Cuhlun, Renas, and the Mind Eater left the room. Before them stretched a long—almost endless—corridor...
Still, since Cuhlun had experienced this before, he knew the way out. The Renas here was more like an NPC; not real, so Cuhlun could guide them.
Cuhlun told the Mind Eater to look at the ground.
Both Cuhlun and the Mind Eater looked down and held Renas by both hands. Then Renas led them to the school's exit.
When they stepped outside, instead of a schoolyard, an endless ocean stretched before them, its depths invisible, its horizon unreachable.
Cuhlun sighed softly, then spoke:"Renas, wait here for us. Mind Eater, you're carrying a fragment of reality just like me right now, so you must keep your eyes on Renas at all times. If you look away, he might vanish. Watch over him while I'm gone—don't blink. I'll bring the Leviathan up."
Renas looked bewildered, trying to make sense of what they were saying.
Then, standing between the green school walls and before the door, Cuhlun threw himself into the endless ocean.
As the light from the school doorway and the surface above began to fade, faint sounds reached him… and some shapes?
Strangely, Cuhlun wasn't drowning—as if the water wasn't really water. Maybe because he had surrendered to it calmly. In the dream realm, perception defined reality; if Cuhlun didn't perceive water as water, then it wasn't.
Still, even if the dream world was fake, it wasn't so easily fooled. The moment Cuhlun thought, "This is water, why am I not drowning?"—the ocean turned on him. Water rushed violently into his nose and ears like a wild beast, trying to drown him without mercy.
"I KNEW THIS WOULD HAPPEN!" he tried to shout, but no sound carried underwater. Then, from the center of his body, a small air bubble began to form, growing rapidly into a three-meter sphere of shimmering light.
When Cuhlun finally came to his senses, he focused on the water around him. He could hear… breathing?
Turning his head, he saw a terrifying creature with scaly, fish-like hands pressed against the bubble—staring at him hungrily, as if deciding how to eat him.
In that instant of fear, Cuhlun used one of the powers he had gained during the apocalypse and temporarily retained in the dream realm.
Sleep Flame.
Within seconds, it was over. Thin streams of black fire seeped upward from Cuhlun's right hand, and before long, his punch landed squarely on the strange sea creature.
Normally, the bubble should have blocked the strike—but this was the dream realm.
The creature was hurled into the dark depths, and from within the foggy sea, something enormous devoured it before vanishing again.
Cuhlun, shaken, summoned a small gust of air to lift himself higher. Below was the fog—he wanted nothing to do with whatever lived inside it.
As he rose, he thought he glimpsed two glowing eyes staring at him from the mist. He chose not to question it and turned away.
In that direction, dozens of tiny fish swam tightly together. Each had a single, bright white eye, the rest of their bodies coated in inky black.
The sight was almost artistic—until he realized where they were swimming. Then he regretted looking.
The fish were merging, forming a single massive eel. The giant eel fixed its gaze on Cuhlun—and the instant he met its eyes, it lunged. Cuhlun covered his face faster than it could move.
And suddenly—nothing.
If he couldn't see it, it didn't exist. That was how the dream world worked. Yet what he had seen moments ago wasn't illusion—it was memory. The entity carrying the third fragment of reality must have witnessed those creatures before, recreating them from memory. So even if they were fake here, their real counterparts existed somewhere in the true world.
Though Cuhlun's eyes were closed, he left a small gap—closing them entirely might pull him back to the ocean's surface, which he didn't want.
Instead, this was the perfect moment to dive deeper, while nothing could attack him.
Using the powers he'd once wielded during the apocalypse, he summoned a massive gust of wind that propelled him straight through the fog and the lurking leviathans toward the ocean floor.
Within seconds, the bubble slammed into pitch-black rocks.
He must've reached the bottom. Opening his eyes slightly, he looked not upward but ahead, at the dark stones—because if he looked into the water, he might see something terrifying, and seeing made things real.
He kept his gaze fixed on the stones and slowly opened his hands. Now, he was beneath even the ocean itself.
A cavern of black rock and pure darkness surrounded him.
It felt familiar.
This was the same cave where his and the Mind Eater's real bodies lay.
He had come this far because the third fragment—the unknown being—was nowhere in the ocean above. Which meant it was here, below, among these caves.
In Cuhlun's own mind, this place had no "lit" version, but the true owner of this dream realm surely imagined it differently. So, if he could call forth "light," the dream itself would render that version and bring him to it.
Cuhlun smirked to himself. "I really am a genius." Maybe he wouldn't even need Renas or the Mind Eater after all.
He dispelled the air bubble—no need for it anymore; the cave had air.
He summoned the Sleep Flame again, this time concentrating it into a single, dense sphere.
Compressing it further, the sphere burst into a brilliant light that illuminated the cavern.
And suddenly, he was no longer in a narrow tunnel but in a vast chamber.
If this were one of the games he used to play, this would be the boss room.
As the light spread, he saw a colossal pill bug resting at the center—purple-scaled, with three blue eyes. The room was filled with its eggs, glowing faintly, strung together by thin cables like veins connecting to the creature's body. The whole chamber looked like a spider's nest.
As Cuhlun entered and lit the room, the giant bug stirred, as though waking from a long sleep.
In the next instant, every egg cracked open, and the newborns swarmed toward him in perfect coordination.
Cuhlun hurled the blazing Sleep Flame at the queen's head.
It moved with blinding speed—but countless tiny pill bugs intercepted it, shielding their queen. Somehow, they succeeded.
The sound of cracking eggs multiplied. The room was filling rapidly with more and more of the small creatures.
Their coordination was uncanny—almost as if they shared a single mind.
Then it hit Cuhlun: the queen was controlling them through those threads.
So if he cut the threads—what would happen?
Cuhlun summoned Sleep Flame again, forming both a shield around himself and a sword of pure black fire.
He whipped up a fierce wind, scattering the smaller bugs. The flames roared, and the sword grew—huge, two-handed, a greatsword forged of darkness.
He swung it with precision, slicing through many of the threads.
As the threads were severed, the bugs connected to them dropped lifelessly.
That might be the way to beat her—probably.
Cuhlun lunged toward the queen—but her powers weren't limited to control alone.
The broken threads shot toward him, wrapping around his neck, arms, body—mummifying him. With his one free hand, he swung the sword into himself, burning away the bindings.
The queen weakened as the threads burned, but not because her strength depended on them—because the Sleep Flames lulled everything they touched into slumber.
So while the bindings were gone, Cuhlun could barely stay awake. His body was fine, but his mind begged for rest.
Come on—stay awake.
He summoned wind again, flinging a nearby pool of water at himself. The shock cleared his head—slightly.
Now he knew: he couldn't defeat this thing alone.
Cuhlun formed a new bubble of Sleep Flame around him and recalled his memories—World 774… the geometric wings on his back.
Yes, he could use that.
He conjured a mighty gust and launched himself at the queen, wrapping his arms around her massive body.
The wings on his back flared open, generating a storm that blasted them upward. The queen's head smashed through the cavern ceiling, and they kept rising—past the ocean floor, through the murky depths, and into the fog above.
Something enormous lunged at them from the mist, nearly swallowing Cuhlun whole—but he dodged just in time.
Finally, they burst through the surface. The vast blue sky and the school beside the sea came into view.
The wings slowed, their force fading. The queen, stripped of her threads, floated at the ocean's surface.
At that moment, a great bell rang out.
Renas had joined the game.