The outpost in the Forest of Dreams was surprisingly advanced. There was already a hotel, a couple of restaurants, a specialized store for equipment, and a few training rooms in the guild. To top it all off, there was a research center that would be used to study elemental spirits. Those creatures were rare to come by, and so far, no two kinds of the same spirits have been found. No one knew for sure if a type of elemental spirit could appear in more than a single room. As a result, any place inhabited by them became a center of research to improve people's knowledge about the spirits and how to get their partnership.

Hera and the group arrived in the city about one hour after sundown. The whole situation with the phantom beings chasing them ended up draining their energy too much. One of the guards who saw them arrive sent the party to the infirmary right away. Apparently, this fatigue was also caused by the forest. They already had seen a few different ways for that to happen, from people showing symptoms of sleep deprivation to people moving as if they had just woken up from a coma. Such symptoms would appear after just a few hours of them being inside the forest of dreams, and unless treated they wouldn't go away. That's why any exploration or discovery in this room was progressing so slowly.

In the infirmary, the healers on call gave everyone a power bar and cleansed any status effect that they were suffering. According to them, the party was under a spell that would create two effects. First, it would make them see a hallucination of their fears as if they were stuck in a waking nightmare. Second, the longer they spent under the influence of the spell, the more drained they would feel. That particular type of magic would trick their bodies into thinking that they needed to sleep, and if the victim pushed past that, their bodies would start going through the stages of sleep deprivation at an accelerated rate. However, it seemed like while under that effect, no one would reach the point of sleep deprivation psychosis, when the affected patient wasn't able to interpret reality.

Hera felt reassured after hearing that. It meant that people wouldn't just die because of the effect. The main issue was that the spell wasn't the only thing that could hurt them here. If someone got too tired to properly function when that weird purple monkey appeared, it was very likely that they would be in serious danger.

"Did anyone find out what that spell is?" Helena asked the healer.

"Not as far as I know. I can only tell you the effects. It's like a forced sleep thing," the healer replied.

"That's a shame," Helena sighed. A spell like that was well within her wheelhouse.

"But how it does that? Like, is there any biological effect like poison or something along those lines?" Hera chimed in.

"From what we can tell, it's not like a poison. There is nothing that goes inside the body. It is just a reaction like when you feel pain after stubbing your toe. Like I said, the spell tricks your body. Instead of making hormones or something like that, it just sends the same type of signals to your brain as if you haven't slept for a few days. This triggers a natural reaction on your body that creates all the hormones and stuff that makes you feel sleepy," the healer kept talking while taking care of Helena.

"So. The spell itself is nothing doing a thing to us? I mean, it's not like actively hurting us," Hera asked.

"Exactly. And you guys also saw something, right? A monster of some sort or something that made you scared."

"Yeah," Helena replied weakly.

"So I think they do that to make it easier for the spell to work. Since the fear triggers a flight or fight response and we get filled with adrenaline, it's easier to send a fake signal to our minds. It's kind of a guerrilla tactic. Causing a distraction so the main part of the attack can go through. Then they send those monsters to attack us," the healer finished checking Helena and used a spell to cleanse the last bit of the sleep magic, "There, all done. Sorry it took so long, but we have to be careful when dealing with something new."

"Don't worry. I appreciate all the work. I know it must be busy since everyone has to come through that doorway," Helena smiled and got up. She and Hera were the last ones to be checked out, and the rest of the group was already waiting for them at the guild entrance.

"Hey. Is everything ok?" Bonnie asked.

"Yeah, we are fine," Helena nodded.

"Great! Can we go to the hotel now?" Blue yawned mid-sentence, "I want to sleep,"

"Same, that made me tired," Mylo sighed.

"Are you ok?" Silah walked closer to Hera.

"Yeah. Sorry for making you wait. They want to be thorough," Hera pulled Silah over for a hug.

"And she got a bit distracted talking about what happened to us," Helena said with a smile, "Am I the only one trying to figure out what that was, or do you have ideas?"

"Well. I have. It's been some time since I got some new spells, and that one seems really good for me. I mean, imagine if I could do that to the monsters we find? Not the showing a monster part, but just making them sleepy. We would have a much easier time fighting them," Hera explained.

"That is a good idea. But can you make that spell?" Silah asked.

"I think so. I'm a conceptual mage, so as long as I have an idea, I think I can make it work. And the more I know about how the effect happens the easier it is," Hera smiled.

"How about you, Silah? How do you use magic?" Shane asked.

"I use runes. It's how we are taught back home. According to Bonnie, that's kind of similar to… code?" Silah turned to Bonnie, who nodded in confirmation, "Yeah, code. It's kind of similar to the runes we have but a bit more complicated. The runes are just different ways to write a word or a concept. We add them together to make what we want. I can send a text to Ogryn and see if he has any ideas about how to make a spell like this. I'm sure making people sleepy would help a lot even back home."

"That's a good idea. If he figures something out, I can translate it to code and then to formula, I think," Bonnie nodded.

"Yeah, that's great. Can we go now?" Blue yawned again.

The group decided to head to the hotel. Blue wasn't the only one tired, and any discussion about spells didn't have to be had in the guild. Blue, Mylo, and Alex went straight to bed as soon as they could while Hera and the others had other plans. They still stopped in the hotel to shower and clean up, but they all wanted to do other things before sleeping.

"What is everyone's plans?" Bonnie asked.

"I was going to the guild to check if they have more information about the Wailing Valley. I'm sure that people haven't fully explored that place," Shane had mentioned this before. The room was huge. To make matters worse, even with a map, it was easy to get lost. The valley formed a literal labyrinth, and having every place look the same only made things more difficult.

"I was kind of thinking about finding out more about the elemental spirits. I never heard about something like that before," Silah said.

"Me too. Those seem incredible," as she spoke, Hera noticed an odd look coming from Shane, "Is that a problem?"

"As long as you don't get one of them as a partner, no," Shane replied.

"Why? I mean, I get it that if things go wrong, it can be bad, but if it was that risky, people wouldn't even try it, right?" Hera understood that Shane had some sort of problem with the idea of a spirit partner, but she couldn't understand why.

"Look, you can do whatever you want, but I don't like the idea of having someone who can be controlled by a spirit around me," Shane shrugged.

"It's not like that. We don't get controlled by the spirits. We just get influenced by their emotions. It's like being angry because you are around someone angry," Helena said.

"Sure, until they turn into a daemon, and then you lose control because of the demonic energy," Shane scoffed.

"One, that is very hard to happen. And two, you don't lose control. The demonic energy just heightens your emotions, and you have to be more careful not to overreact to everything."

"Yeah, that's much different. Having a thing force you to act without a filter is not mind control at all," Shane rolled her eyes.

"No one is saying you have to get one. Just don't complain if we do," Helena crossed her arms.

"You can do whatever you want. Even if one of you gets a spirit partner, I don't care. I would rather you waited to finish this whole test thing so I don't have to sleep with one eye open, but you do you. I'm going to the guild," Shane turned around and walked away.

There was an awkward pause as they watched her leave before Helena sighed, "Well, to each their own. Shall we go?"

"Yeah," Bonnie nodded. Despite being interested in the elemental spirits, now it felt like a bad idea to look for a spirit partner. Hera, on the other hand, still wanted to know more about these creatures. It wasn't so much about getting a partner but about understanding the drowsy spell they used. As long as she figured out how it worked and how to mimic that effect with her own mana, she could get another ailment in her arsenal.

There were some very eager researchers ready to talk about the spirits and their findings. It was funny to see that contrast. Helena and other mages were very private about their experiments and would hardly ever share their discoveries while the project was still ongoing. Researchers, on the other hand, were excited to talk about everything they were doing. It was almost like a kid wanting to show a drawing to their parents.

In just a few minutes, a small group of people who worked in the research center was giving a small lecture about the elemental spirits and this particular variation to this curious group. It was more or less what Helena had explained. Spirits would help you with the cost of certain spells, and there was no restriction of location. You would receive its aid once you had that pact, even if you were in a different room or a dungeon far away. Most sprits would just help you with the cost of spells, but if you had a good relationship with the spirit, you would be able to discover new skills and spells and even call them to your side. Bonnie found that strange. Monsters that leveled up were always considered a special kind of threat, and despite everything, these elemental spirits were still classified as such. So a high-level explorer would gain nothing by calling a low-level spirit to help. However, when someone reached the point to summon a spirit, they could also share some of their strength with the spirit. By spending mana to strengthen the spirit, anyone could temporarily make their partners match their own level.

They discussed more about how to form a pact with a spirit and how although extremely rare, it was possible to have multiple spirit partners, but they had to be from different elements. This also meant that most mages simply couldn't have more than a single pattern since their mana would only be of a single element, and that would scare away any spirit from a different element.

Forming an actual pact sounded troublesome, to say the least. You had to befriend the spirit to the point where they wanted to start a pact with you. The issue with that was the language barrier. Since no one could properly speak with the spirits, befriending one of them was much like trying to tame a wild animal. In most cases, it took months, if not years, to form a bond strong enough for a pact. Not that it was impossible to form one quicker. There were those who even managed to get a partner in just a few hours, but that was considered to be wildly out of the curve.

Hera also took that chance to discover more about the spell, and after the lecture, she spent another half an hour or so with the researchers there coming up with ideas to make the spell work. After that, Hera considered going to the guild to practice, but Silah started yawning. It was late, and she would have a lot of time to figure that spell out. Besides, tomorrow they will start searching for some ancient ruins. It was hard not to be excited about something like that.