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Chapter 10- What Is To Be Trapped in Nightmares?
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After the last jump in time, Aria had lost the comprehension of her need to rest and the determination to follow her objective became set, all else had started to blurry somewhat. So she had immediately hurried towards Clover to take her chances. She had heard that the lizard had been spotted out of his territory on his way to the amusement park and the march hare was probably yet to hear about the twins or the mouse.
She came to the Clover tower to find it empty. Surely Nightmare had done something to keep even faceless out of it, but he could not interfere with a foreigner's passage, so she had no trouble entering and bringing in all she needed nor any interruption while setting it up. Once it was ready she prepared the proper parameters and hid herself for she would leave her body defenseless for a while.
Once she made sure she was well hidden she laid down, taking a pill and focusing into entering the liminal state, that moment when one's body is asleep but one is conscious, a dream space she could control, an invitation and obviously a trap that Nightmare could not ignore.
The set that Aria made for this dream simulation was that of a memory from her world. Something that gave her the advantage over those who had never seen or experienced something like modern urban warfare. The simulation wasn't that expansive but it was quite a dense and destroyed urban space of concrete debris, broken glass windows, burning vehicles and skies darkened with smoke and ashes; she even left corpses on the floor as she remembered having seen them back when she passed by in her world. This was a vivid memory; one of the few well ingrained in her as to remember the details. She let her AI handle the details as she set herself to wait for her prey to come into her trap.
It didn't take that long for Nightmare to make his way into the 'dream'. He looked around and almost vomited upon tasting the scent of burning rotten flesh. He couldn't see her yet, but he knew she was here.
"You know that you can forget all of these terrible memories and start anew. It's not too late, yet." The incubus looked around and then she appeared from behind a charred vehicle, very close to where he was floating.
The foreigner sighed, looking sad and distressed. "I cannot. I sealed my heart. It's too late now, is it not?"
Nightmare was surprised by her demeanor. She was very convincing. "As always, I can't read your mind."
"Neither can I read yours." She shrugged. "So let's speak like a normal person would. Ask me away, this is your chance. Currently I am unconscious and free from the influence of my body and its biological condition; but I have no idea how long that will last and I also don't know if there is a way to deal with my heart." She sighed. "Here in this dream I can still be reached, but outside my body is catching itself to my real time." She gave another sigh. "Why don't we exchange questions?"
Nightmare recognized her way of trying to establish negotiations, this probably was the last desperate attempt on her part to stop herself, something she could not do in the real world anymore. "What do you wish to ask?"
"Since you are giving me the chance to ask first I'll take it. Is there any way to unseal my heart?" She asked directly instead of her usual vague ways. "Tell me or let hope be lost already."
"There is a seal; sealed things can be unsealed." Nightmare answered, not vaguely but not directly either.
Aria nodded. "But the key to unseal my heart is lost because I gave up on it, no? Or something of the sort."
"There is always some hope as long as the game goes on." Nightmare faltered for a moment before remembering who she was and what she had done recently. "What are you planning to do?"
Aria noted his suspicion. It was clear he was not being entirely fooled, but her act had to keep going for a little bit longer. "I," she sighed, "I think I should perhaps search for that key. It's not as if anyone is going to help me. You all would rather kill me. I'm sure you were planning to before anyways." She looked away and sighed. "By any chance, do you know where it could be?"
"Be aware that such a key would only be something that the heart itself could grant, not something that you, heartless at the moment, can give. It is something only those who seek it or those that lost it can find." Nightmare considered that she may be rounding the conversation, asking about something she didn't care about first to try and then get out the information she wanted. But due to his role, he had to answer some of it anyway. "And who knows where it could be but where you lost your heart in the first place."
"I see … thank you for the information, I guess." Aria pondered a second. The place she had lost her heart? Well, that was an easy one. It could be the castle as that where she had gotten it sealed, but rather… according to the emotional understanding of this world, it would rather be wherever she decided to seal it, the place where she was pushed to take such a decision. Meaning the prison.
Nightmare's eyes widened for a second. He had slipped. She had been interrogating him all along directly. "May I ask you now what you really want and what are your plans besides looking for that key?
"Oh, yes, I should answer too, don't I." She kept her saintly expression, but the semblance of regret was entirely gone. "I am simply going to give some emotional comfort to the denizens of this dimension."
"Sounds like a noble cause." The incubus knew that was bullshit - more likely. "How do you plan to achieve that?"
"Quite easily actually." Aria gave a happy grin that turned very deranged in the span of a moment as darkness began oozing out of her form.
"The madness is invading you." Nightmare finally realized that too. This was the dreaded madness!
"My plans are not THE madness. Not yet anyways. And just so you know, the madness feels good, waaaaay too good and that is something the denizens of this dimension do not understand, just how awfully good the madness feels, but…I had tasted better." She shrugged again, chuckling and laughing to herself a bit as she began focusing her energy, the dream simulation starting to small down at its edges out of view. "I plan to give comfort to the vast majority of this world through vengeance and control. The faceless population have suffered so much, being constantly degraded, killed, tortured, abused, betrayed … why not bring a real evolution that can level the field for people here? I am merely giving them a break from you awful holders."
Nightmare laughed. "Such a well intentioned notion!" he mocked. "So you plan to kill the holders to avenge faceless? Really!? Even if you were to kill all holders, it's meaningless! We all can and would be replaced, another faceless taking on the roles."
Aria stopped her own laughing and let the energy she had adhered expand to form tendrils and tentacles of darkness that lunged to try and catch the dream demon, only for him to move back and evade. "I have no reason to tell you any more details. I almost finished what I came to do here anyways. But don't underestimate me … you always did." Aria dissolved her body into nothingness to concentrate into making the liminal space smaller and smaller as the nightmare realm opened up on the ground right under Nightmare. The incubus sensed it and looked down for a moment to see the memories she had remembered from her world and her past, calling to drag her back into the worst of her existence.
Aria's voice was heard from everywhere and nowhere, it was a digital mixed tone without humanity and without emotions. "Without power, the holders would get killed easily, and the next holder just as easily again and again and everything would be thrown into chaos for the general population to enjoy and manage. Of course, this world would run out of energy to exist faster, but I don't think anyone really cares about that."
More tendrils tried to attack Nightmare and he finally realized that the dream was shrinking in size towards the opening of the nightmare realm. She was trying to kill him or force him to enter the nightmare realm, a place that wasn't his domain anymore and that would make him 'dream' therefore separating his mind from his body, leaving his body to appear back in the tower. He tried retreating and escaping, but to his horror he couldn't. He had forgotten that Aria didn't dream. This was her weird simulation that she created while in a liminal space. He could not escape.
"How will you choose to die?" Aria laughed, knowing well that her plan had worked. He was now trapped. The world would crush him once it became so small as to flatten him, her darkness would rip him apart, or he'd have to jump into the nightmare realm and thus 'dream himself' separating from his body so she could physically kill him in the tower.
Nightmare realized it too. He had no choice but he had one chance, he had to hope that something could be done in the tower. He jumped into the portal of the nightmare realm, knowing that he would be forced to endure all the crap from her world, all she saw, experienced, and fought. That alone might as well destroy his mind too.
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Aria woke up with a headache, her facial orifices bleeding. Now she just needed to finish Nightmare and his body should be in his office more likely, in any case it would be in the tower. His mind was still trapped in the nightmare realm, so she had time to find him and end him. She could reach him now and kill that pathetic silkworm.
She chuckled, laughing was becoming more of a distant concept. It was amazing; a foreigner of all creatures would kill the worm even before his own weakness and sickness did. And because the worm had forbidden the entrance to the tower, then no one would be able to arrive.
She stood up, took some painkillers from the stash of drugs in her attire, and realized her body had advanced even more. Her arm now was not organical anymore and her spine had been utterly modified and enhanced as a component, the metal needles and wires enhancing the signal transmission to muscles and other components. She didn't care, in fact it just made things easier as she was now a far more competent combatant. After revising the enhancements and replacements she made her way from her hidden space towards the incubus's office.
It didn't take long for her to reach the incubus office. She unsheathed her improved forearm blades and opened the door.
"Aria!"
She jumped aside as an automatic dodge action and away from the voice, turning around to see Gray standing over Nightmare's sleeping body. He had not attacked yet, but she was now aware of him and the assassin had lost his first strike chance.
Her eyes glowed red in combat mode, even though the lizard's status was pitiful. He had lost an arm, the cutout limp hastily bandaged with the rags of his own coat and the rest of his clothes dirtied with blood and grim. He looked quite beaten up, panting and breathing deeply as if he had run all the way here from wherever he had been.
"I would make a joke about being unarmed but I can't process humor." Aria didn't even bother narrowing her eyes as she couldn't exactly remember what was the point of facial expressions out of a deception. "I assume it was either many enemies or a very strong and skilled one. Since you are not entirely drenched in blood, I'll assume the latter."
"Ace," Gray confirmed with a heaving breath.
"Oh, then I'll assume he is dead. " Aria gave a small nod, not surprised. " Looks like the type of fight where only one comes out alive."
Gray stumbled over Nightmare, gripping his shoulder while keeping his eyes on Aria. "Nightmare, get up." He ordered.
Aria remained relatively passive in her stance while calculating her chances and options. Even tired, hurt and with only one arm, the lizard was of the stronger fighters among the holders. She could fight him directly, but that would take time and she would not come out entirely unscratched; which she didn't really mind except that she was losing herself more and she still needed to go destroy that key, meaning she would have to face Joker and would need her mind to remain lucid for that. In any case her target here was Nightmare and he was out.
"What are you trying to accomplish by making a mess out of Wonderland, Aria? Did someone hire you?" Gray knew that if she was hired then maybe she could be outhired. He doubted it but there was still that chance.
"Wonderland has been messing with me beyond what it should have done. You're as messy of a children as it is this world." The foreigner took some steps back as her eyes glitched, sending the proper signal. Why fight the assassin when she could deal with both the lizard and the worm at the same time while she destroyed the whole tower?
Gray wasn't buying that Aria was backing off. After she took a step back, he prepared, only to see her jump out of the window the next instant and tossing something near the window, a grenade that didn't explode. He grabbed Nightmare and backed off as the tower began shaking from explosions from within. The grenade was a trap. He looked for an exit, knowing that he couldn't approach the windows and even attempting going down by the stairs was suicide, but there was yet another way. He dashed.
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