Looking at Bis's flushed face, Leilin's speech grew even more measured and unhurried: "The reason our Alliance has been cultivating Your Highness Bis is so that one day you can lead us to break through the Flame Throne's blockade. If you don't even have the courage to face their forces, I'm very disappointed..."
"I... how could I..." Bis's face flushed scarlet, but he couldn't find any words of rebuttal.
Even
Just as Leilin had said, they had spared no effort in cultivating Bis — even at any cost — precisely to help him advance to sixth-level Radiant Sun and thereby stand against the other
But if he showed this much weakness, then even if he eventually succeeded in advancing, whether he would honor his commitments remained a serious concern.
After all, if he didn't even have the courage to face the enemy, how could he protect the warlocks' interests?
Leilin's words had been driven like nails into the minds of the other fifth-level Radiant Moons, and more critically, what he said was the truth — leaving Bis with no room to defend himself.
Bis's face was dark enough to drip ink, clearly having grasped Leilin's sinister intentions.
The meeting dissolved in acrimony, and as Leilin watched Bis's retreating back, he silently stroked his chin. A sixth-level bloodline imprint — if he crafted a few more of those, it might prove to be quite a useful thing...
--- Dream World. Leilin wore a full set of protective gear, employing the latest isolation technique to repel vast quantities of dream force from the outside.
With the protective suit on, his frame had become considerably bloated, making him look like a massive humanoid puppet as he trudged with difficulty through a dense forest.
"The environmental changes inside the Dream World are simply too fast..."
After dealing with a giant man-eating banyan tree, Leilin stood at the peak of a hill. From here, he could still make out the circular open-air structure of the nearby laboratory.
But the lab's exterior was now covered in thick vines, with clusters of vivid red blossoms blooming among them.
Dense forest had spread everywhere, nearly concealing the entire enormous facility.
The first time Leilin had come here, it had been a desert. The second time, it had become a grassland. Now, it had transformed into a primeval jungle.
"The speed at which dream force shifts is too fast — even the Chip's processing power can't keep pace with its fluctuations. Is that why the Dream World is so complex and ever-changing?"
Leilin speculated, then glanced upward.
Three differently shaped suns hung in the sky. The central circular sun had far more tendrils of flame, and the blue in its light had grown more dazzling.
[Beep! Dream force collection in progress. Container One is full! Container Two at 76% capacity!] The Chip's mechanical voice chimed in.
Before Leilin, two floating white metal spheres hovered — one had turned completely dark red, while the other was more than half filled.
"Not bad!" Leilin nodded, tucking away the sphere that was already full.
"The Dream World is brimming with treasures!" He was thoroughly pleased with his dream force harvest.
This power ranked half a tier above bloodline force and could even rival the legendary Laws of Rules. Its appeal to Leilin was utterly incomparable.
With such a vast Dream World waiting to be explored, continuing to spar with warlocks like Bis seemed thoroughly foolish.
"If I could fully harness dream force and even use it as the foundation for my own unique wizardry, then even a Radiant Sun Wizard would suffer a devastating blow!"
Leilin felt a surge of excitement. His previous experiments had only uncovered ways to slightly influence dream force. To thoroughly understand its fundamental nature and even develop specialized wizardry from it was still a long road ahead.
But with the Chip's assistance, there was now hope.
He didn't need to completely comprehend the composition of dream force — that was impossible. Anyone who managed that could already be called a Lord of Dreams. What Leilin hoped for was simply to grasp enough of the rules governing dream force's formation to bring it partially under control, using dream force to mount attacks.
As long as he achieved that much, it would count as legitimate wizardry.
However, dream force was fundamentally an entirely different system of power, so it would still require a great deal of time — particularly now that the peak convergence of the two worlds had passed. Leilin could already feel the Dream World gradually drifting away.
Perhaps before long, his laboratory would lose the effect of that convenient spatial gateway. That was precisely why Leilin needed to gather and stockpile as much as he could while he still had the chance.
"The Dream World is unlike any other foreign plane. It's omnipresent, connected to every sentient creature's dreams. Perhaps once I've fully understood dream force, I can bypass the laboratory conversion entirely and commune directly with this world..."
A flicker of anticipation stirred in Leilin's heart.
His growing understanding of dream force gave him the confidence to venture farther from the laboratory.
"This location is somewhere my puppets have never reached!"
Leilin stepped onto a stretch of dark soil, his expression turning cautious. Due to the Dream World's unique rules, even metal puppets and servants could not explore beyond a certain radius from the laboratory.
Every time they crossed the distance threshold, those puppets and servants would automatically lose connection, leaving Leilin entirely helpless.
[Warning! Warning! Dream force concentration in this area exceeds the fifth-level threshold — reaching Critical-One alert status!]
The Chip flashed a red warning bar.
The dark red dream force, already so dense it had materialized in the real world, surrounded Leilin's body and was attempting to push through his protective suit into his flesh.
In that moment, Leilin felt as though he stood at the bottom of an ocean — crushing pressure pressing in from every direction, even producing a faint sense of weakness and oppression in his physique.
"This level is already quite dangerous..." Leilin's heart clenched, and his grip on the Scarlet Pendant tightened involuntarily.
"Ding-ding-dang-dang..."
A cheerful melody of bells drifted from the distance, accompanied by dazzling multicolored neon flashes that made Leilin freeze mid-step.
He looked around. The dense jungle had vanished without a trace. In the distance, hazy phantom images had appeared — as though an enormous amusement park had materialized.
"I've entered someone's dreamscape? Or stumbled into some other dangerous zone? All of this is still too dangerous for me — I need to pull back first..."
Leilin valued his own life greatly, and the moment he witnessed something beyond the ordinary, he was already contemplating retreat.
But then the Chip suddenly issued a notification: [Beep! Energy fluctuation detected ahead. Biological signature: Level One! Thermal radiation and chemical reactions match standard parameters — classified as biological presence indicators! Probability of sentient being: 9%!]
The unexpected alert left Leilin completely stunned.
"Native inhabitants of the Dream World?" Leilin murmured, a fiery gleam kindling in his eyes. "If it's them, their understanding of dream force should far exceed my own. And if they possess their own unique system of power, that would save me an enormous amount of time..."
Leilin's eyes flickered rapidly, clearly caught in an intense internal debate.
"It's dangerous here, but with the protective suit's isolation, I'm fairly confident I can retreat intact. Elsewhere, the chances of finding a sentient being are negligible — it's worth taking the gamble!"
After weighing the pros and cons, a look of resolve settled on Leilin's face, and he plunged directly into the hazy phantom landscape.
It felt like plunging into a pool of water. Leilin sensed a sudden weight settle over his body, as if shattering through an interdimensional barrier into yet another world.
The surrounding dream force was active to an extreme, and the scene that materialized gave Leilin a moment of surprise.
A carousel swayed to a cheerful melody, adorned with flickering multicolored lights. Not far off stood an enormous Ferris wheel, and all around were balloon machines, pirate ships, and other amusement rides.
"Hmm? How can this be... Isn't this the amusement park from my previous life? No! These are the styles from centuries past — I've only ever seen them at retro exhibitions..."
Leilin was momentarily startled. "Was this formed from my leaked memories, or is it the dreamscape of another, similar world?"
The entire amusement park blazed with flickering lights, every machine running on its own. A colossal clown statue endlessly shook its head and bobbed, emitting a continuous chuckling sound.
Yet not a single living thing stirred inside the entire park, which gave Leilin a faint sense of dread.
"Chip! Activate detection scan. Initiate navigation!" A pale blue glow crept into Leilin's eyes.
[Beep! Navigation activated! Searching for life signs!]
The Chip responded mechanically, and soon delivered its answer.
[Target position: 1,900 meters to the front-left! Significant dream force fluctuations detected in the vicinity. Danger level assessed: Five!]
"Level Five!" Leilin hesitated briefly. "That's higher than I expected, but still within a manageable range!"
He pushed off, and his body instantly dissolved into an afterimage, vanishing into the air.
Whoosh!
A beam of white light shot forward like the most brilliant flash of radiance. Everything in its path — steel, concrete — was cleaved cleanly through, leaving smooth cuts behind.
The white light caught up to a fleeing dark figure almost instantly. The figure grunted and dodged half a step, but the beam's edge grazed his arm. His sleeve was shredded to ribbons, and the skin and muscle beneath were sliced open, revealing purple tissue underneath.