I stare at the floor, the black enderman armor only visible against the night-shadowed floor by the faint gleam it reflects from the light of the window.

All I have to do is put on this armor, and I could postpone this crime until tomorrow. But I can hear the Book's persuading words too clearly in my head. They suppress my doubts and guilts one by one, until I feel an unavoidable sense of excitement push itself to the forefront of my mind.

I know what I am about to do is wrong, but I feel a smile spread across my face. I find myself counting the seconds. Just a little while longer, and I am certain she will be asleep.

"Do not forget, they have a plan to capture you," the Book warns. "Do not trust any moving shadow. Have a lethal spell ready, and be prepared to run away on foot."

I hear you loud and clear.

Suddenly I feel an unbelievably painful heat erupt in my chest. I wince and try hard to hold my breath to prevent myself from crying out.

"Do not pull your mind away from the pain, Fristad. This is the energy I am giving you for the lethal voidfire spell."

Why does it have to be so painful?

"The void has a tendency to cause pain when your use of it exceeds your limits. Normally I would take ownership of the spell, but I need to help you create Amanda's nightmare. You will need to be ready to cast it entirely on your own, if the need arises."

Are you saying that all the spells I thought I was casting, I wasn't actually casting to begin with?

"Unfortunately, turning you into a void mage overnight is beyond my abilities. I can only guide you, allowing you to think the thoughts you would have as if you were casting the spell."

I think back to the time I killed that man who spotted me the inn with a voidfire blast. I felt so guilty after killing him. I really did feel like I had created the fire myself, that I had meticulously measured the exertion it would take to burn his head off cleanly. Yet every detail of it was carefully manufactured by the Book.

If it weren't for the Book's control… no, guidance... I would find this degree of control over my mind horrifying. But instead, I find it beautiful. Soon, we will be able to do the same thing to help Amanda.

I drive that train of thought away. It's a distraction. There's no time for that. I push the voidfire into my left hand, trying hard not to make a sound as my thoughts themselves seem to burn, and every part of my body the void passes through becomes hot with scalding fever. Finally, the heat and pain concentrate into my hand, and I try hard to hold that pain in place.

"It is time," the Book says.

I let my mind relax, ignoring the space around me, and a bed materializes before me. My heart beats rapidly. I see Amanda's shadowed face just above the covers, her eyelids shut with tranquility. I swing my head around the room. There is no one here.

"Wrong. Warnado is nearby," the Book warns. "He is not in the room, but he is close. Be careful. He may use an illusion spell."

I note the Book's worry carefully, and turn my attention back to Amanda. She looks so peaceful. I wonder what she's dreaming about right now?

I extend a finger and a thumb from my hand and pull Amanda's eyelids open. Her pupils are looking straight at me. I panic, but then her eyes dart away, consumed with the flitting thoughts of sleep.

I stare deep into her eyes, looking for the specks of light, each of which is a part of her mind, from fleeting trains of thought to the most cherished old memories. The abyss within her pupils is unusually deep. I keep searching deeper, but I can't find even the smallest specks of light inside. What is wrong with Amanda? Is she dead? No, she can't be dead; I saw her eyes move just a minute ago. Is she possessed, maybe? Perhaps this is Warnado's doing?

This is taking too long. Something is wrong.

I pull back my focus. There is something resisting my pull. It takes me several seconds to get back my concentration and ground my perception in the physical space of the night-darkened inn room.

"Warnado just entered through the window."

I turn on my heel toward the window and raise my left hand. Then, I hear a sound like breaking glass as liquid splashes against my clothes. Amanda's arm is raised. She was awake, holding a splash potion this whole time.

I command the voidfire in my hand, but nothing responds. I have no light. I can't teleport. I have no defense. A weight falls in my gut. I turn around toward the inn door. I hear rushing footsteps. I reach for the door.

Then something grabs my boots. I look down and see claw-like appendages twisting around my legs and gripping them in a vice. A great, gaping hole with a faint blue light grows from beneath the claws, and I feel myself sinking down. A deep rumble grows louder beneath me, and faint hisses begin to sting my ears. I try to grab for the doorknob but it is now too high for me to reach. My legs are beginning to give in to pain from the pressure of the claws' grip. The edge of the portal and the claws reach up to my chest, and then my neck, and… the portal closes around my neck.

I wince… but nothing happens. I am still in the same, dark room, my neck still intact. The rumbles and hisses from the portal are still here, but fainter. The tips of the claws gripping around my neck twitch slightly.

A cloaked figure steps in front of me and crouches down. A lantern with a glowing blue frame appears in their hand, lighting everything in the room but keeping their face in shadow.

"I have been looking forward to meeting you," the figure says, its voice deep and echoing like a chorus of giant monsters speaking in unison, "Adobe Dreamweaver."

I frown. "Adobe Dreamweaver?"

"Yea, you know…" the cloaked figure gestures circularly with their hand. "The thing you make websites with."

"I don't follow." I look down at the menacing dimensional hole nestled around my neck with claws inside of it. The Book's reassuring thoughts have vanished. I don't feel so confident anymore. "But I really don't want to die, so if you just tell me what you want from me, then I'll gladly comply."

Lantern-holding demon Warnado slams his fist on the floor. The dimensional hole rumbles more and the claws crawl and relocate around my body, making my neck itch.

"I NEVER ASKED FOR A SUBSCRIPTION MODEL!"

"Okay, okay, I get it…" I sigh. "Yes, I'm the Dreamweaver. I gave Amanda the nightmares. It was wrong. I'm sorry. I have this sentient book that follows me everywhere. It controls my thoughts and gives me void powers. It wants me to control Amanda in the same way it controls me, so it made me give Amanda nightmares that are supposed to make it easier for me to influence her. I don't know what the book's motivations are and have mostly just been doing what it says because I have no idea how to fight it." Oh, Notch, is something else crawling on my leg? "Is that explanation enough for you? Can I come out of this portal now?"

Warnado scratches his chin slowly. "I'm not so sure that's a good idea. You are the Dreamweaver, after all. There's a lot we don't know about you, like how dangerous your powers are, whether you're affiliated with the Entity in some way, whether you have any accomplices…. Heck, everything you've said could have been a lie. I'm going to have to talk with some people to sort this out. This could take a while."

"Can I at least get some assurance that you're not going to kill me?"

"I certainly have no interest in killing you. But I'm not sure where exactly that dimensional hole leads to. It might be best to stay as still as possible."

"Great!" I reply with sarcastic enthusiasm. I note the numbness in my legs caused by the clawed creature squeezing on them. Staying still certainly won't be difficult.

"Are you alright, Amanda?" Warnado, asks, this time in his normal voice.

"I'm fine," she says. "I have the other two potions ready."

I wonder what sort of potion Amanda used to not only stop my teleportation, but completely cut me off from the book's magic? And what was that strange resistance I felt when trying to pull out of Amanda's mind, after I realized I was unable to control it? These people clearly have tricks up their sleeves that even the book doesn't know about. Maybe they will be able to stop the book for good?

As Warnado opens the door just in front of me and walks out of the room, leaving his ethereal lantern on the floor to keep the room lit, I consider the irony of contemplating my freedom while a monster holds a vice grip on the nine tenths of my body stuck in some unknown dimension.

A few moments later, Shadow enters the room, the silhouette of her body somehow slightly rippling, white runes glowing on her skin, followed by Warnado and a cautious-looking Kay. Shadow stops to the side of me, while Warnado stands beside her, with Kay out of view.

Shadow looks down at me with mild amusement. "So, Fristad. You better start explaining exactly what this is about before I start explaining what happens if your explanation isn't satisfactory."

I take a deep breath - well, as deep of a breath as possible given my lungs are being squeezed by otherworldly claws - and think about where to begin. She seems pretty serious, so maybe it's best to start at the very beginning. "As I've mentioned before, I'm an animal farmer, and I've been one for most of my life. That's the truth. But then one morning, I woke up and realized I had this talking book that was trying to control me for Notch knows what reason. I had no idea where it came from. Over time, it started to control my thoughts more and get me to do crazier things. Long story short, I found myself in some abandoned underground city, found a nether portal that wasn't supposed to be there, went through it in an act of self-preservation, and ended up in Nexus."

At this point, Shadow and Warnado are not reacting very much, but are listening intently. I continue to faintly hear rumbles and hisses beneath me, and feel the less subtle grip of the claws, reminders of the threatening world that looms underneath me, eager to swallow me up.

I continue, "At that point, I was concealing the source of the powers this book was starting to give me because I didn't trust anyone. The book made me craft a new set of armor that turns me into an enderman at night. Honestly, I'm not really sure why. Then, as a way of advancing my new powers, the book made me choose someone to gain control over, the same way the book gained control over me. I chose Amanda. That's when I became the Dreamweaver. I'm not really sure how it works, but somehow giving Amanda nightmares was supposed to make it easier for me to influence her."

I take another breath. It's a strange relief to tell strangers from other worlds about a being I've been hiding for so long.

"Now do you understand?" I ask.