I was brought to a large room with a man lying down in its center, it felt like he was in a deep sleep, so maybe he is the counselor that hasn’t woken up in a few days. Him aside, there were also a few robed people in a corner discussing something, and a man in very pompous clothes near them, he was noting down something in a piece of parchment.

The messenger approached the pompous man and introduced me to him, apparently he was the counselor that was supposed to answer any questions I could have. With this out of the way, my escort left without hiding how pleased he was to get away from me… So rude.

Not like the counselor was much better though, I could see from his face that he didn’t want to talk… Why did they even call me if that was the kind of treatment I’d get? “Do you need something or are you going to keep bothering me?” He said.

I wanted to make a snarky reply, but remembered Iris’ words on how I should at least not be openly disrespectful, so I held back, “Is the one laying down the man that hasn’t woken up in days? What information can you give me on that?”

He snorted, “Talk to the mages discussing that over there! I have no time to waste on those trivial matters!” He then went back to writing whatever it was in that parchment… So I guess I was told to talk to him for nothing? Why not send me directly to the mages then? Do people in castles like wasting time or something?

Iris chimed in while I walked towards the mages, “Don’t mind it too much, this guy is probably in charge or something he understands nothing about, but still has to answer to. Just think that he is stressed and has no idea on how to solve the problem at hand.” I’m amazed she can actually think on the circumstances of the rude fellow that just told me off… I’d rather just punch the face of those types… Not like I can punch nobles though, I like my head where it is.

I got close to the mages and asked the nearest one, “Excuse me, could you tell me the details of what happened to the sleeping counselor over there?” Or at least I assume it’s the counselor…

They turned towards me and seemed to be a bit confused, “And who might be asking?” They weren’t briefed on it!? Just what is wrong with this place?

“Aria, a heroine, I was hired to help out in this case.” They seemed surprised for a moment, and then joyous to get the help of someone from the guild… I’m amazed, to think calling myself a heroine would elicit this kind of reaction. I wonder why the others were so grumpy then…

While we did have a good start, they told me basically the same things that Thalia said when she gave me the mission, so the conversation wasn’t being very useful. I decided to ask some questions to see what they already attempted in order to solve the issue, “Did you try tracking down his mana flow to see if it went anywhere?”

“Already did, the mana is disappearing together with his life force, but it’s not going anywhere, as if it was simply ceasing to exist.” Those certainly aren’t good news…

“Then… What about the people that got near him since he fell unconscious? Any abnormalities on them? Or any traces of his mana left behind on other people?” I asked.

“Nothing, the only people that enter this room are us, the supervising counselor and messengers from the king. We’ve tracked the condition of everyone that got involved and everyone had no issues whatsoever.” Great, so we basically have no clues? Well, of course we don’t or they would have already solved it by themselves…

In that case… “Did you try checking it directly on the dream realm?” They opened their eyes wide at my suggestion, why do they look like I just mentioned something completely unthinkable?

Iris was the one to answer my unvoiced question, “Aria, are you mad!? The dream realm is far too confusing, if you were to wander about it aimlessly, you’d never get anywhere… If you wished to get to the source of the drain in his powers…”

“You’d need to directly enter his dream, right?” Iris nodded in response, “So we already have a plan, don’t we?”

She hit the top of my head with her tiny fist… Ouch. “And risk getting involved in what has been draining his life force day by day? That’s too dangerous!” I know that much…

“But we don’t have any other leads, do we…?” I looked around at the mages to see if any of them would say something, but they all failed to meet my eyes, “We ought to do something if we are to solve this case.”

Iris got angry, “Don’t go thinking of this lightly! Just what will happen to you if things go wrong!?” She was shouting at me… When was the last time this happened…? She sure did shout at me when I did something dumb that demanded scolding, but… Not like this, this was different, “How can you just suggest putting your life in the line as the first option…?” Her eyes were glistening with red fiery tears…

I put used my finger to wipe them, they burnt, but it didn’t hurt… Not enough to stop me from doing it at least, “Iris… I will be fine, I may not be the smartest pea in the pod, but I’m not dumb enough to throw myself into a mana-life-sinking-abomination that might be within the dream realm, I’ll just keep distance and observe, alright?”

“And what if it lures you in? Like it lured everyone else that fell into this unnatural slumber so far…” I’d generally be happy to see her worrying about me, but… She’s absolutely right, I might just become the next person to not wake up if I do this… And I didn’t have much at stake here, at most I’d have to find a new job by the next week before my free stay at the inn ran out.

But I didn’t want to, it just left a bad taste in my mouth, I remembered Thalia’s emotionless smile when she told me about the people that fell into this deep sleep… That money grubbing Elf may be heartless, but she was still counting on me to do this… And those mages did see me in a bright light when I said I was a heroine, I didn’t want to let them down.

… This is ridiculous, why am I even considering continuing with this? I shouldn’t be thinking of risking my life away to help some people I know nothing of… I totally shouldn’t, it’s not worth the risk. “Then… I’ll resist it to the best of my capability.” I smiled at Iris, a dumb smile from a dumb girl that should know better than to say that when I know I shouldn’t.

Iris sighed… “You’re hopeless.” I’m sorry...

“I ought to agree, but that’s why I need you with me, right? To save me from my hopelessness.” I told her, she blushed a bit.

“Guess I need to keep taking care of you then.” She flew a bit and kissed my cheek, “Be careful, Aria.” This time I was the one blushing, I just wish it was on my mouth instead.

“I will, I’ll be sure to be back for you, my love.” She blushed furiously and seemed about to shout something at me, but I turned to the nearby mages before that, “Can you help me set up a ritual? I’ll dive inside his dreams.” Iris ended up holding back to not get in the way when we just went into work mood.

They helped me set things up and the preparations were done a lot faster than I expected, royal magi are amazing, they knew exactly what glyphs would be needed to make this work out. If I was alone I’d probably take a few hours to do what we did in a few minutes… Or rather, they did, I was mostly useless here… If they were willing to jump into the dream realm themselves, I bet they could have already solved this issue by now…

Well, guess I’ll just have to do what they aren’t willing to then. I crouched down near the sleeping counselor’s body and put my hand on his chest, then I looked towards Iris and smiled, “I’ll be back soon.”

She smiled back, “Take care.” I made sure to engrave her smile deep inside my heart… I would definitely come back for her.

I nodded, closed my eyes and sent my mana through the glyphs we drew on the ground. And then, my consciousness faded.