Once Nephis agreed to my terms, unsurprisingly, I had Cassie go with her first.The morning was nearing its end, and noon was about to bloom.
"Are you not coming to the meeting?" Cassie asked.
I turned my head toward the exit. She was holding Nephis's hand for guidance now.
"I've got some things I need to take care of. Go on ahead—I'll join you shortly," I assured her.
"Okay… I'll wait for you."
With that, Nephis and Cassie walked out.
"Quite the performance, I must say. Unexpected, though," the apparition quipped.
I shifted my gaze toward him before replying.
"I was simply trying to gauge the limits."
"Limits? You mean the limits of that strange force acting on them all?" he asked.
I ignored his question and countered with one of my own.
"Do you know anything about it?"
Adam only shrugged, smiling easily.
"You were watching Nephis with a lot of interest when she was about to lose control. Don't tell me you didn't notice anything?" I pressed.
The apparition wandered toward Cassie's bed and sat down. As he settled, he looked at me and made a soft tsk-tsk sound.
"Oh, Ivan. You of all people should know how to read the room. I've lived far longer than you, and I've seen far more, but in all that time I haven't managed to grasp even the faintest clue about these phenomena."
He turned away, resting his head on Cassie's makeshift pillow, one hand tucked behind his head. Closing his eyes, he continued:
"Asking me is like asking a barista about quantum physics."
"But… you're not a barista," I replied.
That remark made the apparition's eyes snap open against his will. He looked at me with an incredulous expression.
"What? Did that autistic blowtorch finally manage to infect you with her autistic responses?" he asked, his expression hanging somewhere between cringe and amusement.
"Not in the slightest," I replied coolly.
"I simply find it hard to believe that someone like you, who clearly experiences more, wouldn't be able to figure out the secrets behind the phenomena acting against changes."
I let my gaze wander momentarily before I added:
"After all, what kind of Whisperer are you, if you can't hear the whispers of hidden secrets buried in this novel world?"
The last part seemed to have triggered something in him. He turned to his side, raised his head, and rested it on his right arm. His usual easygoing smile dimmed a little.
"What are you insinuating, Ivan?" he questioned, his brows slightly furrowed.
"I am saying that you're either lying or hiding information that I need. I'm getting tired of waiting. The longer you hold back information, the more of a disadvantage it becomes for me." My expression darkened considerably as I snarled.
The apparition got up and sat cross-legged on Cassie's bed.
He eyed me for a moment… then two.
"What is it that you want to learn?" he finally asked.
My eyes shone a shade of gold.
"The first nightmare, what really happened in there, and why you skipped through it. I know you know things, and I have a feeling you know—or at least have some idea—why our presence is so bizarre."
The apparition stared at me for a moment. His expression was unreadable—even for me—but his eyes carried a shadow of emotion.It was melancholy.
"I would have much preferred if you asked about something else," he remarked."But alas, it can't be helped."
"Why do you say that?" I questioned.
He shrugged.
"Well, it's because it's very complicated to explain."
"Complicated?" I repeated, my expression tightening.
"Yes. But before that, let me explain our timeline in this world."
Now we were getting somewhere. Thinking that, I remained silent and nodded for him to continue.
"You already know that we come from another world. That's no secret, right?"
He gestured with his eyes, waiting for me to confirm.
I nodded.
"We came to this world about four years before the main story at the age of twelve."
"Four years!?" I asked in mild shock.
"Yes. Before you ask, let me clarify: the memories of the four years after we got here are a mystery to us all," he explained.
"That's absurd! Just how much is being hidden?! It makes no sense to erase memories like these—JUST WHAT IS THE GOAL?!" I shouted in frustration.
The apparition, seated on Cassie's bed, looked at me with an expression of understanding.
"I don't know," he replied."I wish I did. I really do. But I don't know why or how this information was hidden. Our main body most definitely had a reason to take such extreme measures…"
"But aside from the considerable part of our past being a mystery, there are snippets of information," he added.
"Snippets?" I whispered softly.
"Yes. For example, our entry into this world was not an isekai but instead a transmigration," he said, a bit more cheerfully.
As if a bit of the fog had cleared, I started to connect dots with everything I already knew.
"Yes… surprisingly, our main body was actually somewhat prodigious. He was already done with school by then and had become an assistant professor at one of the educational institutes in the eastern parts of NQSC."
My eyes widened slightly, both in surprise and awe.
"Wow…" I couldn't help but mutter.
Now that I thought about it, Cassie did say at the academy that I had a kind of scholarly vibe to me.
"Indeed. However, that's where everything ends," he said in a grim tone.
Because two years after we came into this world, we entered our first nightmare—at fourteen years old.
At that, my eyes widened in horror.
"You!?... Don't tell me…" I asked, my voice shaking.
He nodded grimly.
"Our first nightmare lasted two entire years."
…
The silence stretched into infinity as I struggled to process the information.
Without giving me time to adjust, the apparition continued:
"Remember when I first told you about our main body's nefarious deeds?" he questioned.
Still reeling from the shock, I looked at him with a grim expression and nodded.
"Yeah… about that. I might have twisted the truth a bit, and hid some small key information… but here is the truth: all of that stuff happened within the first nightmare," he revealed.
I could only stare blankly at the apparition. All those deeds within just the "first nightmare"??
A part of me was also glad, because in reality I did not harm anyone—only in the fake reality that was the first nightmare. I thought sadly.
The sheer scale of the truth was mind-bending. Stories of heinous actions, all happening within the span and scale of just the first nightmare…
I tried to wrap my head around the absurdity of the claim, when something didn't add up.
"Wait a damn minute! If everything you told me happened within the first nightmare, then that creates a contradiction. Nightmares are supposed to take place within history that has already happened, and the spell evaluates based on how much you stray from that already defined history! So how can something like this be possible?"
The apparition looked a bit surprised, then gave a small knowing smile.
"I was about to get to that point. What you said is true, 100%, no doubt. But as it turns out, it's not entirely true, because our first nightmare was anything but normal."
"I don't know the exact details, but the characters of our first nightmare were the cohort and a few other important characters whose names remain in the dream. Which means…"
"Our first nightmare was likely the present future for our main body," I finished for him.
He looked at me, then nodded to affirm my statement.
"The rest is a mystery. All I know is that our main body, while the same age as us, is likely decades older mentally," he concluded.
I absorbed everything he said, my bright golden eyes peering into the apparition's.
"But then why are we here? No! wait. How did our personas come to be? And what about you? You seem to have awakened much earlier. If we did awaken from our first nightmare at sixteen, according to the timeline, then you should be in the same boat as me—clueless—yet your behavior and knowledge don't match your story," I asked, suspicion creeping into my tone.
The apparition chuckled lightly as he uncrossed his legs and rested them on the floor.
"That's where you're wrong. You and I are not on the same boat, because I awoke inside the first nightmare," he revealed.
My eyes widened. "Y-you awoke inside the first nightmare??"
The surprise was evident.
"Yes. Well, to be more accurate, the very end of the first nightmare. That should explain the disparity between you and me," he corrected.
"But then…"
Sensing what I was about to say, he completed: "Yes, I am the first person to awaken. While the rest awoke outside of it, with you being the last."
"Then how old are you? Mentally, I mean," I asked.
The apparition smiled, then casually replied, "I spent a little more than half a decade in the last part of the nightmare, so… I should be about 21–22 years old—mentally, of course."
This time I didn't express anything. My face remained blank, my mouth tight in a thin line.
I walked forward and then sat beside the apparition.
"Then you met the main body?"
The apparition nodded.
"The first nightmare ended in the Tomb of Ariel?"
The apparition replied, "Yes."
"I assume the main body is there, somehow?"
"Yes," the apparition confirmed.
"The error you spoke of?"
"A synonym for a mistake," the apparition admitted.
I turned my head and looked at him as he did the same.
"Why are you helping me?" I asked the final question.
He held my gaze for a moment before breaking it, then stood up. Looking at me, he replied:
"It's the only viable path forward, whether we like it or not."
And with that he smiled wryly. "Now that's enough questions. You'll figure out the rest. The future isn't that bad, so we should look forward instead of back. Plus…"
He smiled mischievously. "You don't want to keep our dear Cassie waiting now, do you? Come on! Let's go!"
Hearing that, I gave a small smirk.
"You go ahead first. I'll just digest all this for a moment, and then follow you."
The apparition shrugged. "Suit yourself. I'll be going ahead to see the drama."
Saying that, the apparition started walking and soon left the room.
I gazed at the doorway for a moment longer with narrowed eyes.
Then sighed, as I stood up to follow.
But as I walked toward the doorway, I dismissed the runes in front of me.
As I crossed the doorway and closed off the room, the last of the runes shimmered.
[ Currently Envisioned: Sequence 6 Notary ].
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A/N: Wow, this chapter took a lot of rewriting and even then, I'm not completely satisfied with it. Still, it gets the job done.
Overall, I'm really enjoying working on this fanfic. So far, I've planned the story all the way up to Volume 6. I know it might be a little confusing at times, but I hope you stick around and help me smooth out the rough edges along the way. Feel free to leave a comment if you have suggestions or questions, I'd love to hear your thoughts.
A little notice: I'll be starting the Absolute Cinema chapters here soon. As a reminder, you can enjoy all the fanfics connected to this story separately, so don't worry about being overwhelmed, everything important will be explained along the way. For context, Shadow Slave Cinema in this fic will follow an AU route branching from Jrawt's work, mainly to accommodate this story's lore and progression. (Yes, it's all connected!)
I'll also be returning to my usual upload pace of 1–2 chapters per week, depending on my schedule. My current goal is to wrap up Volume 1 by mid or late next month. On top of that, if this fanfic reaches 20+ reviews before the last week of next month, I'll do a special mass release of Volume 2: 10 chapters per week across 2 weeks.
Thank you so much for reading and supporting this project—it really keeps me motivated. See you in the next chapter!