His words hung in silence. The Sleepers looked at Sunny with a hilarious assortment of emotions, ranging from bewilderment to shock. The young man with humorous eyes just smiled politely.

To be honest, getting an Ascended Aspect during the First Nightmare was extremely rare. He was certainly someone special, maybe even outstanding. Actually, despite their apparent differences, the young man somehow reminded Sunny of Hero... Auro of the Nine.

There was a special type of calculating coldness hidden deep inside their eyes. He had encountered such people before, mostly among the veterans of various street gangs in the outskirts.

They simply called this type of coldness "murder math". Basically, it was a habit experienced fighters developed no matter where they were and what mood they were in, there was always a sober part of their minds constantly calculating the most efficient way of killing the person in front of them, just in case such need arises.

'Ugh. Why do I have to antagonize someone like that, of all people?'

But Sunny really had no grounds to complain. After all, he brought this on himself.

After a few seconds, one of the young man's companions finally blinked and said:

"Uh... friend, you must not know a lot about the Spell. Caster's results are truly remarkable."

Then, with a furtive glance at the remarkable Caster, he added:

"He is a Legacy, after all."

An actual, living and breathing descendent of an Awakened clan? Sunny reevaluated his opinion of the humorous young man. Legacies were known to be trained for their eventual entrance into the Spell from the moment they could walk. For them, being infected was a certainty instead of a possibility.

They were extremely formidable people.

'Just great!' he thought bitterly and made his frown deepen.

 "Are you trying to pull a prank on me? You call this remarkable?!"

 The bewilderment in the eyes of these Sleepers was slowly being replaced by hostility.

"Listen, friend. If you don't think that an Ascended Aspect is remarkable, then please share with us your own amazing results! What, pray tell, was your Appraisal?"

 Caster himself was still keeping quiet and smiling. However, his defenders were growing restless.

 This was exactly what Sunny wanted to happen. He smiled with utter contempt.

"I would let you know... my Appraisal was, uh, it was "glorious"! Yes, glorious. And the Aspect I acquired was of the Divine rank."

After that, he received a number of strange looks. No one had ever received a Divine Aspect before; so, of course, they were starting to think that he was a lunatic. But there was still a sliver of doubt... maybe that strange guy was a descendant of a powerful clan? A peerless prodigy? Maybe his Appraisal was, indeed, glorious...

 Sunny had to dispel that tiny bit of doubt.

"Mind you, I'm not some lofty Legacy. Pfft! I'm from the outskirts. I've never even received combat training. All that training and he only got an "excellent"? What did he do during the Nightmare, pick his nose the whole time?"

 The expressions of all the Sleepers that were listening to his bragging instantly changed. An outskirt rat with no training... yeah, sure. Who was he trying to fool? Finally, with the same polite smile, Caster spoke: "Glorious? That is interesting. Would you mind telling us what were your achievements in the Nightmare?" Sunny grinned. "Sure, no problem! First of all, I killed an... uh... an awakened tyrant."  

Every "uh" cost him a couple of moments of intense pain, but he didn't let it show on his face. His expression was nothing but smug and confrontational.  The mere mention of a tyrant, let alone an awakened one, made a couple of Sleepers smile with ridicule.

 "Oh, really? How did you kill it?" An arrogant look appeared on Sunny's face.

 "How? Let me tell you, I didn't even have to lift a finger. I just spat, and it was torn to pieces!"

Which was true. Sunny had spat a mouthful of blood on the altar, and as the result, Mountain King was ruthlessly dismembered by Shadow God.

 Someone openly laughed.

 "This guy is either insane or purposefully messing with us. Listen here, shorty. Have some decency, okay? Who would believe such a lie?" Sunny was genuinely angry. He wanted to retort, saying that he wasn't short. But he couldn't.

Because that would be a lie, damn it!

 So, instead, he just gritted his teeth and said with a voice full of outrage: "I can't answer that, because it's not a lie!" "Are you really insisting that you had killed an awakened tyrant a tyrant! and with a bit of spit no less?"

 Sunny knitted his brows.

 "That's the truth!"

 More laughter followed.

"Crazy bastard!"

 "He actually believes in his own crap!"

"Insane, he's insane..."

Unexpectedly, Caster stopped his companions.

"Guys."

 After the laughter quieted down, he asked in a friendly manner: "What else did you achieve?" What?

That wasn't enough? Sunny raised his chin.

"Let me think... Oh! I also killed an awakened swordsman." "Really? How did you do that?

Acting as though he was a little bit embarrassed, Sunny looked down.

 "That... actually, that time I had to lift a finger. I even had to shake it a couple of times. That was enough to kill him, though."

 He was holding the Silver Bell between his fingers, which led to Hero being attacked and eventually killed by the tyrant. So, technically, all his statements were true.

 "What a crackpot!"

 "Ha! Can you believe this idiot?!"

 "Poor bastard. Not only is he weak, he's also lost it..."

 Caster gave his companions a long look and then turned to Sunny.

 "Anything else?"

 Sunny blinked. Time for the finishing touch...

"Something else? Uh... Well. Oh, right! I communicated with a bunch of gods, even though they were all dead. I made one of them wake up. He gave me a blessing! I was blessed by a god, do you all understand?!"

 The Sleepers were silently shaking their heads or looking at him with pity. Caster sighed.

"I see. Well, in comparison to your achievements, mine do look rather average. Thank you for sharing with us. I hope you'll be as successful once we enter the Dream Realm."

 Sunny smiled with a look of smug superiority on his face.

 "You better believe it!"

 With that, he turned around and walked away.

'Ah. That's a job well done.'

He was pretty sure that after this performance, no one would ever believe that he actually had some kind of a powerful Aspect or did anything worthy of notice during the Nightmare. He only told them the truth, and yet managed to make everyone believe in the opposite truth.

Such an incredible feeling.

What did they think of him now? They thought that he was weak, grew up without any education in the outskirts, and had no training. More than that, he was apparently either insane or incredibly stupid. His temper was terrible.

Truly pathetic and pitiful fellow.

Now, whenever he was asked about his Aspect, he could just honestly say that it was of the Divine rank, and be laughed at. People would rather believe that the Spell had ceased to exist than that he was someone noteworthy. He could even scream about his accomplishments from the roof, and no one would believe him.

Subsequently, no one would ever suspect that he had a True Name.

 'Just you wait, fools. One day I'll be the one laughing.'

 As Sunny was walking away, he heard one of the Sleepers talking to Caster:

 "Why didn't you put that lunatic in his place? He has belittled you!"

After a short pause, Caster answered. His voice sounded low and mellow.

"Poor kid must have lost his mind in the Nightmare. It often happens. He'll most likely die soon, so being kind is the least I can do..."

The corner of Sunny's mouth twitched.

'What a nice guy.

He knew that Caster's words were based on a false assumption, but, for some reason, still felt a cold chill running up his spine.

Satisfied with his performance, Sunny walked back to the deserted corner of the hall. He felt people looking at him with mockery, contempt and pity. No one seemed to be willing to stay close to him. It was just as well: he didn't want to be bothered anyway.

Still, weren't their reactions a bit exaggerated? It's not like he was carrying an infectious disease. Well, except for the Spell. But it wasn't really a disease, which everyone here should have known already.

Finally, he extricated himself from the crowd and reached the corner. For some reason, Sleepers were unwilling to approach it: currently, there was only one girl sitting quietly on the bench. Sunny gave her a look.

The quiet girl was delicate, demure and very pretty. Her clothes were tidy and neat. They weren't very expensive, but still rather tasteful. With her pale blond hair, big blue eyes and exquisite face, she looked like a beautiful porcelain doll.

She was subtly breathtaking.

However, there was something wrong with her. Sunny frowned, trying to understand what exactly about the girl made him uncomfortable. After a while, he realized that her empty, expressionless stare was reminding him of Mountain King.

 Startled, Sunny understood that the girl was blind. It took him a couple of seconds to compose himself.

'What a shame.'

A bit disheartened, he carefully sat on the opposite end of the bench.

The girl wouldn't have survived the First Nightmare if she had been blind prior to entering the Spell. Which meant that she lost her sight as the result of the Appraisal.

It was her Flaw.

 Suddenly, Sunny felt very apprehensive. A cold sensation spread through his chest.

'And I thought my Flaw was bad.'

No matter what Aspect Ability the blind girl had received in exchange for her sight, it was effectively a death sentence. A blind person had no chances of surviving in the Dream Realm, at least not with a dormant core. In some sense, the girl was already dead.

She was effectively a walking corpse.

Feeling extremely disturbed, Sunny turned away and studied the crowd of Sleepers. Now he understood why people were trying to avoid this corner: the girl was surrounded by an invisible, but almost palpable aura of death.

Sleepers usually weren't very superstitious, but anyone would feel uncomfortable in her company.

Armed with this knowledge, Sunny suddenly saw a pattern in how the young people in the hall were grouped. Instinctively, they all tried to stand close to those of their own circumstance.

At the far end of the hall, closest to the stage, were one or two small groups. People in these groups were distinct from the rest of Sleepers. They were all confident, calm and had an air of readiness. These were the Legacies: they were trained for the Spell since birth and had the highest chances of survival. Caster especially stood out from the rest.

Next to them was a larger number of expensively dressed young people. They were lively and excited, and only a little nervous. They were the scions of rich and high-ranking citizens. Their training was pretty good since such families had ample funds to hire private tutors even Awakened ones. Their chances of survival weren't bad.

Then there was the largest part of the crowd, which consisted of kids from middle-class families. They might not have had the privilege of training under Awakened tutors, but their education wasn't bad. The government spent a lot of effort to put all the necessary knowledge and skills into the school curriculum, preparing potential Sleepers in advance.

Some of them might have received additional training in private. To survive, these Sleepers would need to put in a valiant effort, and also have a bit of luck. But it wasn't improbable. Consequently there were tense and nervous.

And lastly, there was Sunny and the blind girl. The corpses. From the point of view of other Sleepers in the hall, their chances of survival were close to zero.

'How charming.'

This was how the young Sleepers had subconsciously divided themselves. The only exception from this rule was the silver- haired girl, who stood alone and apart from everyone, seemingly indifferent to tension and nervousness that permeated the air. She was leaning against a wall with her eyes closed, still listening to music.

But regardless of their group and level of training, everyone was already tired of waiting.

'When will the damn induction ceremony start?' Sunny thought, irritated.

As though answering his thoughts, a tall man in a dark blue uniform appeared on the stage. Not only was he tall, he was actually almost a giant. Sunny even wondered if the man's mother had sinned with a bear...

Of course, it was impossible – bears had gone extinct long before the Spell even appeared. But he once saw pictures in a book, and they looked sort of similar.

 'A bear-like Nightmare Creature, then.'

The giant man had wide shoulders, an athletic build and a gorgeous brown beard. His eyes were calm and serious. After reaching the center of the stage, he gave Sleepers a long look. When his gaze reached the deserted corner, Sunny suddenly felt nervous.

 'Uh... I sure hope he doesn't have a telepathic Ability. Otherwise, he might separate me from a limb or two on behalf of his mother.'

The man didn't pay Sunny a lot of attention and returned his gaze to the front rows of the crowd. Finally, he said in a deep, reverberating voice:

 "I am Awakened Rock. Sleepers, welcome to the Academy." Everyone listened without making a sound. "In less than a month, you will be summoned to the Dream Realm. Some of you might think that you are well prepared. You're wrong. The Spell is merciless and cunning. The moment Awakened begin to think too much of themselves, they die. I've seen countless Sleepers like you lose their lives. I've also seen experienced Masters lose theirs. Even Saints are not assured to survive."

'Thanks for the encouragement,' Sunny thought sarcastically.

"In the following four weeks, we will do everything in our power to increase your chances of survival. You will receive training from the best instructors in the world. However, don't be misled by their fame: in the end, whether you return from the Dream Realm alive depends only on one person you. The responsibility to survive is yours, and yours alone.

"Except for the Legacies, Sleepers were looking at each other with growing fear in their eyes. Awakened Rock continued: "You are not children anymore. It's a shame, because you ought to be. But the Spell has decided otherwise. You have been to the First Nightmare, so you already know what it's like. Your parents, your teachers and your friends can't help you anymore..."

 'Haven't had any of those in a long time.'

 While listening to Rock's speech, Sunny couldn't help but feel a little excluded. It was all old news to him. However, he understood the instructor's purpose: he had to make young Sleepers afraid, because fear was the only thing that would keep them alive.

Finally, the speech got to the important part. Awakened Rock paused, giving kids listening to him a few moments to digest his words. Then, with a short nod, he continued:

"Now we will talk about the difference between Nightmares and the Dream Realm..."

That was something Sunny was keenly interested in.

Of course, he had a general knowledge of how things were set inside the Spell. But the First Nightmare had already shown him that reality was different from how it was portrayed in popular culture in a number of small, but infinitely important ways.

He needed to separate truth from the myths. And, of course, it was very advantageous to hear it from the mouth of someone who had actually been to the Dream Realm. So Sunny was all ears.

 Awakened Rock began to speak:

"Most people are aware of what Nightmares are because they have an impact on the real world and their lives. All of you have been warned before entering the First Nightmare that, should you perish there, a Nightmare Creature would be allowed to cross the threshold and enter reality."

Yup, that was the reason why Master Jet had to wait patiently by his side, prepared to deal with the monster if it appears.

"First Nightmares are unique, because each of them is individual. That's why only a single Creature can appear. However, starting from the Second Nightmare, things become much more dangerous. These Nightmares are not tied to an infected person. Instead, they are born in the Dream Realm. While the Seed of the Nightmare is growing, any number of Awakened can attempt to conquer it."

Hunting down Nightmares was the main responsibility of the Awakened. Sunny knew that much.

"Should they all die or fail to find the Seed before it matures, a Gate will open in the real world, letting through countless monsters. You all know the consequences. Other Awakened will be forced to withstand the onslaught on this side, but then there can be massive destruction or losses among the civilian population."

Opening Gates were something that every person on the planet feared. It was also the second disaster brought upon by the Spell after the initial appearance of the Nightmare Creatures. The main difference was that, in that initial wave, there were only dormant beasts. However, Gates had ranks of their own, and any type of Creature could potentially step through.

Not long before Sunny was born, a Rank 5 Gate opening left a whole continent uninhabitable. Luckily, high-rank Gates were very rare.

Awakened Rock's voice grew solemn.

"So it is not wrong to say that the purpose of the Awakened is to enter the Dream Realm, seek out maturing Nightmares and close them before any harm could befall the real world. From this, you can see that the Dream Realm and the Nightmares are connected, but are not one and the same. If Nightmares are the destination, then the Dream Realm is the road. But it is also so much more."

'Very romantic. Does Awakened Rock have poetic inclinations?'

"Simply put, the Dream Realm is a world. It is vast, mysterious and mostly unexplored. It is also dead. There is no life out there except for the Nightmare Creatures, corrupted ecosystems... and now us. But it wasn't always dead. We can tell that once, a long time ago, the Dream Realm was home to several primitive civilizations. There are a lot of ruins buried in its soil."

From what Sunny knew, those lost civilizations were not really primitive, it's just that their development was centered around soul cores and mysticism as opposed to technology. So, basically, miracles and magic. What were their names? How did they fall? No one knew.

Maybe they were destroyed by the Spell.

"We don't know if the Dream Realm exists inside the Spell as one of its illusions, just on an unimaginably larger scale, or if it's real, with the Spell only serving as a pathway between two realities. However, we do suspect that the illusions conjured up inside the Nightmares are based on its history. They are replicas of past events, somehow reconstructed from the depths of time."

So, there might have been a real slave caravan on that black mountain once, a long time ago. Sunny remembered how time seemed to move in reverse at the beginning of his Nightmare. He thought about how things would have ended up without his involvement. Did the nameless temple slave perish in Mountain King's maw with the rest of the caravan?

Somehow, he felt that the nameless slave was not that simple. Otherwise, why would the Spell remember him? And what about Hero? Was he able to escape?

'I wonder.'

"There are four main differences between the Dream Realm and the Nightmares. Firstly, it doesn't have a "story". There is no predetermined conflict you are forced to resolve. You can move freely and explore, provided that you have the strength to stay alive in the wilderness. Most people tend to stay close to one of the human Citadels."

'That's good to know, Sunny thought, unconvinced.

Sure, there were no predetermined conflicts in the Dream Realm. But with his [Fated] attribute, he was pretty certain to end up in some kind of trouble. So that freedom Awakened Rock had mentioned was relative in his case.

Meanwhile, the instructor continued:

"Secondly, as I have already mentioned, there are no people in the Dream Realm except for those who came from the real world. There are only monsters. Some of them can mimic human appearance, though, so be mindful of that."

Sunny felt cold sweat running down his back. Nightmare Creatures mimicking humans? So creepy! Since when was that a thing? Why hasn't he ever heard about it?

He stole a glance at the Legacies standing in the first row and noticed that they did not show any sign of surprise. So, they knew.

"Thirdly, unlike the First Nightmare, no Nightmare Creatures will appear in the real world if you die in the Dream Realm. It may sound cruel, but that's a good thing. Awakened forces are already spread thin. If we had to monitor every Sleeper, we wouldn't have resources to handle more important matter."

Considering that each Sleeper could spend weeks, sometimes even months in the Dream Realm, there was ruthless logic in that statement.

"And lastly, and most importantly. Unlike Nightmares, which are bound by the rules of fairness, there is no limit to what kind of Creature you can meet in the Dream Realm. During its trials, the Spell won't pit a dormant human against an opponent many ranks above them..."

'Oh really?' Sunny sneered.

However, he was forced to agree with Awakened Rock. Even though both Hero and Mountain King were way out of his league, they were still just one rank above him. "...

But in the Dream Realm, no such restrictions exist. Theoretically, you can stumble upon an Unholy Titan and die before even realizing what happened. So be careful and stick to the regions with enemies on par with your own rank. It's not an ironclad guarantee, but at least there will be less of a chance of you biting off more than you can chew."

Sticking to a region populated by Nightmare Creatures below his rank was even better. That was exactly what Sunny was planning to do.

Awakened Rock paused for a few moments, studying the faces of Sleepers in front of him. Then he added:

"When the solstice comes, you will be drawn into the Dream Realm. The exact location of where you will appear can't be predicted in advance, but there is a high chance that many of you will find yourselves in close proximity to each other. Band together and proceed to the nearest human Citadel. Each Citadel is built around a Gateway. Once you reach it, you will be able to return."

Gateways were special portals that served as exit points from the Dream Realm. Once Sleepers reached such a portal, they would be able to escape back to reality and become Awakened. Their core would evolve, and they would also receive a second Aspect Ability. After that, they would return to the Dream Realm each time they fall asleep.

"If you can't locate or are unable to reach the nearest human Citadel, search for an unclaimed Gateway. It will usually be inside or near the most prominent landmark of the region. Work together to defeat its guardians and come back alive."

He gave them a heavy look.

"That is all for today. Next, follow the instructions sent to your communicators to find your assigned dormitory. Once settled, you may proceed to the cafeteria for some late supper. There will be a round of interviews after that, to prepare your suggested curriculums. Get a good night's rest. Your training starts tomorrow."

With that, he gave them a short nod and left.

Sunny sighed.

'Can't be predicted in advance, huh?'

With his luck, he would either drop right in the middle of a prosperous human Citadel and immediately roll into a Gateway, or appear in some region of the Dream Realm so remote and deadly that no one had ever heard about it or returned from it alive.

'Let's hope for the former.'

Since he couldn't do anything about it, Sunny wasn't very worried. There was something much more important on his mind – what, exactly, do they serve here for supper...