Changes (1)

The darkness wrapped around me. I had neither vision nor perception of my surroundings. It was all pitch black, an eternal void. This lack of sensation would drive one's mind into the depths of the creepy valley.

I had lost every single physical comprehension of the world.

Every single one except...

An unbearable stinging sensation - something I had become all too familiar with during my time in the camp as well as during my previous life. It was the stinging sensation of eyes. Eyes of a stranger that would pierce through your skin. Eyes that would fall on the odd one, the strange one, the outsider.

As I stood in the midst of the vast emptiness, a feeling of eerieness enveloped me. It felt as though every tiny bit of the void was staring at me, as if millions of eyes were hidden beyond the endless darkness, observing me, my very being and soul. The overwhelming feeling of being watched consumed me.

'When you stare into the abyss, the abyss stares back at you...'

I thought, as I regained a subtle sense of consciousness. At that moment, the stinging sensation vanished along with the limitless void, which gradually changed into a hallway. The wooden floor and walls materialized, revealing a narrow path that stretched out infinitely in both directions. The warm, earthy smell of wood filled my nose as I gazed down the dimly lit, seemingly endless corridor.

Nonetheless, this place felt... oddly familiar.

*Thud*

When I turned back to see what was that sound, the scene sent shivers down my spine. My heart constricted with grief as I staggered forward my mother's lifeless body on the ground. Her dull eyes had lost their color, aimlessly staring at the ceiling. The silky brown hair strands were turning whiter and whiter with each second.

And there it was: A knife penetrating her chest, right through her heart.

A sense of helplessness washed over me like a tidal wave. I knelt beside her, reaching out with a trembling hand to touch her skin. Tears stung my eyes as the cruel twist of fate that had torn my family apart replayed itself in my mind.

Suddenly, the hallway began to tremble. Deep cracks began forming on the walls and the ground. My heart racing with desperation, I tried to hold my mother but it was in vain.

The ground abruptly caved in, sending me straight into the void below.

"Mom!"

My eyes swung open with a jolt as I gasped for air. I instinctively squeezed my pounding chest as my heart physically ached with fear and despair. With a sudden rush of clarity, the images of my mother flooded into my mind.

The flow of images disoriented my brain. Before I could pull myself together, I heard an anxious female voice beside me.

"Are you okay?"

Not even having enough strength to flinch, I glanced at Eleanor without saying anything. I reached out for my caffeine gums and threw two into my mouth. The bitter flavor slowly melted away in my mouth. It soothed my pain away.

*Sigh...*

"Yeah... I am fine."

"Are you sure? You seemed... Umm..?"

"Just a dream. Nothing unusual."

She said nothing else and just looked at me with empathetic eyes. She also had a fair share of her struggle against dreams as a prominent demigod. 

"Can I have one?"

"Sure."

She sat next to me and began chewing on the caffeine gum I gave her. However, her facial expressions didn't show any sign of delight as her face scrunched at the bitterness of the sharp coffee aroma.

"Urgh... I thought it was sweet."

Unable to get me to talk, she awkwardly eyed the surrounding forest for a moment. She opened and closed her mouth a few times. She seemed to be hesitating to speak. But she eventually did.

"You know... I have been having these dreams recently. I know it sounds stupid but... they are all the exact same. Every single time, I find myself fighting against the same humanoid figure in the same obscure place with the same beginning and end. It goes on until I lose and wake up... Isn't it super weird?"

She sat there with her arms wrapped securely around her knees. Her gaze was lost in thought, aimlessly staring at a tree in the distance.

"It's a part of being a demigod."

"What is? Being trapped in the same dream over and over again?"

"What I mean is that you are not the only one having such dreams. The majority of demigods undergo some type of extreme lucid dreams once in a while. Though I cannot say if I ever heard a dream like yours before."

She furrowed her brows, a mix of curiosity and skepticism painting her expression.

"How do you know all of this?"

"We are not the first demigods to ever exist. Before us, many struggled with similar issues. It's a common theme in myths about demigods that they experience quote on quote, strange dreams. Plus, if you pay attention to other demigods in the camp, you will quickly realize that's the case."

"I-I see..."

"Sigh... Don't worry about it. I am sure you'll be fine."

"..."

Demigods were prone to experience dreams more vividly and violently. Thus, most of the demigods regularly had lucid dreams. Although most of them were common dreams meant to facilitate and reinforce memory, demigods who carried unique fates sometimes experienced extraordinary dreams.

The thing with these extraordinary dreams was that they were the manifestation of a 'vision'. Some sort of guidance or hint. However, it was impossible to discern whether the dream actually held a vision or not, let alone decrypt the meaning of the vision underlying the dream since these dreams were borderline obscure and disordered. Until the very end, when everything unfolded itself, those abstract dreams never made sense.

I knew Adriel, who was the main character of this world, had been seeing such dreams since his childhood. And also the girl before me, Eleanor. She has also been subjected to such lucid dreams for a while now. However, at the moment, neither of them was aware of the real connotations of their dreams.

On the other hand, my dreams, or rather nightmares, weren't new to me, I had already been having these lucid dreams about my parents even before I ended up in this world and became a demigod. I could, however, notice they had evolved to be more vivid and frequent since I arrived in this world. I figured it was an innate part of being a demigod and didn't mind that much.

"Yo!"

"Hi."

Adriel and Amelia's vague figures emerged behind the thick branches of the trees. Following them, Nadia arrived too. Now that everybody was here, we took our position on a hill to oversee the area we were assigned to. The night promised to be long and boring.

I rummaged through my pocket for my wired headphones and put them on. I had stumbled across them in the storage room of Hades' cabin. Although they seemed quite old, they were in good shape so I took them. I had planned to spend the night listening to music. The music began playing, drowning out the noise of the forest around me.

Despite being transmigrated into another world, my long-standing habits remained deeply ingrained within me. My addiction to music had not diminished even slightly. I still found solace in it, just as it always had. Music felt like cold water that I would submerge my mind to cool it off

As the night wore on, I isolated myself from the occasional conversations within the group. Silence soon replaced those conversations as fatigue gradually settled in. The silence hung in the air for a while until Adriel's curiosity finally got the best of him and he spoke up.

"Do you guys think the traitors were also responsible for this?"

Amelia was the first to get hooked up on the topic.

"You mean the deprivation of divine energy."

"Yeah. Who else would benefit from the deterioration of the barrier, right?"

The group sat in silence, lost in deep thought as they all tried to find out the mystery behind the unexpected turn of events.

"But we still don't know for certain if this really was an inside job. It may as well be related to some external factor or something like that."

Nadia pointed out a gap in Adriel's reasoning. The group once again fell silent as they all paused to ponder, trying to come up with a feasible explanation.

I watched them from my corner like a distant listener. However, my peace was interrupted when Eleanor's gaze met mine. Her furrowed brows relaxed and a subtle smile crept up her face, as if she had just figured out the answer.

"Hey, Blake. What do you think?"