Author's Notes

Well, here we are, at Chapter 9, and the manor will be revealed.

Though uh, I'm not sure if I mentioned it was a manor before, so that could've been a spoiler.

That being said, this chapter contains the first experiment with perspective shifting. I'm planning to make Lucidity, by the end, a collection of journals and diaries from various characters, for some nice perspective.

Also gives me an excuse to write in strange ways if we shift to a wacko.

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Chapter 9

The Manor on the Mountain

I talked to Tadashi early in the morning about returning to the dream world tonight. He naturally, agreed, from curiousity, despite the fact his arrow wound seemed to giving him a noticable limp—which despite his best efforts to cover, showed up quite easily, even in waking life.

Baseball practise was cancelled today, from a morning rain that left the diamond and grass surrounding it soggy and muddy. Oh, sweet freedom.

"Hey, man, wanna do something?"

I turned around. Toshiro was talking to me. "Wanna go to the arcade? I heard they got a few new machines in—that new game 'Burn The Zombies.'"

That is so low brow. So Toshiro. "Nah, I'll pass."

"But—hey, don't be that way!" I was walking out of the room, into the hallway.

"Oh, hey!" Shinako hurried down the stairs to meet me after I had just bought some delicious crab bread. "You free this afternoon?"

"Yeah."

"You wanna get something to eat?"

I found myself in a fast food restaurant. We both had ordered cheeseburgers, myself a double, and hers a triple. Curiously, her drink was larger than mine, and she had ordered a lot more fries.

Am I just a sissy?

"It's nice to be able to talk to someone again."

I raised an eyebrow. "What, were you mute for a few days or something?" No, must tone snarkiness down!

"Nah, I've been shut in the library for a bit, studying."

"Studying? Exams aren't for another month or so, lighten up."

She sighed. "When I was in middle school, my parents expected me to study every moment of the day. But, for some reason, after I wrote examinations for high schools, they just… stopped caring or something. I mean, I got in the right high school, but they just look disappointed in me every day."

"That's gotta be tough on you."

"Well, thanks. I mean, I thought at first it was because I wasn't doing as well at school as they wanted, but... I don't know any more. I'm doing pretty decently, or at least I think so. Yeah, I have free time now, and they don't push me to work quite as hard any more, but I just have to keep studying. It's kinda painful to see them so disappointed."

"You know… this could be a ploy."

"Huh?"

"They might've thought you didn't study hard enough, so they put on the 'I'm very disappointed' act, so you try to not disappoint them, and work even harder than you would if they pushed you."

"Don't be stupid."

I shrugged. Shinako seemed to be opening up a bit.

I heard glass breaking, as time stopped.

"THOU ART I, AND I AM THOU. THOU SHALT HAVE OUR BLESSING OF THE FORTUNE ARCANA.."

Time started again.

"Just take it easy, nobody ever won a race by tiring themselves out in practise.", I said, hoping to comfort her.

"Nobody ever won a race by sitting at home, watching television, while scarfing down potato chips, either."

It did not work.

*

My eyes closed. I was back on the mountain, interestingly enough, in the exact state I was when I woke up, to the point of still running. The path was sloping upwards again, and turned another bend. I couldn't see the manor any more, owing to the slope of the mountainside blocking it.

I turned the bend. It was closer than ever before.

* perspective change *

I think I had this dream a thousand times before, but it was so different this time.

I'm always in a dark room, in a traditional Japanese style. I always wear a yukata, the very same I wear to Tanabata each year. There are always shadowy figures walking on the other side of the paper walls surrounding me.

So why did it feel so different?

The dark room darkened further, like night had fallen. A paper door opened. That had never happened before.

Behind me, a shadowy figure loomed, its features shrouded by the darkness. Faster than I had ever done before, I ran. The paper wall burst with almost no resistance, sending me into a hallway. There was light, muffled by many paper walls, but light nonetheless. I had one chance. I ran, and didn't look back.

The light was near blinding. I stopped my sprint. The ground simply dropped off like a massive cliff, dropping far down, the bottom hidden away from view by fog and clouds.

I couldn't do anything any more.

* perspective change *

A hair-raising scream echoed throughout the mountains—not too far away, judging by how loud it was. The once pleasant misty mountain seemed to be darkening, as the sky began to fade into a deep navy blue. The mountain's stone turned from a light sepia into a dark muddish brown, drawing attention to cracks, spread along the face of the rock—looking to threaten to crumble at any moment. This was a strange feeling.

Fear.

I kept running as fast as my legs would go. There was no pain or fatigue—there was only reaching the manor now. A scream had come from the mountains, and the only candidate was where I was heading. Whoever it was, I had to help.

I turned one final bend along the side of the mountain. Crap!

The manor was so close—yet so far. It too was on the "side" of the mountain, except that it seemed to be on some isolated stone—which led me to wonder how materials were even transported there. Between where I was and the ground the manor sat on was perhaps 50 feet, which simply dropped off, almost straight off the face of the mountain, plummeting far enough that the clouds covered the ground.

A large silhouette emerged from the manor, slowly. I saw another silhouette, against the edge of the cliff. It was now or never. Behind me, Tadashi was running, looking thoroughly shocked.

I couldn't jump fifty feet—at least not without help.

Then I had a brilliant idea.

I backed up, and gave myself about fifty feet of ground to get myself a running start. Tired, I began a frantic sprint uphill. The edge of the mountain was drawing nearer—maybe thirty feet, twenty feet—I was about to go off…

And I jumped.

"HOTHERUS!"

I fell as I said the words, straight off the side of the mountain, praying it would work. I looked ahead. I saw a tint of green below me.

Instantly, I knew my attack wasn't child's play. The sheer force and winds were probably enough to break several bones if I had hit something. Instead, I was flung wildly forward, and upwards, like a ragdoll being slingshotted from a ballista. I flailed wildly through the air, in an attempt to regain control—but nothing could be done.

I saw the edge of the manor's cliff, drawing near. Would I even make it?

It drew closer and closer. By miracle or by fate, I landed perfectly with enough height, tumbling wildly onto the rocky ground, feeling sore all over, and almost certain I had heard a crack.

But that didn't matter right now.

I got up as quickly as I could, and took a better view of the large and small silhouettes.

The large one seemed like the shadow that had attacked me when I first awakened to Hotherus, except even larger. It seemed to be beefier, bulkier, and stronger, walking with a swagger like a high roller and a muscle builder rolled into one. There was no doubt in my mind that it was definitely much larger (as I had just stated), and probably many times stronger than the one that had attacked me.

I turned to the smaller of the two silhouettes, about to belt out "RUN!", but the air was curiously sucked out of my lungs.

It was Shinako.

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Admittedly, I hate cliffhangers, even this semi-cliffhanger I've left you on, especially owing to fanfiction's tendency to update erratically.

However, I think I can get away with this one.

And as with before, please do review. Not to beg or anything.