"Where am I?" Matthew asked looking around.

He was in a prairie. A slow creak ran softly and calm beside him. Few trees shaded the grassy lands filled with berries and small fruits. The wind blew cold, but comfortable. A very welcomed breeze under the sun.

It wasn't warm. It wasn't cold. It was just perfect. The kind of place you want to lie down on the soft grass on a lazy afternoon and take a nap. Just listening to the running water flowing downstream. Just smelling the faint scent of flowers and fruit around. Just relaxing.

He had been in a place like that before. When he met Ffyr for the first time. The place inside them where they talked before making their pact.

Ffyr.

Vanessa.

They were with him when the fireball exploded. He remembered jumping over Vanessa to protect her. Did she survive?

Did Ffyr survive?

Last thing he remembered was Ffyr trying to stop the fire with her winds. It was clearly not enough. Clearly?

Did he survive?

Was he alive? Was that heaven? What was going on?

It's lost inside those thoughts that Matthew saw Ffyr flying towards him from the distance. She was big. As big as him. Not the foot long fairy anymore. More like the winged elf he saw the first time.

"You're awake." Ffyr said sitting beside him. "Glad I brought you here."

"And where's here?" Matthew asked her looking around again.

"My Oneiros." Ffyr explained.

Oneiros was the dream realm. Each person had their own. Unlike other realms, the dream realms was only inhabited by the consciousness of the persons. It was the place all your dreams gained shape. A place where normal people could only visit when they were asleep and very few had any control over them.

Pacted creatures could visit each other's Onerioi if any of them had enough experience with it. Not necessarily the Dream Walk skill from the Somniomancer class that allowed them to make their consciousness travel between other people's dreams. But simply enough knowledge about how dreams work.

This was also the reason pacted creatures could communicate through telepathy and could feel each other's feelings. Their connected souls also connected their dreams, their Oneiros.

Ffyr was clearly very experienced with the Oneiros. Perhaps because the Fae realm was extremely volatile as the dream realms were. Matthew could tell, although, at the time, he didn't know anything about the dream realms, only studying after he pacted with Ffyr, he could tell Ffyr had immense control of her Oneiros by their first meeting.

"So… Why did you bring me here?" Matthew asked laying on the soft grass and enjoying the comfortable climate.

"Because you are dying." Ffyr said with a sad tone.

"What?" Matthew asked surprised getting up.

"That fireball. It… It almost killed you." The fairy said putting a hand on his shoulder.

"What about Vanessa?" Matthew asked as if his life was only secondary.

"She was also at a bad state. But I don't know much. I brought you here after as soon as I saw your wounds. I'm sure they're trying to save you by now, else you'd be already dead." Ffyr explained.

"Why did you bring me here?" Matthew asked trying to understand.

"You know that our souls are connected." Ffyr started to explain. "If you die, I also die." She said as Matthew nodded. "But we spirits aren't idiots. If there is time, we can undo the pact and save ourselves."

"Then do it." Matthew said as if it was nothing. "I don't want you to also die because of me. Because I put my guard down." He added.

"Yes. But for me to do that, I need to kill you before your body dies." Ffyr said ominously and the climate around them reflected that. Dark clouds covered the sky and the wind got stronger and colder.

Her Oneiros was reflecting her state of mind.

"Explain to me this better." Matthew asked ignoring how the dream changed to fit the fairy's mood.

"To undo the pact, I need to remove your consciousness and place it on the part of your soul that I took. This will make you inhabit my soul. But this also means that your body will have no consciousness. It will be an empty husk. You'll be basically dead." Ffyr said not looking at him and cowering from the cold she herself was creating.

"Can I ever return? To my body that is." Matthew asked.

"It would require the power of a Greater God to do it." Ffyr said.

"And this will undo the pact?"

"Not quite. But it would mean that I would survive even if you died. Because your consciousness inhabiting my body would control the part of your soul that is embedded in mine. Therefore I would not die." Ffyr explained.

"Why do spirits die when their partner dies and humans don't?" Matthew asked trying to find another way.

"Our souls are different than the souls of the primes. Even a small part that is used to make the Pact is enough to make our souls decay if it's not there. Meanwhile you can live with damaged souls as if it was nothing. So, when you die, the part of your soul in mine will disappear and that will make a hole in mine and with time it will fester and decay." Ffyr explained getting up and looking at the first drops of rain that started to fall from the sky.

"So, if my consciousness is tied to you, the part of my soul in you won't die?" Matthew summarized.

"Yes." Ffyr said creating a huge umbrella out of nowhere and shielding both of them from the rain with it.

"Then have you already done it?" Matthew asked. "Since I'm already here."

"No. I only brought you as a visitor. You are still in your body. Since we're alive, I believe they are treating you. But from what I saw… I don't think you'll survive." Ffyr said as the rain started to pour down together with streams of tears from her eyes.

"Then I'm here because you wanted to ask me first?" Matthew concluded looking at her. He could not read her thoughts if she didn't communicate them directly through the pact telepathy, but he could feel her feelings.

"Yes. Do you want to bet our lives on your world's medics? If we wait for them to heal you, we might both live and return back to normal. Or we both die. Or you can live within me. You'd be just a tiny voice in my consciousness. But we could always play together here in my Oneiros. I can even teach you how to control this realm. You could make your own place here." Ffyr smiled with a sad face.

Matthew looked at her and dried her tears. He looked around at the pouring rain. He knew he didn't had the demonic mana taking over his body when the fireball hit him. He used his body to shield Vanessa. A concentrated fireball from a level 30 plus adventurer. It was a miracle he was still alive.

He could picture the doctors giving him drugs and air and chest compression to keep his heart beating and his body alive.

Was he willing to bet on them?

He looked at Ffyr who was still crying. A sharp contrast to her usual carefree smile and childlike innocence.

If it was only his life he was willing to bet on the doctors. But he could not put Ffyr at risk.

Matthew took Ffyr's hands on his.

"Do it. Bring me here. Save yourself." He said to her looking in her eyes.

"Are you sure? We could be going to fast about this." Ffyr said with a worried face.

"Is there a way to go see how the condition of my body is?" Matthew asked.

"I could go see. But to bring you back here after that will be hard. I brought you here before you got unconscious from the blast. To bring an unconscious person to Oneiros is hard and might not even work depending on the state of your body now." Ffyr explained.

"And the more we talk, the riskier it is that my body dies, correct?" Matthew added.

"Yes." Ffyr confirmed.

"Then do it now. Let's not risk your life any longer." Matthew smiled at her hiding the dozens of feelings he was feeling.

He would no longer see his family. He just started dating Faralynn. He was having a lot of fun with Vanessa and the others. Even dungeon diving for Claudio was getting fun. He had dozens of frustrations, of regrets. Dozens of unfinished businesses. He didn't want to die.

All those feelings rushed out of his eyes as tears and though he forced himself to smile.

"Are you sure?" Ffyr asked him one last time after seeing him cry.

"Yes. I just… I had so many things I wanted to do. Life was so fun, even though I had my demons to face, it was so good. I didn't want to die. But I need to save you." Matthew cried. "Do it."

"No." Ffyr said pushing him away from her. "I'm going to bet on Vanessa and Faralynn. Those two know a lot of doctors. They will save you!" The fairy changed her mind after seeing Matthew crying.

"Ffyr!" Matthew protested. "We don't have time! Just do it!"

"No!" Ffyr shouted. "I'll not rob you of your life."

"My life might as well be over! Save yourself"

"I'm trusting in them!" Ffyr shouted so loud that made the rain go away and Matthew fall to the floor.

At this moment, when Matthew looked dumbfounded on the floor looking at Ffyr with wide eyes, they heard a loud laughter. A voice that Matthew not only heard, but felt in his mouth as the sweetest of honeys said in a playful tone.

"That was so fun. I wondered who was the man that whiskered my daughter away, but I see she got herself a good one. Thanks for the meal you two."

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