Snapping his eyes open, Marcus was struck by a violent explosion of light.
Electric reds, neon greens, icy blues, and vibrant purples came rushing in from every direction, saturating his vision to the point of irritation.
There was no warmth of a campfire, nor the faint comfort of a lantern. This was pure voltage, a discharge of artificial luminescence that devoured everything.
He was standing right in the middle of a crosswalk that seemed to have no end.
On either side of him, skyscrapers rose and rose until they disappeared into the black sky, like giants trying to touch the stars. But the walls weren't concrete or stone—they were gigantic screens plastered across the buildings, projecting images that never stopped.
It was an endless parade of ads: luxury makeup, the latest smartphones, giant coffee cups, and restaurant logos he remembered perfectly.
The noise was insane, a chaos of music, engines, and voices trying to sell you your very soul:
"Second one half price! Today only, don't miss out!"
"Limited edition! Don't be left without yours!"
"Hey there, handsome! Come on over and take a look, I don't bite~!"
Marcus stood motionless, stunned by the sensory shock for several seconds.
His eyes ran over the billboards, the traffic lights, the asphalt under his feet. Faced with the violence of that glow that wrapped around everything, an incredulous smile slowly began to form on his face.
He didn't need to ask where he was.
This was his corner of the world, the place where he had spent more than twenty years. A place that only knew noise, compulsive shopping, and never sleeping.
"It's been so long..."
Then he abruptly turned his head.
Someone was standing next to him.
She wore a startling pink kimono, had jet-black hair, and a fox mask with flowers sat on top of her head.
Her cyan eyes were sweeping across the place with a mixture of caution and confusion.
"Makomo?"
"Marcus-kun...," she looked at him, still processing the surroundings. "Where... where are we? Weren't we on the train?"
As she spoke, her gaze landed on one of the screens, where some girls were dancing in barely any clothes, and she brought a hand to her mouth to stifle a scream—but then she froze.
She felt its warmth.
Was that... her hand?
She lowered her gaze to her palm, completely stunned. She turned her hand to see the back, then the palm again. Finally, with trembling fingers, she pinched her own cheek.
… It hurt.
"H-How is this possible...?" She raised her head to look at Marcus with absolute disbelief.
Seeing her so unnerved, Marcus took her small hand.
It was warm.
Just as he had seen, Enmu's technique was extraordinarily realistic. As one of the main antagonists of the Infinity Train, the demon possessed the ability to drag anyone into a dream world so perfect that not even someone with Rengoku's senses could tell fiction from reality.
And it was precisely that perfection that Marcus intended to exploit.
The hemp rope he had stolen was the key: an artifact designed by Enmu to connect the dreams of two people.
Enmu's original plan was for his slaves to use the ropes to slip into the hunters' dreams and destroy their spiritual cores without spilling a single drop of blood.
And Marcus simply flipped the board on him. By tying himself to Makomo before falling asleep, he had bet that the power of the dream would drag her spirit along with his.
And the facts had just proven him right: Makomo was flesh and blood once again.
And how had he fallen asleep?
The ticket, obviously.
Enmu's trick was that if the conductor punched your ticket, you fell asleep. The problem was that the guy got stubborn—he refused to punch only Marcus's ticket. Made sense, his orders were to hypnotize the whole group, and if Marcus was handling everyone's tickets, the rest would stay awake.
But he didn't give a damn what the Conductor wanted. He had a plan to carry out: he wanted Makomo to feel what it was like to be alive again, but he wasn't about to take any chances.
He knew Enmu was fusing with the train and couldn't move from the locomotive for now, but just in case, he wasn't going to let the others fall into the dream.
He needed bodyguards while he was in the dream world, and with Rengoku awake, he could sleep like a baby.
As for the Conductor's resistance... Heh, as if that mattered!
Marcus used his Invisible Arrows to force the man to punch the tickets whether he liked it or not.
That said, he had the courtesy to give Zenitsu's ticket back to him so he could activate his Prime.
"Marcus-kun?"
Makomo's voice brought him back to the present.
"I'm right here."
"... is this real...?" she murmured, her face flushed. "I-I... I can feel you..."
Squeezing her hand, Marcus smiled at her tenderly. "It's absolutely real."
And without ever taking his eyes off her, he guided her hand up to his own cheek. "See? It's warm."
"..."
Feeling the warmth of his skin, Makomo's eyes began to well up.
"Marcus..."
"Yeah?"
"I can touch you..."
"Yeah."
"I-I can... I can feel you..."
"Yeah."
Finally, a tear rolled down Makomo's cheek and fell to the ground.
Plip
Lowering her gaze, she was hypnotized by the small stain of water darkening on the asphalt. They were tears... real tears.
"... I'm crying..." she whispered, lifting her head to find Marcus's eyes once more. "I can shed tears!"
Marcus reached out and, with his thumb, wiped the wet trail from her face.
That simple touch made Makomo tremble from head to toe, as if she had taken an electric shock.
She couldn't take it anymore.
She threw herself into his arms and wrapped them around him with all her strength, clinging to him as if the world were about to disappear.
"M-Marcus... Marcus... Marcus..."
He pulled her against his chest and rested his chin on top of her head, closing his eyes to savor the moment.
"I'm right here," he repeated as the noise of the big city kept roaring around them.
…
Quite a while passed before Makomo finally calmed down.
She looked up without letting go of him, her eyes still a little red and the trail of tears marked on her cheeks, but with a smile that lit up the entire place.
"So... what happened? And where are we?"
Then Marcus explained, without getting into too many technicalities, that they were inside a dream. Then he raised his eyes toward the giant screens surrounding them, the ones bathing the street in their colored lights.
"As for this place… It's the future of my dreams."
"The future?"
"Yeah. The future."
He took her hand and started walking, guiding her through the crowd. "I'll tell you about it as we go."
The pedestrian street was packed.
There was everything: kids dressed in clothes that looked like they were from another planet, couples walking hand in hand, and families pushing strollers.
Makomo, clinging to Marcus's hand, didn't know where to look; everything fascinated her endlessly.
She turned as red as a tomato when she saw some girls in pretty provocative outfits, and got a little dizzy from the constant flickering of the screens.
Watching her like that, so lost and amazed all at once, Marcus felt a tickle inside.
"Makomo."
She, who had been distracted staring at an advertising billboard, lifted her head. Marcus was watching her with a smile, but his eyes had a different kind of glint.
It was that kind of look…
Makomo's face went from pink to a glowing red. "W-why... why are you looking at me like that!?"
But he didn't say a word. He just admired her with a passion he wasn't even trying to hide.
Under that scrutiny, Makomo felt her body heat up. She wanted to lower her head to hide, but her neck wouldn't obey; she wanted to say something to break the ice, but her lips had glued themselves shut.
All she could do was stand there, watching him slowly lean in…
Closer and closer…
A little more…
"Mmmh~!"
Her lips were sealed.
Makomo's eyes flew wide open, completely in shock.
She froze stiff as a statue, unable to react as her mind went blank.
In the middle of that chaos of lights and noise, only one thought remained:
'Is this a… kiss!?'
__________
Throw your stones, drop them ALL! 💎
And don't forget to comment, I wanna know if you liked the chapter 👀
______
And if PS aren't your thing but you still want more chapters...
P-a-t-r-e-o-n → Athome790