Chapter 1392: Heartbroken
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Although Maria was able to create a miracle with her abilities, and felt relieved, the revived felt confused, and above all, quickly began to fall into despair upon realizing they were unable to fall for their Dream Weapons anymore. Their powers, and perhaps their entire identities, were gone. Even the magic related to such powers was also gone.
To them, they had become just normal humans now, they were no longer Dream Warriors, no longer special, no longer themselves… It made them feel frustrated above all else.
"M-My power…" Eduard muttered. "No… W-What…?! This is…! I've had my Dream Weapon since I was a child… How can I even… do anything now?! I am nothing but a normal man now, where do I go now?! What do I do?! Shouldn't I had remained dead instead?!"
"W-What nonsense are you talking about you idiot?!" Emily reprimanded him. "Dying is worse than losing your powers! What about your family or those that would miss you? Losing someone like this would be so terrible!"
"B-But…" Eduard started crying. "You wouldn't know this… pain! Emily! You're fine! And I… I lost everything…"
Emily was constantly trying to calm down Eduard, who had become borderline suicidal after learning his only power was gone, and so his entire future as a Dream Warrior was ruined.
"W-What do I do now?!" Ming Lee started weeping and crying like a baby, very loudly. "Mama and papa will hate me without my Dream Heart! Buuuuaaaaahhh!"
"C-Calm down Ming Lee!" Celes muttered. "I-It'll work out somehow! Your parents will always love you right?"
"No they won't!" Ming Lee cried.
Ming Lee was afraid of her parents and whatever punishment they would give to her; she was also afraid they would stop loving her. Celes did his best trying to calm her down, but it wasn't working.
"Arthur… I've lost everything…"
Katherine cried silently while whispering sadly over Arthur's shoulders, he embraced her and let her cry, caressing her hair and comforting her.
"You will be able to pull through… I know you will."
He tried to comfort her, but Katherine was similar to Ming Lee.
"Without this power I am nothing, Arthur… My parents.. they will… they will hate me, or even kick me out…"
"T-There's no way they will do that if they love you!"
"B-But I don't even know if they do… or if they only loved my powers…"
"K-Katherine…"
In a world where the entire population are just normal humans, where nobody is guaranteed classes and skills like in Yggdrasil, things were much more different.
A single Dream Weapon separated a normal human from a Dream Warrior, and it also gave them a completely different future and even treatment in society.
To Arthur, it felt illogical, as if a single skill someone had somehow made them more important in the whole world, and without it they were nothing.
That simply made no sense to him, and it made him angered… This world was crueler than he had imagined.
"…"
Maria didn't know what to say right now, she mostly remained in silence. She had revived them and that was enough, whatever else they went through, it wasn't her problem.
And yet, Sofia held her hand as she looked at her with a smile.
"Sofia?" She asked, confused.
"Can you help me cheer them up?" Sofia asked. "They went through something similar to me… I also lost my Dream Heart, right? And yet, I ended up obtaining a new little friend. I think they might be able to as well! I know it is a small chance, perhaps there's no chance at all either but… I want to give them some hope, even if it is small. Because even the smallest light of hope is much better than the darkness of despair."
"Wow… Nice saying, where did you get that?" Maria giggled a bit.
"I-I just made it up on the spot! Pretty good huh?" giggled Sofia. "Anyway, we have to help them."
"I know," Maria nodded. "Let's go tell them then. I did infuse them with as much dream energy as possible, so it is within them. I can feel something… Perhaps not in a Dream Heart, not in a crystal anymore, but within them, just like your own Dream Spirit."
"I see…" Sofia nodded. "Then there's no reason to not tell them then! Let's do it."
Maria and Sofia walked towards the three revived students, explaining to them what Sofia had gone through, something that Sofia would've preferred to be a secret.
However, once she told them that she also lacked a Dream Heart and had a Dream Spirit, they were left speechless.
They simply couldn't believe her words!
"W-We can obtain… Spirits?" Eduard wondered. "How is this done? Can we do it right now?"
"I don't know exactly how it happened, but I think they're triggered based no our emotions and our dreams," explained Sofia. "All three of you got Dream Essence inside of your bodies now, so a Dream Spirit could be born from it, with enough dreams and effort."
"Dreams and efforts?" Katherine asked. "But how exactly?"
"I don't know how either…" Ming Lee muttered. "W-What do I do, Celes?"
"I don't know…" Celes sighed.
"W-Well, there's no time to talk anymore. We'll tell you and help you later, alright?" Maria asked. "This is not the time to be sad anymore! And- Ah! Look!"
Maria suddenly realized a large boat was approaching their island, where many professors from the academy and several other Professional Dream Warriors and Police Officers came along.
"Students! We received a report of a Nightmare Demon attack!"
"Are you alright?!"
"Let's bring them back to a hospital!"
"Hurry, hurry!"
At the end, the conversations ended abruptly as everyone was carried back to the Island, where the Academy was.
After they were given a medical checkup and explained everything that happened and what they went through, with some stuff skipped over, they were allowed to go back to their dorms.
What could've been a great tragedy luckily became something of lesser tragedy, although for those three without Dream Hearts, it might've felt like their entire world fell apart on them.
However, Maria knew that it was still better than just being dead, that's for sure.
"And even less being eaten by whatever that thing was…"
There were more mysteries left to be solved than Maria imagined.
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