A Grave Mistake

A poor soul has been Corrupted by the dark magic of The Nightmare Lord...

It was probably a month after that experience in Puella’s ‘Dream’. She kept having them, and in amazing detail too. She went on another date with Amelie, but nothing exactly happened.

So she was now in The World of Sleep, practicing fighting and tag in the woods. We were having lunch in the shop.

Ira was munching on a sandwich, and Pulchra was having a drink of fresh ice water. The Study door popped open, Puella looked. The Dream Lord looked more stressed out than usual, he was rubbing the back of his neck and holding a piece of paper, staring at it with the utmost intensity. Ira even noticed his Stressfulness.

“Yo’ Okey, Daf,” Ira managed to say with a full mouth.

He darted his gaze over to her, he had a golden-yellow color to his eyes. This eye color would really set him off even if he had decent intentions with his actions. He just had this scary vibe about him.

“I just got a message from one of my Scouts that there was a nightmare in a village that’s 3 miles away, but I’m so busy with my dream statistics that just came in. It would at least take me the whole day to set it all up,” He said as he walked to the back of the register and dumping out all of the coins on the counter and sorting them all out into neat little piles.

“W-well Sir, maybe it would be nice if I could go take care of this ‘Nightmare,”’ Puella asked with a little hope from this boring, and difficult training.

He looked to Puella, then back to the pile of coins. “You probably shouldn’t, these monsters are pretty dangerous. So I suggest a few more months before I take you out to do such a thing, and I take you out on my errands,” He said as he looked under the counter and he grabbed three medium sized pouches pouches for the coins. Puella didn’t want this, she wanted to explore this new world, not stick close to the house and train. Pulchra sipped the rest of her tea and walked towards the study door. Ira finished chewing and swallowed.

“Where are you going, sis,” Ira asked as she stood up and stretched her arms from they’re stiffness.

“I’m going to send a Scout, I need to contact some friends back home,” Pulchra said as she turned the latches and she opened the door, Puella saw a white room with a glowing pastel pink light from the inside. Pulchra disappeared into the room with the door closed behind her.

Puella had learned that Scouts are like robotic birds powered off a certain magic, anything that seems to be advanced is either powered by magic, or an alchemist has found a different way to make such devices. Anyway, the Scouts are often built to resemble small animals or insects so they can listen to things around the device. But sometimes the can be used as message carriers. Which they are often build like fast animals like dogs or cats.

Ira stood up and walked towards the front door, she started to look rather impatient. She snot her gaze to Puella, The light Hazel eyes seemed to look right through her.  “What are you waiting for, let's go do some more running,” Ira said with a strict, and growling tone in her voice. Puella flinched and she shot up from the couch. She walked over to the door as quickly as she could. She walked through, and Ira followed close behind. The door slammed behind them, Puella jumped. Puella could feel Ira’s anger from so far below her. “So, are you okay, Ira,” Puella asked hoping that she wouldn’t get killed. “Alright, I’ll show you the direction where you should start walking,” Ira said as she pushed Puella to the side and started to walk towards the forest, and down a small path. Puella picked up her Coffin Shield and Short Sword. She slipped the Sword into the fancy Sheath and she began walking towards Ira. Ira stepped aside and pointed down the path.

“If you follow down that path, you should eventually reach the village. I’ll be following you close behind to make sure nothing goes completely wrong, I don’t wanna kill the future Dream Lord after they’re first mission. That, and finding another one will be a huge pain in my a*s. Your probably the most tolerable Dreamer in this world,” Ira said as she crossed her long arms, and looked to the forest.

Puella felt honored when she said that, She never knew that she could be tolerated by strong creatures, or any humanoid for that matter.

Puella gave Ira a fearful yet warm smile. “Thank you, it’s nice for you to consider this. I just wanted a short break from all of this training, It’s actually unusually nice for you,” Puella said kindly, trying not to piss of Ira. Knowing of her frustrated nature.  

Ira gave Puella one last burning stare, then she stretched out her wings, and flew off the ground. She seemed to be flying ahead, as if scouting for Puella.

It was Dusk, Puella was walking for a few hours. She felt her left heel forming a blister, and her right foot on the side of her big toe have a big blister. So you can imagine the pain her feet are feeling. She was sitting on the edge of a cliff, the village was just below the cliff. But she was watching the sun setting. The sky’s colors were constantly changing every minute. From a fiery orange, it would turn to a dark red, then to a light hue of yellow. Above the sun you could see magic hour setting in. Stars were appearing, and the two moons could be faintly seen. One of the moons were a bloody orange, and the other, a ghostly light blue. Puella felt some sadness in this sight. She didn’t know much about this world, but she felt like she had lived here for months. And she couldn’t possibly imagine seeing a sight like this in the the reality she lived in.  

Puella felt a gust of wind behind her, She shot a look behind her. Ira was landing, she actually looked quite graceful when she did this. It almost made her look a lot less angry than usual. Ira folded her giant wings and sat herself next to Puella to watch the sun set.

“I’m guessing you don’t have sunsets like this in your world,” Ira said as she kept her eyes on the sky. Puella looked to her, and looked down at her hands.

“No, after all. We only have one moon. That, and this is one of the first times I’ve stopped to look at a sunset. I’m always so busy in my world,” Puella said sadly as she looked back to Ira. Ira looked at Puella in a puzzled look. “Whys that? From what I hear from Dad, a lot of humans do a whole lot of nothing,” Ira said in slight protest. “Well, not all humans do nothing. Most of us are running around all the time working, or partying. And the people that are doing nothing are either living in their mom’s basement, or rich,” Puella said as she stood up and picked her coffin shield back up in her left hand. Way down the trail on the side of the cliff.

“Wait, what else do you know about the human world,” Ira said as she jumped down onto the path in front of Puella.

Puella was kinda freaked out, that and Puella was the last person to ask about her world. Puella walked past Ira as she kinda smirked a little. “Well, the truth is that humans eat nothing but dogs in our food. And we actually travel on horses that walk backwards,” Puella declared seriously. Puella couldn’t see her reaction to this, because she was on the break of laughing her a*s off.

It was almost dark by the time they got off the cliff, and the town looked empty. There was only one torch that was lit in the center of all the houses. There was a small fountain, it looked like a 8 foot figure that was hunched over. Ira had taken to the skies when she found out that Puella was bull-shiting her after a few fake examples of the human world. Puella drew her One Handed Sword and slowly walked over. As she drew closer, she heard whimpering coming from the figure. As if they were in massive pain. “H-hello, are you okay,” Puella asked as she was 5 feet away from the figure. It was an oily black figure, they’re black arms were dripping with black liquid, it seemed to be covering its face. As soon as Puella tried speaking. The stench of the creature went up her nostrils. It smelled like burning rotten flesh, she threw up in her mouth a little bit it was so bad. The creature must have heard her, it dropped it’s arms and turned around. It’s head was the size of her shield, it had a head of a Catfish. It’s large eyes were wide with terror, with some stray tears slowly moving down the black tar like surface. “You have to find shelter child, the curse caught up with me. I’ll be unstoppable soon,” It said in an old gurgling voice. They’re whiskers twitched and it tried to grab onto Puella’s shield. Puella stepped back a few paces, scared out of her mind. “I-I don’t understand sir, what do you mean,” Puella asked, confused and scared of this monster that was talking to her.

The monster’s body shifted a little bit, then it dropped to its knees. Spikes seemed to shoot out of the spine forming a fish like spine, sharpened claws, eyes that started to cry tears of blood, and size seemed to double. It let out a scratch of bloody murder, Puella flinched at the sound. The lights in the houses around her turned on, people were waking up from the horrible sound from this poor creature. Puella tried to snap out of it and charge the creature. It was standing up, winding back an arm to strike Puella. Puella sliced off the left arm, it cried out and it hit Puella’s shield. She flew into a building, her back felt like she really hit a wall. Puella looked up, it looked like the monstrosity was preparing to spit on Puella. Puella rolled to the side, the spit hit the wall. The Bricks began to disintegrate as if the spit was acid. Puella ran towards the creature and trusted into the creatures chest. The creature fell silent, Puella twisted the sword for good measure and pushed it back. It fell into the fountain and the Black material seemed to slowly ooze off of the body. It was an old man, his legs were fused together forming a fishes fin. Scales and all. The scales were melting off, and pieces of his face were missing. Revealing pieces of his skull Puella was in shock, her thoughts were going a mile a minute.

The doors of the houses burst open, humans came out. They were thanking Puella for saving them from this beast, but all Puella thought as she looked down at the dead fish man was fear and emptiness.