Leona’s Dream

Malleus sends all of Sage’s Island to sleep in Book 7 so that they might enjoy “unending happiness,” and for Leona this goes in a unique direction: following the deaths of his father, brother and nephew, Leona is king of a famine-stricken country whose residents live in fear of hyaenas.

In a variation from previous dreams the NPC conjured by Leona’s imagination (Kifaji, the Grand Chamberlain from his childhood) does not enable or encourage him, but scolds him for rapid overdevelopment against the warnings of experts and the citizens.

Despite being born of Leona’s own mind dream-Kifaji shames Leona for treating his people like pawns and accuses him of abdicating responsibility, demanding that Leona take action.

Outside the palace the remaining citizenry of Leona’s dream world—joined by a dream version of Ruggie—declare that Leona is worse than his brother. Leona responds, “I’ll do as I see fit. After all, I am the king.”

Silver wonders why it is that Leona has lost his family and become a king reviled by his own people in a dream-world that was supposed to be designed to make him happy, and Idia suggests that Leona’s dream is of a pattern that they have never seen before: a sandbox game.

Idia explains,

“Players are free to build a world inside their own server. But when you create something in these games, that necessitates environmental destruction and resource exploitation. You run the risk of extracting too many resources and depleting your supply. Sometimes there are surprise collapses and natural disasters, too.

In the real world, sandbox games are limited by your PC or game console’s performance. But in Malleus’s arcane realm, as long as you’ve got the imagination for it, you’re guaranteed an ultra-realistic, fully immersive gameplay experience, both graphics-wise and physics-wise. So the smarter you are, the more addictive the gameplay becomes.”

And Leona is, canonically, extremely intelligent. More here: Leona, Intelligence

Azul asks if he shouldn’t be free to curtail environmental damage and negative public sentiment and Ortho responds, “it’s possible that Leona chose a mode with a more realistic environmental simulation….I think it’s that he’s keenly aware that rapid urban development carries major risks. And that awareness is reflected in his dream.”

Jack asks why Leona would knowingly set himself up to fail and Ruggie explains, “I bet he did it BECAUSE he knew better. It’s like when you’re sneaking a bite of pizza late at night and you think to yourself, “I really shouldn’t…” Doesn’t that guilty pleasure make it taste even more delicious?”

Azul summarizes that the failure of Leona’s reign as king is not a result of his poor planning or mistakes: he made the conscious decision to fail.

Sebek asks why he would abandon his duties after wanting to become king so badly and losing his family in the process.

Idia explains that Leona’s dream is different: dreams generally operate on the same basic idea as procedural generation, only crafting spaces in the areas that the dreamer’s imagination is able to cover. This means that things that are not a part of a dreamer’s awareness are never manifested at all, which is why it is dangerous for visitors like Silver to stray too far from the owner of a dream, lest they end up in an abyss.

But, Idia says, “Leona’s dream is ludicrously huge. It’s basically generating the entire Sunset Savanna at all times.”

This is likely related to how Leona is extremely powerful, and the strength of magic is the strength of imagination. More here: Leona’s Power

Idia explains that it’s possible Leona’s major ideas led to so much work and subsequent issues that he stopped knowing exactly what to do, at which point his motivation dropped and he stopped trying. 

Azul again summarizes: Leona always knew that his ideas would never work, but chose to pursue them anyway. “What an utterly vexatious-ah, I mean to say, complicated individual.”

Due to the complicated and elaborate nature of Leona’s dream, Azul suggests that they awaken him by taking away his authority as king, which will force him to stop playing his sandbox game whether he wishes to or not.

With Ruggie’s idea of Cheka returning from the grave, Ortho receives a motionless, speechless 3D model of Cheka from STYX that Ruggie can control via his unique magic.

Ruggie attempts to trick Leona through the Cheka-puppet but Leona is not fooled, destroying the hologram immediately. 

Leona seems about to use his unique magic on Ruggie for the second time since Book 2 when he is interrupted by Kifaji, who says, “I’ve waited so long for the day when you’d wake up from this nightmare. And now I’ve realized…that day is upon us!”

Ortho wonders why Kifaji is siding with the invaders who are trying to wake Leona up rather than trying to keep Leona asleep and if he was not created by darkness but by Leona himself (and it is fascinating that the dream-Kifaji knew Leona was asleep. As a figment of Leona’s own mind, was Kifaji a representation of Leona subconsciously knowing that he was dreaming?)

Ortho guesses that Kifaji’s characterization might not be dissimilar to Jade and Floyd in Azul’s dream, where Azul—also a powerful mage—prioritized the twins acting in character over their eliminating enemies.

Ortho reflects, “maybe in these dreams, accurately representing the dreamer’s perceptions—or wishes—takes priority. That’s fascinating.” (Did Leona wish for someone who would call him out when he was wrong?)

Having fled the throne room Leona meets with palace guards who say that they are his only true friends, dragging him into a deeper sleep.

The deeper level of the dream seems to be an alternate timeline where Savanaclaw successfully sabotaged Malleus in the interdorm spelldrive tournament and are now setting their sights on improving test placements by similarly injuring academically talented students.

Azul, Silver and Sebek tell Leona that his plan was actually a failure in a conversation that is very similar to the revelation of Book 2, nearly awakening Leona.

The dream-students go to Leona’s aid, fought off by the others, and Jack tells Leona to remember who he is, successfully awakening him.

With Leona’s happy ending compromised the dream begins to collapse into an abyss, with Ruggie getting caught by darkness. Leona goes to Ruggie’s aid and Ruggie begs him not to let go, but Leona says, “you can’t win them all.” Ruggie asks, “Are you gonna cut me loose again?!” but Leona sacrifices himself to save Ruggie instead.

Inside the abyss Leona is met with the overblotted version of himself, bemoaning how unfair it is that the throne is destined to go to his brother and nephew without them ever having to try.

Leona calls himself pitiful, and when the dream-version of himself says that he would be a thousand times better king than his brother Leona responds, “That’s a pretty bold claim to make…for a guy who looks down on everyone, you’re pathetically desperate for recognition. And you never put in any effort to earn it. I can’t stand the sight of it. But I guess that’s me.”

Dream-Leona responds, “If I competed seriously and lost, the pride I’ve been so desperately protecting will be left in tatters. Isn’t that right, my friend?,” and transforms into a haggard old lion.

The dream-Leona encourages him to stay there and keep his pride safe but Leona says he is leaving, that the dream-Leona can cling to his crumbled throne forever and “I’ve got just the blessing for you. Long live the king,” transforming into his overblot form to do battle with the dark.

Leona observes, “I guess you’re gonna stay somewhere deep down inside me, whining about wanting to be king. For my whole life, refusing to ever give up, even with your teeth and claws shattered…fine. I’ll let you in. And I’ll give you want you want, someday. A throne and pride to call my own!”

Leona returns to his previous dream and dream-Kifaji, who greets him with, “You finally realize this is a dream.” Kifaji says, “Bravo, my king,” but Leona responds, “I’m nothing of the sort, and you know it,” dismissing the dream-Kifaji with his unique magic. Unlike previous dreams, Kifaji seems pleased, encouraging Leona to go back to where he truly belongs. 

Leona responds, “Where I belong and how I live are for ME to decide.”