"What the hell…"
The air was thick. Too thick. A dreamlike haze clung to Kivas' skin as she stirred, her senses swimming against a tide of dampness and illusion.
The soil beneath her was soft, wet, pulsing faintly with a humid pressure that coiled into her soles. She blinked several times, the fog settling across her vision in slow folds.
Massive gnarled trees stretched like the limbs of titans, their twisted silhouettes crowding the sky above.
Mist crawled through every surface, tracing the forest in silent, white breath.
Kivas exhaled harshly, sitting up with narrowed eyes and clenched fists.
"She really knocked me out again…" she muttered bitterly. "Seriously, who just decides that for someone else?"
Her voice vanished into the mist like it had never existed. Still grumbling, Kivas glanced at her hands and her breath caught—gleaming softly in her grasp were the unmistakable forms of the Remington 870 and the cinquedea.
She lifted both slowly, turning them in her hands, eyes scanning the flawless integration of metal and the pulse of mana lining each weapon's edge. The weight was perfect. Familiar. Part of her now.
"I'm... actually armed this time."
She stood carefully, soles sinking slightly into the wet soil as fog coiled around her ankles.
This iteration of the Nightmare realm looked completely different from the last—the shattered throne room, the molten cliffs, the frozen tomb—all had changed.
Now she stood in a hushed woodland that oozed with ancient weight, every step squelching in a rhythm that mimicked breath.
She lifted the shotgun slightly, her other hand spinning the cinquedea once for reassurance. It felt weightless, surprisingly easy to handle unlike the time she wielded it in the real world.
"I wonder if this feeling will persist after I got out from this nightmare." Kivas pondered with a wry smile. "Never had time to try it because a certain former dragon chopped my neck like I was a karate block."
The comfort didn't last long.
From the edge of the fog—far behind the dying light of the dreamworld's unseen sun—something moved.
A long, slithering distortion coiled between the trees. Massive chitinous plates shifted into view. Segmented armor scraped against the mist-drenched wood. Dozens of jointed legs emerged one by one, carrying a mountainous bulk of obsidian and glistening muscle.
A skeletal crown of mandibles creaked into place. Spiraling limbs emerged from where a head should have been, weaving into the open grin of its horrific face. The same face she had seen each time.
The same grin it had worn while devouring her countless times. The Centipede Voidling.
Kivas didn't move. Her knees locked in place. Her heartbeat rattled her ribs in erratic pulses.
It had found her again.
Its body scraped into visibility with impossible length, eyes—if they could be called such—glaring with that same malignant certainty. It remembered. It knew her. It knew her weakness. It understood her fear. Its every movement was deliberate, cruel, like it was savoring the pause before the carnage resumed.
Kivas could barely breathe. She felt like she had died. She wanted to end it before it happened, end it now and spare herself the vivid pain and utter torment when her body was mutilated while she was still alive.
She wanted to end it. She wanted to end it. She wanted to end it.
The Nightmare body arched like a collapsing bridge, every limb crashing forward with killing intent. The wide mandibles opened as it rushed her, poised to sever her head from her body. Its speed tore through the fog, splitting the air in jagged spirals.
Kivas watched it happen, but a sudden realization came to her.
She remembered.
She remembered Earth.
She remembered her mother and father in caskets she couldn't comprehend.
She remembered the dull taste of cafeteria food she never touched.
She remembered the rooftop wind brushing her face as she considered ending her own life to escape inherited debt.
She remembered the void between lives. The eternity of torture. The realm between death and incarnation. The probing minds of three eldritch gods tearing into her soul for amusement. She remembered being nothing. She remembered being reborn.
Kivas always remember, because she couldn't forget. People around her was jealous of it, claiming that it was a blessing, saying that she should be in a better position while stabbing her in the back.
They didn't know that Kivas was just a normal human being, an averagely intelligent individual with the curse of hyperthymesia.
And now, she was being hunted again. Always hunted. Always alone. Always cornered.
"Haa…"
Something cracked.
Something inside her, buried beneath layers of anxiety and vulnerability, finally shattered into clarity. A silent scream. A declaration. An ultimate realization.
She didn't have to run.
She didn't have to flinch.
She didn't have to submit to survival.
She could just wreak havoc and make them rue their sin.
Her arms moved before her mind caught up. The shotgun bucked in her grip, magic-infused shrapnel ripping into the centipede's descending face.
The blast tore into its left mandible, shattering half its jaw. Steam burst from the wound, divine heat burning into its outer plating.
Its shriek never left its throat. She shot again, rotating her footing as she ducked under one of its legs and fired into the gap between its chitin.
Her aim was perfect. The pellets embedded themselves deep, and the creature reared in confusion. She rolled beneath it, coming up on the other side, already slashing with her cinquedea. The divine dagger sliced into the crevice between its body segments, severing muscle and shattering spiritual shielding.
She didn't stop.
She moved with inhuman precision. The Fate Weaver skill in her soulsupported her malicious intent like a loyal butler.
Every time the centipede turned to retaliate, her body slipped from its grasp like smoke. When it lunged, her blade was already waiting. When it reared to crush her, she had already fired twice into its eye sockets.
The Voidling howled, yet she laughed.
The forest warped as the creature tried to adapt. Its legs shifted, its form expanded, its plating transformed to repel bullets and blades.
She adjusted instantly. Her shotgun released glowing rounds that exploded on impact. The cinquedea crackled with soul-light as she reversed the grip and plunged it straight into the nerve cluster beneath its primary brainplate.
With each injury she inflicted, something cold and deep within her surged with delight. All of the helplessness that had clung to her spine since birth—gone. All the anguish that had no place to go—found purpose. The centuries of silence. The agony of becoming. The humiliation of fear.
She bathed in it, the bodily liquid that was thrashed around this dome of vivid drea.
The Nightmare bucked and flailed.
She rode it down.
It crashed into the soil, tearing up roots, shattering the mist with its impact. She stood atop its ruined crown, legs firm, eyes burning with contempt. Her shotgun rested against one shoulder. The cinquedea dripped black soul-fluid in her opposite hand.
Kivas stood still.
Mist rolled around her ankles again. The forest quieted. No wind. No movement. No resistance.
Atop the corpse of the Centipede Voidling, Kivas stood with eyes empty of mercy, lips pressed into a thin line of disdain. The edge of her blade tilted downward as she watched its twitching limbs fall still.
Whatever hatred had been buried in her heart for years had finally found a target.
But should this be enough to quench it?