This morning, before I woke up, I had a very vivid and amazing dream that has captivated my attention. It was just as realistic as my account of the dream in which I was a Japanese artist and author writing the book of Chou Lin.

This time I was a young boy around the age of 8 or 10. I had hair like I did when I was around that age; dark brown and being just long enough to stop above my eyebrows. I was traveling with my younger sister who was a few years younger than me. I don’t think she was really my sister since her hair was dark blond and its length ran halfway down her back. I think she considered her like my sister since we grew up together and often only had each other to play with. We were both dressed in what could be considered casual clothes for children of that age but had been dirtied from sleeping on the ground and journeying where we had. We were alone in the woods together and had been for a long time (probably several days or weeks). It was as if we had been transported into another dimension similar to our own, but with an air of mystical nature to it. We had found some tarps for a tent that we used like ponchos to stay dry in the rain, and as blankets when cold. We had no idea where the people where who had been using them for their camp, but they seemed to have been discarded and the if it was a campsite where we found them, it hadn’t been used in ages for it looked nearly void of anything else but some trudged up dirt as if animals and nature had taken over the site. Despite our serious dilemma, my sister liked to play around and imagine herself some princess with her tarp wrapped around her like a royal gown or regal cape. This often annoyed me as I was trying to shoulder the burden of the responsible grownup. I would sometimes yell at her for being so childish but knew it was her way of forgetting the miserable situation we were in. In truth, we had no idea what we were searching for or where to find it. All we had was a necklace of a dragon or griffin talon clutching a small blue crystal orb. We knew it would help point the direction as at times it would sway like a magnet towards its attractant.

As we ventured through the forest we eventually came upon a large lack with an enormous hill on its bank opposite of where we stood. We noticed the pendant begin to give a faint glow and knew right away that we had to get to the top of that hill. We began rounding the lake, admiring the beautiful scenery along the way. It seemed to take forever to reach the base of the hill that had seemed so close at first; It’s presence now that of a looming mountain. We searched its base for a way up and eventually found a hill, deep in the wood, gradual enough for us to walk up. It was beginning to get dark and started to rain so we decided to rest for the night under the tarps we had found. By morning the sky was clear again with bright white clouds dotting the sky. The treetops helped to hide the sun that seemed to gleam through the swaying branches. Once we set off it wasn’t too long till we reached one of the flat part sections that lay part way up the hill. There where wide clearings as if trails had been made, leading in both directions around the hill. My sister pointed out that the pendant around my neck had begun to point in the direction of the right path. I took it from around my head and held it in front of us, allowing it to lead the way. We eagerly picked up pace and followed the trail till something change in the scenery. It was as if we crossed through an invisible curtain and where back in the real world. The trail we had been following became a paved street but there was no sign of traffic or people. The pendant was pulling even stronger towards something on the other side of the street so we continued to follow its direction. As we stepped onto the street, I noticed in the distance a white van coming our way. I glanced at the fat, black skinned, driver who wore a look of astonishment on his face. As we reached the other side of the road I could hear him stop his vehicle and step out at if to confront us seemingly homeless children who had ventured from the forest. But it seems that as we set foot on the grass again, we had vanished as I heard the man’s shocked and distant sounding words of, “What the hell?”

At this point, the pendant was tugging even harder and seemed to fight to free itself from the bonds of the black string that held it in my grasp. The man from the real world did not seem to be following us, or perhaps, he could not follow us. Without a second though to this my sister and I followed the direction the pendant pulled towards; eventually being led to what looked like the villa or manor for a castle. The glow of the pendant had begun to pulse and its pull so strong I had to hold it tight with two hands for fear of it flying from my hands. It thrashed and spun on the string as I held it tight; not wanting to let go of our only direction of truth. It pulled so strongly towards the manor that I begin to run, not caring if my sister was following behind me or not. I was too anxious to see what lay at the end of our quest. I ran over the grass and stone walkways not caring if there were guards patrolling the premises. As I neared the back side of the manor I noticed a voice that sounded like a maiden’s call. Its gentle tone soothed and enchanted me like a mother singing a lullaby to her child. The voice seemed to be coming from within a small hedge garden on the backside of the manor. The soothing chords of the song pulling me towards it just as the pendant tugged towards our goal. I knew that whoever was singing this lovely melody was the same thing the pendant had been leading me and my sister towards. I expected to see a beautiful young princess in her teens as I rounded the final statue lined hedge. I had this feeling that she had been waiting for me this entire time and her song was that of a signal to come find her. But as I would have caught my first glance of her, I awoke; her song echoing in my head as I ponder this vivid dream.

*I would like to note that the van in the dream seemed to be a van for the Comcast Company, and its driver resembled Cedric Kyles (aka – Cedric the Entertainer). Along with this, the song sung by the woman at the end of the dream was Melodies of Life from the video game, Final Fantasy 9. However, this version of the song was without the lyrics but instead with the Lo’s and La’s of someone simply voicing the tune.