I know the title is pretty self-explanatory, but I had a really odd dream last night. With everything going on, I don't feel like what I saw was a coincidence. The weirdest part of the whole thing is how well I remember it all. I've never had a dream that felt this real.
I fell asleep pretty soon after my last post. I know Deb made a post on here, though, honestly, I just don't have the time to be upset about that. She's just as much a part of this whole affair as I am.
In the dream, I woke up inside this huge chapel type place. It's hard to describe it, but I felt the heat of the place through my whole body, like it was alive. The walls were this thick, bony stuff and everything was covered in a thin layer of veins. There were organs interspersed among them, too. Hearts, sets of lungs, kidneys, bladders, anything you could think of. There were pews for miles, all made of the same bone as the rest of the place. The whole place would shudder occasionally, like a beating heart.
There was nothing else to look at, so I started walking. I must have been walking for a good few minutes before I started hearing wet, slapping footsteps behind me. Every time I turned, there was nothing there. The footsteps were mirroring my own, so I started trying to trip them up. Finally, after about ten minutes of doing that, whatever was behind me finally moved out of turn.
Everything went silent, and I felt in my gut that I had just done something really wrong.
The footsteps began sprinting after me, and I ran as fast as I could. I ran for what felt like hours. The footsteps only stopped when I tripped and fell, passing straight through the veiny floor and into some dark crevice. I fell for just a few seconds before something grabbed me in the dark, and before I knew it, I was in front of an altar.
It wasn't made of bone. It was made of this black stone. Totally seamless. No cuts or markings at all. I looked around, and behind me were the same miles and miles of pews I'd been traversing. In front of me was the altar. Behind it, was an enormous statue made of jet black stone. The veins had spread everywhere else in the cathedral, but they wouldn't spread onto the black stone.
The statue was a figure, like a man, but not. The statue itself had to have been sixty feet tall, at least, and just thinking about it now gives me a headache. The face was just blank, or rather, it wasn't blank. There was something there but I just can't remember. All I can remember was how wrong it was. It had a crown over it's head, and most of it's body was covered in a long cape-like thing. It had about six or so arms coming out of the cloak, three on each side. The bottom right was holding a book, while the top left was holding a sword. It took me some time after I woke up to realize it, but there was a symbol on the book. The same symbol is on the cover of the book I found.
A crown, with a worm around it.
I looked down at the altar, and there was the book. It was much newer than the one I had. Leather binding. Smooth, black, practically begging me to open it. I did.
It's hard to describe exactly what I felt when I read it. The best thing I can compare it to is a massive blast of information. Anything I could think about, the book had an answer. Yet, I can't remember anything I actually learned from it. Only snippets here and there. Fragments of whatever knowledge it contains. The copy I have is almost indecipherable, from what I understand. It takes someone who knows the language to get it. It's not a cipher, it's not gibberish. It's some kind of language.
Someone called out to me from behind. I turned, and saw a man standing in front of me. An older man, in a judge's robes. They were black, but had these distinctive orange accents on the sleeves and up the arms. He looked half-way between a judge and a priest, basically. He had a really narrow face, with balding grey hair and a thin neck. He was almost corpse-like in how thin he was. The Judge, since that's the first name that came to mind, spoke to me. His voice was baritone, commanding.
"Only those closest to the King can learn his teachings."
I asked him what he meant, what this was all about.
"Your mind is not open," he said. "As for what this is about, well, you're meddling. Too much for my tastes."
Again, I asked him what this was all about, and he just sighed again before he spoke.
"Jannura is busy preparing her assemblage in the desert, and she asked me to watch over her flock here. You are not the first to come looking into their midst, into our affairs."
Their affairs?
"Ascendance."
Before I could ask anything else, he moved closer, sounding almost angry as he spoke.
"You people live in decadence, in depravity. You've lost the very essence of the hands that bred you, that brought you from the mud and made you what you are. Your people are lost, tumbling in darkness, and He offers salvation."
I tried to keep pressing him, asking him what he meant by "your people" and "Him".
"The King. My Lord, and my Savior. He who lifted us from the yolk, and cast off our chains of mortality so we could better serve him. He who waits beyond the veil, He who will return to bring eternal salvation to sinner and saint alike."
Naturally, I had more questions, but before I knew it, we were both standing on a hillside. We were overlooking a field, but instead of grass or trees, it was hundreds of miles of nothing but people. All on their knees, all wearing nothing but rags and looking like starved holocaust survivors. They were all muttering prayers in nearly every language, all facing towards a massive figure in the distance. Just like the statue, but it had to have been miles tall. The Judge kept talking.
"It is said in the last passages of the Compendium that King will return someday, and that all men will gain a greater purpose. To serve his will. We must hasten his return."
I told him that that was a load of bullshit, and that they needed to be stopped. He just stared at me, and sighed.
"So be it," he said. "I thought you'd be a bit more receptive than the scientist. I'll ensure that Whitewall deals with you appropriately."
Then, something came from behind. It was fast, but it looked like some kind of hooded figure. It threw me down among the people praying, and they all broke off to come after me. Their cold, half-dead fingers were just digging into me when I woke up.
I was screaming when I woke up, covered in sweat, and I must have scared the shit out of Deb because she looked like she'd seen a ghost.
After a bit of prodding, I finally told her about the dream, and she went really pale. Said she'd had almost the same dream, verbatim, and that we needed to get out of town. Now.
I agree with the sentiment. Whatever this is, I need to get out of here and get help before whatever we're dealing with decides to really come after us. I don't know if I should take that dream as gospel, no pun intended, but if the Judge is really going to sic the whole town on us, then I'm going to need some more guns on my side.
We're leaving in a few minutes. I'll try and get another update once we're out of town.
