The sky was a bruised gray when Lila led Ethan beyond the city limits, past the train tracks that separated the living from the forgotten. Mist clung low to the ground like regret, curling around their feet as they followed an unmarked road that didn't exist on any map.
"I thought you said she was close," Ethan muttered, checking the time. "We've been walking for half an hour."
Lila didn't glance back. "She doesn't live in places. She lives in thresholds."
"That's… cryptic."
"That's Delilah."
The trees around them began to twist, their trunks spiraling unnaturally, like they'd grown while writhing in pain. Birds didn't sing here. No wind stirred. Only silence, thick and pressing.
Then Ethan felt it.
A tug.
Not physical. Internal.
Like a thread pulling gently on his ribcage, luring him forward.
The world shimmered.
> [Minor Reality Bleed Detected]
Veil Status: Partially Active – Layer Overlap in Effect
Entity Presence Nearby: Classified – Obfuscated by System Permissions
They stepped through a veil of hanging moss—and emerged into a clearing that hadn't existed before.
It was a ruin.
Stone arches stood broken in the center of a crater, their surfaces etched with language Ethan didn't understand but recognized—as if from a half-remembered dream. Vines crept up the ruins like veins. A circle of candles burned with cold, white flames, surrounding a woman seated on a throne made of discarded mirrors and torn books.
She looked young.
Too young.
Barefoot and pale, her long hair black as oil, streaked with blood-red threads. A blindfold made of torn lace covered her eyes, and she wore a sleeveless tunic of stitched paper, scrawled with words that shifted when Ethan looked too long.
Lila knelt.
"Lady Delilah. We seek counsel."
The woman didn't respond at first.
Then she laughed.
Soft. Melodic. Full of something between madness and sorrow.
"You brought me a newborn," she said. Her voice was layered—several at once. "One whose soul smells of silver thread and broken time."
Ethan swallowed.
"I'm Ethan," he said.
Delilah tilted her head. "You think names matter here?"
"They help."
She chuckled again. "How quaint. Very well… Ethan of Thread and Ash. Sit."
Ethan didn't move.
Delilah pointed, and reality bent.
A chair unfolded beside him—made of spine bones and typewriter keys. It hummed softly.
He sat.
Lila remained kneeling.
Delilah's voice lost its playfulness. "You've seen Lucien."
"Yes."
"Did he touch you?"
Ethan hesitated. "No. But he marked me. The system said he was observing."
Delilah exhaled. The candles flared.
"Then you don't have much time."
Ethan stiffened. "What does that mean?"
Delilah leaned forward. "Lucien isn't like us anymore. He used to be a Dreamweaver, yes—like you, like me. But he was chosen by something older. The Devourer doesn't consume him. It feeds through him."
"The Dream Devourer," Ethan whispered.
Lila's eyes narrowed. "You said you only had rumors of it."
Delilah smiled bitterly. "Rumors are all anyone has. Even I have never seen its true form. But I have seen its mouth."
She raised her hand.
And revealed her left arm.
Or what was left of it.
From the shoulder down, it was warped—covered in dreamflesh. Veins pulsed with memory-light. The fingers had too many joints. It was like a collage of limbs stolen from other dreams.
Ethan looked away.
"He used me as a bridge," she said. "Lucien opened a gate between my mind and the Deep Rift. The Devourer tried to remake me. I survived. Barely."
Lila whispered, "This is what happens when you fail."
Delilah turned her blindfolded eyes toward Ethan. "You're already unraveling."
He frowned. "What?"
"Thread of Will. Thoughtbind Snare. Shield of Memory. Your constructs are too clean for your level. Too refined. The Rift is accelerating your sync. Something wants you shaped quickly."
"Then I need to get stronger. Fast."
Delilah leaned back. "Strength is nothing here. Only clarity matters."
She stood slowly, her hair floating as if underwater.
"I'll give you a gift," she said. "But know this—everything has a cost."
Ethan nodded. "I accept."
She walked forward.
The candles dimmed. The air froze.
Delilah raised her dream-twisted hand—and pressed it to Ethan's chest.
> [Direct Memory Transfer Initiated]
Warning: Incoming Dream Core Fragment. Sanity Risk Elevated.
Accept Transfer? Y/N
"Y," Ethan whispered.
Pain exploded behind his eyes.
He screamed.
The world shattered.
---
He was on a battlefield of mirrors.
Bodies lay scattered—Dreamwalkers, all dead. Some still twitched, stuck in death-loops.
Lucien stood atop a pile of skulls made of obsidian, his clockwork eye spinning like a music box.
"Time is not a line," Lucien said, grinning. "It's a spiral. And I'm the needle."
He raised his hand—and the sky opened.
A massive maw, stitched shut with chains of light, groaned.
The Devourer.
An eye opened behind it—an eye that saw too much.
And Ethan's mind snapped—
---
He fell backward into his own body, gasping.
Delilah was gone.
Only Lila remained, holding his shoulders.
"You're okay," she whispered. "You're okay. You're back."
Ethan clutched his chest.
The pain had stopped.
But something was inside him.
A shard.
A memory.
> [Dream Core Fragment Absorbed: Lucien's Path I]
New ability awakened.
Skill: Spiral Echo
Type: Temporal Feedback Construct
Function: Triggers a delayed mimic of last Dreamweaver skill used, with altered effect based on emotional charge. Can activate once per conflict. Cooldown: Long.
Rank: E-
He stared at the system message.
Lila helped him to his feet. "You shouldn't have accepted that."
"I needed to know," Ethan said. "Lucien… he's not just dangerous. He's a vessel. And he's opening something."
They turned and walked away from the ruins.
Ethan looked back only once.
The throne was empty.
The candles extinguished.
But the thread in his chest now pulsed with new color.
The next time he met Lucien, he wouldn't run.
He would understand.
---
Back in the city, Ethan sat in his dorm room, replaying the memory again and again in his mind. The moment the sky opened. The mouth. The eye.
The spiral.
He opened his palm.
Threads formed—clean, perfect.
But beneath them now, another pattern flickered. A spiraling afterimage. A trace of something deeper.
Spiral Echo was still dormant.
But he felt it—coiled like a second heart.
He checked the system panel.
> Level: 3
SP: 0
Dream Energy: 42%
Known Skills:
– Thread of Will
– Shield of Memory
– Thoughtbind Snare
– Spiral Echo (New)
His hand trembled.
And yet, for the first time…
He didn't feel like prey.
He felt like a player in the game.
A weaver of dreams.
And he had only just begun.