Nightmare

---Characteristics---

[Presence]: 34

Nightmares are, nothing more nothing less, creatures made of darkness itself. In the physical world, they lack a physical form, wandering through space as a being made of pitch-black nothingness. It cannot be touched, cannot be seen, and cannot be heard. As long as darkness exists it'll always reform itself even if theoretically destroyed.

Their appearance often varies but the most common ones are humanoid-shaped darkness with bright purple eyes, and claws. They have no legs but can fly leaving a trail of darkness behind. Their height is 300 cm and their overall width is about 50 cm.

Nightmares feed off of dreams made by living creatures. Whenever a human is sleeping, it's the best time for a Nightmare to act. They can vividly see their dreams as a visible, tangible construct from their perspective. They then start to eat it, but not in a metaphorical sense. They can literally grab and eat dreams piece by piece. This does not wake up the victim, but instead indirectly causes the human to get extremely horrible nightmares.

Nightmares are, to the best of our knowledge, completely non-physical. If they could be harmed physically, then they should be fatal to the attacker, but they do not appear to have any real mass to them. Some evidence points to them having an 'anti-mass' component to them, though it is unknown what this would actually be like.

While they lack a physical form, certain effects may happen if you accidentally barge into them. If the victim accidentally "touches" or passes right through a Nightmare, they will either instantly fall asleep (while having multiple nightmares afterward) or will enter a state of temporary madness. Other Nightmares are immune to this effect.

Nightmares appear to have their own self-reflective rhythm which they usually use to communicate with each other. They don't always use this rhythm, though, as they usually speak in a language only they can understand.

If a human is sleeping in an illuminated room, Nightmares won't pester them. They heavily dislike light and as such try to stay away from it if possible, acting only at night. It is not lethal to them, however.

Certain instances of Nightmares physically affecting reality have been spotted, which would possibly mean that it is not only a threat to the non-physical but also to the physical. In theory, a Nightmare would be able to easily rip a human to shreds with one attack from its claws, but this would serve it no purpose unless it was an act of self-defense.

---Abilities---

<<Dream Eater>>: Nightmares can perceive and touch dreams as a tangible construct from their perspective, eating them whole as a form of sustenance.

<<Nightmare Inducement>>: After eating a dream, the victim will suffer from terrible nightmares and won't be able to wake up from them until the rest of the night.

<<Immortality>>: A nightmare is incapable of dying as long as darkness exists in reality.

---Modus Operandi---

A Nightmare will always act at night, seeking any sleeping creature in a non-illuminated room. After they find their prey, they'll quickly approach and grab its dream, eating it piece by piece. The process takes no longer than 1 minute. After the deed is done, it quickly flies away from the place, returning to the darkness once more