In the beginning, the three would occasionally exchange their thoughts on completing the mission. But they gradually realized that all guesses and deductions were utterly meaningless.
The three straw men existed as though isolated from the world. Only the wind, rain, thunder, and lightning falling from high above the heavens could come into contact with them.
Aside from that, everything in the mortal world seemed blind to their existence. Flocks of birds, beasts, and swarms of insects flew past them without ever lingering.
Even the specks of dust of the world would not settle upon their bodies. And so, the three gradually fell silent. Lying flat and powerless, they watched the world change.
Suns rose and moons set as the years drifted past. As if a fast-forward button had been pressed, the days sped by. The mountain peak where the three lay gradually grew slender and jagged under the erosion of rain, wind, and sand.
What was once a towering, broad mountain slowly wore down into nothing more than a solitary, needle-like spire, jutting abruptly between heaven and earth.
The terrain surrounding the mountain peak also transformed, shifting from continuous verdant hills into majestic canyons of a thousand gullies and ravines. Amid the vast shifts of seas turning to mulberry fields, only the black stone upon which Sun Erlang and the others lay remained eternal and unchanging.
Battered by the wind and rain, the minds of the three were likewise eroded by the power of time, growing somewhat decayed and blurred.
They even began to lose all responsiveness to external events. If things continued like this, their consciousnesses might one day dissipate completely.
Just as they were about to sink into total oblivion, an imposing, sacred figure suddenly burst forth with ten thousand rays of radiant light, surfacing in their minds.
It seemed taller than heaven and earth itself, warding off all the eroding wind and rain.
"Saint Teacher..." Though their memories had blurred, these two words seemed engraved into the depths of their divine souls, springing forth instinctively.
"Saint Teacher... Saint Teacher... Saint Teacher..." Like men possessed, the three ceaselessly repeated those two words. Like a spring bursting from the ground, memories of the past reemerged within their parched minds.
"Ah!!" As though awakening abruptly from a nightmare, the three snapped to consciousness. They knew in their hearts that the Saint Teacher had mysteriously saved their lives.
Yet if they failed to find a way to escape, sinking into oblivion would still be their inevitable fate. Seizing this rare moment of clarity, the three plunged into non-stop discussion.
As they talked, they were astonished to discover that they felt as though they had truly undergone the tempering of tens of millions of years.
Their temperaments had become immensely more steady and composed. Even with crisis staring them in the face, they no longer felt the panic they once had.
"A dream trial can never be a dead end. When the peak beneath us is finally eroded and snapped by the rain and wind, and the black stone plummets, perhaps our liberation will come. As long as we hold on until that moment, we will complete the mission." The three finally arrived at this conclusion.
Holding to this as their ultimate conviction, they gritted their teeth and persevered. Countless more years slipped by, until the figure of the Saint Teacher in their minds had faded to near imperceptibility.
Only the obsession they continuously recited remained the reason for their endurance. On this day, the mountain body, eroded to its thinnest extremity until it was supported by only a spindly stone pillar, could no longer bear the weight of the black stone perched at its apex.
Following a gentle breeze, it collapsed with a crash. As the three straw men plummeted from the peak into the mortal realm below, the world before their eyes seemed to freeze into stillness.
The clear sky abruptly darkened, as though draped in a sheer black film. A colossal black beak pierced through the sky, plunging in from beyond the firmament.
Merely half the bird's head was larger than the entire world. Taking up the whole sky, two sharp avian eyes shifted slightly, locking onto the three falling straw men.
From the eyes of this unimaginably massive, ferocious bird, Sun Erlang and the other two saw a look of satisfaction. With a terrifying avian cry, the world began to fracture and crumble inch by inch.
From the three straw men—from their brows, their hearts, and their abdomens respectively—three orbs of light drifted out, slowly ascending toward the ferocious bird.
Sun Erlang and the others, whose consciousnesses still lingered within the straw figures, faintly glimpsed within those three orbs of light scenes of the passage of time and the shifting of mountains and rivers.
Boom! Following that, the world plunged into endless darkness. Even the monitoring simulated heavenly persona could not determine how much time had truly passed.
When Sun Erlang and the other two regained consciousness, they had already successfully escaped from the dream. Not only were they safe and sound, but they had even gained a divine ability called "Mountain and River Epoch Contemplation."
Transforming into the straw man atop the mountain peak, time within oneself seemed to halt its flow, allowing one to observe the changing affairs of the world as the years flashed by.
It was somewhat similar to when Li Fan had once transformed into the Vast Sea Pearl to observe the changes of the world as seas turned into mulberry fields. However, the true strength of this Mountain and River Epoch Contemplation lay in the fact that, once activated, one's lifespan would be virtually frozen.
Even if tens of millions of years passed in the outside world, the effect on oneself would be almost negligible. Of course, that was merely the theoretical explanation provided by the dream's prompts.
As for whether the divine ability was truly effective... Sun Erlang and the others had no intention of testing it just yet. Having completed three—and all of—the dream boundaries, their surroundings finally shifted once more.
It was still within Qiuxi Prefecture of the Five Elders Association. But unlike the previously sparsely populated landscape, this Qiuxi Prefecture was bustling with clamorous crowds.
Not only were cities brimming with cultivators, but countless structures had suddenly sprouted across what had been desolate wilderness.
Furthermore, cultivators seemed to be living inside these buildings. The changes were not confined to the outside world; they had occurred within Sun Erlang and the others as well.
"Sun Erlang, Golden Core perfection, Deaths: 1."
"Paradise Experience Level: 2."
"Currently Unlockable Dream World Level: 3."
"Carefree Coins: 2,000." ...These were the personal details that Sun Erlang and the others could see.
When the pink progress bar finally filled up, the so-called Paradise Experience Level had at last advanced to Level 2.
An option to unlock dream worlds had appeared. In addition to this, there were other, more detailed informational descriptions.
And when their thoughts focused on the words, detailed explanations finally surfaced in their minds; they no longer had to rely entirely on guesswork.
Sun Erlang read through each entry carefully to avoid missing any crucial information.
"So local cultivators of the Five Elders Association entering the Carefree Paradise must also undergo trials across three dream worlds, but theirs are nowhere near as grueling as what we went through. In the terms of the Paradise, our world difficulty level had reached Level 3.
"The reason our experience was so exceptional is that we aren't members of the Five Elders Association, but trespassers who broke in without Heavenly Venerable Wuyou's permission!
"Yet the Heavenly Venerable is merciful and does not expel intruders outright. Instead, he bestows dream trials. If one passes, one can formally join the Dream Paradise. If one fails the trials, one is permanently banished from the Paradise, and as punishment for expending power to construct the dreams, more than half of one's divine soul strength is drained..." Sun Erlang's expression turned somewhat grim.
Exchanging a glance with Wang Xuanba and Yue Zhenwei, he continued to read.
"The place we encountered when first entering the dream was the transit hub leading to the trial dreams. Every cultivator entering the Paradise for the first time appears there.
"Within the Dream Paradise, harming other cultivators is prohibited. If one disregards this rule and forces a fight, the attacked party will be transferred to a safe area. Concurrently, depending on the severity of the violation, Paradise Coins will be deducted from the attacker.
"Carefree Coins—also known as Paradise Coins—are earned by cultivators through exploratory activities within the Dream Paradise. They can be used in the Heavenly Venerable's Treasury to exchange for all manner of supplies to strengthen oneself.
"Inside the Heavenly Venerable's Treasury, everything imaginable is available, all-encompassing..." Looking at the two thousand Paradise Coins in his possession, Sun Erlang felt a stir of curiosity and opened the details page of the Heavenly Venerable's Treasury.
An instant later, Sun Erlang froze on the spot. Even with his current Level 2 Paradise Experience clearance, which limited the number of viewable items,
the inventory of goods within the Heavenly Venerable's Treasury was still beyond belief. To say nothing of basic natural treasures, pills, and magical instruments,
even cultivation methods were merely commonplace wares in the Heavenly Venerable's Treasury. Moreover, unlike the techniques prevalent in the Xuanhuang Realm, the lowest-tier methods here could all be cultivated up to the Soul Formation realm.
Furthermore, according to the Paradise's explanation, there was no need to worry about being unable to practice a method because it was too abstruse. As long as one completed the exchange, one could achieve initial mastery in an instant.
Expending Paradise Coins would advance one's progress in the technique.
"Once exchanged and learned, it cannot be shared with others. However, prior to learning, it can be transferred as a gift.
"In this way, although the restriction that dharmas cannot be practiced concurrently does not exist in the Paradise, the reality is not much different. To cultivate, one still must pay the price of an exchange.
"One's cultivation and techniques in the real world are synchronized only once upon first entering the Paradise, serving as one's starting point here.
"However, future progress within the Paradise cannot, under normal circumstances, be brought back to reality—that is, to the Xuanhuang Realm." Seeing this, Sun Erlang's brows furrowed at once.
Yet after a moment's thought, he soon felt relieved. After all, the things in the Paradise were simply too heaven-defying. If every single item could be synchronized into reality... then the Paradise's scale would exist on a completely different plane from the Xuanhuang Realm.
"True to its name, the Paradise is presided over by the power of the great Heavenly Venerable Wuyou, constructed from various different dream worlds.
"The blueprints for constructing these dream worlds stem from historical fragments of the Xuanhuang Realm's past, the dreams of living beings, or even deeper, magnificent wills. Therefore, they are not perpetually safe, but fraught with all manner of perils.
"To facilitate exploration, the distinctions of Dream Experience and Dream World Levels were established." Sun Erlang nodded slightly.
With their strength at Golden Core perfection, exploring a Level 3 dream world was already their limit. Stepping any further would surely mean certain death.
Only with a general assessment of danger levels could dream explorers be spared from needlessly throwing their lives away.
"In the Paradise, one can die.
"A cultivator's allowed number of deaths is not limitless.
"As a vital factor in determining a cultivator's status within the dream, the death count is an indicator second only to the Dream Experience Level.
"Cultivators with similar death counts exist roughly in the same realm layer in the Paradise. The broad tiers are 1–3 deaths, 3–5 deaths, 5–10 deaths, and 10–15 deaths.
"The death cap appears to be fifteen. If one dies again after reaching that...
"One truly dies.
"In reality as well." Sun Erlang felt a chill run through him.
"An increase in deaths signifies not only a shift in the people one interacts with, but also the fading of one's spirituality.
"Spirituality is a hidden stat, not displayed, yet truly existent within the Paradise. It affects the actual efficiency of combat and cultivation.
"The more times one dies, the lower one's spirituality falls, making further advancement all the more difficult.
"It seems spirituality has other effects as well..." Sun Erlang mused inwardly.
"The death count can also be erased through certain methods. Aside from exchanging Paradise Coins in the Heavenly Venerable's Treasury, one can also use certain items obtained from the dreams.
"Naturally, their cost is steep.
"Looked at this way, the Carefree Paradise is fraught with crises. Yet the reason it draws the entire Five Elders Association in droves is that this dreamland truly earns the word 'Carefree.'
"Each cultivator need only pay a certain amount of Paradise Coins to generate a dream world unique to themselves.
"Whether one wishes to be a supreme sovereign whose word is law or an all-controlling Immortal Emperor, it can all be realized within the dream.
"Within the dream, it is almost indistinguishable from reality. In fact, the more Paradise Coins paid, the richer the details...
"However, beyond the initial cost to forge the dream, maintaining its existence also requires Paradise Coins.
"This is the driving force behind cultivators exploring dream worlds.
"The higher the Dream World Level, the greater the risks, but the greater the corresponding rewards as well.
"Exploring dreams can be done alone or in groups.
"At regular intervals, free dream worlds become available for exploration. Of course, one can also spend Paradise Coins to unlock them early." ...Sun Erlang gradually gained a comprehensive understanding of every aspect of the Carefree Paradise.
What truly caught his attention, however, were the final pieces of information.
"Everything in the dream cannot, under normal circumstances, be brought back to reality.
"Yet there are exceptions.
"First, through the blessing of Heavenly Venerable Wuyou's power. It can be achieved at virtually no cost. However, throughout the entire history of the Paradise, this has rarely occurred.
"Second, through key items. By submitting them, one can choose a portion of their dream power to bring back to reality.
"Third, by deeply exploring unknown dreams.
"Fourth... by submitting a vast quantity of Paradise Coins."
Sun Erlang and the others exchanged another look and began conferring among themselves.
"This Paradise truly exceeds our expectations."
"Even the Saint Teacher might not fully understand it. To create such a magnificent Paradise, that Heavenly Venerable Wuyou's might is truly beyond imagination."
"Still, a dream is just a dream, illusory after all. In the end, we must return to reality."
"Only, looking at it now, it seems rather difficult. The Paradise holds hundreds of millions of living beings, yet those able to return to reality each year can be counted on one's fingers," Yue Zhenwei remarked thoughtfully.
"Actually, I think that even if we can't return, staying in this Paradise wouldn't be bad at all. Look at all the dream world templates in this treasury. Any one of them would be utterly wonderful," Wang Xuanba said involuntarily, staring at the vast offerings in the Heavenly Venerable's Treasury.
Sun Erlang remained silent.
Chapter 1356