My Post Infection AU [Hollow Knight]

Part 8: Signs and seals

"Oh come on guys!" Vessel yells at all the siblings staring at her in the Dream Realm.

None of them seem to understand the problem.

The wyrm groans irritatedly as she facepalmed, "You know what? I don't even want to hear what you were going to say anymore." She starts to move downward through the gray realm, the siblings quickly following her.

She grumbled under her breath as platforms just appear underneath her. It's incredibly difficult to kick yourself out of your own realm. After a few minutes of descent, she feels one of the shades pick her up by the waist. Of course it's the Hollow Knight, none of the others have arms that are this long.

"Hey! Put me down!" Vessel squirms in their grasp. They don't seem to notice.

After getting back up to about where Vessel started, they drop her. She pushes herself into a sitting position before just sitting there for a moment, and burring her face in her hands and sighing, "What?"

She groans again as it suddenly gets much darker, meaning the Shade Lord has just come over. They then use their massive finger to move away Vessel's hands, forcing her to look at them.

"All of you are a bunch of impatient crybabies." Vessel says flatly. "Now what do you want?"

There's a roar from the Shade Lord.

Vessel sighs in annoyance, now remembering how hard it is to communicate, "Can't you just show me?"

The massive being of Void stares down at Vessel then disappears below.

"Alright then." Vessel looks where they vanished.

Typically her dreams go like this if the siblings want something, other times it's just her foresight showing her other things. Sometimes the Shade Lord uses her wyrm ability to communicate with what they want to say. Vessel was too nervous to cause lots of damage to the already half destroyed realm to try anything else in it.

Vessel just stayed seated to wait for them to come back. A rather familiar and more grown shade approaches her from the side.

"Oh, hey." Vessel turns when she finally sees the Hollow Knight staring at her. "It's been what? Five minutes?"

The shade pats her head lightly, almost like a parent praising their child.

"Thank you? Do you know what's taking them so long?" She takes their hand and holds onto it lightly.

The Hollow Knight looks down at the ground then back at Vessel, shaking their head.

"Heh, at least you can answer my questions when I ask them." Vessel uses their hand to pat their own voided head, then lets go of it.

They're stunned for a moment before laying the hand on the cracks in their face, pushing Vessel away with the other.

"Oh yeah, I forgot..." Vessel looks away. It's very quiet when no one else can speak.

After a few moments, a smaller shade approaches Vessel and stops next to her.

"Hello there." Vessel looks up at them. They have a mask shape she does not recognize. "Did you want something?"

The child leans on Vessel, as if to give a sort of armless hug.

"Thank you." Vessel hugs them back with her hand before the massive shade comes roaring back out of the ground, setting something on the ground in front of it.

Vessel stares at the object, not clicking in her mind what it was at all. When the Shade Lord scooted it closer to her her eyes widen in realization that it's a seal of binding engraved on a tablet. Picking it up, she gives a weird look to the being of Void and looks down at the tablet.