Skipping all the necessary studies and training before learning a cantrip was risky, but Angor made it happen again by relying on his nightmare energy to facilitate Dream Enkindle.
Freud offered himself as Angor’s first test subject. “Please. I almost forgot what dreams feel like since I can no longer use any of my old skills as a soul.”
“I can drag people’s souls into dreams too?” Angor wondered.
“Yes. Dream Enkindle is used for connecting minds with the Dream Realm. The state of the target does not matter. You can use this cantrip against monsters or elemental creatures, as long as they are capable of dreaming.”
Angor agreed to the plan. He believed Freud, who used to be a Dream Manipulator, must be very professional at exploring the Dream Realm.
He closed his eyes and focused.
Two minutes had passed, and the cantrip model was still incomplete.
Freud was not sure why it took Angor so long. Telling from his past experience, even beginners could finish the cantrip faster than this.
After another full minute, Angor opened his eyes again as he unleashed Dream Enkindle at Freud by using his nightmare energy.
It was Freud’s turn to shut his eyes this time. Probably because he had not enjoyed the sense of sleep in a long time, Freud easily fell into a deep slumber.
Meanwhile, Angor took a seat nearby and began enjoying a cup of Milkberry Tree juice he found in his bracelet. He wasn’t going to enter Freud’s dream and risk getting attacked since he couldn’t make sure that Freud would remain friendly. Before Freud took the Follower’s Oath, Angor would remain careful.
Freud just said that the dream caused by Dream Enkindle was a lucid dream. In this case, it was easy for Freud to look for an “intruder” and harm them.
Several hours had passed before Freud woke up in great excitement, which he couldn’t hide. And telling from his look, Angor knew the result was desirable.
“I arrived at the ‘dream wasteland’ for real! The same place you told me about. It’s official. The Dream Whelk has nothing to do with it. Your ‘special illusion’ made this possible!”
Angor was equally excited to know this because he just opened up a brand new subject regarding his nightmare power.
Upon receiving The Mystery of Nightmare Domain from Sunders, he was also tasked to provide his own discoveries as a price for using the book. Finding the connection between nightmare energy and dreams sounded like a good choice.
“Since I was forced by your cantrip, I could not control the place like other lucid dreams. It’s fine though, we’ll just take adventures and explore it! We can start by making a camp, and perhaps build a city!”
Angor, however, wasn’t sure about Freud’s ambitions. As far as he could tell, objects he pulled into the dream wasteland tended to appear at random spots. If this kept happening, then there was no way he could achieve his desired jobs, such as doing alchemy experiments.
It would be disastrous if he brought Jon here only to send Jon somewhere he couldn’t find.
Sadly, successfully learning Dream Enkindle did not help him get any closer to a solution for rescuing Jon. It would be best if he knew how to command the dream wasteland at his free will. But figuring out a way might take some time.
He asked Toby to watch over him and cast Dream Enkindle on himself.
After going through a little bit of drowsiness, he re-opened his eyes and found himself standing in the endless wilderness again.
He checked his body and realized that his possessions, including his clothes, which was enchanted with a Preserve Heat effect, was now “fake”. The cold wind blowing over the wasteland reached his skin as if he weren’t wearing anything.
Similarly, he could no longer reach inside his mindspace and channel cantrips. In other words, he was as helpless as a mortal in this place.
It seemed the dream wasteland wasn’t dangerous since there weren’t any monsters or any forms of creatures around here. Yet without any of his wizardry abilities, he didn’t know where to start gaining control of this realm.
He stroked his chin while lost in thoughts. This was when he saw something shiny coming from his hand.
It appeared that the glove Sunders gave him had lost its enchantment as well, thus allowing his abnormal right hand to be fully exposed. He could clearly see its extra size along with those green sigils floating about.
The sigils were still releasing more nightmare energy into the environment like how they had been doing all along. According to Sunders, they could use this property to replenish nightmare energy in the same way as to how people used nightmare stones.
As he wondered why his right hand did not “mortalize”, he suddenly felt his shoulder bones getting itchy.
Each time this happened, something about the Nightmare Realm would show up soon. He wondered if he should get out as fast as possible.
“No. I need to learn the secrets of the dream wasteland sooner or later, for both Jon and myself. This could be a good chance.”
He waited for a while and did not see any threats coming as he expected. Instead, he got a strange feeling, that he was slowly being connected to the wild nightmare energy wandering around him.
He then tried to take control of the nightmare energy and was thrilled to find out that he could now send his vision farther away and observe the wasteland in a bird’s eye view. While staying completely still, he was capable of using the energy in this realm as his “monitor”.
He was still a little clumsy when shifting his view, but it was a lot faster than using the “Dream Gondola”, which he couldn’t control.
Unfortunately, his “detention range” was restricted by how much nightmare energy existed in the wasteland. However, he could tell that the energy was slowly getting stronger and wider, which meant he might be able to reach every part of the wasteland in the future.
With this new gift, he no longer had to worry about having trouble exploring the dream wasteland.
It was a shame that he could only “see” but not interact with anything he found in this way. He could try finding things of interest than traveling there. Yet this would take a lot of time since he couldn’t fly.
After getting familiarized with his new tool, he tried searching for the source of the nightmare energy. As he sensed, apart from his right hand, there was something else to the southeast of his current position that was pumping more nightmare energy into the area.
As his vision moved farther, he accidentally discovered the “apartment” he brought into the dream wasteland a few days ago. All the furniture and decorations in the building were still intact. At least giving Jon a place to live seemed quite possible as of now...
To make sure this was a safe thing to do, he had to make sure there was no hidden danger. Checking out the source of the nightmare energy was the first step.