[4.4] The Dream Home Date

"Are you sure about this?" Asked Teru. Was he even supposed to be here?

"Positive!" Keina twirled around as she clapped her hands.

A familiar, neon pastel pink chalk outline of a castle stood raised before them, the only source of light in the dusty blackness surrounding them.

Teru had only seen this place once, very briefly, when he first became lucid, and his dream about being on the moon faded away. But he had never actually been inside, or even had a good look around here.

He still didn't really understand what this castle even was. It looked off from anything else he's seen in the dreams with her. 

It looked more like some kind of abstract art piece or spiritual afterlife relic than an actual place for humans to inhabit.

It clearly wasn't trying to even remotely emulate real life.

The most that he understood, vaguely, was that underneath all of the dreams they shared and the dates they had was this castle.

The exact process, he had no clue. Neither did Keina, nor even Yumeppo.

Perhaps it was like the backstage of a theater play, the system behind the scenes that kept everything together unbeknownst to the audience. Or the algorithm in procedurally generated games.

Keina had somehow taken him here from the grand library.

To this castle that was, in a sense,

her home.

"I feel like more of a squatter, really." She mused as they ascended the steps.

A sign also resembling a chalk sketch stood outside the gate, before a vague outline of a drawbridge and moat, as if it was meant for tourists explaining the site.

Keina Castle

"The squatter named the place after herself?" He chuckled a little.

"T-That was probably Yumeppo," Keina shook her hands. "He was like 'You should name the place after yourself-ppo'. It's a little embarrassing to use my name."

"I kind of get it." He pondered while looking at all the ribbons and frills that meticulously decorated the sign. "This is the place you first came to when this Dream began, right? It might as well be yours." Something like...

The Castle of the Host of the Dream.

"Sounds like a place from an anime." She giggled before looking up at the castle. "I still have a hard time believing that I was the one who made this."

"I don't really feel like I'm the homeowner. Or castle owner."

---

The interior of the castle didn't look any different from the outside, like a rough, non-transparent chalk sketch suggesting a regal architecture of hallways and doors. Vague shapes resembling paintings, pottery, and other decoration befitting an affluent home were randomly scattered about.

"This place is huge." Teru was in mild awe as they silently walked down the hall. Another recurring example of building interiors being far larger than what the outside could physically allow in real life.

The ground felt solid but gave nothing else away from their footsteps, as if it were well insulated against vibrations. 

"I'm surprised you don't get lost in here."

"I really only use like three rooms in this place." She scratched the back of her head. "There's my room, Yumeppo's room, and one door that goes to your school."

"So that's how you always meet me at my school so quickly." It sounded like a similar door to the one to his school rooftop. "You don't use the rest of the castle at all?"

Keina's eyes pondered his question. "Sometimes I go for a walk when I'm bored, and nobody's with me. But a good amount of this place is kind of... fake?"

"Like there's a lot of hallways that just lead back to where I started, and doors that just loop around, like this one—"

Keina slammed the door she had randomly chosen with both arms as soon as she opened it.

"What was in there?" Teru raised his brow.

"Nothing! Nothing at all." She yipped, her face notably red as she leaned back against the door she had just closed.

Teru tried to inch closer to that door, but she intercepted him before he could sneak a glimpse.

"But shouldn't the doors and layout be completely different whenever you're not here to perceive them?" He non-seriously struggled as she tugged him up a winding staircase.

"For some reason, those doors don't really move." Keina adjusted her grip on him so he wouldn't trip. "They're always in the same place, same with the entrance and staircase."

"Speaking of which, here we are!" She announced.

Two doors, down a straight hallway from each other.

It had the same chalk aesthetic as the rest of the castle, but the layout looked less like a natural part of the location and more like it was transplanted from someone's home.

Still a big home, to be fair.

One of the pink doors had the letter 'K' etched onto it.

"K for Keina?" She gave a thumbs-up.

The other had a slightly more messily scrawled 'Ý', as if somebody added onto it.

...Was the Y in his name accented? Like Ýumeppo?

"I guess he's not back yet. Yumeppo always leave his door open when he's around." The likely Ý vandal remarked as she turned the knob on her own door.

---

"Make yourself at home!"

Keina welcomed Teru into the 'K' door, beyond which was at complete odds with the rest of Keina Castle.

It actually looked like something that could exist in real life, and was more in line with the rest of the dreams. A cozy, simple aesthetic, with white drywalls, bright wood flooring and soft sunset lighting.

There was a window overlooking an urban neighborhood that could not be there if it respected the rest of the castle's layout.

"It's my real-life room! As much as I can remember, at least. Yumeppo helped me recreate it as close as possible." She proudly presented her space.

It was a normal bedroom.

It was... her bedroom.

Teru suddenly felt himself turning a self-conscious red as Keina guided him to a table on top of a circular carpet in the middle of the room, sitting with a stiff posture.

Was it okay for him to be in here? Especially after they almost...

"Of course you are! I invited you in after all." Keina, who was now in a hoodie and trousers, said matter-of-factly. Teru could've sworn he saw a flash of red before she plopped down across from him.

She pulled out something from behind her.

"Ta-dah!"

It was that accursed physics workbook from the library.

"You took that with you?!" He shifted back at his newest trauma as it was plopped on the table.

Keina giggled before explaining herself.

"I thought that the library might not have been the best place to get any work done. Like maybe all the details of that setting were causing too much noise, and that kept messing with the continuity of the contents.

"I can't promise that it won't still happen, but..." She flipped through the pages before finding the same question about the melting ice from before. No added details about salinity, and no nonsensical sections about trigonometry and viscosity.

"I thought since this castle is the purest form of the Dream, this is the best shot we have to look at any school things, if you really need to.

"I need to start looking at this stuff more too, since I'm going to have my own ronin arc when I wake up. So I figured we could work through it together! It'll be like... a group home study session! Or... an at-home date! Or a home hangout?

"But most of all... I want you to be able to relax as well, Teru."

Teru's eyes widened as Keina continued, softly.

"The adventures in all the places this castle helps make are always a joy with you...

"But if you have another day like today, where it's tough to keep going on, then we don't have to do anything sensational. We can just hang out and chill, no pressure.

"Just think of this place as your second home, Teru.

"And if life gets too much to bear, you can always come here."

The light from outside the window provided a backdrop of rays that almost made her seem angelic as she smiled.

Teru felt his heart swell, his eyes almost shimmering as all the tension in his body instantly evaporated.

How long had it been since someone was this considerate of him?

Nobody ever made his life difficult, but to have someone looking out for him like this..

"Come to think of it, since this is a dream, that kind of sounds like escap—"

He reached over to embrace her before she could finish her latest stray thought.

"Keina... Thank you."

She paused before she returned the hug, leaning in for a few precious moments before pulling back. "Any time."

"Now, let's see how hard these exam questions really are!" She pumped his fist as she shifted gears, a new vigor flowing through her as a pink pen popped up in her hand.

Teru let out a contented laugh as he held his own pencil, ready once more to tackle his work.

Together.