The Dead Dreamer

Alexander told me that this is not the true Epsilon that Hunter's were promised. The real Epsilon is at the center of this world. He told me that this fake Epsilon was a huge world where one could find many different stairs that we could descend.

The more we descended the stronger the beasts became, and the stronger the other Hunters we would find, but the reward would be worth it. And at the center of the core of the planet, was a huge temple, and that was the place that would take us to the true dream world.

But to reach the dream world I would have to be able to fight. Alexander started to teach me how to fight like a true Hunter. You must never run away from a challenge or a fight. The ecstasy that I felt whenever I got hit by his punches was the thrill that Hunters lived for.

That was the reason most of them wanted to become stronger, so that they could find powerful opponents and feel greater happiness. They always wanted to reach greater heights.

Hunters, before I became one, felt like they were free, they could do whatever they wanted to, they had complete freedom, but Alexander taught me that they were chained by their own impulses. They were chained to always seeking greater pleasures, greater opponents.

We kept moving forward. The colorful paradise before us seemed to remain a rainbow of colors that our occasional blood from fighting destroyed. I will have to fight more and more to be able to at least not be a burden.

Hunters seemed extremely scarce in the first layer, but it might be because the outer layers are huge. Epsilon is a planet in another dimension, like an onion whose layers are peeled to reach the center.

I was thinking that maybe we would never see another soul until I had my first encounter with the Dead Dreamers.

We first found a corpse, one without a head. The cut was extremely clean, as if it was done with a sword. Alexander had to make sure that his sister didn't see anything. And as I started to get closer to the corpse, a voice from one of the branches of the near tree spoke out.

"If you are looking for the one who committed the murder, I am right here", he said.

I looked up at the branch and saw a man with a dark cloak who just sat there. He wore an oriental rice hat and was chewing wheat. If the guy was trying to look badass, he was doing a fine job at it.

He got down from the branch and I finally saw his face. He had a beautiful face, with slitted red eyes.

Most people have green, blue or brown eyes, but members of the Dead Dreamers had red eyes. It was a sort of right of passage earned by becoming a prominent member of the society. His hair was black and parted in two. His face was long, and it had almost no ruggedness to it, making it smooth and clean cut.

I stood there in shock, he was so beautiful I was completely paralyzed, yet Alexander was the one that took me out of my daze. He pushed me to the side and I finally jumped back into reality. He came close to the mysterious man and suddenly spoke out.

"I can finally redeem myself, Lucius," Alexander said.

"I do not have a name," he responded. "Those that belong to the insurgency have no need for names. Names are for those that seek an identity, we cannot afford human emotions, and so we have no need for them" Lucius said.

"Yeah yeah, you are always saying whatever crap comes to your mind. It won't end like last time."

"That pain will bring us closer together."

Alexander didn't even usher in a reply, he just went ahead and tried to sucker-punch the man. But the dude was fast. Faster than anything I had ever seen in my life.

He stopped Alexander's punch as if it was nothing and hit him so hard in the stomach Alexander coughed blood. Then I saw the hole in his stomach. The whole thing was simply blown off.

The pure strength of this skinny, tall bastard was insane. I wanted to heal Alexander, but the bastard was not going to let me. He moved so fast I didn't even see him.

This time, he hit me with his palm opened, and the next thing I know I broke the tree in two. There was no way we were going to beat this bastard.

Alexander was not the type of man that would run away. He was a true Hunter. But I was scared shitless. I wanted to run away, I wanted to live. I wanted to spend more time with Ana.

But true Hunter's were like that. The woman I fought before didn't run away, even if she wasn't a fighter. Hunters are prideful, and they would never run.

I couldn't believe that Alexander had survived all this time in this place, just by always fighting. At some point you were going to find someone that was stronger than you, that could kill you with a moment's notice, but he still decided to die by the hands of that man.

What about your little sister you dickhead ? Where you just going to leave her here to survive by herself?

The man with no name finally took off his hat, and I could see it in his eyes that he finally got serious. I really wanted to run away.

The man generated fear.

Lucius had always been regarded as a true genius. Skilled in both close combat and long-range, he was born as royalty. As he became more and more aware of his surroundings, he learned the truth about the world.

The mistreatment of humans, the slave system, the discrimination, the unfair world you were subjected to just because you were human. All of these things became elements that would force him to become the prince that would raise the flag of rebellion.

He gave up his privileges as royalty and became a member of the very strange organization known as the Dead Dreamers.

And he was going to kill us.