Rein woke up drowned in sweat.

Rein jumped from the bed. He had returned to his dull gray room, in his house, in the neighborhood he knew. Outside, the sun was rising over a city covered with fresh-fallen snow. The screen of his phone told him it was the day after he tried to kill himself. How did he get here? Did he slept and dreamed about the night? The clarity of mind had disappeared and everything it tried to conjure was blurry.

The wound on his stomach, shoulder, and hands were all gone, but the mark on his chest was still there, clear as ever. No, it grew more complex now, spreading to the base of his thigh and arms. His heart and skin numb like a rock.

It seemed he had escaped nothing. The dream wasn’t even a good dream but a nightmare unlike anything he ever experienced. Ignoring the moon and strange occurrence, all that dream does was gave him a fleeting taste of his former self. A reminder of a life he and could no longer live.

But terrible the dream was, Rein couldn’t get it out of his head. What happened there was so outlandish yet also the most vivid and real dream he ever experienced. Everything engaged all five of his senses, maybe even a few others of his supernatural ones. He felt pain and raw emotion. And he could recall them, every single excruciating moment. The way the woman’s tongue entered his body and wriggled inside him. Everything was so fascinating, yet so grotesque and …

A sound came from the first floor. The sound of the stove burning and cooking pan moving around.

”Father?” He asked. Had father returned? But father wouldn’t enter the house. ”Friede?” It was not rare for Friede to barge into his house and made food without his consent – he gave her a spare key in the past. Though after what happened in the hospital he doubted her father allowed her to come here. ”Who’s there?!” He shouted down from the second floor, but still, the person didn’t answer.

He descended the stair, making as little sound as possible. If the worst comes to worst and someone broke into his house, his unfeeling body would be a great asset. But as he turned to the kitchen, ”Ah!” He gasped.

She was there, still as transcendentally beautiful as in his dream. Her blue eyes burning like a Sirius in the sky. Skin of flawless white marble and hair a straight Blackhole. Yet her form wasn’t demonic like in his dream. As human as he was, or even more so than him. The claw on her hand now delicate slender fingers. Her horns gone and her hooves now a beautiful pair of legs.

“Dear.” The smile ... the smile on her face made him realize his own beating heart, and the heat his body produced. The burning sensation between his legs, the coldness of the floor and the winter breeze from the opened windows. The bitter taste of his dried tongue. The wafting fragrance coming from her.

“Ah ... Ah ...” Just as his senses returned to him, so too did his overflowing joy. His hand trembled, and his knee buckled under the weight of such emotion. The woman quickly caught his body before it touched the ground.

Her face, filled with worries made him wonder, who was she? How did she appear in his dream? Why was she here now? Why did she make such a worried expression? What was he to her? Why did she call him dear? A thousand more questions filled his head, yet only one question came out from his mouth. “Wha- wha- what’s your name?”

She opened her luscious pink lips, and a sweet smell of heaven wafted into his nose. “Irhkryx.” The voice that her beautiful red tongue made was a rough gargle. The word she made was alien and gibberish yet not unintelligible to his ears. He caught one among a thousand spoken at once. A beautiful name. The most beautiful name.

“I ... Irys.”