Finn floated.
Not on water. Not in air.
But in something heavier—thicker. A current made of dreams, not his own. They moved around him in slow, viscous tides, brushing his skin like silk and ash. They whispered as they passed, each one a fragment, a sliver of a soul.
He was no longer in the corridor. No longer being dragged. The castle had opened like a mouth, and he had fallen inward.
Now he drifted through its stomach.
A hollow void filled with lightless stars.
Each one pulsed softly in the black, a dying ember of thought. A dream that once was—a life, a hope, a yearning.
And the King had devoured them all.
Finn's breath caught as the first one brushed his face.
It was a child's dream.
Simple. Innocent.
A toy soldier held aloft in tiny fingers. A wooden horse. Laughter echoing from a memory long turned cold.
It vanished as soon as he touched it.
The next dream collided with his chest. This one burned hotter. It seared across his skin.
A man. Battle-scarred. Desperate. Charging into a hopeless war, sword drawn, screaming a name that no longer existed. His family, perhaps? His love?
Gone now. Nothing left but the echo of a final cry and the sickening crunch of bones breaking.
Finn recoiled—but there was no retreat. The dreams kept coming.
A woman curled on a rooftop under a sky of stars that no longer shone. She sang a lullaby to a baby who had never been born. The melody was too beautiful to exist in a place like this. And for a moment, Finn wept.
Not for the King.
Not for the Hollowed.
But for her. For the dream that had meant something.
Then it, too, was gone.
There were millions of them.
Too many to comprehend.
He could feel them. Layers upon layers, woven together like rotting silk. Entire generations—men and women, children and elders, warriors and poets, rebels and dreamers—all eaten. All stripped of meaning and filed away in the King's insatiable belly.
The dreamscapes twisted around him now. Not fragments, but full visions.
He stood in a city made of glass towers that reached into stars. He blinked—and the towers were ash, buried under chains and screaming. He saw a boy holding a flower, running to give it to his mother—then crushed beneath hooves. A king kneeling before a god, begging to save his kingdom. A girl staring into a mirror, wondering if her reflection would ever smile back.
So many dreams.
So many souls.
All of them stolen.
All of them devoured.
And Finn saw what had become of them. The King had not simply eaten them. He had replaced them. Overwritten them.
In their place, the same dream, repeated again and again:
Him.
The King, bathed in gold.
The King, faceless and perfect.
The King, always watching.
In every stolen mind, He stood—unchallenged, eternal. They had not only lost their dreams. They had been filled with His.
This was His power.
Not war. Not death.
But consumption. He did not destroy. He rewrote.
He made them need Him.
Finn screamed—and this time, the sound actually echoed.
And the dreams heard him.
They paused in their orbit. Just briefly. Just enough for him to feel it.
They recognized something in him. Not hope. Not power.
But resistance.
And something changed.
The dreams began swarming.
Not attacking. Not welcoming.
Showing.
A flood of lifetimes rushed into him.
Finn saw through thousands of eyes.
He was a prisoner in a cell, carving prayers into stone. He was a mother who died holding her stillborn child. He was a knight dragging a sword too heavy to lift. A traitor laughing at his own hanging. A child running from fire. A healer drowning in blood. A monster praying for forgiveness.
Each soul screamed their last breath into him.
Each life branded itself into his skin.
Finn shattered.
He was no longer just himself. He was a mosaic of broken people.
And behind it all… he felt the King watching.
No words. No movement.
Just acknowledgment.
Like a chef noticing someone step into his kitchen.
Finn dropped to his knees—on what ground, he didn't know. The dreamspace twisted, crackling with static and flame. He clutched his head, screaming, the flood of lives pouring through him too fast, too much.
And yet—
And yet—
He held on.
Because he had seen the truth.
These were not just the King's meals.
They were his weakness.
Each one was a scar the King couldn't hide. Each one was proof that he needed to feed to exist. That without the dreams of others, he was nothing.
And Finn?
Finn was still here.
He was still whole.
Still hungry—but not for surrender.
He stood, body trembling, soul cracked and fraying.
The dreams drifted around him now, orbiting like moons. Watching. Waiting.
Finn didn't know what came next.
But he knew one thing for sure.
He was no longer alone in the belly of the beast.