346. Rose new world, 4

(Rose)

The air feels cool on my skin and in my lungs.

Sore memories keep reactivating inside my mind.

Bleue looks truly adult for the first time to me. She has tired face and eyes on a mature face that's no longer teenager.

I feel really odd... Washed. Waking up from terrible dreams, returning to a bittersweet reality. With some things pleasant and others quite unsettling.

Looking at my body I hardly recognise, feeling my weakened heart pumping what's left of my blood as best it can, I'm feeling frail and alive. I'm reminded of my own mortality. It's stressful.

And more importantly, I'm reminded of the first thing to remember when dealing with daiûas and powers like theirs.

Be careful what you wish for.

Because in this world, your wishes, true or unspoken, good or bad, can be granted eventually.

And everything I've felt inside was becoming able to materialise one way or another, in the outside world.

The boundary between dream and reality has shifted, a long time ago. It's less rigid than before. It has holes.

Making things like her appear.

Making bad dreams influential over reality and weather.

Making sometime a threatening demon weaker than a tormented human...

The lord of nightmares opened the door to my mind, in order to flood me with its will and fear.

It wanted to dissolve and digest something of me.

Opening my psyche to the world, my human torment, released something much worse than this nightmare.

My repressed, swallowed suffering, my inner stress, was released out of myself, without my conscious control to stop it. I flooded the land, and the lord of nightmares against all odds, became the one taken over by the storm coming out from my fears.

It underestimated my depth... And caused our roles to reverse.

My body and mind got split. My body disappeared, consumed by a then all powerful subconscious mind that was released to the world in a tangible form.

My monstrous mind then released from the prison of my body consumed it, and consumed the land of nightmares in mindless appetite.

Simply put, what I once was became a shapeless monster, ruled by my repressed emotions and memories.

And ironically, the lord's only way to survive this flood of negativity, its only way to avoid being absorbed, was to fully incarnate itself into a physical body. We completely switched places for a while, because that demon made the mistake I did as well, and misjudged what I was really capable of.

We didn't understand what each other really were, and the lord opened the wrong doors between thoughts and reality...

My human mind was meant to be and exist within its body only. Outside of it, it should vanish. If it doesn't instantly scatter, then it becomes like a disease, a tumour. An unconscious demon... Another nightmarish beast or lord of nightmares.

In this world, your will and your dreams can sometimes affect reality directly, far more than the actions of your own body could. But translating a human mind or subconscious mind into reality outside of its carnal frame, it creates something very different.

Outside the context of human biology, my mind allowed to persist and live on became... Something terrifying. Even if it was arguably still me.

Wills unleashed, ghosts, are storms in the waiting. I consumed everything within reach just to cause and bring out storms mindlessly.

Luckily enough, that power of will over reality beyond one's original body is also what saved me from that nightmarish reincarnation or metamorphosis.

It was Bleue's presence and will that was able to wake me up from my unreal slumber. I was literally unaware, lost in a different world or reality, oblivious to what was happening on the other side, ours on Earth.

Bleue managed to reach out to me.

I truly woke up from hell thanks to her. I was in the depth of an abyss, and she made a gate back to reality appear into my sky.

I didn't hesitate to jump through that blinding door of light, leading back to the world of humanity.

Being like a dark god is just living in hell. Living as a god was torture...

I can now better understand their instinctive despair to emigrate to our plane of existence. Having a mind and emotions in that realm without physical form, it's just the worst jail imaginable to me.

You would jump ferociously at any chance of transmigration...

Like any daiûa longing to live again...

But for a day or so, I was no better than all these self-proclaimed gods we've met on occasions. Only I had a persona to return to. An existence to be reunited with. Myself. Rose. Rosemay Herson. Me.

With my past and everything else it contained.

The wish of my unbound will became to return to that reality, of being just me.

What was left of my flesh and soul consumed what was left of the hungry devouring ghost to heal my body entirely.

With that defined objective, al the power left to define me focused on that wish.

It was my last and only real wish as a being-like-her, as a false god.

And luckily enough I guess, there was enough energy left to grant me that wish.

Memories outside my own rebuilt what they knew best, my cells and bones, up to my brain.

It sure hurts to have a healing brain. But my anatomy is back to normal in most ways.

I returned...

To the only world and existence I know to be worth living through.

Luckily or not, a world where such transformation was possible.

~

I breath in deeply. I sigh and breathe in deeply again.

B - How do you feel?

R - Like I've escaped from years and years in prison... Seeing light and breathing air for the first time in so long... I'm forever grateful to you.

B - I would do anything for you Rose.

So did I. For her, and for me.

R - I... I've always had very violent impulses, since very little. Even before that time around my tenth anniversary. Long before that I think. I have no clear recollection anymore. Somewhere around the time just before I was adopted by our parents... There was a time where I realised I was all alone in the world, before I had the chance to be adopted by them.

B - It must have been painful. You were just a few years old.

R - That loneliness, that fear in a wide, too wide world. It left a wound. I can still feel its echo today. It never fully disappeared. It's not the only and single reason why I am as I am today of course. But I think that's the earliest time when my emotions became murky, and didn't really heal over the years.

B - You've let some of it out today, and for real.

R - You mean the destruction I seem to have caused to the city?

B - No, I mean you acknowledging and telling me that you've hated me direly at times.

R - I've always loved you far more.

B - Me too. And recognising that thorn of yours, doesn't it feel a little appeased now?

R - It feels like I've been tormenting myself out of fear...

B - I will help you relax. And you have all the time in the world to keep evolving on that path to reconciliation within yourself. Please Rose, keep giving all of it to me.

R - You really want all of it?

B - I want all of you yes. All. No mask. No role of the perfect woman. Just you. With your petals, your perfumes, your thorns and your fears.

R - I feel exhausted... But I will thrive. I will, Bleue. I am yours.

She smiles with tired eyes but happy cheeks. She looks like she's been through a tough day as well.

~

We walk slowly a little further ahead onto that path, hand in hand. We don't know what we will do next, but for now we're heading back home.

Ana appears a step further on the path.

R - Hello, pretty bird.

A - Sorry Rose.

R - Ah... It didn't work as planned eh? Ah ah... That's life... It's alright. Tomorrow, the sun will rise again...

B - And roses will thrive.

Bleue and I exchange a gaze as we smile. I share a short kiss with her. Ana seems to be a little bewildered.

A - Ana happy you're alive, Rose.

R - Thank you. Me too. And I will evolve from what happened. I will learn as much as I can...

A - What should we do. With Nightmare?

A little further along the path, sits a scrawny figure with wide scared and spooky eyes. Nightmare looks even more terrified as she sees me approaching.

B - That bitch...

I can't help but feel sympathy for Nightmare. I could have ended up like her. Her suffering and mine were not that different.

I breathe in slowly.

R - She's... Just like me, Bleue. What do you think we should do with her?

Bleue is thinking about it. At the very least, I can't kill her.

But I'm not sure I want to adopt her either. She's not a kind soul like Blume or Grape.

We get slowly closer. Nightmare looks trapped, cornered, powerless and in complete despair.

But she is human looking all over. I doubt it's a coincidence if she rushed into a physical body like that.

R - Were you... human, before?

N - .... Possibly... I don't recall much before my appearance, during the white day. Before that, I may have already been a god only dormant, or worst, one of them...

B - You mean one of us.

N - I'm a god...

We sigh Bleue and I. Another one...

R - You're not a god, you're just another humane form of existence. Just accept it.

Shades move in uncanny manner around her body. Her magic is gradually gathering back around her.

R - You don't want to remain human?

N - ...

Bleue offers her hand to help her stand up.

B - We won't be friends I think. But we may be able to help. We don't have to kill each other since we can talk.

Nightmare doesn't move, unable to make that leap of faith and trust. I can't blame her.

R - Well... We tried. Good luck Nightmare. Don't worry, neither of us will try to come bother you ever again. We will leave you in your... peace.

Nightmare looks insulted and pissed off, and looks at us as we begin taking our leave step by step.

She's sweating fear and anger.

A moment later, as we look behind our shoulder, she's gone.

Her body vanished. She returned home and to her natural self.

On the other side, we're doing the same.

B - There can be lots of sadness in this world. We can't avoid it all.

R - Being human... Has been tough on me, more than once. I...

Bleue looks at me with wider eyes, awaiting the next words preciously.

R - I'm thankful I've met you. And I'm also happy I chose to devote my love to you.

She begins to smile, and it turns into a weird grin of pride and joy.

In this world were dreams and nightmares alike can become true, we will adapt.

~