“Huff… huff…”

A little girl wearing a red hood was running. She was panting. Her hands were clutching an amber locket, which she held closer to her heart.

She had tears in her eyes. She was running inside a dense jungle. Behind her, people were chasing her. She stumbled and fell.

“Why did you kill her?”

A young man in his twenties, wearing aristocratic clothes, was thrashed by another aristocrat man. He was punching him over and over again. The young man’s face was bruised all over and covered with blood.

“Elijah. Why did you do it? She was your sister. She had a daughter. Tell me, what was so important that you killed my wife?”

“…Because I needed a sacrifice. And she was the only thing that mattered to me most.”

“Psychopath.”

The other man punched Elijah on his face again.

“You were so fixed on your goal that you broke a family. You know what, I will break that dream of yours”

After saying that, he pushed Elijah over the cliff.

Aarav tried to stop the man. But he couldn’t as the scene changed and he realized he was dreaming again. He was dreaming those dreams again.

A man was sitting on the throne, wearing cotton garbs which mostly covered his legs, adorned with jewellery made from bronze. It looked similar to the medieval era of Earth.

Aarav was standing beside that man. The man looked like the chieftain of the place. He was waiting anxiously for someone.

“My lord. Congratulations. It’s a girl”

The man laughed happily and rushed out of the place.

He sat beside a woman who looked sickly. The man was holding a baby, yet he didn’t look happy. His wife was dying.

Aarav wanted to wake up from this dream. He didn’t want to watch this dream anymore.

Soon the scenes changed and the baby grew up into a fine lady. She and her father were having food together. They looked happy.

“What are you doing here?”

The man suddenly turned to Aarav and asked him. “You pervert, stop peeping into people’s dream.”

Aarav woke up feeling somebody choking him.

Shula was holding on to his collars. He had anger written on his face.

“What are you doing?”

“I should be the one saying that,”

“Release me. I can not breathe.”

Shula released Aarav from his grip and glared at him.

“Was that man I dreamed about, you?”

“No. It was Michael Jackson.” Shula continued,” What were you thinking peeping into my dream?”

“I didn’t mean to. I don’t know how it happened.”

“…You don’t know?”

“…”

“You don’t know your ability.”

“I had been having such dreams for a while. I know these dreams were real. How I can dream them, I have no idea.”

“How long has it been?”

“I think from the day our plane crashed in this place. I don’t remember most of them.”

“And you also have insomnia from PTSD”

“Hey. I know you can read minds but can you be subtle about it. It doesn’t feel good about being laid bare.”

“Yeah. Me too. Don’t peep into other people’s dream.”

“I don’t even know how I did it. How will I stop doing it?”

“….”

After a long silence, Shula replied,” your ability is similar to Valenthia. Even she is not able to get into my dreams. I will contact her.”

“Valenthia. Why does the name sound familiar?”

“That’s the name of the guardian of this place.”

“Guardian. You mean the one who is as huge as a mountain and is a silver wolf.”

“A…huh”

“Also the one who can shred you into million pieces even before you realize it”

“Yes. The same one”

“Are you kidding?”

“You do realize that you are talking to a dragon”

“You are different.”

“I’m different. Why? Don’t I look ferocious?”

“You don’t have that…what we say…an evil aura… Even Kiara wasn’t scared of seeing you. You should have seen how excited she looked back then.”

“Hmm. Is it because of that those superhumans keep coming after me?”

Shula fell into thought. Usually, if a superior being comes before a human, they will shit pants. That never happened with him. He never found any human or animals running away from him. The first time he met Aarav and Kiara, they were shocked but were okay.

Was he not intimidating?

Arav told him about most of his dream. How they were mostly about the locket he had lost. Shula told him that he had awakened his ability. To explain what was awakening, he explained about the human race and magic first.

There were plenty of races like humans; dwarfs, Neanderthals, elves, superhumans etc. Humans are divided into two, on the type of magic they had. Elementalists were people who were born with magic. It included the healing clan of Sanka, fire clan, earth clan etc. There were twelve such clans. They lived mostly in Taiba and were otherwise called Ancient humans.

Other humans were magic-less. They acquired magic through a phenomenon called Awakening. The abilities were of a wide variety. It wasn’t just limited to basic elements.

Aarav’s ability was dream related. Shula told him how a normal awakening happens. The person undergoes trial inside their dream. If they can get out of the trial, they get the ability; otherwise, they die. Aarav didn’t remember anything that remotely felt like a trial. He was insomniac. He always had nightmares. But it stopped after he set foot on this planet.

Shula told him an awakening dream was crucial as it contained many clues about their ability and sometimes prophecized their life too. Aarav didn’t remember anything about it.

He had been dreaming about the locket. Most of his dreams he remembered had the locket and people associated with it. If only he had that locket. Maybe Shula could have solved some puzzles.

Aarav and Kiara delayed their journey to Caito. They wanted to learn more about the place than fly headless.

Shula was very kind to them, especially(only) to Kiara. He sparred with Aarav or rather bullied him in the name of training.

Kiara was making progress with her newfound ability. She could control the wind as she willed. She could condense her spiritual power in the form of a silver leaf and control it with her will. As the leaf flows, so the wind, it slowly takes the form of a small whirlwind. It keeps gaining momentum until it becomes a tornado. Shula then dissipates it. With help from the heavenly dragon, Kiara learns to control her power.

To mark their end of lessons, he gave them a test. It was to kill the only monster on that planet, the wraith. It was the same monster which ate one of their companions. Kiara wanted to take revenge but also she feared the existence.

The wraith was once a human who was driven by the greed of becoming an immortal. He did many unforgivable things and later turned into a thing that was neither human nor animal. He lost his sanity and was driven by hunger and instinct.

It became a timid creature. It only comes out at night. Only attacks when the prey was unaware. If it was retaliated it would runoff.

The adversary was not a very tough opponent. The problem was they couldn’t fight it.

It was like chasing your own shadow.