Dreams
When Bakura was younger, he used to daydream about two things. The first: that he was adopted. The second was that his real family was composed of sorcerers, all ready and kindly smiling, awaiting his arrival. They would teach him of their arcane lore, and he would be a hero, his white magic indomitable and limitless, able to obliterate the shadows themselves. He would scour the world of darkness and evil and, each evening, come back dutifully his real family, who would be hovering happily about the spell-ridden house. They would say that they loved him and needed him, and his many siblings would be his best friends in all the world.
Later, when his mother and sister rotted in the earth, wilting lilies marking their resting places with pale, greying petals, his thoughts took a darker turn. Perhaps he would run away, he would muse, in pursuit of the demons who slew his family – after all, who but a demon would do that? Not some nameless driver, drunk and thoughtless. That would not make for a very good story. No, the murderer was a demon, and Bakura would tear at it with nails and teeth, bite it, scream at it, burn it because it would deserve agony. Unfortunately, this daydream was different from the earlier ones: it often was not a daydream at all. Rather, he would wake up cold in the night, haunted by his spectres, and would curl up in a tight ball, the covers clenched tightly in his hands. That would stop him screaming, which was good, because Dad was already trying hard to deal, and "You don't want to disturb your father, do you, Ryou?"
In time, the worlds in his head diverged from meaningless scenarios of revenge. He accepted that slaughter could be the fault of nobody at all, and often was. Turning his attention to another cause, Bakura started to research the occult. Returning to the magic at his mind's roots, he systematically searched the internet, methodically checking books out of the library and even – very cautiously – probed his friends for knowledge or hearsay. Resurrection, he decided, was fascinating. More so than any childish adoption fantasy. The loss of someone… and their safe return. A beautiful conclusion. Days spun away in a constant stream of rites and rituals, most of them useless. All of them useless, in fact. Sheer frustration curbed his interest after - maybe three years, and Bakura ceased to care about very much at all. His fantasy morphed - became clear and simple and governed by a ten-sided dice; shaped by his own thoughts; altered by the actions of his friends.
Upon learning about the ring, Bakura lost faith in all illusion. Fiction was more pointless than thinking, crying, sleeping… He gave up a lot of things. He was, it seemed, blessed with magic, though not - and this ached, somewhere deep down and a little numb – a hero. Still, his life was transformed. He travelled to distant lands. He bore witness to the slaying of multiple, less than literal demons. In essence, it was his very own fairy tale. Fairy tales, he knew, were not always fluffy and bright. Once their harsh gleam pierced hearts – told people voice to voice of death and power and uncompromising, inevitable retribution. But Bakura never dreamt anymore, so he did not think about it.
And later still, when he is free to dream again, and feeling desperately young and liable to break, he finds that he misses his fantasies and fairy tales and unwavering, ceaseless narrative. But it would not do to end a story like that, would it? No proper tale ends in regret. He sleeps. In time, the nightmares stop.