The sound of gunfire tore through the school hallways. Screams, footsteps, and chaos filled the air.
Everything blurred in Osm's mind as he pressed himself against the cold metal of a locker. His heart pounded like a caged animal slamming into its bars. A minute ago, he had been joking with his best friend in the cafeteria. A minute ago, life was normal.
Now, blood stained the wooden floor, and the air reeked of iron, smoke, and fear.
He dared to peek around the corner. The shooter – a masked figure in black – was reloading, muttering under his breath. Osm seized the moment to slip past. But as his legs moved, they faltered, refusing to obey. It was as if his body had already surrendered to the silk threads of fate.
The shooter turned – and locked eyes with him.
A flash of light. A deafening bang. Sharp, searing pain in his chest. Another shot followed.
Osm collapsed, vision flickering like a dying flame. Cold crept through him, replacing the fire in his chest. He tried to scream, but only gurgling emerged, choking on his own blood. Then – the final shot.
Darkness.
There was no pain. Only emptiness. The cold of the floor beneath him. The distant echoes of horrified screams fading into silence.
Then, something pulled him – a sensation neither sleep nor waking. He floated, weightless, through an abyss that felt alive, yet untouched by time.
And then – light.
Not the blinding glow of an afterlife. Something else entirely.
His eyes fluttered open.
He lays on a surface smooth, almost glass-like, reflecting swirling mist in every direction. Shapes flickered in the distance – ghostly, half-formed echoes of something ancient.
He sat up, breath shallow and trembling.
"Where… am I?"
The air was thick, heavy with forgotten dreams. Overhead, the sky – if it could be called that – was deep magenta, veined with ripples of violet, like lightning trapped in liquid.
A dream. Yet more real than any he had ever known.
He pushed himself to his feet.
Ahead, rising from the mist, stood a stone pedestal. Cracked. Weathered. Untouched by time. Resting atop it: a pair of gauntlets, jagged and claw-like, pulsing with violet light. Their surface shimmered like a mirage woven from lost memories.
And yet… they did not merely lie there. They were alive. Waiting. Almost as if they had already chosen him – bound to his soul. Trembling, he reached out.
The moment his fingers brushed the metal, a surge of energy flooded through him. Visions struck like lightning: shattered kingdoms, ruined thrones, voices whispering in the dark, begging to be remembered.
Then – a voice. Soft as dust, yet deep as the earth. Timeless.
"Wielder…"
The voice carried neither malice nor warmth. It simply was – an echo of an age long past, stirring anew.
Osm turned.
She was there. The Seer. Tall, frail, yet imposing in presence. Silver hair framed a face both gentle and lined with age. One eye burned pale gray, the other missing, leaving darkness like a window into forgotten realms.
She wore a flowing robe, her posture patient, serene, like a grandmother passing a cherished heirloom to a beloved child.
Osm swallowed, voice brittle.
"Who… who are you?"
Her lips curved in a soft, knowing smile.
"I am she who watches over the edge of sleep and sorrow. The last to remember what the world has chosen to forget."
Her gaze pierced him – not his flesh, but the soul quivering beneath.
"You… are unmoored. A fragment not born of this place."
Osm faltered. He saw his reflection on the floor and scarcely recognized himself – or the fate that had claimed him. Yet she saw. She knew.
She stepped closer, and the mist coiled around her as if drawn to warmth.
"I feel the weight within you… the call of the Dream, the burdens of what has been lost. And now…"
Her voice softened, a quiet gravity like stone settling in water.
"…the Claws have found you."
Osm's eyes fell. The gauntlets thrummed, urgent and fevered, as if alive. He clenched his hands, trembling.
"What… what does that mean?"
Her hand rose, pale as bone, hovering near him, careful not to break the space between.
"It means your path is no longer solely yours. The Dream grants and the Dream takes. Its threads are woven from longing, memory, and fate alike."
She paused, a tender weight to her gaze.
"And now, Wielder… you must decide."
Osm's breath hitched.
"Decide… what?"
Her gray eye glimmered, kind yet unyielding. The mist curled around them, forming serpentine shadows, restless but contained.
"Will you guide the Dream… or let the Dream guide you?"
The floor crumbled beneath him. Heavens above shimmered and sighed as the dream faded around him.
---
The first thing Osm felt was an endless, weightless descent through violet mist. His body drifted as if submerged in a sea of dreams. Shadows flickered at the edges of his vision, forming shapes that dissolved the moment he tried to focus on them.
The whispers were louder now, pressing against his thoughts like unseen hands.
Then, the fall ended.
He landed not with a jolt, but as though gently placed by unseen forces. The ground beneath him was impossibly smooth, like marble polished over centuries.
He pushed himself up, hands trembling. The Dream Claws pulsed with spectral light, steady and watchful.
The air hummed.
Alive.
Listening.
Before him stretched a palace that seemed to have no end. Vast. Pristine. Blindingly white.
Towering columns reached skyward, vanishing into a golden haze. The floor beneath his feet shimmered faintly, as though something ancient slept just beneath its surface.
Every step he took echoed softly, swallowed by a silence too heavy to be natural.
Then – a movement.
Figures glided through the marble halls. Tall. Graceful. Their steps flowed like water over stone. They wore porcelain masks and flowing silks, flawless and serene. At first glance he thought they were gods – untouched, unshaken, divine.
But Osm noticed the fracture in the illusion.
Their movements were too precise. Their reflections bent at wrong angles in the polished floor. Their limbs moved with far too much control, like marionettes guided by invisible strings.
They did not breathe. They did not blink.
Servants.
Beyond them, deeper within the palace, five greater presences stirred. Red. Orange. Yellow. Green. Blue.
He could not see them, yet they burned against his awareness like distant stars. Vast. Ancient. Watching.
He did not know their names. Only that their power was woven into the roots of this realm – unchallenged, unquestioned.
Not yet.
Something else stirred within him.
The Dream Claws pulsed harder, spectral tendrils curling up his arms as if they remembered this place.
Osm lifted his hands.
His body was no longer flesh and bone, but a shifting form of black mist. Writhing. Formless. Whole, yet unfinished.
Pressure brushed his face.
He reached up – and his fingers touched what he thought could be a smooth porcelain.
The mask was warm. Almost breathing. The moment he touched it, a faint sigh echoed through his mind. The mist composing his body stilled, drawn inward, shaping itself into something human once more.
Flesh born of mist.
A gift.
Or a restraint.
And then – he felt her.
Air thickened, trembling under an unseen weight. The palace itself seemed to bow.
Osm turned.
At the summit of a grand staircase, she stood.
The White Empress.
Her raiment flowed like molten moonlight, each fold carrying the slow patience of ages. Gold filigree traced her robes in living sigils, breathing with quiet power.
Her mask was vast and immaculate – featureless, flawless, unreadable. Her presence was not cruel, it was immense.
She regarded him for a long moment, and though her face was hidden, Osm felt the gentleness beneath the seeming distance – like a grandmother watching a child stand at the edge of a world too large for him.
Then she moved.
Each of her steps rang softly, like a bell echoing through eternity. Stillness rippled outward as she descended, the palace responding to her with reverent silence.
When she spoke, her voice was calm and deep, worn smooth by time.
"Another touched by fate's quiet hand," she said.
"Yet not one shaped by my design."
Her gaze rested upon him – not judging, merely observing.
"Tell me, child," she continued, her tone formal and faintly distant "what is it you believe yourself to be?"
Osm tried to answer.
No sound came.
She turned away, not in dismissal, but certainty.
Beyond the servants, the palace opened into a vast hall – so wide, its edges dissolved into pale light.
And there, they waited.
Thousands upon thousands of souls.
But they where diferent somehow, as if they were not human. Some living, some not.
They hovered in quiet suspension, each bearing a single hue, that pulsed softly within their forms.
Red. Orange. Yellow. Green. Blue.
No two shades were quite the same, yet none were misplaced. They did not speak. They did not move. They simply were. Assigned. Remembered.
Osm felt them – not as individuals, but as a choir of presence. Each soul held fast to its color, as though it were a promise, a name, or a truth they had never been allowed to forget.
Hidden deeper still, beyond even them, five greater presences watched – vast anchors of will and authority. The colors answered to them, subtly, instinctively.
The Empress turned.
Around her, the hall responded, as she raised one of her pale hands. And the colors moved.
The souls began to drift, slow at first. Then faster, drawn upward and onward. Red bled into gold. Gold into green. Green into blue. They streamed past one another, intertwining, separating, reforming.
Living spectrum, a great and silent rainbow unfurling across the hall.
"You shall be scattered," the Empress said, her voice perfectly calm. "Not cast away… but sent where you are needed."
The colorful souls surged outward, vanishing into distant horizons beyond the palace walls – each hue finding its path, each soul carried by purpose older than choice.
Only Osm remained.
"Walk in remembrance," Empress said softly turning to him, "or wander into ruin. When your journey nears its end, judgment will find you – whether you seek it or not."
Silence followed.
Not emptiness, but the stillness before creation draws breath.
Then – darkness.
Not void, but concealment. A whisper threaded through the black, not hers, but older. A voice of memory and warning.
"Yes… indeed… In ages long forgotten, when fire flickered faint upon the bones of the world, there was a dream.
"A realm wrapped in mist and memory.
A place where lost souls drift, seeking solace from weary minds. You may have glimpsed it. But soon… it shall claim you.
"You will lose everything, once branded.
The mark of affliction, the curse of the singing flame. Your past, your future.
"Even the faint light of your soul, all shall fade – until only hunger remains.
"You shall be other, than human. A vessel of longing. A Chorus.
"Long ago, in a land sealed by stone and sorrow, a king raised a proud kingdom.
It's name is lost, as all names are.
"One day, you will stand before its broken gates, not knowing why you came. Drawn by a singing fire you cannot name.
"You will burn. Again and again. For such is the fate of the Marked. To wander through shadow, seeking a light that refuses to last. To carry the Dream forward – or vanish within its depths.
"Yes… indeed…
The fire fades.
And the dream begins anew..."