Was the sinister thing inside the coffin coming out?
Staring at the grotesque, ghostly hand reaching out of the coffin, Zhang Yuanqing felt his heart hammering wildly against his ribs. Thudding beats filled his ears as an uncontrollable dread surged up, shattering his composure.
Under the influence of this terror, his body trembled faintly, his hands and feet twitching in spasms.
*M-My fear is being amplified...* With his wealth of experience, Zhang Yuanqing instantly realized that the Dream Master hiding in the shadows was playing tricks.
Amplifying emotions and devouring reason were the signature skills of an Illusionist.
He took a deep breath, trying his utmost to suppress the terror.
Yet the fear in his heart did not subside; instead, it escalated violently, almost obliterating his sanity.
This was no ordinary Illusionist—this was a Level 6 Dream Master.
For a Level 6 Dream Master, detonating the emotions of a Level 4 Saint was a matter of a single second.
The reason Zhang Yuanqing hadn't collapsed instantly was twofold: on one hand, a Night Walker possessed a resilient soul and abilities in the realm of illusion; on the other, he had cultivated the Pure Yang Body Cleansing Record for some time, granting him extraordinary resistance to negative effects.
"The way out of a dream is simple—just wake up..." Zhang Yuanqing muttered under his breath. Gathering his resolve, he lunged toward Chen Xuedao on the other side of the campfire, shouting:
"Foster Father, wake up! Wake up!"
Zhang Yuanqing vaulted across the campfire and reached out to shove Chen Xuedao's shoulder, but his hand passed straight through the Mountain God.
He froze.
Everyone else hadn't been dragged into a dream—*he* had!
When had he entered the dream? When he shut the door? Or even earlier, when the gale blew the mortuary doors open?
Cold sweat broke out across Zhang Yuanqing's back.
Right then, a tremendous force blew the coffin lid into the air. It crashed to the ground with a loud clatter.
A twisted, horrific figure stood straight up from the coffin. It had a human silhouette, but four heads grew from its shoulders, each one heavily decomposed and bloated.
Upon those hideous faces, milky-white eyes stared wide.
*Crack, crack!* In unison, the four heads spun one hundred and eighty degrees, twisting toward Zhang Yuanqing. Four pairs of spine-chilling white pupils stared fixedly at him with sinister gloom.
By the dim firelight, Zhang Yuanqing clearly saw their faces—they were precisely the four escorts who had mysteriously vanished over the past two days.
*This must be a monster conjured by the Dream Master using my inner anxieties, not the true terror inside the coffin...*
The moment the thought crossed his mind, the monster launched into the air, leaping stiffly out of the coffin like a speeding car, charging violently toward him.
Zhang Yuanqing retreated repeatedly, attempting Night Roam and the Star Escape Technique again and again, but all failed.
His inventory was locked as well.
He had encountered a situation like this once before—back when Deacon Pang used a prop to assassinate him.
The Murderess in White within that dream had been virtually invincible, a memory that still left psychological scars to this day. Back then, Master Wuhen had been there to aid him, but inside this trial, there was no one to help.
Amid his racing thoughts, Zhang Yuanqing halted his retreat, drew his steel saber, and slashed at the oncoming monster.
*Clang!*
The gleaming blade struck the monster's middle head, showering blinding sparks.
The edge curled instantly.
The skin between Zhang Yuanqing's thumb and index finger tore, blood spilling out as the searing pain nearly knocked the weapon from his grasp.
*Hehh, hehh...*
Rancid black smoke spewed from the monster's four heads. It bent its arms, its razor-sharp fingernails thrusting ferociously forward.
*Too fast—* Zhang Yuanqing's vision blurred, followed immediately by a sharp sting in his chest as ten blackened nails sank deep into his flesh.
Without hesitation, he planted a kick onto the monster's steel-hard chest, borrowing the momentum to fly backward.
The four-headed creature let out a low, guttural roar. Leaping into the air, it cleared seven or eight meters with ease, pouncing down for the kill.
Without even a moment to check his wounds, Zhang Yuanqing threw himself sideways.
The moment he hit the floor, he rolled frantically.
The four-headed monster bounded after him, stooping to stab its nails downward again and again, missing every time.
*The way this monster attacks is just like the jiangshi movies I watched as a kid. Did she extract a nightmare from my childhood trauma?* Sensing the mounting danger, Zhang Yuanqing sped up his rolling.
Suddenly, a jolt of pain shot through his lower back, halting his roll.
He had slammed into a support pillar.
*Damn it—* Zhang Yuanqing's expression tightened. In the very next second, a foul stench rushed at him.
In haste, he raised his saber horizontally.
*Tink!*
The jet-black fingernails jabbed into the blade, followed by hands mottled with corpse spots clamping down with brute strength.
With a tooth-grinding screech of warping metal, the steel saber was crushed into a mangled rod.
His scalp prickling with numbness, Zhang Yuanqing scrambled past the monster's feet, pushed off the ground with both arms, and bolted toward the mortuary doors.
He tried to haul open the latticed door, but no matter how hard he pulled, it only rattled loudly against the frame, refusing to budge.
Left with no choice, he darted among the plain wooden coffins.
Wood splintered and crashed as Zhang Yuanqing used the obstacles to desperately play for time. Coffins shattered and flew one after another, his situation growing ever more perilous.
The stronger the Dream Master, the deadlier the dream. The greater the gap in level between the two, the more oppressive the suppression upon falling into the dream.
Zhang Yuanqing had been suppressed straight down to the level of an ordinary mortal.
"Who the hell are you?!"
"Come out! Get the fuck out here!"
Zhang Yuanqing roared in exasperation while dodging the monster's pursuit.
Even as he shouted, he took two more stabs from the beast. The punctures weren't wide, but they ran deep, gushing crimson blood.
Yet the mastermind behind the curtain offered no response.
The struggle dragged on for several more minutes. Reduced to an ordinary man in this dream, Zhang Yuanqing's injuries grew increasingly severe, his movements steadily sluggish. Finally, under the monster's relentless onslaught, his luck ran out. A leaping thrust pierced straight through his heart.
The ferocious creature raised its arms like a pike, hoisting Zhang Yuanqing high into the air.
"Oh? You actually had no backup plan?"
A soft, sultry voice drifted out unexpectedly.
Straining to lift his head toward the sound, Zhang Yuanqing saw a figure appear out of nowhere beside the monster. It was a voluptuous, statuesque woman of extreme allure.
She possessed lovely features, her eyes brimming with stirring passion, resembling a ripe peach—one that anyone could take a bite from.
"Yi Chuanmei?!" blurted Zhang Yuanqing.
His face drained of color, overwhelmed with shock. This wasn't an act; it was genuine emotion.
Yi Chuanmei was a senior Saint of the Nihility Sect's Southern Faction, a notorious evil class. The official database held a thick stack of dossiers on her.
She was extraordinarily powerful, a standout among Level 6s, so much so that even Fu Qingyang had failed to eliminate her.
As a Dream Master, she came and went without a trace, staying unseen for most of the year. Yet around the annual killing trials, she would emerge to harvest official Walkers.
Moreover, she preferred handsome men.
Her method of harvesting wasn't murder, but turning male Walkers into her playthings and thralls.
Beyond that, the woman possessed a severe masochistic streak, having risked her life multiple times just to personally experience Fu Qingyang's near-Dao martial arts.
To have escaped Fu Qingyang's hands time and again was proof enough of her caliber.
Back when Li Xianzong launched his terrorist attack in Songhai, Yi Chuanmei had assaulted Fu Qingyang to buy the former time.
To this day, Zhang Yuanqing still remembered Fu Qingyang's evaluation of this woman: *A lunatic!*
Hearing him speak her name, Yi Chuanmei let out a soft murmur of interest. "Oh? You know me? Hmm, a Night Walker from the Taiyi Sect? Your level isn't high; how did I get matched against an insect like you?
"I wonder what your real face looks like. What a pity—you're far too weak. Dying in a dream means dying in reality, too."
Radiant and charming, a smile curled at the corners of her lips, her eyes carrying the playful amusement of a cat toying with a mouse.
*She didn't recognize me. I still look like Lin Ci right now...* Pale-faced, Zhang Yuanqing hung limply in the air. Hanging on by a thread of breath, he asked, "How did you figure me out? C-Could you tell me, so I can die knowing the truth?"
Yi Chuanmei smiled sweetly. "Guess!"
Zhang Yuanqing gazed at her, his face steeped in despair. The spark of life in his eyes dimmed, swallowed by a lifeless void.
He died.
***
Outside, the storm raged. Inside the mortuary, the firelight flickered as the escorts sat cross-legged around the fire, their heads slumped in deep slumber.
Near the door, Chen Wei was leaning against her lover, Lin Ci, sound asleep. Suddenly, Lin Ci's body dispersed into streams of light.
"Hmm?"
Losing her prop, Chen Wei tilted sideways, blinking open bleary eyes.
It was at that exact moment that her bright, dark eyes caught the reflection of another Lin Ci. Appearing out of thin air, he had closed the distance before she even noticed.
Clutching the petite purple-gold pumpkin mallet, he brought it smashing down upon her crown.
*Crack!*
Chen Wei's head burst open like a shattered watermelon, brain matter and bone fragments spraying in all directions.
Her supple body stiffened violently before toppling backward.
*Dead... I killed Yi Chuanmei?*
Looking down at the blood-spattered, headless female corpse, Zhang Yuanqing felt a mix of shock and delight.
While finding out that his opponent was Yi Chuanmei had caught him off guard, the development had unfolded just as he anticipated.
Chen Xuedao's words had given him inspiration: if he couldn't break free from a dream, he would simply stay awake. A waking mind had nothing to fear from a Dream Master.
And so, he had voluntarily stepped out to gather firewood, using the Yata no Kagami in secret to create an identical clone of himself. Meanwhile, his true body slipped away under Night Roam, hiding outside the mortuary and monitoring every movement inside through his connection with the avatar.
Earlier in the dream, Yi Chuanmei had refused to show herself, keeping him from acting rashly. The moment her consciousness manifested within the dreamscape, he decisively infiltrated the mortuary to strike at the Dream Master's fragile physical body.
A woman whom even Fu Qingyang hadn't managed to kill had been bludgeoned to death with a single strike of his hammer.
*To be safe, let's see if the bloody calamity is gone.*
Zhang Yuanqing produced the Ghost Mirror and angled it toward his face. In the bronze surface, a mantle of bloody light still loomed between his brows.
*This...* His expression shifted.
At the same moment, a cold voice rang out: "How did you find me out?"
With those words, the scenery distorted instantly. The mortuary with its crackling campfire vanished; Zhang Yuanqing found himself standing in the mortuary's courtyard, amidst the stormy, rain-swept night.
The latticed door, reflecting a faint glow of firelight, stood less than ten paces away.
He hadn't entered the mortuary at all. Everything he had just seen was an illusion.
*Creak—*
The latticed door swung open, and a grim-faced Chen Wei stepped outside. She remained radiant and beautiful, but gone was the straightforward cheerfulness of a Fire Specialist.
She scrutinized Lin Ci in the courtyard and asked again, "How did you find me out?"
The playful amusement from the dream had vanished entirely.
*As expected, she isn't that easy to kill. Wait, she didn't attack me right away... That's right. Just because my avatar was weak doesn't mean my real body is weak. She can't gauge my true strength. I need to stall for time and summon the Commandery Princess...* Zhang Yuanqing twitched the corner of his mouth.
"Guess!"
Yi Chuanmei's eyes narrowed. After staring at Zhang Yuanqing for a moment, she suddenly let out a low, delicate chuckle.
"No wonder my opponent seemed so feeble—it was an avatar all along, and I didn't even notice. Who on earth are you? I'm getting more and more curious about your identity.
"Ever since the Ghost King of Fengdu advanced to Dominator, I've crossed paths with nearly every Level 6 Starlord in the Taiyi Sect. You don't resemble any of them."
While mentally communicating with Commandery Princess Yinyao and Blood Rose outside the mortuary, Zhang Yuanqing tightened his nerves, maintaining a tense standoff as he smirked once more:
"Guess!"
Standing beneath the eaves, Yi Chuanmei reached out to catch a string of raindrops, smiling sweetly.
"Since you saw through my disguise, you ought to know how I saw through yours. Truth be told, if it weren't for restrictions, I would have killed you last night."
*Restrictions? What restrictions?!* Hearing her go this far, Zhang Yuanqing was certain that she was wary of him and probing with words.
More than happy to bluff and extract intelligence, he said, "It was that night at the pleasure house, wasn't it? When I turned you down."
Yi Chuanmei nodded slightly.
"You and I both know the relationship between Lin Ci and Chen Wei. Heh, a hot-blooded young man who has already tasted the pleasures of a woman, turning down his lover's advances when given the chance?
"Aside from you sanctimonious hypocrites from the official faction, I can't imagine any other possibility."
*It was just bad luck that we were paired up together...* Remembering that he had shared a bed and french-kissed this woman, Zhang Yuanqing felt a chill run down his spine. This was an expert at the peak of Level 6.
He probed, "You mentioned restrictions just now. What restrictions?"
Yi Chuanmei smiled coyly. "You haven't answered my question yet. How did you find me out?"
Glancing past her shoulder toward the latticed door, Zhang Yuanqing gave a scoff.
"You slept with Zhao Youcai last night, didn't you? You masked the scent well, but both of you opened your doors late. From that moment on, I suspected the evil class wasn't lurking nearby, but right inside our team."
"Just from that?" Disbelief was written across Yi Chuanmei's face.
*Of course there was more—the Commandery Princess and Blood Rose searched the surroundings for hours and didn't spot a soul within miles. Naturally, the enemy had to be on the inside...* Zhang Yuanqing sneered.
"Your turn to answer."
Yi Chuanmei pondered for a moment before speaking:
"The coffin can only devour two people a night, and I cannot use my class skills during the day. Those are my restrictions."
*That doesn't sound right. Why didn't you just have the coffin devour Chen Xuedao and me?* Zhang Yuanqing analyzed rapidly.
He doubted Yi Chuanmei was telling the full truth; she was almost certainly withholding details.
Yi Chuanmei returned to the earlier topic: "You deduced my identity solely because we opened our doors late?"
Zhang Yuanqing replied, "No one understands Fire Specialists better than I do. A Fire Specialist would never choose another of the same class as a partner, because their volatile tempers make maintaining a relationship impossible.
"Chen Wei could never have an affair with Zhao Youcai—unless Chen Wei wasn't Chen Wei. Remember when we left the inn this morning and I claimed I left something behind? I actually went back to inspect Zhao Youcai's bedsheets. Tsk tsk, Yi Chuanmei, you were quite soaking wet, weren't you?"
He deliberately adopted a teasing tone to project absolute confidence, aiming to rattle her judgment.
Yi Chuanmei sighed softly.
"If you hadn't rejected me that night, I wouldn't have stooped to using Zhao Youcai to vent my desires. His performance at the pleasure house was decent enough, but if given the choice, I'd still prefer you. Because you're a Night Walker.
"Not every Night Walker is the Demon Lord, of course, but that incredible stamina of yours is something I truly adore."
*Just how many women did the Demon Lord sleep with?!* Zhang Yuanqing was at a total loss for what expression to make.
Right then, a bloodcurdling scream tore through the mortuary.
The corners of Yi Chuanmei's mouth curved upward. "Time is up. My mission is complete!"
Chapter 472