After taking a train north to Naimpour city we took carriages to the beginning of the Wraith Frost Peninsula where the Forest of Living Dreams was located.

  During the trip I got closer to Thunderbird team. I wouldn’t be able to call them friends, not only were they all five years older than me, they also had a shared history I was not a part of. Instead I felt as though I was one of their siblings tagging along for a trip. Not a wholly unwelcome feeling if I was being honest.

  Out of the six of them I got along best with Downs and Gelf. The other four were fine, but Downs and Gelf gave their equipment and more importantly their studies of various Nightmares more than just a professional interest.

  While they were not allowed to tell me the Stygoscript formulas used in Champion armor making, they were able to explain the product of such formulas. How Downs’s spear blade was able to heat up to extreme temperatures and use bursts of kinetic energy to stab through tough opponents. Or how Gelf’s pack was able to produce a metal shell to protect him when needed.

  What interested me far more was their classes on Nightmares. They would be brought Nightmares, some living and some dead, and were given demonstrations on their powers or they would be dissected to show their unique organs.

  When I tried to get them to go into more detail about it they would deflect, saying it was too grotesque to bring up to a child.

  Three mountains encased The Forest of Living Dreams. The easternmost mountain had a large crack slicing it in half where large gouts of steam constantly flowed out, bringing water from the lower Layers back up to the First Layer. It aided in creating the heavily overcast sky, blocking much of the sun and causing us to be frugal with Sun Stone usage.

  We had to get out of the carriage and travel by foot, which took us another two days. During that time I noticed how different the mindsets were between the students of Daybreak Dreamer Academy and the Forged Order. They were a collective, and shared an understanding that breached personality and beliefs.

  Haphazard was the only way to describe the students. Tents not all the way set up, personal possessions strewn about.

  Meanwhile the soldiers kept their tents in an ordered fashion, they stored their equipment properly under waterproof canvases. By no means were they perfect, but there was something distinctly satisfying in a group of people all acting as if they shared a mind.

  Professor Alyci stopped us halfway up the southern mountain. A rocky outcropping allowed them a clear view of the mystical forest below. It was… incredible. The entire forest was suffused in a twisting multi-colored mist. By far the most common color was purple, but greens, reds and even pink areas could be seen.

  Dominating the center of the forest was a giant tree with black bark and purple leaves.

  “If that tree isn’t the source of the magical mist I’ll eat my hammer,” Private Icey said.

  “You’d probably like the taste of it. After all, you do put ketchup on your eggs,” Private Quint said staring out over the wooded area.

  “You know, you bring that up a lot,” Icey complained.

  “Because it's disgusting,” Yun said.

  “Don’t start on me too. I’ve seen some Empyrean dishes. Who eats fish eyes?”

  “They’re actually pretty good once you get used to them,” Yun said with a shrug. “Very crunchy.”

  “Delightful.”

  “While this is a riveting conversation. We should go see the details of our mission,” Quint told our group.

  I followed behind the Forged Order soldiers, watching their interactions up close. It was interesting to observe their intersocial placements.

  Icey had a wide variety of small hobbies, such as learning to lockpick, collecting rocks, odd things such as that.

  Yun enjoyed putting people off balance verbally. Be it disgusting, disturbing, or dishonest.

  Terkville, or just Terk, enjoyed putting people off balance physically, pushing their shoulders, lightly tripping them. Never maliciously, but never kindly.

  Gelf was like me in that he wished to know the details of how things functioned, however unlike me he was prone to overspeaking.

  Downs was like me in that she didn’t speak much. It could have been that she felt too different from the men she was constantly surrounded by, or perhaps the other way around. I noticed that when she was close by, the other members of the Thunderbird team would shy away from their more crass conversations. Terk wouldn’t even brush her shoulder while passing by her and Yun didn’t say some of his more vulgar verbiage.

  Quint… Quint wanted to be perfect. The perfect leader, the perfect soldier, the perfect Champion. He looked to his superiors for approval and his subordinates for disapproval. I could practically see the mold of Adam Brightstrike that Quint was trying to shove himself into.

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  He wouldn’t fit.

  “Well,” Professor Alyci began, stretching her arms out wide with the Forest of Living Dreams behind her. “Here we are!”

  Our singular professor wore clothing that in no way should be worn while hiking. A frilly knee length skirt, a corset over a loose blouse, her long pink hair flowing freely. The only thing that fit our journey to a dangerous forest were her combat boots and the rifle slung over her back. Line Sergeant Brightstrike stood next to her in his battleworn Champions armor.

  “The Forest of Living Dreams has existed for as long as anyone can remember. When we first found that it could help young Dreamers align themselves to their Dream we cleared out the Nightmares. However we found that the unique aspect of the forest draws them in. The forest alters its environment to be the ideal place for these Nightmare’s and uses them as a sort of buffer against danger. But what it does for Nightmare’s it also does for Dreamers. Tomorrow you will go down the mountain and enter the forest along with your team of Forged Order, the goal is to reach the center tree and touch it before heading back here where I will be waiting.”

  Would she be able to keep track of all of us? I would think the fog would make it difficult to verify that we did touch the tree

  Heidi raised her hand.

  “Yes Lady Brightstrike?”

  “You said we will head into the forest with our team, does that mean we will be separated from one another?”

  “I assume you mean from your fellow Daybreak classmates, and the answer is yes. Because the forest changes according to the individual Dreamer or Nightmare, having multiple in the same place would result in an amalgamation of the two.”

  After her speech we began to set up camp for the day. One of Icey’s many talents was cooking, and while the rations we had were by no means a luxury, he had a way to make even beans and toast seem like fine dining.

  “So, can you feel the button?” Yun asked as we sat around a fire.

  Around us the various teams ate together, some individuals flitting from one group to another like a fly deciding which carcass to lay its eggs on. Many such flies stopped by our fire to feast on Icey’s food.

  Outside of those on guard duty the rest of the Forged Order had taken off their gear. Some nearby mirror mechanisms recharged the used Sun Stones and Champion Armor could apparently be folded into neat boxes.

  I glanced at where Cystella sat with Heidi. No one, not even her supposed “team” spent any time with her, outside of Heidi. I didn’t think they were friends, or at least I didn’t think Cystella thought of Heidi as a friend, but Heidi’s was the only presence Cystella seemed to tolerate. Perhaps not considering the rest of us peers.

  It would have been nice to be there with them, even if the idea of being so close to Heidi was daunting. She was too bright, and after Professor Pure’s lecture I felt bad about not reaching out to her when Brax continued to bully me.

  “In a way,” I finally replied, my bronze button floating over my hand with only a slight wobble. “It is not as though stabbing the Intent coming off of me would be painful. Instead its a phantom sensation. Such as thinking about how the rock in front of you feels on your fingers.”

  Yun picked up said rock, running his thumb over it.

  “Does that mean you can learn the insides of a mechanism if you flow your magic sauce through it?” Gelf asked.

  “Magic sauce?” Downs replied.

  “Calling it Intent seems wrong. Magic sauce makes more sense,” Gelf explained with a shrug.

  “It's a vapor though,” Terk said.

  “According to Monty it can be a liquid if he wants.”

  “It can also be a solid. Hence calling it sauce is not accurate,” Terk said, finger snootily pointing in the air.

  “But it is fun.”

  “Let's test out his magic sauce theory,” Icey said, taking out a simple lock. “Try and see if you can tell me how many cylinders are in this lock.”

  I rather felt like a monkey in a circus, but acquiesced to Icey.

  The bronze button was replaced with a heavy lock, and instead of trying to make it float I instead filled the entire lock with my Intent. I was quickly lost in a sea of angles and hard surfaces. As though I woke up in a cold, oddly angled, dark room and was trying to find my way with my fingers. Only my fingers had fingers and they were twisting and tangling with one another.

  Intent could pass through solid objects as if they weren’t there, proven by the fact that when I pulled Intent it didn’t balloon out my clothing. However when I tried to feel with it, the Intent then had difficulty doing so. Not impossible, just different.

  I could guess how many cylinders there were, but I didn’t want to. I wanted to know, a familiar itch built in my fingertips, as if they desired to scratch away the metal to examine the insides of the mechanism.

  Magic sauce. A liquid would fill the area better. I closed my eyes, tuning out the chatter of those around me. I tried to imagine water, but it was not enough. I needed more. Liquid life. The thing that binds us all. Thick and viscous. Blood, blood between my fingers.

  “Incredible,” Gelf breathed.

  I opened my eyes to see that my white Intent had coagulated in my hand, dripping down the sides of my palm and splashing into non-existence on the ground below.

  “Five,” I said looking up at Icey.

  He raised an eyebrow.

  “Five? Are you sure?”

  He wanted me to second-guess myself, but I knew. I could feel the five pins, my viscous Intent barely able to pass the small gap further into the cylinder where it stuck to the fine springs.

  “Five,” I said again, tossing him back the lock.

  He grinned like we shared a secret between us. Then he took out a pair of lockpicks and effortlessly opened the lock in a blink.

  “Five,” he agreed.

  “So Monty, what do you think the forest will change into for you?” Private Quint asked.

  I froze, but time continued around me. The other members of team Thunderbird added their silence onto mine, the weight of their stares settling on me. I stared off to the side, where Professor Alyci stood staring out into the wilderness below.

  “I don’t know.”

  They stayed silent for a beat before Quint spoke again.

  “I see, well we should at least go over what we will do once we enter.”

  I let their conversation wash through me. It wasn’t as though they were expecting me to fight anything. Instead I continued to watch the professor. She tilted her head, eyes squinting as if she could see something even with the overcast sky. After a few moments she turned back to the camp and headed for her tent.

  “Good luck tomorrow,” she said to me as she passed by.

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