One second, Stefan was sleeping soundly on Nyanko’s lap, but the next, he could feel the cold wind blowing. His vision was obstructed partly by something white. 

 

It’s happening again.

 

Indeed, Stefan had been seeing the same dream over and over again, every single night for over a week now. How did this happen? Stefan had no idea. All he knew was that the dreams were vivid, as real as a dream could get, showing him the sight of a busy ancient European-styled city where all kinds of beast people live. There were mainly wolf people, with wolf ears on human faces and fluffy tails, but there were cat and mouse people too. Also, the town had always been covered in snow, with a giant wall of snow protecting it. Stefan knew about this city as he had been here a lot. He recognized the inn, the tavern, the bakery. After all, this was a city in Fantasia. Lunaria, home of the wolven tribe, also known as the impenetrable snow fortress of the Northern Lands.

 

However, unlike when playing Fantasia while he was in highschool, the current Stefan had no control over his body. He was immobilized. Completely, like a statue, unable to move even an inch of his fingers.

 

It was annoying because sometimes Stefan’s visions were completely blocked by the snow that he couldn’t wipe off, but at least, the freezing cold didn’t seem to harm him. The environment was indeed chilled to the bones, but at the same time gave no frost bite nor discomfort. 

 

It was weird, but after all, this was just a dream.

 

People dream about weird stuff every single day.

 

And maybe this was caused by the side effect of his new medication.

 

I’m going to ask Shoji about this, Stefan thought.

 

But suddenly, the wind changed. Snow melted on Stefan’s eyes.

 

What? What is happening?

 

Rain fell, and Stefan was now confused. Something had changed the weather and Stefan had a bad feeling about this. The people around him, too, looked at each other with perplexed eyes. 

 

And then, a silhouette of a giant creature emerged from the sky line. 

 

What… is that?

 

A bird? 

 

A plane?

 

The creature flew closer. It had wings, not two, but four. 

 

Stefan could now see it.

 

A dragon with the color red…

 

All of the sudden, the air around it blurred and its body glowed like it was made of flame. And then, the dragon opened its mouth.

 

Light flashed intensely. A giant ray of fire struck down, pierced the city wall like a laser beam shot through foam.

 

The dragon moved its neck, the ray of fire from its mouth moved along, swiping through the city, then everything turned into a sea of fire.

 

In just a blink of an eyes, hundreds of people had been dusted.

 

Everything happened so fast, Stefan’s mind struggled to process this. He just stood there, watching the scene, unable to even form a proper question inside his head.

 

Wha.. what…

 

Why?

 

How?

 

...

 

BOOM!

 

The dragon then landed right in front of Stefan. As big as a castle, it squashed everything under its feet. No more snow on the ground. Instead, the ground melted, bubbly, just like lava. Lava was also spewing from its mouth and nostrils while its eyes glowed crimson.

 

The dragon looked at Stefan for a second. Its eyes, with thin slitted pupils, stared menacingly. 

 

Was the dragon going for Stefan next?   

 

Shit… what should I do?

 

Stefan panicked. For some reason, he was still standing, unscathed after that fire beam attack. But if the dragon was going to do that again, and at close range like this…

 

If I die in this dream, I won’t die in real life, right? RIGHT!?

 

The dragon then retracted its wings, shrunk to the size of a man.

 

What? Anthropomorphize?

 

Instead of a dragon, the creature now had the appearance of an adult human. Tall, red hair, muscular, sleeveless shirt. There were chains wrapped around his arms and legs, but it seemed that what had been restraining him had been broken.

 

For a human being, this guy looked kind of pale though…

 

The man stepped forward and touched Stefan’s face. Smoke came out, sizzling.

 

Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!

 

Stefan screamed out of pain inside his mind as he could feel the man’s touch. This sensation, it was like being deep fried a million times! He tried to thrash around and break free, but of course, he couldn’t!

 

But that wasn’t all. The temperature kept on increasing, Stefan’s vision was filled with steam and fire. Stop! Please stop! Stefan begged, but those words didn’t reach the man. 

 

In the middle of this unbearable pain, Stefan suddenly caught a glimpse of the man’s eyes. They were lifeless, but there were streams of tears being vaporized.

 

“Va...laine…” the man muttered those words.

 

And just right at the moment when Stefan thought he was about to break, a familiar voice reached his ears.

 

“Master! Master! Wake up!”

 

Stefan jolted awake, found himself thrashing around while Nyanko was trying her best to hold him down. 

 

“No... No!” 

 

“Master, it’s ok, it’s okay now!”

 

“No!” Stefan was still screaming and crying. “Just kill me! Please! Kill me!!!”

 

“Yes, I will kill you, but only if you calm down first!”

 

And just like that, it took Stefan a whole minute to get back to reality.

 

---

 

1 a.m

 

“Nyanko… boobs?”

 

Looking up with teary eyes, Stefan asked his android cat girl, while his hands were still touching her gigantic boobs. If it was not for the calming power of boobs, Stefan could have gone insane already, given the trauma that he had just been through.

 

“Yes, just for today, I will allow this degeneracy act of yours.” Nyanko said while gently patting her master’s head, “But what happened? I’ve never seen you so scared like that.”

 

Hearing that, Stefan stopped touching boobs and hugged the cat girl instead. Like a baby, his body curled and shrunk into her arms. Now that Stefan noticed, he was all drenched in sweat and there was some kind of stinky smell.  

 

“Shit, I even wet myself…” Stefan noticed a puddle on the floor and his wet pajamas. “Did I really... peed on you?” he asked, worriedly.

 

“I turned off my olfactory receptors, so don’t worry about it.” Nyanko kindly replied.

 

“I see.” Stefan heaved a relief. And then, “So… can we take a bath together too? I’m still scared,” he asked, wanting to take this situation to its full advantage.

 

However, “No,” Nyanko smiled, “but I have hot water ready for you.”

 

“Ah… very nice…”

 

Stefan then took off his clothes, headed straight towards the bathroom. The bathtub was already filled with hot water and its steam carried the calming lavender scent. Aromatherapy was indeed, quite awesome. Stefan proceeded to submerge himself, allowing his body and mind to relax.

 

But, no matter how much he tried, he couldn’t get the dragon’s image out of his mind. Especially its humanoid form.

 

“Fuck you Jeffrey, why do you have to do this to me?”

 

Yes, the draconic man’s face somewhat resembled someone that Stefan knew. A childhood friend, to be exact.

 

This man was very well known in the Fantasia community many years ago.

 

Jeffrey Sternberg, Fantasia top player

 

Rank 8: Zudras, the Red Knight of Dragonia