“Don’t say gibberish!” Ryutaro boomed, raising the tone of his voice. He slammed the palm of his hand on the surface of the tome with a decisive gesture, releasing another cloud of greyish dust.

The sudden noise scared Yoichi, ever closer to the idea that Ryutaro was just an old war veteran maddened by loneliness. ​​

“No one besides me owns this book, boy. It is a gift from Emperor Tatsui Nishiyama. This sacred tome tells the true story of Lumya’s first dragon lineage and was handed down by all the Emperors of the Nishiyama dynasty”, the gatekeeper spoke, gradually lowering the tone of the voice. “Tatsui considered his son Shinzo unworthy of such knowledge, which is why he entrusted it to me. No one knows and understands dragons like me, Yoichi.”

Somehow, the words spoken by the old monk made the young tamer reason. Although he seemed to be saying nonsense, what he insinuated about Kenji did not deviate too much from reality. When Yoichi stopped countering Ryutaro’s claims, the monk continued to speak.

“Your skepticism does you credit, young warrior. However, faith is what makes a simple man the strongest of tamers,” he added, resting the book on the mat behind him. Soon after, he extended a hand forward, waiting for Yoichi to grab it.

Ryutaro’s hand was wide: his long, wrinkled fingers, ruined by a thousand scars, narrated the battles fought for the people of Tentochu. The fingertips were so worn out that the fingerprints have been erased. Despite the age of the gatekeeper, his hand did not tremble like that of any other older man. It was confident and motionless.

“Give me your hand, boy. I’m going to show you something, and you’re going to tell me what you’ll see,” he affirmed, asking Yoichi to touch his hand.

The tamer’s curiosity exceeded his hesitancy and, after thinking it over and over, he put his hand on that of the gatekeeper. Both their hands remained suspended for a few seconds above the body of water of the stone sink.

With extreme delicacy, Ryutaro closed his fingers, squeezing Yoichi’s hand. Slowly, as if he were performing a sacred ritual, he plunged it into the water.

When the surface of the water reached his wrist, the old monk let it go, pulling out his wet hand. Unprecedented magic enveloped Yoichi’s full body: his head dangled forward, and his mind entered a stasis as if someone had disconnected the power cord from his body.”

…

His perception of things broke away from reality, and his spirit distanced itself from his body. Observing the process with his own eyes, Yoichi saw his soul being catapulted into that cold water, so deep that it looked like an ocean.

Suddenly, he found himself wrapped in thick darkness. Flying through space at an almost supersonic speed, his every movement seemed to last only a few moments. As after an explosion, the darkness disappeared, and Yoichi’s body was catapulted to another dimension.

“Ouch! Pff… pff!” – Regaining his senses, he clasped his hands, sinking them into dense, hot sand. Spitting the same sand from his mouth, Yoichi knelt down, trying to wipe his face and open his eyes.

With his heart beating wildly, the young tamer had trouble opening his eyes. Strong light illuminated the surrounding environment, and his sight took longer than usual to focus on the landscape.

Sand dunes were regularly repeated themselves up to the horizon, illuminated by the hot midday sun. The same sand as that arid desert covered half his legs, which were sinking under his bodyweight.

“Aargh! What the fuck!” Yoichi gasped, pulling his legs out of the sand and rolling down the dune. When his feet managed to stay in balance on that soft, malleable surface, the young tamer looked around frantically, coughing and covering his eyes from the intense sun rays.

“What the fuck is going on? What is this place? Ryutaroo! Ryutaroooo!” he screamed, using all the breath in his lungs, calling for help. The desert extended in every direction, beyond his field of view. A moment earlier, Yoichi was in the highest room of the Goldhaven Dojo; a moment later, he was in the middle of a desert as vast as a sand ocean.

“This is not possible, what kind of magic is this? Damn old man, what did you do to me?” Yoichi panicked, starting to walk forward aimlessly. “Kenji! Where are you, buddy? Where did you go? Kenjiii!” he kept yelling, placing his hands beside his mouth to limit the dispersion of his voice.

The warm wind changed the shape of the dunes, whose grains made a slight noise sliding on each other. Besides those muted sounds, that desert was devoid of anything other than sand.

“This is a fucking nightmare. Kenji! Kenji!”

Noticing that time kept flowing, but nothing happened around him, Yoichi stopped screaming, trying to refocus. Sweat began to flow copiously from his forehead due to the excessive heat of the desert. Looking at the rest of his body, the young tamer noticed that he was wearing his standard clothing.

The mawashi he was wearing when he had woken up in Ryutaro’s room had disappeared. Through that observation, he finally realized that he was within a vision despite the heat and the real sensations he was feeling.

That desert was a parallel world, the material manifestation of his thoughts or those of someone else. Regularizing his breath, as he used to do every time he had to keep calm, Yoichi affirmed aloud, “Ildriss!” summoning his Oracle.

Waiting for the strong burning to burst into his chest, he shut his eyes, hardening all the body muscles to increase pain resistance. After about five seconds, he opened his eyes again.

Besides from the wind and sand, nothing had moved around him. “Ildriss! Ildriss!” Yoichi called again, beginning to lose hope. His eyes kept looking around, hoping something would happen.

Just as the sun was dulling his sight and hope was about to abandon him, a sudden sound broke the silence of the desert.