The Dream & The Awakening

1st of Deepwinter, 1 AW

“Blood! I taste blood....why is there blood in my mouth?” The thoughts passing through my mind as the darkness of unconsciousness fades from me and is replaced by this stale coppery taste and a pain that seems to ebb from the center of my head. Wincing from the pain, I slowly open my eyes and am filled with a sense of confusion and dread. Before me is sight one could call amazing if it were not for the dread that fills my heart upon looking at it. I am in an alien land it seems.

Looking about in all directions, I behold a sickly green sky without a wisp of any notable clouds nor any stars, while bright enough to see, I know not the time of day. Far below me, down what appears to be a mountain or a large mound I stand on, rests an ink stained land – pitch black without an ounce of color, that is unknown the wind blows across it. To my surprise this land, I had thought it to be, is a sea – vast and wide before my eyes and a deep sinking fear settles in my stomach as I think what might lie below its obsidian surface. As the wind blows, I can make out its direction to what little good that does to me. The water crests in soft waves and foams in grayish hues upon the cliffs of my mountainous host.

A shimmering of metal and stone catches my eye and I focus upon it, after a moment I see clearly something that I can swear was not there a moment prior; A vast pyramid made of what appears to be masterfully cut and carved stone as well as both braced and adorned by sections of metal. It is of incomparable size and seems to rest upon the surface of the midnight sea below it. Soon the fear that sits in my belly swells to consume my conscious thoughts as a strange chanting flows forth from the structure. The language strange and unlike any I've ever heard, chills me with each word and repetition, but I do not know why a sound would cause such a reaction within me.

"Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn"

Desires to flee and hide run rampant in my mind. Though even if I wished to do so, in reality I cannot as there is nowhere to run. No trees to climb, no caves to hide within, no tunnels to crawl through, just an impossible leap off the edge of this spot into the rocky cliff below or into a black sea of unknown depth. Still, the chanting unnerves me to such a degree I rather dig a hole and put my head in it – as those thoughts crossed my mind the world around me darkens rapidly. As it dawns on me, I shoot a glance upwards to see pitch-black clouds forming across the grim viridescent sky until just the barest bit of it remains. Without much time to react, a distant thunder announced the coming torrent in which I found myself soaked by the black rain that fell.

Wet, cold, afraid, and alone I remain standing in that spot, frozen with confusion and uncertainty. Suddenly bright azure lightning burnt the sky before my eyes. Just before the echoing thunder that followed, in that moment I saw something – something so indescribable that it filled me with an overwhelming sense of hopelessness as well as a moment of warmth as piss flowed down my leg. Overcome by this feeling I fall to my knees and tears flow uncontrollably down my cheeks. I remain silent, despite a desire to scream over and over but my burning throat prevents me. I try to close my eyes and place my hands over my ears, but it avails to nothing as more lightning rains down across the bleak scene before me – each flash giving me just the briefest of horrible moments to gaze upon a thing of the unknown. My mind addled and dread consuming me, I escape into the relative safety of the darkness of unconsciousness.

Awakening in the mud where I blacked out in, the rain continued to fall but now gently unlike before while the sky around me remained dark – one thing stood out, the chanting no longer could be heard. Slowly I arose out of the mud while holding myself, my mind still trying to make sense of what it seen and failing, I stood on the edge of the cliff and searched the darkness for the pyramid once more. Slowly my eyes grew more accustomed the world they now resided in and could see just the slightest of glimmers from the metalwork on the pyramid. Though, something stirred within me once more, a feeling of unease that caused a tensing of my leg muscles to coil as if to prepare me to spring away at a moment's notice. “The body always seems to know before the mind does,” those words echoed briefly in my moment as the first reverberation of a great drum called forth across the water toward me. No doubt in my mind it came from the pyramid and before long several more followed the first. I fell once more to my knees as dread sank its teeth into me again upon hearing what came next, the chanting renewed but more aggressive and louder – its words different and seemingly with a new purpose. More voices, more purpose as the drums lead them in unison. Hope was fading from my mind that I would ever get to leave this place and fearing that perhaps even death would not be enough though it would at least hopefully grant some brief respite if not eternal solace.

I crawl toward the edge and peer down into the abyss before me and ponder my choice as the chanting suddenly stops and the drumming continues in very precise patterns. Looking up with a furrowed brow, I stare forward toward the pyramid in a vain attempt to see what is going on – what I see is a massive flailing tentacle of a beast whose size must be impossibly large. This tendril flies forth toward me before crashing into the water shy of my mount, sending me scrambling back in shrieks of terror and hyperventilation. In a dark, ancient voice – speaking in the same tongue as the chanters, a disembodied voice's calling to me – complete hopelessness flooded my mind and I scream before blacking out once more.

15th of Deepwinter, 1 AW

"What in the nine hells is going on?"

I've lost count of how many variations of those words I've heard over the past fortnight, some more colorful than others. It is one thing to dream of madness, but something entirely more dreadful to wake up in it. To slumber beneath Selûne one night, and then to awaken under a deep green sky, speckled with constellations completely alien to the eye. Hundreds of us, or perhaps many more than that, torn from our beds, tents, ships, and thrown here, scattered and lost.

We call it The Awakening. The morning when countless Faerunian souls sprang awake all at once. Every one of us having shared the same dream - though no two people I have met experienced it in the same way. Some met the dream with confusion, others terror, and some yet with a manic form of delight. I take no shame in admitting the sense of horror that dream filled me with, and I expect it will chill me to think back on until my last breath.

I have identified no rhyme or reason behind those who awoke here. There are many representatives from all races, and all walks of life. Young and old. Wealthy and poor. Sick and healthy. The vilest of Drow, and the noblest of Aasimar. Many killed each other the first day. By the second day the violence ended and was replaced with a daze of confusion, and dread. Dread that none of us knew where we were, and not even the wisest mages and priests I've crossed could explain how to get home.

Home. I fear that is what this place must now become for us. The awoken found themselves with only what they had on them as they went to sleep. But some were luckier than others, taking with them entire houses, estates, or wagons full of goods. Others awoke with no possessions at all, as nude as they were when they drifted to sleep.

Strangest of all, is how this place seems to exist out of time. When I drifted to sleep for the last time under Selûne, it was 1372 DR. Some of the others I have met have claimed the same, and others yet talk of a Spellplague in 1390 DR, or tell me they drifted off in 1350 DR, before even the Time of Troubles. Yet priests I have encountered of gods I know to be dead tell me their prayers are still answered - even if their deities have not revealed to them yet a path to salvation.

Perhaps my most troubling thought is that no matter where I walk, I will find no roads. No one to ask for directions. My compass tells me I am headed east. That will have to do.