A Dream I Never Had...

The universe itself seemed to scream in agony, yet the sound wasn't its own—it was Arielle's.

A single punch. That's all it took. Dark's fist tore through her stomach like a spear of oblivion, twisting reality itself around the sheer force of the blow. Blood splattered like shattered glass suspended in the air, a crimson constellation that painted the battlefield in despair. Her body crumpled—lifeless, hollow, and cold—before her consciousness even had time to register her demise.

Richard's knees buckled. His vision blurred. His brain refused to process what had just happened. Arielle… gone?

He clenched his fists. No… NO—

Then, without warning, darkness overtook him. His mind snapped—not from grief, not from rage, but from something far dumber. Pure exhaustion, mixed with sheer stupidity. His overworked brain simply shut down like a broken machine, unable to handle both the battle and the absurdity of his existence.

---

When Richard's consciousness reawakened, he wasn't on the battlefield anymore. Instead, he stood in an endless void, a shattered realm that defied logic and time. The air crackled with ghostly whispers, the scent of memories long forgotten drifting through the abyss.

And then, they appeared.

His six personalities.

Each one a different version of himself. Each one staring at him with varying degrees of annoyance and mockery.

One of them, a cynical-looking version with tired eyes, crossed his arms.

"Why? Why are you here?"

Another, a cocky grin plastered across his face, scoffed.

"Yeah, seriously. What the hell is this dumb idiot doing here?"

Richard didn't hesitate. A shoe materialized in his hand.

Splat!

The shoe collided directly with the smug Richard's forehead, sending him stumbling backward.

"I don't know either!" Richard snapped. "Who in the world sent me here to deal with you fools?"

A chuckle echoed from one of them—one that carried an extra dose of cruelty.

"Maybe your mom? Because she didn't want you! Oh wait… you're parentless."

Silence.

Richard was about to get cooked, but instead, he chose to do the cooking.

"Oh, I see," he smirked. "That's funny. But you know what's funnier? The fact that I'm still alive, while you're stuck here talking out of your nonexistent brain."

The group fell silent, their gazes sharp, but Richard wasn't here to argue with himself. Before another insult could be thrown, a wave of energy surged through the void.

A glitch in mana. A crack in existence itself.

Richard barely had time to react before his body was forcibly ripped from the realm.

---

And then—he felt it.

A sensation that could not be described by mere words.

Pain. Not just pain.

500,000,000 times the agony.

His body writhed as he was dragged through a maelstrom of suffering. His mind replayed every single death, every loop, every scream, every wound. His body shattered, rebuilt, shattered again. His soul was stretched and twisted, forced to endure every second of agony from every timeline—all at once.

And in the midst of the chaos, a voice spoke.

A dark, terrible voice that carried the weight of the abyss itself.

"The Fake UnReal… was just an illusion."

The darkness stirred.

Two crimson eyes snapped open within the void.

"You thought it gave you infinite IQ?" The voice laughed, low and menacing. "You thought it made you stronger?"

The universe itself trembled.

"No— it just made your pain even better. 500,000,000 times better."

---

And then, just as suddenly as it had begun—

Richard was back.

The battlefield. The blood-soaked ground. Dark, standing over Arielle's lifeless body.

Everything was exactly as it was before.

Except now, Richard stood there—eyes cold, body trembling, mind on the verge of breaking.

He had seen something. Something beyond reality.

And now… he was angrier than he had ever been before.

The battlefield remained eerily silent.

Dark Richard Filver—gone. His corpse lay in a pool of blackened blood, but no one knew who had done it. Not Richard. Not the other warriors. No one.

Richard's mind raced. His hands trembled, not from exhaustion, but from something deeper. A wrongness.

Who killed him?

He scanned the battlefield, eyes darting across the ruins, searching for any sign, any clue, any presence.

Nothing.

But he felt it.

Something was still here. Watching. Hiding.

And it was not human.

A cold sweat dripped down Richard's face. He had fought gods, demons, monsters beyond understanding. He had experienced pain beyond existence.

But this? This was something different.

A force that could erase his darkest self without even being noticed?

His breath slowed. His instincts screamed at him. Something was coming.

And then—

The ground beneath him shattered.

---

The Echo of Something… Beyond.

Reality itself seemed to break. Richard felt his soul crack, as if some invisible force had reached through existence itself and touched him.

A voice—no, a whisper—brushed against his mind.

"You should not have seen this."

The battlefield rippled. The corpses, the ruins, the sky—all distorted, as if this entire moment wasn't meant to exist.

And then, in an instant—it was gone.

Dark Richard's body.

Vanished.

Richard's heart pounded. He looked around. The warriors who had fought beside him, the survivors—they were frozen. As if time had stopped for them.

No one else had noticed.

No one else even remembered that Dark Richard had been there.

Richard swallowed hard.

Something was rewriting reality itself.

And it was covering its tracks.

---

A War That Wasn't Supposed to End.

Richard clenched his fists. His instincts screamed at him to run, to hide, to forget.

But he couldn't.

Someone, or something, had erased Dark Richard Filver from existence.

Not just his life.

His very presence.

Richard knew one thing for sure—whatever did this…

It wasn't an ally.

And if it could erase Dark Richard effortlessly…

What was stopping it from erasing him next?

---

The war was over.

But the real nightmare had just begun.

The battlefield had gone silent. No trace of Dark Richard remained—just a vanishing aura and a hollow emptiness. Richard stood still, confused. Not victorious. Not defeated. Just… broken.

Before he could question anything, a sudden grip clenched the back of his collar. He turned—but no one was there. In the next moment, his body was pulled backward with an immense force, reality cracking around him like shattered glass.

Everything turned black.

He landed hard. Not on ground—but something far worse. It breathed. It whispered. The sky above him wasn't a sky—it was a moving abyss, filled with crawling black threads and twitching lights.

A shadow stood before him. A figure with no form, only burning red eyes.

"I ask again," the entity spoke with a voice that wasn't a voice, "Have you enjoyed living in a dream?"

Richard raised his head slowly, barely managing to stand. But before he could answer—another portal ripped the darkness apart. He was thrown in—like a mistake being erased.

No choice. No resistance.

He was gone.

When he opened his eyes, he was lying on a soft bed. Warm sunlight poured through the windows. Children were laughing outside. People were smiling. Trees danced with the wind.

He sat up, confused. There was no pain. No blood. No screams.

Just peace.

A woman entered the room, holding a tray. She smiled at him. "You're awake. Welcome to NarLand."

NarLand?

He stepped outside. Children ran past him, giggling. Flowers bloomed along the roads. He watched them, silent, emotionless. A boy tripped and fell—but started laughing anyway.

Richard… smiled.

His chest felt light. The scars on his body were gone. The weight on his soul was missing.

But something inside him twitched.

This wasn't right.

He walked to a mirror in the center of the town. His reflection didn't show him—it showed every loop he had lived. Every death. Every betrayal. Every scream.

And a voice echoed again.

"The dream… was never yours. It was the cage."

Meanwhile, back in the battlefield, a figure stood over Dark Richard's lifeless corpse. A blade pierced through his chest. The body twitched once… then never again.

No one saw it. No one knew.

Except the one who did it—Ragnar Filver

NarLand.

It sounded like a joke when Richard first heard it, but… somehow, the place was real. It felt real.

No screams.

No blood.

No endless loop of death.

Just children playing tag. Old folks chatting on wooden benches. Bright flowers growing from the cracks of cobblestone paths. The scent of warm bread filling the air.

Richard sat on a swing, for the first time in what felt like centuries.

A little girl with paint on her cheeks ran up to him. "Mister! You're always so serious. Smile more, okay?"

He blinked.

Then smiled.

She grinned, gave him a paper crown, and ran off.

It was… warm. It felt stupid. But he laughed. A real, soft laugh—awkward, clumsy, but real.

Later that day, he joined in their games. Hide and seek. Painting contests. Flying paper planes.

He wasn't Richard Filver, the hated mastermind, the killer of gods.

He was just… Richard.

He danced with the kids. He cracked horrible jokes that made them fall over laughing.

He even helped a blind boy make a painting—though Richard drew nothing but black scribbles.

The boy called it "The Real Sky."

And Richard laughed again.

He lay in the grass that night, stars twinkling above. No blood. No fire. No pain.

Just… stars.

"If this is a lie," he whispered to the sky, "then I don't want the truth."

For once… just once… he was allowed to be human.

The sun in NarLand wasn't harsh. It didn't burn like the flames of war or blind like divine light.

It was gentle—almost like it was trying to hug him.

Richard woke up in a soft bed. A real one. No bloodstains, no chains, no threats above his head.

Just a warm blanket.

And the smell of pancakes.

He blinked. "What…?"

Downstairs, a small woman in an apron waved. "Ah! You're up, sleepyhead! We've made breakfast—come join!"

He joined. And for the first time in his life, he tasted food that wasn't rationed, poisoned, or earned through violence.

Just pancakes. Syrup. Fruit.

A little boy gave him a drawing: "It's you! You're the Hero of NarLand!"

Richard stared at it.

A stick figure, with spiky hair and a dumb smile. Crown on the head. Sword in hand.

He almost cried.

He didn't.

Instead, he lifted the boy in the air and spun him around. "Guess I gotta live up to that then, huh?"

The kids clapped. The villagers cheered.

He helped build a treehouse later that day. It collapsed twice. Everyone laughed.

They had a water fight. He got soaked. He slipped. He fell flat on his back and laughed like a madman.

Then came the festival.

Lights danced in the air. Fireflies. Lanterns. Music.

Richard danced with the villagers. He wore a mask—one with a smiling face. The kids said it matched him now.

He played flute. Badly. They still clapped.

He sang. Horribly. They still cheered.

He laughed. Really, deeply laughed.

And when fireworks filled the sky, he whispered to himself:

"So this is what it's like… to just live."

He didn't want to go back.

He didn't want it to end.

Not this.

Not now.

He didn't know who brought him here. Or why.

But for once…

He didn't care.

Richard hummed as he walked back through the woods of NarLand, a basket full of colorful fruits hanging off his arm. His clothes were messy, his hair unkempt, but his face…

It was alive. Like it belonged to someone who believed the world had more than just war.

He whistled a stupid tune one of the kids taught him.

Then he reached the hill.

Then he saw it.

Smoke.

He dropped the basket. The fruits rolled down the grass, staining the soil in red, purple, orange…

Like blood.

His legs moved on their own. Down the slope. Into the village.

Ash.

Flames.

Silence.

Then screams. Then silence again.

Bodies.

Everywhere.

Children. Mothers. The man who taught him flute. The woman who called him "sleepyhead."

Burnt. Ripped. Gone.

Richard fell to his knees. "No… No, no, no, no…"

The world dimmed.

A chill ran through his spine.

Then came the whisper.

From behind. From within.

Like it wasn't just in his ears—but inside his very soul.

"A dream… A dream you never dreamt of."

He turned.

Nothing.

Just… a flicker of something wrong. A crawling black mist.

Then, eyes.

Red. Hollow. Eternal.

"It was all a dream. No one finds peace. Not you. Not me."

"Especially not you."

And like that, his chest caved in. Blood gushed from his mouth. His eyes widened. He gasped.

He died.

But death wasn't the end.

It never was.

The dream collapsed, and reality rewrote itself.

He was flung through time—not space, not memories—but time.

And then he landed.

Right there.

On the battlefield.

Time slowed.

He saw her—Arielle.

Smiling. Bleeding. Brave.

And behind her—

Himself.

No. Not him.

Dark Richard.

Smiling. Cruel. Inevitable.

And before he could scream—

Slash.

The blade cut through Arielle's stomach.

Blood. Everywhere.

And Richard? The real one?

He watched it all happen again.

Because that's what fate does to monsters.

It makes them watch.