Caster's eyes flittered open and soft, bright sunlight entered them.
Laid on a soft bed, miles better than the one in his own room, Caster looked around. High ceiling, elaborate arabesques, palladian windows, a calender on the side table and overall a very well thought out room design... it appeared that he was back at the Sanctuary, inside of Sky Tide's residence.
His own body looked to be healed, but he didn't have the slightest bit of energy to move. Not just that, his body still felt injured, even though he looked to be healed.
The injuries he had were enough to kill any awakened. If not for his tough physique as an awakened with multiple cores, and his attribute "Apostle of Eternity" — which made him harder to get injured — he would have definitely died.
After all, no awakened can endure the might of a saint.
Trying to make a noise, he felt an ache in his vocal cords.
Unable to speak comfortably, realisation hit him that his vocal cords werent functioning in his current state.
"I ghot... lucky..."
Relaxing his body further, Caster tried to recollect his memories. He noticed the calender on the side table, and comparing the dates from his estimate last waking date, he realised a simple fact.
A week.
It had been a week since the massacre at the night temple.
'Sigh, at least whoever healed me did enough to keep me alive... I can't ask for more.'
The dull pain crept back into his skull which made his heart throb.
He was barely able to stay conscious.
Seeing that he had no reason to force himself awake, he drifted back into the dream world... or he would have, if he was in the waking world. For now, he simply fell unconscious again.
Suddenly, he felt good, abnormally vulnerable and... intimate. He had felt this feeling before, but couldn't pinpoint it, as he was asleep.
And right about that time, still deep in his sleep, he started to feel like he was reliving Kieron's life.
Flashes of Kieron's memories flowed into Caster's own, repeatedly...
About Kieron's mother, death of Kieron's family, death of those he loved...
Over and over and over again.
Many times over.
All of his trauma and regrets.
It was as if Kieron was constantly trying to fight back and regain control.
Caster couldn't bear it.
"Get out of my head!"
With a flash, Caster sat up at terrible speeds and shouted:
"This is my body! My life! You, fucking, outsider! Mine, you understand! I will never let you take it!"
His vision was blurry, eyes tearing up, heart beating fast.
Panting, he tried to regain composure.
But it wasn't so easy...
Unlike Kieron, Caster didn't have the fourth wall. The fourth wall was currently recovering... and it belonged to Kieron. It wouldn't help him.
Caster suspected that if fourth wall recovered... he'd fall dormant again.
His voice trembled, barely steady.
"Dont... erase me... I am... I am... This is my life... you thief..."
An unfamiliar presence wrapped his hands around Caster, capturing him in a light hug.
"It will be alright."
It was Kai.
Caster pulled back and wiped his eyes, his vision returning.
Sunny, Nephis, Effie, Cassie, Kai, Sky Tide and Master Raon were all looking at Caster standing at different parts of the room.
Seeing people around him, Caster finally regained his composure.
Looking at the saint, Caster spoke in a trembling, respectful tone: "Apologies for the... display of weakness. It-it was a nightmare, pay it no mind."
That didn't sit well with Master Raon. "You can't dream in the dream realm, unless there's some special circumstances."
"You're right, but you can say I'm somewhat of an exception. It's not the first time I've dreamt in the dream realm."
The expressionless saint nodded and motioned for Raon to stop. Following that, she took a step towards the bed and looked down.
"I had given you the opportunity to come to Chained Isles despite the conflict between the Song clan and the Valor clan, all because my White Feather clan is only a vassal of Clan Valor, not its servant. I gave you a chance... but in less than three months, you've made a big mess of things..."
Her voice seemed to be devoid of any emotion, however if one listened to her closely they'd find a hint of sternness in it.
She didn't usually speak this much, but even she couldn't let this go.
"...I need an explaination."
Caster sighed internally. He, or well Kieron, more or less knew this would happen. At the moment, he needed a plausible excuse.
"The reason I came to the Isles was that... I needed to find a nightmare seed. For the second nightmare... I had gotten information about the nightmare seed, where it is, where it will take us, what it consists of and a lot of such things. I had yet to reach the nightmare seed, and I was preparing for that. Which is why I brought a part of the Gold Reapers along. One of those preparations was to retrieve something from the night temple."
After saying that, Caster lifted his hand slightly and summoned his storage ring from which he took out the ivory knife and showed it to everyone.
Master Raon spoke up: "This is similar to the obsidian knife at the altar..."
Caster nodded.
"Yes, but I have yet to figure out if I can take that knife out or not. That knife is also, most likely, going to be useful."
"Why do you even want to get to the second nightmare so fast? You've just become an awakened just about four months ago. It is better to saturate your core... or cores, before rushing into the second nightmare."
It was Master Raon who spoke again.
Caster didn't want to answer that truthfully but he felt like he had no choice.
At the moment, apart from himself and Cassie, perhaps no one knew about it. Which was why the two were working together behind the scenes.
His voice grew grim when he spoke up again:
"In about a year and half, a Chain of Nightmare gates will begin. An apocalyptic scenario is imminent. And all we can do about it is prepare..."
Everyone in the room grew colder, well, apart from Nephis and Sky Tide. The two had their usual aloof expression on them.
Sky Tide wasn't satisfied with the information that Caster gave her. It felt redundant but she asked again.
"That explains why you want to go into the second nightmare so soon, and you have SSA designation, I'll trust you to be aware of the risks. However... you've gone off track. What I need an explaination for is why Saint Cormac wanted to kill you... and what happened in the Night Temple."
'She won't let me go with just that, huh?'
"Alright... where do i begin..."
Caster went on to tell them mostly the truth, but not everything was the complete truth, like how he encountered the mirror beast "accidentally" and killed it and stored the shard inside his storage ring. Following that, he talked about how he was ambused by five masters of valor, who he killed except for one. Told them how he made that last master lead him to the night temple.
Then, he told them about the voice he heard from the time he got the reflection, and how it randomly talked to him along the way to the night temple. Since he was in the presence of Kai, he had to go about things in a roundabout way, to avoid it being counted as a lie.
He also told them that when he entered the night temple, the saint of night temple was not there, which was the truth, but even if the saint was at the night temple, he would wait for the saint to leave before he entered the temple and his statement would still hold true.
After that he talked about how Mordret, Prince of Valor, was unleashed due to that mirror shard and how he massacred most of the night temple.
He didn't say "all of the night temple" since that would be caught as a lie. Caster had killed a few people too. But that was unavoidable, and the others understood that tacitly.
In the end he attributed his nature as a divine aspect holder to be able to barely kill Mordret and escape. But while escaping, Cormac caught up to him and after that, Sky Tide already knew.
"...So, the saint wanted to kill me because I was either a vessel of Mordret or a witness. And due to the fact that I belong to a clan under Song Domain- I mean, Song clan... the saint likely thought of just framing me for the massacre as the justification for killing me, and well... it would be more than enough justification even without framing me for any of it, after all, I was the one who caused Mordret to be unleashed."
Silence spread throughout the room.
Towards the start of the narration, they were asking questions occasionally, but as it went on, they stopped asking questions.
What they heard was completely unheard of and downright crazy.
A battle of Divines had occured!
Only Tyris remained indifferent.
After Caster was done, he got up, no longer feeling injured for some reason.
'Maybe Neph healed me...'
Following that, Caster got off the bed and stood up before bowed under the indifferent gaze of Sky Tide.
"I apologize for putting you in such a spot."
Sky Tide sighed.
"Rise. I understand the situation. Recover well..."
Caster sighed.
'It seems she's chosen to trust me...'
Sky tide continued, interrupting Caster's thoughts:
"...However, you will stay at this residence and you're not allowed to leave until I allow you to. I will take care of the rest."
Following that, she turned around and looked at the rest of the awakened in the room.
"I'll not consider all of you his accompalices in this act, hence you're all free. You can come to meet him occasionally if you wish to."
A smile crept up Kai's face, revealing a bright look.
"Thank you very much Saint Sky Tide."
The earnest reply had Master Roan smiling, slightly. But without giving the company a reply, they left them alone.
Silence captured the room upon the departure of the owners of this place.
Caster went back to the bed and sat down, looking at the calender on the side table again, he realised it had been another day.
He looked around again, and noticed a mess of things.
It appears as though someone had been taking care of him these last eight to ten days.
The silence was deafening.
No one was speaking a word to Caster, or even to each other, whether that was because of the nightmare at the start, or whether it was the news Caster delivered about the chain of nightmares.
Maybe it was both.
The cohort wasn't very willing to start a conversation.
It was very off putting.
But Caster was fine with that. He wasn't certain if he could fool the cohort...
And more than that, Caster had a weird view about Nephis.
On one hand, he had received an order to eliminate Nephis. On the other hand, he knew about Neph's aspect rank and future.
She was necessary for this world.
And more than that, Kieron wished to keep her alive.
That guy's plans, no matter how risky or reckless they maybe, have always worked out. Almost to the extent that was unreasonable. As if something was keeping him alive...
Getting the train of thought back to the point... Caster realised that the Sovereigns he revered and respected were nothing infront of the potential Sunny and Nephis have.
Even he himself has the potential to far surpass the current sovereigns.
But at the same time, his mind couldn't help but think "What if I kill Nephis now?".
He knew it was a useless thought.
If he kills her right now, Kieron's carefully crafted plans would all go to naught, and Caster would lose a lot of his advantage.
And that is, if he successfully kills her. Before, he would have had no chance. However, now? He had been given power due to Kieron's interference.
There was a non-zero chance of him loosing to Nephis, however it was heavily in Caster's favour.
But even more than Nephis, Caster's thoughts — negative thoughts — drifted more towards Sunny.
Sunless.
That guy.
The one who killed Caster originally.
Caster couldn't blame him for that, because that didn't happen in this world. Even disregarding that, there was no need to be surprised over that. Caster tried to kill Nephis, so Sunny stopped him. It was fair.
Before, Caster would have never thought that, but his mind, thoughts, memories, moral compass... everything had seen a change from the time Kieron took over.
Not wanting to think too deeply about that, he changed his line of thought.
His whole life was a lie, and his entire existence was written by someone, however...
He was given a chance to learn the truth.
He couldn't let himself be drowned by his old sense of duty and remain biased by it.
He was the chosen one. The chosen one to bring change to this world.
He had to do it and...
He was the only one who could do it.
He swore to burden the world on his shoulders.
Whatever it would take, he would fulfil his duty and see through it till the end.
His end.