The echo of Halesia's final "Thank you" hung in the air.
Her body dissolved, unravelling like the silk she wore; the flawless, alabaster-like skin, the weeping mask, and the heavy gown all surrendered to the wind, turning into a fine, glittering dust that swirled upward toward the broken dome.
Asteria's hand finally slid from the altar. It was cold now, a dead stone that had no more heat to give.
Silence rushed back into the room, but it was a different kind of silence than the one Halesia had enforced. This was the silence of mourning, of anxiety – like holding your breath for too long.
Valerius remained on his knees, his forearms still glowing with the fading traces of his intangible blades. He looked hollowed out. The man who always had a witty retort or a cryptic smile was staring at the empty space where his Queen had once stood.
He had done it. He had committed the ultimate parricide of the soul, overthrew the daughter of his heart's king, and usurped a throne he had spent centuries pretending to despise.
The weight of the atmosphere shifted. The five other transcendents – the pillars who had held the roof from collapsing – slowly lowered their hands.
Kaelen was the first to move, pulling his claymore from the floor with a heavy thud. He wiped a smear of silver soot from his brow and looked at Valerius. There was no cheering. There were no victory songs.
Just a heavy air of duty and anxiety.
"It is done," Draxis rumbled, his metallic voice sounding small in the vast ruin of the nave. He looked around at the bleeding marble and the shattered glass. "We won, Val. The throne is yours – and you rule over... whatever this skeleton is."
"A skeleton can be dressed," Silas muttered, though his hands were shaking as he adjusted his spectacles. He looked at Valerius with a mixture of awe and terror. They had all been accomplices, but Valerius was the one who had actually plunged the knife. He was a Supreme now. He was their new sun, and they were terrified of this newfound heat.
"We need to stabilize the people," Myra said, her voice sharp with nerves. "They're waking up, right? Millions of them. They'll be hungry, confused, and looking for something to hold on to. Valerius, we need a decree. We need a plan for the morning."
Valerius didn't answer. He stayed on the floor, breathing in the dust of the woman he had just murdered.
Asteria watched them from her spot by the altar. She felt like a ghost watching a play. The lords were bickering, calculating, and panicking, already moving on to the logistics of a new regime.
They spoke of her contribution in hushed, disgruntled tones – acknowledging that she had been the linchpin, yet clearly resentful of how much she was needed.
"The girl," Sora whispered, her milky eyes turning toward Asteria. "We should perhaps... give her some credit – that isn't to say we won't make good use of her, either."
Asteria didn't care about their threats. She didn't care about the spark, or the throne, or the politics of a city made of glass.
All she cares about was the strange, numb sensation was creeping up her spine. Her heart was beating, but it felt distant, as if it belonged to someone else.
Her nightmare was over. She had killed the tyrant. She had cleared the objectives.
'So why am I still here?'
She looked at her hands. They were pale, trembling. The adrenaline that had sustained her through this ordeal was draining away, leaving behind a bone-deep exhaustion that made her feel like she was made of lead.
"Asteria?"
It was Myra who spoke, her jade eyes narrowing as she stepped closer. The lords stopped their bickering to look at her.
Asteria's face had gone the color of parchment. Her eyes were wide, fixed on a point in the air that none of them could see. She looked like she had seen a ghost, or perhaps, like she was realizing the ghost was her. A cold sweat broke out across her brow, and she began to sway on her feet.
"Can I go home now?"
The whisper was tiny. It was the voice of a girl who was tired. Tired of being in this place away from home – and desperately wanted to wake up in a bed that didn't smell like blood and dust.
The lords exchanged glances. To them, she was a terrifying anomaly – a mortal human who had just assisted in the slaying of a demigod. They didn't know how to answer her. They didn't even know where "home" was for a creature like her.
Valerius finally looked up. His eyes found hers, and for a second, the façade of the architect slipped. He saw her – not as a toy nor a tool, or a successor – but as a child who had been forced to carry the sun and had been burned by it.
Before he could speak, the world stuttered.
The grey, dusty air of the Cathedral froze. The falling debris suspended in mid-air. The lords became statues, their mouths open in unfinished sentences.
Then, a voice – vast, cold, and utterly indifferent – spoke directly into Asteria's bones. It wasn't the frantic, amused voice from before. This was a clinical assessment.
[Your nightmare is over.]
The words hit her like a physical wave of relief. It was so intense that her knees finally gave out, and she slumped against the cracked base of the altar.
She had done it.
She – a lone Sleeper – had entered a Second Nightmare. She had survived a world that should have crushed her in the first hour. She had outmaneuvered transcendents, navigated the schemes of an ancient architect, and offered mercy to a fallen goddess. She had saved a kingdom that didn't even know it was drowning.
'A good day's work,' she thought, a hysterical, tired laugh bubbling up in her chest. 'I wonder if they'll give me a medal. Or maybe just a sandwich. I'd really like a sandwich.'
She closed her eyes, waiting the sensation of the soul to take her, to pull her back to the waking world where things made sense, where she was just Asteria again.
But the voice wasn't finished.
The coldness sharpened – this time returning to a hint of the amusement she heard before.
The air grew heavy with a weight that made the Queen's will feel like a summer breeze. The silence of the Cathedral deepened, turning into a void that swallowed all sound and light.
Asteria's breath hitched, hearing the voice perpetrate her being once more.
[Prepare for appraisal.]
The words burnt into her mind with a blinding intensity. Asteria tried to reach out, to grab onto the altar, but the stone was already dissolving. The Cathedral, the lords, and Valerius's reaching hand all vanished into a sea of white.
Her heart hammered one last time – not in fear, but in anticipation.
She survived.
She was going home.
***
Somewhere else in the dream realm...
There stood a castle of bright stone amidst a forest of crimson coral, perched upon a shore the world had long forgotten.
Above the gates of this sullen fortress hung a grisly collection of skulls – the remains of the strong, the influential, and the weak alike. They were the trophies of the desperate, those who had bartered everything just to survive the night.
A crowd poured into the heart of the keep, their faces etched with sunken hopes and bitter resentment. These inhabitants lined the edges of a cavernous throne room, their gazes anxious as they watched the stage being set before them.
Behind some of the figures loomed monsters of all shapes and sizes – lifeless, mindless thralls carved from the remains of corrupted foes.
In the centre of this disorganized gathering stood a woman with bright silver hair, clad in plates of armor that made her appear radiant, as if she were a star that could change their fate.
Beside her stood a taller woman with brown hair pulled into a tight braid, her athletic build humming with power, muscles rippling beneath her olive skin.
Near them was a boy, small enough to be a child, with black hair and eyes that seemed to devour the very light around him. He looked almost feral, yet remained nearly invisible to those standing right beside him.
Finally, the master of this daunting castle made his entrance.
No one saw the man in gold move, yet everyone felt his intoxicating presence weigh upon their chests like lead. He was tall, with broad, powerful shoulders, his entire body encased in armour that flowed like molten gold. Every inch of him was sealed; not even his eyes or mouth were visible through the flowing metal.
The blinding star of silver and the heavy man of gold began to bicker – a dance of politics and trickery meant to save face and undermine the other's authority. But the verbal sparring ceased the moment the silver-haired woman spoke her next words.
"I wish to invoke the Right of Challenge."
An echoing silence smothered the crowd of the mundane and the powerful alike.
The stillness was shattered by a violent crash against the heavy doors. Shouts of the injured erupted from the other side, followed by a loud, hysterical, and manic laugh from the woman who stepped through the wreckage.
She was stunning, her hair iridescent – a myriad of colours that shifted like an oil spill in the light. Her beauty was hypnotic, her smile a seductive, twisted mask of pleasure that threatened to pull anyone who looked too long into her corrupted web.
Her voice rumbled through the hall, a whisper that seemed to crawl into everyone's ears at once.
"I found you, Changing Star," she said, her eyes – those same, violet and hungry eyes – locking onto the silver figure in the centre, who still held her sword leveled at the man of gold.
The girl of silver sighed, though the corner of her mouth twitched into a slight, defiant smile.
"Queen of Nightmare."