CH 10

A dragon without a head. A maid without a head. The numerous severed heads she saw in the river. 

‘Ah, I think I know something.’ 

Sonidor found a common denominator in Marmel’s seemingly insane dream. 

“Snake, should I eat this?” 

Marmel asked, picking up the apple from the tray and lightly tossing it upwards. It was a very appetizing apple that made her mouth water just by looking at it.

“Hmm?,” he said, a languid smile appearing on his clear lips.

‘Are you asking me that now?‘ Sonidor hissed in response. He wished to communicate with a snake. Her head moved up and down, and left and right as she faced his shining, sculpture-like face. ‘Eat it. Don’t eat it. Eat it. Don’t eat it.‘ She couldn’t believe she became a reptile, and not even a mammal, and she was dissatisfied with the fact that she couldn’t even make a single coherent sound in response.

Knowing what to read from her insincere reply, Marmel raised the corners of his mouth and grabbed the fruit at once. In an instant, a dark, red juice dripped from the fruit he crushed in his grasp. 

Sonidor stopped moving and broke out in a cold sweat for a moment. ‘I don’t know if a snake can break out into a cold sweat, but that’s how it feels…‘ Perhaps a flower patterned snake will be newly added to the Crown Prince’s collection of headless creatures. No matter the fact that she was in a dream, she completely rejected the idea of her head being separated from her body. She stopped messing around, and nodded her head obediently. 

“Eat it?” 

Nod. 

“Hmm.” 

Even if she answered, he still seemed dissatisfied. 

‘Wasn’t that the answer you wanted? Since he’s clearly decided on an answer, should I give him the answer he wants?‘ As Sonidor tried to shake her head this time, Marmel’s face contorted slightly. It was a very small change, but for some reason he seemed very discontented. 

Marmel asked as he tossed and caught the fruit that was dripping juice everywhere. 

“I’ll say it again, snake. Should I eat this? 

He asked twice. Even the most ignorant person would probably know at this point – the prince did not want to eat that fruit. Sonidor, who had been staring at it, suddenly realized. That fruit wasn’t just any fruit, not in his dream.

‘It’s the source.’

Any object or person that provides new information in a dream she called a source. Usually, the source was hidden like a hint in various places in a dream. To put it simply, it was like bread crumbs that lured one deeper inside the sleeper’s consciousness. However, this was the first time someone was asking about the source openly like that. ‘Is it a lucid dream? Do you even know how it works?‘ 

Her reptilian, glittering eyes flashed for a moment and took on a different colour. 

“Do you know what will happen when you eat it?” 

And when she spoke, the Prince was surprised.

It was the first time she became an animal in a dream, so now she knew how it felt speaking as an animal. Rather than the feeling of moving her mouth to speak, it was closer to the feeling of directly conveying her intentions to the other person. It was annoying, being in a reptilian state for two consecutive dreams, but it wasn’t so hopeless if it was possible for her to communicate. 

“You can speak?” 

Marmel made a surprised face for a moment. Then he suddenly burst into laughter. It was the most delightful of his appearances Sonidor had ever seen. He, who had been laughing for a long time, looked down at her with an expression that suggested he was suppressing laughter.

“A talking snake. There is nothing like that in my paradise.” 

Sonidor wanted to ask why, but she was be able to anticipate the answer that would somehow come back. ‘That’s because they all have no necks, so they can’t speak.‘

‘Haa, His Highness is a person who enjoys silence.‘ It seemed he had found the seed of becoming a rare tyrant, not a saint who will never exist again like many people of the empire said. The future of the empire seemed to be truly bleak when the rich were not just wealthy, but also tyrannical. 

Marmel asked in a confident tone. 

“You must have come from outside. Are you a really a snake?” 

As expected, the Prince seemed to have already guessed that she was not actually here. Sonidor pondered for quite some time whether it was okay to reveal her identity. In a normal case, it was taboo to say that ‘this is a dream’ in a client’s dream, and that she was not truly here. Beings within the sleeper’s dream would try to harm her if she broke the taboo. 

In order for that fact not to be discovered, Sonidor automatically turned into an existence from the memory of the sleeper. However, in the case of the Crown Prince, the story was different. Not only did he know that this place was a dream, he had no existence precious to him, and he was crazy. It would have been only a matter of time before he noticed that she was from the outside world. ‘If so, wouldn’t it be okay to break the taboo? I don’t know how the beings in the will dream will react, but it’s a gamble worth taking.‘

She’d rather reveal her identity and ask him to wake up from his dream. It was the quickest and easiest way for the request to end. 

“I am not a being of the paradise that Your Highness is talking about, nor am I a snake.”

“Then what, you mean you’re a person? How the hell did you get here?” 

She whispered as if she were telling a great secret. 

“I am Sonidor, the dream artisan.” 

“A dream artisan? Are you an artisan who can enter dreams? It’s amazing. Did His Majesty call for you?” 

“You are correct. I’m here to wake you up from the deep slumber you are under.”

Suddenly, Marmel whistled softly and covered her mouth with his thumb and forefinger. Sonidor, who almost bit his tongue for a moment, looked up at him in surprise. He was silent for a moment, only raising the corner of his mouth, then nodded at the headless maid. He whispered in a low voice, raising his wrist wrapped around the Sonidor close to his face. 

“I just felt a strong murderous intent. It looks like it wants to kill you.” 

The maid had no head, but it seemed like she was looking straight in Sonidor’s direction. She couldn’t say anything because she didn’t have a neck, she just twisted her body, but that made her even more terrifying. Sonidor, who was frightened for a moment, tightened around Marmel’s wrist with her body. 

“W-why all of a sudden?” 

“Looks like she was responding to your words.”

‘What do you mean?‘

As though he had read her mind, he continued. 

“It seems that even though she can’t talk because she doesn’t have a head, she can still hear, strangely enough.” 

‘What…that’s scary. So she heard our whole conversation?‘ Her body shrank and she whispered in Marmel’s ear. 

“I thought it would be okay since Your Highness seemed to know everything. As expected, beings in the dream will try to kill me if I break the taboo.” 

“Taboo? What is?” 

“So this place is… No, I mean where we are…” 

Sonidor had never revealed information like this to a client in their dream. There was a time when she used acting skills comparable to that of a theatre actor. However, Marmel seemed to know better the rules of this world, which he called paradise, so she confided in him everything. If she approached him honestly from her side, he might open up to her, by giving her information about him, or making a sincere resolve to wake up. 

“It doesn’t matter if you say it’s a dream. Even though you said it was a dream before, she didn’t show any reaction.” 

“Yes. I was so relieved…” 

“I know that this is a dream. And they recognize that I know.” 

Marmel shrugged and said. 

“I think the problem is probably the word you were trying to say next.” 

Sonidor thought about that and remembered what she had been trying to say earlier. What she was trying to say was that she had come to awaken His Highness from a deep slumber at His Majesty’s request. The only word that could be taboo there was ‘awaken’. Then, were they afraid of Marmel waking up from his dream? 

Beings from a dream were usually most afraid of a sleeper finding out that it was a dream. They could only exist in a dream, so they were angry that the reality they were living in was instantly turned into an illusion by the sleeper. If Sonidor reminded Marmel that it was his dream, the maid would go on a rampage to kill them both.

But what is going on here? Marmel knew that this place was a dream. Even so, leaving him alive meant that it’s okay for him to know that they are imaginary beings, but they didn’t want to disappear? ‘When he wakes up from his dream, their existence would disappear. ‘

Sonidor hit her forehead with her tail. Although she had been a dream artisan for 10 years, it was the first time in her life that her work was such a headache. 

“They aren’t normal, so it would be best not to mention that word. As you said, as long as you’re careful with the taboos, they won’t harm you. They’re stupid like that.”

“Thank god.”

“But sometimes they can be sharp.”

“Which one is it?”

“There’s nothing wrong with being careful.” 

‘Could it be that the Prince saved me?‘ She was slightly impressed by the unexpected help. She had treated him like a crazy person, and she was starting to feel sorry about that now. He might’ve just been someone who had very unique taste and genuinely thought that this kind of scenery was a paradise.

However, at Marmel’s following words, Sonidor immediately gave up her thoughts.

“I have a lot of questions to ask you, but it would be difficult if you died in my dream.’ 

It seemed that a crisis had barely passed, and a new crisis had now struck. Sonidor let out a hollow laugh inwardly. ‘Haha, damn it.‘ Marmel’s face changed in an instant. His serious look was different from when he asked her a trivial question about whether or not to eat the apple. The Prince muttered as he stared at Sonidor, who was hissing in bewilderment.

“Did you know?”

“Wh-what?”

“You know.”

It was no longer a question. He seemed to be hinting at something that should have been obvious to Sonidor.

‘No way, are there more ways that I could die in this dream??’

But Marmel foretold her future.

“That if His Majesty has called on you directly, you will end up dead.” 

It was a very pessimistic future.

“But, he said I would survive if I saved you-”