Chapter 1: 18 Years later

Sunlight spilled through the cracked blinds, which painted golden stripes across Arwyn's room. It was morning, a fresh day stretching out ahead of him. He sat at his desk, hunched over a sketchbook, his pencil still warm from his grip. 

"I did it," he muttered, letting the pencil drop with a soft clatter. A smirk pulled at the corner of his mouth as he studied his latest creation: which was a sword he'd named The Zenith. Its blade gleamed on the page, and it was surrounded by a faint aura of light he'd scribbled in with quick, jagged strokes.

He leaned back in his chair, and the old wood creaked under his weight. He twirled the pencil between his fingers as The Zenith stared up at him, bold and imperfect. The hilt was a little crooked, and the aura? It looked more like a flickering candle than the divine glow he'd imagined. 

"Good enough for today," he said to himself, shrugging off the flaws. Perfection could wait. For now, it was done, and that was what mattered.

His room was a chaos of his own making. Posters plastered the walls, all his own designs: swords with wicked curves, guns with sleek barrels, weapons born from late-night doodles. A shelf above his desk held tiny gun models he'd sculpted from clay, each one a little lopsided but loved all the same. His brown hair stuck out in every direction, a mess from restless sleep and the instant he'd bolted awake with the sword idea buzzing in his head. 

The floor was littered with broken pencils, snapped in half during frustrated sketches, and crumpled paper balls rolled around like tumbleweeds. His bed sat unmade, sheets tangled from a night of kicking them off.

He flipped the sketchbook shut, the cover slapping closed with a satisfying thud. Just then, a knock rattled the door. Arwyn froze, mid-twirl, and called out without moving closer. "Dad?"

"The new housekeeper's here," came the reply, a voice rough around the edges, somewhere in the mid-thirties range. "Do me a favor and get out of there." It was Marco, his tone a mix of patience worn thin and exhaustion that never quite faded. 

Arwyn opened his mouth to argue, but before a word could slip out, the door slammed shut downstairs, cutting off any chance of a comeback. He stood there, staring at the closed door to his room, listening to the faint growl of Marco's car engine as it roared to life outside and faded down the street.

"Housekeeper?" Arwyn muttered, scratching his head and making his hair even wilder. "Since when do we need one of those?" He sighed, resigned. No point in fighting it now. Marco was gone, off to whatever art auction had him scrambling this time. 

Arwyn shuffled over to the kitchen cabinet, grabbed a box of cereal, and snagged a carton of milk from the fridge. No bowl, no fuss. He cradled them in his arms and wandered into the living area, ready to collapse and let the day roll by.

There he was: the housekeeper. A guy with blue hair tied back in a messy bun, moving through the room like a shadow. Quiet, stoic, almost too smooth. He knelt by the bookshelf, dusting off titles Arwyn hadn't touched since middle school. 

The Tale of the Succubus sat next to an unopened Advanced Calculus textbook, both buried under years of neglect. Next to them was a jar labeled Lotion (DO NOT TOUCH), its glass suspiciously sticky. Arwyn watched, chewing a handful of dry cereal, as the guy worked a rag over a stain that had probably been there since the '80s.

"Hey," Arwyn said, his voice muffled by the crunching. "You're blocking the TV."

The housekeeper glanced up, green eyes sharp behind a pair of glasses that caught the light. "Apologies," he said, shifting just enough to keep cleaning. His voice was calm, clipped, like he didn't waste words.

Arwyn flopped onto the couch, spilling a few cereal flakes onto the cushions. "So. Nathaniel, huh? That's what Dad called you? Is the whole clean-freak thing just your vibe or what?"

"Your father said you're an artist," Nathaniel replied, not looking up from the bookshelf. His rag moved in steady circles, kicking up faint clouds of dust.

"Yeah, something like that." Arwyn grabbed the remote and cranked the volume. The TV blared to life, and the movie Titanic filled the screen. Rose wailed over Jack's frozen body, her sobs echoing through the room. "Wow, a classic," he said with a grin, leaning back and pouring milk straight into his mouth from the carton.

Nathaniel didn't react, just kept working. Around his neck hung a pendant: emerald eyes set in a golden paintbrush design. It dangled as he moved, catching Arwyn's eye. Something about it felt familiar, like a memory he couldn't place, though he was sure he'd never seen it before.

Weird.

"Hm," Nathaniel hummed, pausing to pick up a crumpled paper from the floor near the trash bin. Arwyn recognized it instantly: The Zenith, mid-motion, a rough draft he'd tossed after a bad angle. Nathaniel smoothed it out, studying it with a nod. "Interesting style. Chaotic."

"It's called modern art," Arwyn shot back, smirking as he crunched more cereal. Nathaniel didn't argue, just crumpled the paper again and lobbed it back into the bin. No ring on his finger, Arwyn noticed, though why that mattered, he couldn't say. The guy went back to the shelves, brushing dust off books no one cared about.

Then Nathaniel stopped. His fingers hovered over a spine, old leather cracked and brittle. Arwyn squinted from the couch. The Delacroix Diary. 

He groaned, slouching against the doorframe he'd wandered to, still clutching his cereal box. "Seriously, it's just Dad's conspiracy blog in book form," he said, rolling his eyes. "Chapter 4's a real page-turner. 'How to Summon a Demon with Finger Paint.' Riveting stuff."

Nathaniel didn't laugh. He pulled the diary free, opening it to a page titled Generation 1: Shinichi Delacroix. 

A sketch stared back: a man with a sharp jawline, blue hair tied in a warrior's knot, a serpent coiled around his wrist. "Your ancestor," Nathaniel said, his finger tracing the serpent. "First Dream Sketcher. He drew storms that sank fleets, beasts that devoured armies."

"Cool," Arwyn said, unimpressed. "Bet his therapist was rich." He stepped closer, peering over Nathaniel's shoulder at the drawing. "Look, unless there's a coupon for free Wi-Fi in there, I'm not sold."

Nathaniel flipped to another page without a word. Generation 4: Nathaniel. The sketch was a mirror: same blue hair, same piercing green eyes, same serpent pendant. Arwyn blinked, leaning in. "Huh. You do cosplay?"

"I am Nathaniel," the housekeeper said, his voice steady, like it was the most normal thing in the world.

"Right. And I'm the Pope." Arwyn snorted, sarcasm dripping from every syllable. This guy was nuts.

Nathaniel didn't flinch. He unbuttoned his sleeve, rolling it up to reveal a tattoo: a serpent, its scales shimmering like wet ink on his skin. "Shinichi drew this on me in 509 BC," he said, calm as ever. "He said it'd keep me humble."

Arwyn's smirk faltered. He set the cereal box down, and his stomach twisted slightly. "Okay, man, either you're a vampire, or Dad spiked my cereal."

"Sketches like me age a long time," Nathaniel replied, flipping to the diary's final page. Generation 120: Arwyn Delacroix. It was blank, just his name scrawled at the top. "Your parents skipped their turn. Now it's yours."

"Huh? My turn?" Arwyn's voice cracked, half-laughing, half-confused.

"To learn. To create. To survive." Nathaniel tapped the empty page with each word, his eyes locked on Arwyn's. "Every sketch you make feeds it. Every lie you tell strengthens it."

"You're insane." Arwyn took a step back toward the door, his heart thudding. "This is some Netflix show bullshit."

Nathaniel didn't blink. He traced a symbol in the air: a serpent eating its own tail. The pendant around his neck glowed softly and eerily, and the diary trembled in his hands. The lines he'd drawn shimmered, hanging there like a ghost.

Arwyn's breath caught. The cereal churned in his gut. "What are you?" he whispered, voice barely audible.

"Your tutor," Nathaniel said, closing the diary. Dust swirled in the sunlight, catching in the air between them. "You're a Dream Sketcher, after all."