xThis was an unexpected find for me, I had been thinking as I fell asleep of a game that was so devilishly hard that no one had ever managed to make it past the first level. That in this game there expanded out the most wonderful world one may ever find, but they needed only to beat the first level that no one ever did. The slip from thought to dream was seamless, so I know not where the dream began and my conscious thoughts ended. This is also possibly the most number of consecutive deaths I experienced in a dream
The start is very clear. I was given a gun, and before me was a small natural bridge over a deep stream cut 30 feet from the ground to the surface of the water. To the left was a raging sea, in front of me, across the bridge, a small glade, and on every side not of the sea was a deep forest. The ground was covered only in soft springy grass that would have been pleasant to the touch, if I had spared the time.
Instead, in the middle of that glade, spawned a creature. At the time I knew not its name, but now with knowledge of the wider world it would be best described as an Elder Thing from the Cthulhu Mythos. Perhaps I had seen it passing, but I had no context beyond my video game primed mind. So I shot it, badly. I missed a few times, but I barely managed enough to kill it. So it fell and despawned into the texture of dreams. I began to move, and it felt as though I were drenched in molasses. Each turn or step is a struggle. So it was little wonder that more creatures appeared and I was consumed. These deaths were not very painful, I would merely reappear in the starting place, gun in hand and creature respawning.
So I got better at the gun, eventually killing two, then three of the creatures with my limited ammo. Over time it became readily apparent that I could not kill them all, so I looked for alternative methods. I dove into the ocean and was battered against the rocks, this was a brutal way to die. Then I jumped into the stream, where my muscles seized from the meltwater’s chill and I drowned in agony.
I tried so many methods. Until, I threw the gun away and ran into the woods. At first the molasses held on to me, the creatures spawned around me and grew closer. That feeling faded with every step, restrictive ribbons slogging off my form as I sprinted through the woods. The grass giving way to ferns and, eventually, fields.
This was one of my first encounters with The Stormkissed Fields.
It was awe inspiring.
Above me were terraces of clouds painted in black, silver, and grey, thin in their individuality but creating a tapestry of texture that bulged out towards my eyes. They carried with them the winds that stirred the fields below, never raining, never thundering, merely gales that brought the character of the clouds and the fields ever closer. In that diffuse light coming from everywhere and nowhere the fields shone like shimmering silks. Each stalk started with a pale gold at the base, before transmuting into a collection of metallic lilac, [silver](#D8D8D8 toAFB1AE), and blue. Each stalk was rushing against another, a voice in a kaleidoscope of sound directed by the storm clouds above. The stormlight poured pale onto the scene that was transmuted by the fields into a scintillating symphony of coruscance. A synesthetic phantasmagoria.
I had been stunned, but I felt that urge pulling me onwards; now threaded with the winds tugging my hair and the waves of grain marking my way. Besides the trees, on a dirt road, a motorcycle stood. It was a shiny black creature, like a mechanical beetle with the steadfast character of a rock. So I rode into The Stormkissed Fields.
Through my driving I found a house buried in The Stormkissed Fields, a piece of history carried in of itself. Perhaps we were near my great grandmother’s home in my mind, a strangely suburban scene in an expanse of fields. I pulled over and investigated, searching for what this could be. The house was poorly painted, a pale reflection of colour coming from the grain, the wooden slats rotten and crushed in places. The side porch and dark roof tiles feeling as though they might collapse under their own weight. The house was cluttered and dark, the light barely able to illuminate its interior. Somehow I still felt as though I should be there, until very suddenly I knew I should not.
So I hopped back on my motorcycle and began the trip to The House by the Flat Sea, a memory of Arbuckle perhaps. That is for another day though, for at this point I awoke.