Chương 381: (374) 5.70. It Came to Me…

Lumel was patiently waiting for them near the dungeon, as they wouldn't be able to get the Earthers back to Terra without her. A few quick warps through the dungeons and one long walk through the Underside later, and Vin officially handed off the missing Earthers to Myers at the town hall.

"You've really outdone yourself this time, Vin," she whispered as Linda sat the newcomers down and started explaining how things worked around Terra.

"The fact you managed to find and bring these people back to us after more than three weeks had passed… It's nothing short of a miracle."

"We just got lucky they were being held by a group of people with a strange sense of honor," he admitted, shaking his head as John immediately raised a hand and asked Linda about the crime rates in town.

"While they were certainly prisoners, that fact kept them safe and alive all this time."

"And the rankers? We don't need to worry about them?"

"I don't think they'll be able to get out of their fragment anytime soon," Vin nodded.

"The fact that the ranker king doesn't have to follow their strange sense of honor concerns me a bit, as he could easily sprint his way through the exploding mists or the fragment of darkness, but I guess all we can do is hope that he was either killed by the others when he was wounded, or that honor continues to keep him bound to his people."

"Handicapping their strongest warrior is a pretty impressive feat," Myers said, frowning as John followed up his question by asking Linda if she could be sure he was put in a townhouse away from the orcs and beastkin in town.

"Spur might even try to give you a medal."

"Wait, what? We do that?"

"No, but you know how Spur is," she sighed, giving him a small smile.

"But seriously, great work out there. I'll fill the others in on what you told me. You should head back out to your friends before you get bogged down here."

"Thanks, Myers, I owe you one!" Leaving the three no-longer-missing Earthers in Linda's capable hands, Vin stepped outside, blinking when he couldn't find Lumel. He was just about to try casting Sense Dimension and start searching for her Dimensional Pocket when she stepped away from the side of the building, her robes blurring back to their regular colors.

"Alright, that is such a cool passive," he said, earning a giggle from her as she took his hand.

"It really is fun to hide in plain sight like that," she admitted.

"I like getting to watch people without having them stare at me in turn."

"Ahh people watching. The greatest hobby of us poor vagabonds everywhere," he said, fondly recalling all the hours he'd spent simply relaxing on public benches and watching the people wander by as he recovered his stamina.

"It's definitely underrated!"

"What's with that guy over there?" Lumel asked, squinting down the street at what looked like a clown of all things walking toward them, complete with a big red nose, white face paint, and giant shoes that were comically large.

"Is he sick or something?"

"Worse. He's Theodore," Vin said, rolling his eyes as the 'clown' made a beeline right for him.

"Would you mind warping us back to the apartment? It's been a rather long day, and as much as I love Theodore, I really just want to lie down and pass out at the moment."

"Of course," Lumel said, smiling as she squeezed his hand. Theodore somehow began sprinting at them despite his large shoes as the purple bubble appeared around them, but Lumel's spell was faster than the Spy, and they escaped in the nick of time. Vin barely even managed to put together his stronghold of slumber before his exhaustion overtook him, and he slept hard and fast through the night. Though he did dream. Vin woke the next morning, groaning as he pushed himself up onto his elbows.

In response, Lumel yawned as she rubbed her eyes, looking sleepily up at him.

"Everything okay?"

"Yeah… I think so," he said slowly, wondering how to word this in a way that didn't sound weird.

"I was visited in my dream during the night. By Fred."

"Fred? Pixie Fred?" Lumel asked, looking a lot more awake as she sat up and raised her brow.

"Using dream magic? What did he want? Was he offering to teach you?"

"Not at all," Vin snorted.

"He, uh… went on a bit of a rant, before demanding I get Scule under control. Apparently, Fria went on a dream date with him recently, and Fred is not happy about it."

"Aww that's kind of cute," Lumel said, giggling at the thought.

"He's being protective of his twin sister!"

"Is it really protective if they're just seeing each other in a dream?" Vin asked.

"Not to mention she was clearly the one who initiated the date, as last I checked, Scule doesn't have a magical bone in his body."

"I think it's sweet. So long as he isn't hounding you or anything," Lumel clarified.

"What did you tell him?"

"Despite the fact that I can remember this dream a lot more clearly than most, it's still all a little fuzzy," he admitted, scratching his head.

"I think I told him I was planning on coming by their fragment today, and we could talk more then. He seemed okay with that, and he told me where to meet him." The story has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

"Dream magic is weird," Lumel muttered, snuggling up against him as she gave him a quick kiss on the cheek.

"I suppose that means we're getting up?"

"I don't want to be late for meeting someone who has the power to haunt me in my dreams," Vin laughed, returning her kiss before forcing himself out of bed. After getting ready for the morning and storing his mattress once more, the two of them grabbed a quick bite to eat before heading over to the dungeon. A few warps later, and after a peaceful walk through the Underside where they simply enjoyed one another's company, they were once again back in the pixies' fragment.

"I've got my own plans for the day, but I hope you have fun with your new tinier friend!" Lumel said, giving him one final hug before warping back to the Underside and leaving him alone in the pixie fragment. Following the directions he'd been given, and taking care of a lone salamander monster with a well-placed Stone Shot, Vin managed to find Fred rather easily. Though the pixie wasn't alone.

"I'm allowed to date whoever I want!" Fria snapped, the pixie hovering over her twin brother's head as she planted her hands on her hips and glared down at him.

"You're not the boss of me!"

"Dad asked me to watch over you, and that's exactly what I'm going to do!" Fred argued, flitting up with a few flaps of his wings to put himself above his sister instead.

"You've known him for all of what, a day? It's too soon for any sort of dating!"

"That's why it's a date, you idiot, we're not bonding or anything like that!" Fria shouted, shoving a finger into her brother's chest as she darted above him yet again.

"Dating is how you get to know if you and someone else are right for one another! Maybe you'd know that if you actually had some semblance of a love life!" Fred looked like he was about to shout back with some scathing remark, when he finally spotted Vin standing off to the side. The pixie froze mid-breath, nearly choking as he realized Vin had witnessed their entire fight. Still fuming, Fria turned to see what had given her twin pause, and her eyes landed on Vin.

"Oh, you did not try to bring in Scule's friend to convince him to stop seeing me!" she said, her body shaking so hard small flecks of pixie dust were falling off her like snow as she stared daggers at Fred.

"No, it's not like that!" Fred said hurriedly, sinking down in the air a little as he cowed under his twin sister's rage. His eyes darted back and forth between Vin and his sister as he tried to come up with some sort of excuse, before finally blurting out what was probably the first thing that came to mind.

"He's here about dream magic!"

"Dream magic?" Fria repeated, her eyes narrowing as she bored holes straight through her nervous twin.

"He came all the way here, to your favorite hiding spot you thought I didn't know about, to ask about dream magic?"

"Yes, that's exactly right!" Fred nodded vigorously.

"Remember how he asked about learning it just the other day? I told him to meet me here if he was still interested, and here he is!" Fria didn't seem to buy that explanation one bit, but Fred had one last card to play, and desperately play it he did.

"Maybe you forgot, but Scule was the one who first told us Vin here was interested in dream magic! I bet teaching his friend dream magic would make him really happy!"

"Oh yeah… He was the one who told us, wasn't he?" Fria asked, her entire demeanor changing in an instant as she went from seething rage to bubbly excitement like a switch had been flipped. That seemed to signal that Fred was in the clear, as the male pixie let out a quiet sigh of relief and shot him an apologetic glance.

"Actually, I would in fact love to learn dream magic," Vin said, trying not to laugh at his lucky break. The pixies seemed friendly enough that he was pretty certain they would have been happy to teach him if he'd just come out and ask, but it was nice having them come up with the idea themselves.

"Though when I asked before, you mentioned it involved casting magic in my dreams. How does that work, exactly?"

"While our most basic of spells are capable of being cast while awake, the majority of our magic requires one to already be sleeping in order to function," Fria explained, flitting over to him and giving him a wide smile as she lowered her voice.

"Scule and I talked about you last night you know. I asked him about his friends, and he mentioned you had something of an obsession with magic."

"Yeah, I can't really refute that," Vin admitted with a chuckle.

"Out of curiosity, beyond talking about one's friends, what exactly does a dream date even entail?"

"I'm not one to kiss and tell," Fria winked, which elicited a strained gurgle from her twin, right up until she shot him another glare.

"Like Fria said, dream magic requires one to have a solid control of their dreams," Fred hurriedly added, clearing his throat as he drifted over to join them.

"A high focus is essential for this, but that's not enough. Like we mentioned before, this wouldn't be the first time we've taught the tall folk how to use dream magic, but there are two things that are always required. First, you need to either pick up the Deep Sleeper passive, or learn the Sleeping skill."

"Seriously? There's a Sleeping skill?" Vin asked, pulling open the general skill list and scrolling through the many offered skills. Sure enough, right there on the list was the Sleeping skill, costing two skill points just like every other general skill.

"Well that's wild. What does it even do?"

"Makes it easier to fall asleep, leads to better and more control over one's dreams, things like that," Fria explained.

"To the point where you'll be able to cast magic even in your sleep!"

"Alright, I do like the sound of that," Vin admitted, scratching his chin in thought. At this point, he had something of an unofficial quest to try and create the greatest night of sleep in all of Edregon. His shimmerwing mattress. His merider-silk blanket. His magical cloud pillow. Even the coolness of Lumel's gel-like skin as she cuddled against him and the Warmth spell for when he wanted to go all out. He'd finally gotten to the point where he thought he had it all. But if there was a whole Sleeping skill …

"You said there were two things that were required for dream magic," he said, deciding to worry about whether filling his final skill slot with the Sleeping skill was reckless or not later.

"What's the second thing?"

"The second is why so few of the tall folk who don't have a natural affinity for dream magic like we do choose to attempt to learn dream magic," Fred said, giving him a dangerous smile.

"You'll need the help of an experienced Dream Mage to lead you on a dream journey deep within your own subconscious mind in search of your core, as linking the two of them together is the only way you can control your mana in your sleep."

"That does sound rather whimsical," Vin admitted, noting the nervous look on Fria's face.

"What's the catch?"

"It's a lot more dangerous than Fred is making it out to be," Fria said, wringing her hands with worry as she stared at him with warning in her eyes.

"If you go too deep and end up getting lost within your own subconscious… You might not wake up ever again!"