Chapter 276

There was another task Zoey had put off—if not for as long as solidifying her bonds with her two girlfriends and confessing the truth of her feelings.

Fe.

The sheepgirl artificer was someone Zoey was quite fond of and probably the only person for whom she had significant affection that had been left behind in Mantle. It wasn’t unreasonable that she hadn’t been immediately willing to uproot her life. Sabina had done so, but she was intertwined with Zoey, being her alchemy teacher and also benefiting from a livelihood sense.

Unfortunately, for all its magic, long-distance communication was limited in this world. Zoey didn’t know if the highest echelons of society had means of instant message transportation—and it seemed likely there were some artifacts like that—but there was certainly no ‘magic post office’. Keeping in contact was limited to regular mail, which could take days or weeks depending on who they hired to carry the message.

But Zoey?

Zoey had other ways of getting in contact.

[Potion of Expanded Consciousness] - Open the consumer’s mind to the dream world, allowing external influences to delve deep into one’s psyche.

Zoey had yet to explore everything the potion was capable of. Like many of her underutilized items and potions, that was simply because of how hectic her life was. She had too much going on to utilize everything to the highest degree, or to the degree it deserved. Nevertheless, she’d come up with a practical use for her dreaming potion: contacting Fe.

The potion was limited, though. At a minimum, it required her target to be sleeping. So, Zoey waited until late at night to drink the potion—after some, ah, celebrations with Rosalie and Delta—and thus she expected the sheepgirl to be asleep. Then again, it seemed possible the dedicated artificer was the kind of person who would often be burning the midnight oil if a project had caught her fancy. There was also the risk of the dream realm limiting links by distance; she had no idea. It was a gamble twice over.

But hardly an expensive or risky one. So, Zoey tipped the vial back and cuddled in with her two girlfriends.

Delta’s amused voice was the last thing she heard before she drifted off, consciousness sapping away all at once.

“Say hi to her for me, by the way. And by that, I mean fuck her brains—”

Zoey could intuit Delta’s request, even if she wasn’t conscious enough to finish hearing it.

Just like that, she was floating in a black void. Splayed out beneath her was a sea of multicolored orbs, each representing a dream of a different type. Her attention was drawn to the pink ones, which represented dreams where the dominant emotion was lust. A myriad of other colors pervaded the dense spiritual space making up the spiderweb of Mantle’s sleeping citizens. But intriguing as exploring that landscape might be, Zoey had other goals.

She looked down at herself—though she had no self, being a floating spirit of nothingness, no shape or form to represent her body—and found a collection of lines emanating from her. Each was a relationship. These lines were how Zoey had forced contact with Ephy, once. Though that prismatic string was gone now, Ephy denying such easy access a second time. She preferred ‘rituals’.

The links to her girlfriends were strongest, but they were faded and grayed out since they were awake. Though likely not for much longer; they had all settled down for the night.

Focusing on the lines gave her a sixth sense for who they represented. Finding Sabina’s, Zoey discovered the alchemist was asleep. Her dream was, curiously, golden-colored. Curiosity tickled at her to go find what gold meant—glory? Excitement?—but she had more pressing aims.

Because, identifying Fe’s line, Zoey found she was asleep as well. And accessible, despite being a great distance away. Her dream link was thin and strained, either because of the distance or because they were only friendly acquaintances. For all that she liked Fe, they didn’t know each other that well. But it was still available.

Gripping onto the dream-link, she let herself be tugged toward her destination. The line had a pull of its own. She accelerated with every passing second, the collection of thousands of dream orbs blurring beneath her.

A surreal trip later, she arrived to Treyhull. It felt like it had taken both minutes and hours—it was hard to tell how much had truly passed. Like sleeping, she thought amusedly.

She found herself face-to-face with Fe’s dream orb.

It was a strange color—half pink and half burnt orange. Orange was a common color among dreams; her best guess was anxiousness or ‘restless energy’. That was an instinctive assumption, at least, and in a world built from her consciousness, why wouldn’t instinct be correct?

Pressing into the bubble, into the murky depths that she could almost but not quite make out, she met resistance. But all at once, it yielded, and—