyes assemble above her, poking at her flesh and touching her long blonde hair.  They looked at one another once more before they turned around and grabbed a couple needles, each holding a needle of their own.  "No!  Please!  Don't!  Not that!  Anything but needles!  Please!" she said before one of the gray men stuck a needle into her eye, causing her to scream out in pain, injecting her eye with a strange green liquid while another stabbed a needle into Euphemia's neck, injecting her with a strange red liquid.  All of the creatures poked different parts of Euphemia's body with these needles, causing her to scream out in pain and absolute terror before they quickly pulled the needles out at the same time, turning around for even more.

"No more!  I'm not a lab rat!  Please, I'm sorry!" she said as there was yet another round of the needles penetrating her flesh, being injected with strange liquids.  After the second round, they pulled out actual knitting needles each and started to stab them into Euphemia, as if to test a person's pain threshold or even a person's reaction to certain stimuli.  While they were casually prodding at Euphemia, an extremely bright light shined, blinding the creatures and causing them to recoil away from the light.  While they were distracted, Anastasia swooped in, brandishing the Scepter of Dreams and started to undo the bindings upon Euphemia.  

"Don't worry, Euphie.. I've got you. We're getting out of here!" she said as she removed all of her bindings and picked up her, holding her over her shoulder in one hand while holding the scepter in the other hand.  "Euphemia.  I need you to concentrate for me," she said as she started to back off, noticing the gray creatures quickly approaching.  "I need you to wake up.  This is only a dream.  I need you to wake up right now," she said as she saw each of these gray creatures holding what appeared to be a futuristic gun in their hands.  Each of the gray creatures fired a shot only for Anastasia to create a field of light to deflect the shots.  "Wake up now!" she said as she moved the scepter and bonked Euphemia over the head with it, finding herself back at the temple with nobody over her shoulders.  

Anastasia began to sob as she finally did it.  She had awakened all 10 of the Dream Sages from their slumber.  She contacted Flappy once more and Flappy replied with.  "Roger!  Now CHARRRRRRRGE!" she heard as Flappy's army started to invade the castle for it's imminent takeover.  Before she had a chance to say anything, she had awakened, returning to the real world.  Both Karla and Taliya were passed out in the control room.  Ripping the wires off of her body, she walked out of the room for a moment before returning to it and getting back into her clothes.  A sigh came out of Anastasia as she finished getting dressed.  After getting dressed, she walked over to the control room and placed her hands upon her hips, tapping her feet as she noticed Karla and Taliya both passed out.

"Let me guess, Karla was trying to get some shut eye and you were told to watch for any changes, right, Taliya?" Ana asked as she walked over to Taliya and clubbed her over the head, instantly waking her up.  "What the hell was that?" Taliya asked as she noticed it was Anastasia and threw herself onto her. "You're back!" she said, awakening Karla.  She looked up to Ana and gasped for a moment.  She ran out of the room and the sounds of sobbing could be heard.  "Marco!" she shouted out.  Ana and Taliya walked over to the room that Marco was in only to see Karla hugging Marco with tears in her eyes.  The sound of collective groaning could be heard as the rest of the company started to wake up.  

After a long hug to Marco, Karla turned and looked to Anastasia and bowed to her.  "On behalf of me, Quantic Dreams, and the world, we thank you.  You saved us from the King of Dreamland.  I know what you have done has no price-tag for the level of greatness you did for us, but please accept this," she said as she handed Anastasia a card.  It was a money card, pre-loaded with money.  "How much money on it isn't important.  Thank you.  I think it's time for you to leave though.  You should welcome your friends back to the world of the awakened," she said before lunging back into Marco's arms.

"Yeah, our friends should be back, huh?" Ana said with a smile upon her face before turning to Taliya.  "Let's go home," she said as Taliya nodded her head and the two started to walk towards the airship.

Notes

The Nightmare
Is Finally Over

Anastasia stood on the deck of the SS Myrmidon as it started to fly from then Neutral Grounds back to the Divide Island.  She let the wind blow through her hair as she smiled, feeling the cool wind blow over her skin, feeling the realm of the awakened.  She spent, what felt like months within Dreamland.  The months lasting only several hours. The feeling of freedom from freeing the world from the terrible clutches of the Dreamland King and the merging of the two worlds was a beautiful feeling, however, it was also a saddening feeling.  The thought that she went through each and every one of the people's nightmares, to get a good look at what each person fears stuck with her on an emotional level, especially the fears involving the people she knows and loves; to include the men and women in her guild.  

"How was it like inside of Dreamland?" Taliya asked.  Anastasia frowned for a moment before forcing a smile upon her face and turned to Taliya.  "Well, let's just say it's something I wouldn't want to repeat ever again," she said as she turned her head back towards the pale blue ocean in front of her, letting the wind blow through her hair.  "It gave me an insight into the fears of people; things that I don't want to ever experience again," she said, lamenting about her time in Dreamland.  "I've spent months in that hellish place, going through adventures and seeing the horrors of humanity and the human consciousness.  The fears that we acquired from past experiences are things I wouldn't wish to repeat.  Ever," she said before releasing the binding that kept her hair in place.  She took a step forward and closed her eyes, letting the wind strike her face and letting her hair swing like golden wheat int he wind.  

Victory was a wonderful feeling.  As she felt the wind upon her face, she noticed something strange within her shirt pocket.  Reaching in, she pulled out a picture of Flappy, his imperial guards, and Anastasia standing in the throne room.  Anastasia stifled out a little laugh as a tear fell down her face.  What felt like an eternity that only lasted 8 hours was indeed an experience that one should encounter once, even if it was with a cute and cuddly king like Flappy.  She looked at the image once more and whispered out, "Be a kind king."  She replaced the image back into the shirt pocket, which she would proudly display in her quarters as soon as she returned to the Lair.

"Land ho!" Taliya shouted out as Anastasia held her hand up above her brow to see the Divide Island in the distance.  A smile came across her face as she turned to look towards Taliya.  "Let's see if everyone in the Lair is back to normal, yeah?" she said as Taliya nodded and rushed inside, preparing for submergence into the water.  Staring upwards at the sky for a moment, feeling wind upon her face once more, she walked back onto the bridge and prepared the ship to submerge into the water.

In Dreamland...

In the rubble of the fallen castle, there were bodies of the Dream King's soldiers strewn about everywhere.  Their corpses decorated the area as Flappy's minions began patrolling the area.  This place is set for renovation as soon as the new Dreamland government is prepared.  A couple of the guards talked about the Dream Warrior, Anastasia for a moment before walking out of the throne room where the previous King of Dreamland resided.  With a burst outward, a large hand could be seen coming out of the rubble.

"So, the Robo-Bitch was the Dream Warrior?" a man asked with a thick russian accent, pulling himself out of the rubble.  The rest of the man's body was pulled out of the rubble before completely crawling out of it.  The large man flexed his muscles and shouted out.  "I'm coming to get you, Robo-Bitch!" he said before letting out an evil laugh.  Attracted by this laugh, the guards that spoke about Anastasia earlier ran into the throne room only to see nothing remaining.  They looked around, questioning what they just heard.  They KNEW they heard someone, but nothing was there as soon as they arrived.  What was strange, however, was the laughing continued even though nobody was left remaining.

"HAHAHAHAHA!  I'm coming to get you, Robo-Bitch!  As soon as I figure out how to leave this Dreamland place!  But once I do!  Your ass is mine!  MWahahahahahaha!" shouted the disembodied voice before slowly fading away to nothingness.

Notes