Lincoln snapped his eyes open. It was pitch black all around him, despite it being a moonlit night just before.

Immediately, he could tell that something heavy and sturdy covered his body, something heavier than the blankets he was certain were covering him only a little while earlier. He wearily raised his hand to his face, surprised to see a padded glove raise up in return, and some metal plating, laced together with leather straps, on the rest of his arm.

With a degree of trepidation he pulled himself up, the weight on his outfit shifting down with gravity. At a glance, he could tell he was wearing some kind of medieval armour. Metal vambraces were mostly obscured by the gloves he was wearing, as was the breastplate, hidden behind an orange tabard. His legs and upper arms also had plate armour, reflecting a dull orange light. On his left hip, in a scabbard anchored to his belt, was an unremarkable sword of some kind. Lying next to him was a heater shield with a similar pattern to his tabard, but purple instead of orange.

"What the…?" he spent a moment studying his armour before deciding to work out where the hell he was. Nothing but utter darkness surrounded him, except for the light from a very large campfire, its eerily dull light covering a large area. Six pinpricks of fire dotted around the campfire, held in place by six deep-blue candles. Lying around the campfire were a few other figures, one with blonde hair clad in brilliant gold armour, another blonde in a mint-green uniform of some kind, and the last, smallest one, in what looked like some kind of white coat and unkempt brown hair.

He scooped up the shield and approached the one in gold armour first, and it didn't take him long to recognise her as her eldest sister, Lori. He rolled her onto her back gently, which stirred her awake. "Mrr…" She wearily opened her eyes. "L-Lincoln…?" Her eyes immediately widened. "What are you doing in my room?!"

"Woah, hold on, Lori!" Lincoln backpedaled. "I don't know where the heck we are."

"What?" Lori sat upright and started looking around, her anger melting away into confusion. "What…? Where…?" She turned to Lincoln and looked him over. "Why… are you… wearing that...?"

"I… could ask you the same, miss Ornstein."

Lori blinked, then cast a look over herself. Her golden armour was a far more stylised design than Lincoln's, with a small blue cloth between a set of tassets instead of a tabard. Lying to her side was an equally stylised glaive forged from a similarly gold metal. She pulled herself up, taking a moment to stabilise herself. "Lincoln, what the heck is going on?"

He shrugged. "Hey, I know as much as you do." He approached the mint-green uniformed figure, quickly noticing it was Leni.

"This has to be some kind of dream." Lori followed up behind him. "A… very real-feeling dream."

Lincoln gently nudged Leni, who started to wake. "Five more minutes…"

The last figure, quickly seen to be Lisa in a futuristic-looking white coat worn over a green bodysuit, stirred awake on her own. After an initial stumble, she quickly righted herself and approached the three of them. "Greetings, siblings."

"Lisa, do you have any idea what's going on?" Lincoln asked, nudging Leni again.

"That's a negative." she replied. "I am experiencing complete consciousness and you are acting within your usual parameters, meaning that you are not constructs of my imagination, ergo, I can deduce that this is not a lucid dream, or if it is we're somehow sharing this experience."

"Dang it." Lori sighed. "So, how do we get out of here? Pinch ourselves? Jump off something?"

"If we were indeed lucid dreaming, neither of those would be effective. If we are not, then the latter would cause us to perish. Not… that there appears to be any elevated position here."

Lori groaned. "Well, might as well wake Leni up while we're at it." She knelt down next to Leni and gently shook her. "Leni, wake up."

Leni finally stirred awake, sitting up and stretching. "Wow, that was, like, the best sleep I've had in ages." She paused. "What…? This isn't our room. Or the mall." She looked down at her uniform, a futuristic military uniform with a skirt and white headband. "Ooh, this is a cute outfit."

Lori snapped her fingers, muffled by the gauntlets in her hand, in front of Leni. "Focus. What's the last thing you remember?"

"Well… I was, like, heading to bed early cuz of my morning class, then I was having this dream about going to the mall but it was totes bigger than normal. Then there was this bright light on one of the doors, I think it was a candle shop, so I walked towards it, and then I woke up here."

"Huh. Candle shop." Lincoln mused, glancing at the short candles.

"So why are you guys in costume anyway?" She gasped excitedly. "Is it Halloween?!"

"Er… no. This is actual armour."

Leni placed a hand on Lori's armour. "Wow." The looked around, studying the black void. "So where are we?"

"Your guess is as good as mine." Lincoln shrugged. "But it looks like some kind of campfire surrounded by… well, nothing."

Lisa hummed to herself, and proceeded to walk directly away from them and the campfire.

"Lisa, where are you going?"

"I'm investigating our surroundings. I'll be careful, do not fret."

"Dang it, Lisa." Lincoln muttered under his breath. He noticed thin, faintly glowing lines were connecting the candles together, forming a six-pointed star within a hexagon, though most of it was hidden under the campfire. No wax had melted around the candles despite being lit for what could possibly be ages.

Lisa emerged from the same direction she had disappeared from. "Fascinating. This room appears to send anyone walking too far directly back towards the centre. If I had my notebook…"

"Well, what do we do now?" Lori asked.

Lincoln started to pace. "We could try going back to sleep."

"Really? You literally think doing the same thing we did to end up here would work?" Lori crossed her arms.

Lincoln turned to her on his heel. "If you have any better ideas, please, share it with us, Lori."

Lori went to reply, but faltered, her eyes drifting to behind him. "I…"

Lincoln noticed a bright light slowly build up behind him. He turned sharply, and spotted a massive, archway-shaped mass of light, standing nearly four times his height. A faint, cool breeze wafted by, causing the flames to flicker slightly. A low, quiet tone started echoing through the room, gradually building in volume and pitch.

"What the heck…?"

Lisa walked to the other side of it. "There's only a solid black surface on this side." She pushed onto the black surface, making sure it was indeed solid, then wrapped her hand around and put it through the glowing side, noting the lack of it appearing on the other side. "It's some kind of gateway."

"Should we go through it?" Lincoln asked.

"What choice do we have?" Lori replied.

Leni grabbed Lori's hand. "Lori, please, don't let go."

"I won't." She tightened her grip on Leni. With caution, the two approached the gate, Lori watching her leg go through an immensely thick fog. She turned to Lincoln, and offered her hand. "If we go, we go together!" She said, almost inaudible over the now-deafening noise.

Lincoln approached her, and gave her his hand. Turning around, he offered his other hand to Lisa, who grabbed it. Taking a deep breath, the four of them stepped through, and Lincoln found himself in a plain white void, with no noise.

And, as his hand slipped out of Lori's, no sister. He turned to see where Lori was. Nothing.

Then gravity stopped. He felt himself falling down, but not hitting anything, instead tumbling in empty space.

With a flash of a dark shape crossing his eyes, he suddenly felt gravity reassert itself, catching a glimpse of a bright sunny day before he ended up face-first in grass with a dull thud.

"Ugh…" He groaned, pulling himself upright and spitting out a wad of dirt. To his left, a large forest lay, so thick he reckoned he would barely fit through it. To his right, a bunch of floating islands suspended above an endless sea of clouds, gently bobbing but never drifting away or towards each other. Ahead of him, an ever greater mass of floating islands, including a castle on one of them, all of them connected by a series of bridges.

And behind him, nothing except clouds. Instinct kicked in and he leaped directly away from the ledge he was standing on, unceremoniously landing on his behind.

"Jeez, that was close…"