As head of security, Mori had been particularly on edge these days, every time the rest of the faculty went home. His team was strong, surely, but he always felt better with at least a few Masters around to provide extra support.
So when a shout rang out, he left all thoughts of finally taking a rest in a sleeping pod and ran for the front entrance.
Whatever he had expected, a young man draped in bedding was not in his top one hundred. After bringing the young man in and listening to his tale, Mori felt more confused than when he began.
"Maybe I should not have had that last cup of coffee…" Mori rubbed his eyes tiredly.
Finding that the young man was not a threat, Mori sent the student to be examined in the medical ward while he reviewed the security footage.
There wasn't much to see. At most, there had been a gust of wind around when Arcana claimed to have been woken from his slumber. It didn't help that the angle wasn't quite right. Mori could almost convince himself that the window was opened and shut at the time of the incident. But there was no one to be seen.
Coming up empty, the head of security wasn't sure what to do now. Had a crime been committed?
Not as far as he could tell. A youth Awakening on his own without having to go through the Solstice as something to celebrate, right?
Mori pulled at his chin.
Was this a new phase of the Spell? A fluke?
He wasn't sure.
After much deliberation, he turned to his subordinate and sighed. "Make sure that a sample of that boy's blood is sent for testing. Something strange happened, but I don't know what. Maybe I should alert the research facility, too. They will be very interested in the development."
Mori sat down to write his report. What words would encompass what happened that night?
More importantly...what would the Provost say when she saw them?
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It became apparent less than a week later that Arcana's experience was not an isolated event. Three more individuals, one male and two females, disappeared and immediately returned on consecutive nights.
The experiences they described were eerily similar, but the young man added that he saw a monster for a split second before finding himself at the edge of the ice palace in Ravenheart. He later admitted that it might have been a Pilgrim on the nightly rounds, but by then the account of a child-stealing monster had burned through the campus like a wildfire.
Students were frantic about the mysterious beast and who might be its next victim. Provost Noble had to come out with a public statement that no one had been hurt and even recorded the former Sleepers saying that they were alive and well for concerned parents.
By the time Dreamer Stella wandered out of his dormitory in the middle of the night, over a dozen Sleepers had been transported to the Dream Realm with no one knowing exactly how.
Pulling his hood tightly around his dark hair, Stella rushed across the campus, following the directions on his piece of paper to the letter.
He stepped into the shadows of a building, and his heart stopped. There was another person there.
Before he could retreat to his dorm, the voice whispered. "Stella?"
Stella squinted. "Ashican, is that you?"
The curly-headed boy nodded, his night-vision Memory goggles shining in the darkness. "What are you doing here?"
"Same as you, I'd imagine." Stella held up the paper.
Lifting his glasses, Ashican furrowed his brow. "Do you think it's some kind of prank?"
"What are you two doing here?" A third voice caused the other two to nearly jump out of their skin.
"Grass?" Stella squinted, barely able to make out the boy in his black clothes.
"What are you looking at? Of course it's me!" Grass frowned.
"Sh, keep your voice down." Stella's green eyes looked around anxiously.
"Come on, now, get on with it!" Grass continued in his loud tone. "Why did you two chuckleheads send me this note?"
Annoyed, the other two boys exchanged glances before Ashican answered. "We didn't send it. We got them too."
All three boys held out their notes. The strange lettering and message were identical. They were to meet behind the Dream Lab Building exactly between the two large windows.
"You've made the list. Your time has come." Stella read the words at the end once more. "What do you suppose that means?"
"Probably a ploy to draw idiots out here in the middle of the night," Grass blew out his cheeks.
"You're out here too," Ashican pointed out.
"Yeah...well...What do you think is going on then?" The irritating young man shot back.
"I am not sure, but I know what I hope..." Stella pursed his lips.
The other two boys grew silent for a moment. They hoped for the same thing as well, but none of them dared voice it.
Grass stood a little straighter. "We're at the top of the transfer list, aren't we? Why shouldn't it be our turn?!"
"I'm not sure that's how it works. Vis told me that Err was not on the list at all, which makes sense because he's a legacy of Clan Valor. He was none too pleased when he woke up before the solstice in Ravenheart." Ashican shivered.
"The awakenings do seem random," Stella agreed.
"Alright, but what else could it be?" Grass's grating voice caused the other two to grit their teeth.
"What if…" Stella stopped. He glanced at the shadows nervously. The gravity around him seemed weighted by his emotions.
"What?" Ashican followed his gaze.
"I…thought I heard something." The green-eyed boy peered into the shadows.
After many moments of silence, the boys relaxed, and the pull of the earth returned to normal.
Grass grunted.
"Get on with it. What were you going to say before?!"
Stella took a deep breath. "There's a theory going around that the one doing all of this is a Nightmare Creature. They say it's actually gobbling up students while the Academy is doing a massive cover-up. What if… what if it's more than just a theory and we are waiting around to be something's lunch?"
"Ha! You are gullible," Grass laughed loudly. "Believing in ghost stories like a child. How naive can you be? Do you think those videos were faked too?"
Stella flushed. "I'm just telling you what I heard! Have you seen any of the new Awakened with your own eyes?"
Grass narrowed his gaze. "No, but…"
"Quiet, both of you. It's almost time. If we want to find out what's going on here, we need to lay low before campus security finds us!" Ashican tugged on both boys' sleeves to pull them closer to the designated spot.
"When people tell you to touch grass, this isn't what they mean!" The obnoxious boy shrugged off his companion.
"Sh!" The other two hissed at him, huddling close together in the darkness.
Grass crossed his arms. "Fine. Anything's better than listening to Stella's urban legend."
A whisper answered him.
"The thing about urban legends is they are always based on something, or at least…sssssomeone."
"That's not funny, Stella." Ashican shot an accusing look at his friend.
"It wasn't me!" Stella shook his head. A chill ran down the students' spines. Feeling a presence behind them, the three boys turned and met two glowing reptilian eyes.
"Boo."