[EVENT] He comes again.

The faceless face grows a grin most mischievous. Its invisible eyes glare deep into the back of your mind, where your deepest thoughts and darkest desires manifest themselves. Your eyes see it not, but your mind's eye quivers with terror--or, perhaps, fills with glee.

"Under that mask," comes the faceless voice of an innocent boy, "Will you and I meet?" There comes a giggle, "I want to see your mask, though..."

Abruptly comes a stabbing pain at the outlines of your face, slicing, stabbing, penetrating deep into the flesh of your cheeks--ripping, tearing-- the gut-wrenching sound of torn flesh is only overtook by a soul-crushing howl of unimaginable agony. Of course, that squeal is your own. As the blood oozes down your neck, you see his face emerging from the gore where your visage once was. The Twister grows a grin most mischievous, as he claims your body as his own.

You startle awake, finding your body quivering; bumps have risen on every inch of your skin. Instinctively, you feel at your nose and lips, as if to reassure yourself that your form hasn't changed.

Just as relief begins to wash over you, you feel a cold chill running through your thighs. Looking down, a chord of fear strikes through your body as you gaze upon an oddity which you have never before perceived... It's small, yet, uncanny and profoundly disturbing in ways words can never describe.

Before you can examine it any further, that horrible, horrid, grotesque, chilling voice whispers with glee, "Trick? Or Treat?" ...And vanishes, never to be heard again... or so you had hoped. The twisted trickster chuckles with glee for the second, and hopefully last, time in your life.

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Choose one Trick: Bind, Handheld Illusion, Summon Keese, Torturing Strike, or Ventriloquism
- or-
Choose one Treat: Bomb Mask, Gibdo Mask, Hover Boots, Lens of Truth, or 20 Rupees

Take one of either, by making your choice known here. Wear your mask if you wish, or show me the hideous face underneath. Let me reassure you, you shall take only one... Only I am the trickster here.

Generosity is plentiful, for you have a full fortnight to make your decision.

I probably shouldn't drink before bed (open) I probably shouldn't drink before bed (close)

Yasmin shivered in her bed, jolting awake and looking around, lighting the candle next to her bed. That was... the freakiest nightmare she'd had in a while. She made sure to check every nook and cranny of her room. Maybe it was something she ate, or maybe she was just having a bad night, but she couldn't discount the possibility that some mage had been messing with her mind.

After a quick sweep, she satisfied herself that she was alone in her room, and she walked over to shut the window. It had been blown open by the wind, and the resulting draft had woken her. Once done with that, she set down her candle and ran her hand through her hair. "Nonsense," she said, "I'm a grown woman."

Right on cue, a blood-curdling scream echoed through the entire house. "Agnes?!" Yasmin wasted no time, immediately throwing herself into a feverish spin. As she came to a halt, she had changed from her nightwear into her combat clothes, and she pulled out one of her daggers before rushing out into the hallway. She made no sound as she approached the girls' room, and tried not to think of what she could find there as she gently pushed the door open and entered. The room was dark, so she didn't bother to make a light. Instead, she walked over to Hannah's bed. It was perfectly made and unused- and, more notably, it was empty. On a hunch, she also inspected Agnes's bed.

This time, the sheets were disturbed, and the bed in general showed signs of a struggle. Yasmin struck the sheets back and patted the mattress. There was nothing wet on it, and she smelt nothing particular, so she supposed it hadn't been stained with blood. That was a relief, at least. She shivered in the draft, realising the window in this room was open, too. Maybe something had happened and the girls had escaped through there? She walked over, leaning out to scan the surroundings. She saw nothing, so she shut the window. And just in time, too- as she did so, she saw reflected in the glass the ghastly appearance of a grotesque ghost, a skull-faced, blue-skinned creature covered head to toe in a long, white robe and bearing a lantern in one hand. The problem was, that it was using that lantern to shoot fire her way.

She dove, rolled away from the window, and got up, smashing her knife into the ghost. "You bedsheet from hell!" she screamed, "Where are my daughters?! What have you done to my little girls?!" She flew at it again, only for it to hold up its lantern and show her that not one but two little flames were dancing around inside it. On instinct, Yasmin interrupted her swing and dropped herself to the ground.

They are with me, the Big Poe said, And you will join me, too.

"Yasmin Shahnaz has never been caught," Yasmin said through gritted teeth. "And you will return my girls to me!" She was a thief, after all. It shouldn't be too hard to snatch that lantern from him. And then run to some mages who could help her save the girls... But first, the lantern. Yasmin launched herself at the Big Poe again, this time aiming for the neck as he wouldn't be fast enough to put the lantern between that, but was pushed away by an aura of bluish white flame. "Right," she muttered. She needed a way to get rid of that...

Her eyes fell on a length of rope that had been shoved under the girls' dresser, and she grabbed it, although not sure of what to do with it. Then, on instinct, she threw herself at the ghost one last time, planning to wrap it around his neck as she would with a target to suffocate. Another blast of fire came her way, but connected with the rope, where it remained... giving the hemp a bluish glow. She finished her attack, winding the rope tightly around the ghost's neck. It screeched, dropping the lantern, and Yasmin quickly caught it, setting it on the dresser. "Now then," she said, twirling her dagger in her hand. "I'll save them, don't you worry. As for you..." She saw a tiny little ball of red and purple light within the thing's chest. "You're getting out of my house. NOW!"

She leapt, dug her dagger into the ball of light... and woke up in her bed, panting like she'd just ran a mile.

A dream? ..."Agnes and Hannah," she muttered, leaping out of bed and running out into the hallway. As she shoved open her door, she heard a loud thud and a curse from her eldest, who had been hit in the head as she returned from the bathroom. "HANNAH!" Yasmin didn't stop to think, just ran over to hug the mage tightly.

"The heck, Yas?" Hannah muttered, but Yasmin gave her no answer even as Agnes wandered out into the hallway to see what the ruckus was about.

Yasmin Shahnaz obtained Bind.

The Next Nightmare (open) The Next Nightmare (close)

Again.

My dreams were rarely, if ever, pleasant. Most of them ended with my death. But lately they were becoming more numerous and strange. And, as the night of Allhallow's Eve approached, I found myself ever more troubled by them. At first, they were merely occasional dreams of that strange other world. They were odd, but not all of them bad; they were very much like still-lifes from a stranger's mind and story. But of late I was haunted by The Presence. I knew not what to call it, only that it filled me with a sense of absolute and primal fear, an unreasoning terror that I could not describe. If I were pressed to say why, I would have vague theories, but the strongest one being this:

It was intelligent. It was unfathomable. And it was hunting me. I could tell that, before this creature, I was but a plaything. I was prey.

I felt a rush of sympathy for any small creatures that were preyed upon by other, larger beasts, particularly those hunted by humans. That was how far the gap felt.

The dream would always go like this: I would be standing in a dark, cold place, alone, with no idea of how I got there. I would look around, hoping to find wherever I had come from last time. I would choose a direction in the vast blackness and start to walk, and walk, finding only more darkness and cold. I would gradually grow doubtful and wary. I would understand that I was going nowhere. And then came The Presence. I would feel Its eyes upon me, distantly hear its whispers, feel a chill, a wind from behind me. I would try to hasten my steps, I would run. And still I would go nowhere, and The Presence would grow ever closer, slowly, leisurely even in Its pace.

In only a few short nights I began to understand its amusement at my struggles. Every night would I flee, and every night would I fail. I would always awaken before it caught me, but every night it would be closer before I would escape into the world of the wakeful. I almost wished the blasted thing would just catch me already and be done with it.

And so, on Halloween, I had to shake the feeling of dread as the evening dragged on and I prepared for bed. I tried to tell myself that surely I was being foolish and superstitious. I tried to tell myself that it was childish to succumb to this... oneirophobia. But I did not succeed in allaying my fears. And after I finally fell asleep some time around the witching hour, I found that they were not misplaced.

It began like any other of the stalking dreams. But just when I decided on a direction, I felt The Presence for a moment. Then, for a second, nothing. I was deeply unnerved, turning and trying to locate it.

And then I was swept up, snatched up by the leg like a frightened hare, and feeling very much like one as well. I could do nothing but try to find my captor, watching with unseeing eyes as something, somewhere, giggled with the voice of a young boy. Something about the sound completely sapped my will. I saw now that not only was I entirely powerless before this being, I never had any chance of escape, if it did not wish it. So I was reduced to merely shivering of cold and fear in the unbreakable grasp of something I could not even comprehend.

"Are you afraid?"

Hearing a child's voice from nowhere, belonging to something that was quite clearly not a child, chilled me again. I could give no answer for my own shaking and chattering.

A satisfied giggle. "So stoic. Let's see what happens when you see something really fearful."

And like that, I was released.

No, not released. I was put into a new cage.

I was walking through a burning town. Broken, nonhuman bodies filled the streets. In a language I did not understand I heard screams of agony. I half-realized that they were humanoid and had bodies like granite. Then I found, slowly as is the way in dreams, that there was fighting. The stone-men and what looked like beast-men of all description. Boars and monsters cutting down and razing all they saw. As the stone men died before me, I knew not why, but I was consumed with grief and guilt.

Then I saw a new figure, and it filled me with dread. A dread different from the Presence from earlier. That had been alien, ancient, unknowable... this was brutal, powerful, dominating. An immense dark figure directing the monsters. When it saw me, it turned and fell upon me. A blade as big as I was sang through the air.

When Garvan--no, when I--and I have no idea from whence that name came--awoke my heart was making an earnest endeavor to leave my ribcage, and I was covered in a veil of sweat. I got up and washed my face. Nothing like last year, not yet.

But when I left for a walk to calm my mind, when the cold air and rain and harsh half-light hit my face, I swore I heard a ghostly laughter.

Garvan Gailarns gained 20 Rupees

Words (open) Words (close)

Over the dull crackle of campfire came the words, "Is there truly nothing you fear?"

Sienna glared softly at her brother, taking his question a bit more seriously this time. She soon found herself lost in thought, lost in reflection, as she glared into his eyes as solemnly as ever.

"...I'm sure you fear your armor getting rusty," Guy scoffed, turning away from her. "Or something like that."

"Fear... is something I felt as a child." Her eyes narrowed. "Unease; disgust; adrenaline... I feel these, still. Perhaps it has been too long since I felt true terror." She paused for a long moment, waiting for her brother to respond. He listened, but said nothing. There was no snarky comeback this time. It was uncanny. Both siblings stared into the fire, their backs to the endless darkness of the forest.

Sienna continued, "For decades, now, I awake with the thought, 'Today, I will die.'"

"As do I," Guy responded quickly, raising an eyebrow. "How can we live like this if we don't?"

"You would, I suppose. You feel it, then, don't you? Death feels like a mere hazard I want to avoid, not something to fear. It's all a game to us, isn't it?"

"A game?" Guy's eyes narrowed. Perhaps he did think of it that way, now. He knew, at one point in time, everything was far more serious. In his youth it was all a risk; there was peril and conquest, and there is still peril and conquest. Nothing had changed but his perception of it. Every week he still gambled his life for such trivial pursuits as glory and riches, and his earnings always ended up squandered. He knew his sister to be the same. "I suppose it is all a game," he admitted, to himself. "But... where you and I differ is that I still fear death. I fear losing my riches. I fear the loss of my friends, or their betrayal..."

"Friends, huh." Sienna's eyes turned towards her brother, and she chuckled softly. "I would be pissed if you died."

Guy smirked softly, meeting her gaze. It had been days since he heard anything but coldness out of that voice. "It's good to know you have a soul, still."

"Whatever's left of it," Sienna answered, indifferently. "My weapons will break. I have no riches. I have assets, but no friends. What I treasure above all--my own strength--will eventually decay or crumble, unless it is to be destroyed sooner. I live because my body tells me to live; I fight because my mind tells me to fight. That is why I have continued until now. That is how I will continue tomorrow. I have won every battle until now, but even I can accept that the battles against time and death are forever lost--and it is not something I fear."

For a long moment, nothing could be heard but the crackling of flames. Guy was drowning in his own thoughts, his concerns, spurred by his sister's words. He understood many things, he thought, but Sienna's simple and straightforward view always perplexed him. She had all the answers she would ever need, and--despite a thousand books read, Guy always had more mysterious and more questions which he feared he would never solve.

...

Sienna's fingertips ran across the smooth sheen of her gauntlets. Fear? Rust? A mere annoyance. She would keep living if everyone else in the world died. Even if her Wolfos died, it would be a mere inconvenience. Yet, somehow, the thought of her brother... or her sister... impaled upon the spear of a Moblin... the mere thought shot adrenaline through her veins, filled her mind with rage. She feared nothing for herself, but, perhaps, she began to realize, she feared something for the only two people that mattered. Just a little.

Momentarily, Sienna was tempted to kill Guy just so she didn't need to worry about him ever again. Her eyes moved to his, glaring softly.

"...Wh-what?"

Reflected in Guy's eyes, Sienna's face disappeared.

The faceless face grew a grin most mischievous. Guy could feel but not see his sister's eyes burrowing into his own, stabbing into the darkest reaches of his mind, only to rip out three words. The words ripped from his face, but in a horrid, twisted voice that was not his own.

"TRICK. OR. TREAT."

Guy grew a grin most mischievous. He cackled, wildly, before his voice distorted back into his own. Tears he couldn't cry burst from his eyes, as he cried out in horrid agony, "SIENNA...!! I-I'm sorry!"

A glaive shot out of Guy's chest, leaving his body dangling pathetically, impaled. Sap and fluids flowed from the twitching, gagging corpse... dribbling down the weapon, until they washed over Sienna's hand. Guy's corpse exploded apart into a sea of black, transforming into a sea of Keese that shot into Sienna from every direction, a thousand tiny voices all screaming into her ears.

"WHHHYYYYYYY!!!?!"

...

Sienna bolted upright. The fire was out. Several feet away. Guy was snoring softly against a tree trunk.

"Ugh, that bastard." Her eyes narrowed at him. "...I really hate Keese..."

...

Guy's eyes fluttered open. He grew a grin most mischievous. His hand outstretched. His palm exploded with a flash of darkness, revealing a newborn Keese resting upon his fingertips. A whisper flowed from his smirking face, "I knew you feared something, Sienna."

Guy gained Summon Keese, apparently.