"Two plates of braised moonfish noodles coming please!"

The words drifted through the restaurant in a warped and distorted echo, as if the speaker stood at the end of a long tunnel instead of just a few meters away like he actually was.

Steam rolled through the dim room in pale waves, blurring the hanging lights of the lightbulbs overhead into trembling golden halos.

Seated in one of the chairs with a table in this restaurant, Leon looked around in a daze. ’Where am I...?’

He didn’t know where he was, he didn’t quite realize how he got here either.

He tried to focus but it was hard to focus. Still, he was able to make out a few details about where he was.

He already knew that this place was a restaurant; that was the only knowledge in his head. Now, on closer look, he realized that the place looked painfully ordinary.

It was almost like... it was almost like this was not Year 714 A.G anymore, and rather this was Year 2036 in a world that Leon had long forgotten, lost in the fragments of his shattered memories.

The restaurant had cream-colored walls with crooked menu boards that had missing letters, with plastic condiment bottles that were already sticky from years of use and careless hands.

A creaking ceiling fan rotated above the restaurant.

’Huh?’ Leon was even more confused.

Somewhere nearby, oil hissed endlessly in a pan while dishes clattered with strange rhythm... too slow one second, too fast the next.

Leon’s attention was inadvertently drawn to the dishes that were being washed manually. ’People still wash dishes with hands? What the hell...?’

By now, he could tell that something was wrong though he couldn’t quite wrap his head around it yet.

The smell in the restaurant was warm and heavy, filled with the smell of soy sauce, fried garlic, pepper broth, and something faintly sweet like chestnuts roasting too long over charcoal.

’Charcoal?’ All these concepts felt familiar and painfully unfamiliar to Leon at the same time, leaving him a bit disoriented.

It should have been comforting, but instead it felt distant, as though Leon was remembering the smell rather than actually breathing it in.

Customers filled the restaurant, but none of them stayed clear for long.

Their faces shifted and blurred every time that Leon blinked. A laughing couple became silent strangers, a child drinking from a glass suddenly vanished altogether, leaving only the straw moving by itself.

Leon blinked again, unnerved. ’What the hell?’

The only constant was one specific customer who sat in the Eastern end of the restaurant. He seemed to be sipping on a bottle of Hollandia juice, but for some reason Leon felt that he was actually looking at him.

’What the hell is wrong with me today?’

’And why the hell is he looking at me? Creepy bastard’.

He noticed that even the windows of the restaurant were foggy.

Beyond the fogged windows outside, neon signs bled color into the wet street, painting hues of red, blues, and purples, melting together like wet paint in the gentle rain that was falling.

’It’s not acid rain...’ Leon realized. ’What is going on?’

Outside, shadowy pedestrians drifted past unnaturally slowly, their movements jerking every now and then like marionettes being controlled by the Lord of Mysteries.

Leon focused back on inside the restaurant.

Behind the counter, a cook stirred a massive pot of broth. Steam swallowed him whole except for the occasional glimpse of rough hands and the glowing tip of a cigarette hanging from his mouth.

Every motion he made seemed delayed, like reality was struggling to keep up with itself.

’What the hell is actually going on?’

Leon sat quietly at the corner table, his fingertips brushing against chipped ceramic as his onyx black eyes narrowed. His brain was already feverishly working and was on overdrive.

’Something is wrong, but what is it?’

’Think, think, think goddamit!’

And then...

Clank!

"Your order is ready sir!" The waiter said with a smile, dropping the tray of food that he supposedly ordered on his table.

Leon flinched and looked at the waiter, instinctively turning alert.

For some reason, he expected something grayish white to emerge from his body but nothing happened. ’Huh? Weird...’

He looked at the waiter and forced a smile. "Uh, thanks".

"You’re welcome," the waiter flashed a big smile. "I hope you enjoy your meal, do visit some other time".

"Ok..." Leon replied absentmindedly and looked down at the food.

He picked the spoon and dipped it into the soup, his brain still feverishly thinking. Then he scooped the food and brought it closer to his mouth in an absentminded manner, and that was when it happened.

Leon froze as he felt his body suddenly fill up with cold dread!

’W-w-what is this feeling?’ He was stunned.

’What triggered it?’

Unnerved, he looked at the spoon that was close to his mouth. For some reason, he felt that persistent customer of the restaurant not only just staring at him now but actually glaring at him. ’Huh?’

He didn’t pay attention to him though as instead he looked at the spoon on his hand again, his hand shuddered.

’I-it’s because of this...’

’Wait,’ his eyes darkened. ’Poison. It’s poison!’

’The food is poisoned!’

What made him detect the danger was his Danger Premonition, his Rat DNA Racial Trait but Leon didn’t realize yet.

It took him a few seconds to realize what just happened, and when he did he froze again. ’Danger premonition... danger premonition...’

And then...

CRKSH!

Leon heard a sound like those of shattering scales.

All of a sudden, it felt like scales that were previously covering his eyes and memory shattered and finally, he was able to pierce through the veil that was blinding and obscuring his consciousness.

Leon’s eyes widened as he remembered.

’We just completed an assassination mission!’

’We killed Earl Joe, and I’m currently hiding inside the cave with Umar, Daren, and Brick, so... w-what happened?’

Somehow, without him knowing, he had been pulled right from his sleep into an entirely different world that he didn’t understand.

’What the hell!’ He felt a chill crawl down his spine.

Afterall, the greatest fear was the fear of the unknown and right now, Leon had absolutely zero idea of what was happening.

But he had a hunch. Afterall, this was not his first time experiencing something like this... right?

Leon’s brain whirred and he remembered.

Months earlier, he experienced something like this for the very first time when Parasite’s subordinate who was an F Rank Quantum Shaper pulled him and the other members of the original Wraith-Cell 9 crew into a dream just to terrorize them.

In that dream, Talia was killed!

The second time that he experienced something similar to this was during his encounter with Lucian when the Demon of Ozempic pulled him into a dream, and Leon awakened in that dream lucid.

’I-it’s a dream!’ Leon realized as his eyes turned sharp.

’But why did it take me so long to regain my lucidity unlike with Lucian?’

The last time against Lucian, Leon guessed that his lucidity was because of either his unique identity as a human or it was because of the ChronoSystem that enabled him to maintain his lucidity in the dream.

But now... even that didn’t seem to work fully.

Leon didn’t even need to think, he understood the reason why immediately. ’This Quantum Shaper is far stronger than Lucian ever was!’

For the first time in his life, Leon truly loathed dreams. ’What the f*ck!’

He was tense but he didn’t try to show it. Afterall, if his experiences with Lucian taught him anything then the creator of this dreamscape was likely right here in this restaurant with him.

Leon shuddered. ’It’s him!’

’It’s that customer that’s the one constant in this restaurant, it’s the guy that’s always looking at me from the Eastern end!’

It took all of Leon’s willpower not to look in that direction.

His brain whirred. ’Think, think, f*ck! What to do?’

He didn’t even know how he was supposed to escape from a dream. He was already trying to wake up, but nothing was happening.

’Phew!’ He exhaled softly, trying to calm his nerves. ’Calm down and think...’

Well, that seemed to work and he managed to calm down.

Finally, Leon could think straight. ’To escape, first I need to know the exact type of enemy that I’m facing, his Class and his Class Specialization’.

Leon was 100% sure that the enemy was a D Rank Ascended, he was also sure that he was dealing with a D Rank Quantum Shaper.

The question was the specific Class Specialization.

His brain whirred as he thought. ’His initial intention was to poison me and kill me in my sleep, meaning he believes that he can kill me in the dream!’

His eyes gleamed. ’I know what Class Specialization this is...’

In that moment, the conversations that he had with General Ren Nora some time ago floated back to his brain like water filling a dam.

Leon remembered.