Chapter 4: Chapter Three: Realm-Link

The moonlight shone, barely brightening the darkness of the night. Valdus felt weary, his head throbbing in pain after what had occurred. Still, he couldn’t reach an understanding, yet the more he thought about it the more his curiosity grew. After those events, Valdus felt restless. At this point, sleep no longer was an option for him. He scanned his surroundings, somewhat glad to still be in his room. To still be home. He left his room and entered the living room, away from where the madness had occurred. Hoping to avoid as much darkness as possible, he switched on the living room light. Following soon after as he did so, his mother entered the room with a tired and confused expression. She tried to glare through her drowsiness as Valdus sat down on a comfy chair.

“What are you doing awake again...? Not only have I told you not to stay up late, but now you’ve left your room and woken me up. Was that nightmare you had that bad?”
His mother grumbled.

“It’s...nothing, mum... I’m all right. I just...can’t sleep right now. I-I doubt it’s a headache, but... Anyway, yeah... I’m good.”
Valdus mumbled.

Valdus’s mother then gave a suggestion,
“Well... I can’t really think of anything else, but perhaps you could go write more of your stories? You could even read a book. I’ll let you off just for tonight-”

It was simply a kind suggestion, but the thought of returning to his room was too much. His heart raced wildly. He felt himself sweat as fear blanketed him again; his emotions spiking more than normal. Though as much as he wanted to tell his mother what had happened, he hesitated to mention the madness he had seen. Even if he wanted to, he felt his chest burn whenever he thought of speaking out about it. He couldn’t explain any of it, either. After only hearing a small portion of his mother’s suggestion, Valdus suddenly snapped, cutting her off mid-sentence.

“No! I said I’m fine...! I-... Really, I’m fine... Just...let me stay here for a little longer...”
Valdus trailed off, shocked by his own outburst,
“W-why’d...I just...?”

His mother looked back at him with a surprised expression, similar to his. Valdus shook his head and sighed.

“N-never mind... I’ll...try to sleep...”
Valdus muttered, getting up to leave. Before his mother could speak again, he stopped her.
“...and I’ll be fine... S-sorry... Anyway, just leave me be for a while...please.”

Valdus returned to his room, and slammed the door shut. He leaned against the door, his back turned to it, and held his head.

The hell am I doing...? All of this, because of a drawing...so why has it all felt so real? The scratches on the wall, the purple dragon... That nightmare...!
As he recapped the events, he attempted to calm down.
I’m such a hypocrite, though... Always commenting on those typical horror scenes in games, and shows, and how they should just leave the place if there’s something weird going on...and what am I doing now?

As Valdus lifted his head, he sighted the picture of the purple dragon. Switching his room’s light on, he noticed something worse. Its grin was wider than before, and the glare it gave reminded Valdus of the emotions which ran rampant within the nightmare. He was being toyed with. He could hear the dragon’s laughter and the eerie whispers crawling back to haunt him. It all then stopped the second his mother arrived at his room’s door and knocked. Valdus gasped for air, not having noticed it leave him, and turned away from the picture, reaching to open the door. The handle clicked halfway. He then shook the handle.

“Wha-? Mum! Since when did I have a lock on my door?”
Valdus called out, his voice shaking with a fearful chuckle.

“A lock? We don’t have locks on the room doors. What are you talking about?”
His mother replied.

Valdus shook the door more violently. The handle kept clicking halfway, and the door didn’t budge at all. His mother started to shake the door too. Valdus tried to push and pull, only to be met with what felt like a boulder, or perhaps heavier than that. He then stepped back and barged into the door. He felt the impact bruise his shoulder, and he staggered back from it.

“G- Argh!”
Gripping his shoulder, he called out again,
“It won’t budge!”

“How? I never added a lock or anything! Just wait in there for me. I’ll see if I can get a tool to help. The door must’ve jammed onto something. Place might be getting old...”
Valdus’s mother called back, before heading back to the living room.

Valdus waited, and he had hoped to hear an indication that his mother had called for help, but he heard something he’d fear. A growl emanated from outside his room, and his mother’s screams followed soon after. Valdus shouted out and barged into the door again.

You are reading story Realm of Eldoria at novel35.com

“...but nobody came...”
The dragon’s voice echoed within his mind.

As the voice had mocked, Valdus got no response from his mother. He then turned around and glared back at the picture of the dragon. The dragon’s laughter from earlier began to grow louder. Valdus felt fear, mixing grossly in his stomach with a wad of confusion. Amongst those emotions though, a seething rage began to boil as he held back tears. When the laughter stopped, the dragon’s voice echoed within his mind again.

“Oh, Valdus... Now that’s a much better expression than before! It just makes all of this...so much more...exciting...! I must apologise, though. This...vessel couldn’t do a lot to stop you from leaving this house... Don’t worry though, I know exactly what you’re going to ask. Your mother will be...asleep...from now on. In a better place, some might say. I wouldn’t want her bringing some so-called help now, would I...? Oh, but I should mention too, she might still be awake if you hadn’t been so stubborn to not tell her the truth.”
The dragon continued to mock,
“Am I wrong...? Tsk, tsk tsk...”

“Th-this isn’t right...! Everything that’s happened so far...it shouldn’t be possible! You’re-...! Yeah...”
Valdus let out a crazed, terrified laugh.
“N-none of this is real...! This is just another nightmare! I’ll just wake up, and everything will be normal again! My mother will be alive...!”

“Just...another nightmare, you say? Do you not remember what I told you?”
Mocking Valdus once more, the dragon laughed as well, but with joy,
“Well, if it really is just another nightmare, as you say it is...and that you’ve realised it, I can’t necessarily harm you then...can I? Perhaps you have a clue on what to do. Wake up~...!”

Valdus fell to the thoughts in his head and approached the drawing with clenched fists. As he did, he raised his hand toward it, ready to tear it down from the spear. Without another thought, Valdus attempted to do as he urged, only to feel an extreme burn cover his hand. He flinched and threw his hand back, wincing in pain at first, before reopening his eyes to review what had happened. He sighted the dragon breathing fire to where his hand had been placed, yet the fire was drawn in too. It was a strange, purple flame. Valdus knew he had never added fire to the emblem, yet there he saw its flames. He had even felt it, and his hand was still burning. Even though his stubbornness of thinking this was a dream had seemingly been proven wrong, Valdus continued to hope it all would end as just that.

“You’re such a stubborn idiot, aren’t you? Even now I still could just toy with you all I want...”
The dragon snarled.

Valdus shook his head again.
“No... No more of your mockery! I’ll prove this is a dream, and I’ll wake back up, back in my real home! Not some nightmare for you to torment me in!!”

Valdus then threw a punch into the wall where the flag was propped. The dragon let out a roar of pain, causing Valdus to flinch and shield his ears. The dragon’s fire, Valdus’s headache, and the whispers began to fade, but the rest of his surroundings remained. The emblem of the dragon remained too, seemingly untouched, yet it was no longer grinning. The dragon looked furious. The word etched onto the wall, ’Eldoria’, was now glowing with a dark purple surrounded by a moonlit white.

“No...! Not yet! The portal... This wasn’t meant to happen!”
The dragon snarled again,
“You...you helped him, didn’t you?”

The glowing grew brighter and brighter, soon filling the entire room. Valdus shielded his eyes until the light faded, and as the light weakened, the area on the wall with the scratches was now replaced with a strange portal. Its exterior was a bright white, while the interior of the portal was a pristine blue. A new urge overwhelmed Valdus once more, this time driving him to dive into the portal. He took in a deep breath and stepped closer; a sense of trust mixed in with that urge. He ignored the dragon’s snarls to stay away from it, and as he approached it, he felt a weak pull.

“No!!”
The dragon roared,
“Fine then, so be it! This is a choice you’ve made, and a choice you’ll both come to regret! The Corrupt might as well just devour everything! The pull from the portal isn’t strong enough just yet though, so I guess I can explain a few things before you traverse to the other side...!”

“You’ll bother to tell me now, after what you put me through, and the fact that you tried to use me?”
Valdus shouted in anger.

The dragon only laughed, then continued,
“It’s true that all you really did was create an emblem of a dragon...but as you’ve noticed by now, it isn’t just that. What you’ve unintentionally created is called a Realm-Link. Normally a one-way portal from one world to another – what I intended was for both this...imbecile, and you as well, to ready the portal so that I could use it for myself and take over your realm! Once I had done that, I would’ve created a full link from your realm back to this one and have conquered both worlds! On top of that, the rest of the Corrupt would have likely listened to me for once, but now with what’s been done, my plans are all for naught, and now you have the portal’s control... So, when I find you, I’m going to make sure I kill you and leave no trace of your existence!! Then I can deal with this vessel...”

Before Valdus could respond to what the dragon had said or consider if he had anything else left in his current world, the pull of the portal grew stronger in an instant. He was swept off his feet and dragged into it. By that point, all he could do was watch as his realm slowly disappeared from his sight. Embers of a sudden raging fire seeped from the edges of the now-distant portal as the final sparks of his home faded away. He was soon surrounded by a tunnel of swirling thunder and wind, clueless as to what he’d face next.

Only one thought now crossed his mind,
Where the hell is this portal taking me?

You can find story with these keywords: Realm of Eldoria, Read Realm of Eldoria, Realm of Eldoria novel, Realm of Eldoria book, Realm of Eldoria story, Realm of Eldoria full, Realm of Eldoria Latest Chapter