Where Immortals Once Walked

Chapter 504: What the Nightmare Couldn’t Understand

What cultivators feared most were inner demons. Yet this Hundred-Faced Nightmare had gone and taken in other people’s consciousnesses one after another; the fact that it had not driven itself insane was impressive enough already. One of He Lingchuan’s eyebrows rose in askance. “If you completely forget your past, then isn’t that no different from dying?”

“You could say that, or you could say it’s a new birth,” the grotesque head replied. “In our world, memories are the cheapest thing there is. Otherwise, Hundred-Face would never have grown one self-awareness after another.”

“So dreams form a world of their own too?”

“Of course they do. Dreams are reflections of the real world; the two are like outer and inner surfaces of the same thing.”

He Lingchuan pointed around them. “This isn’t a dream, then?” The Soul-Stealing Mirror had said that it was not, but he still wanted confirmation.

“Of course not. We originally thought this was a soul land, a place for dead souls to linger!” The grotesque head glared. “But after observing carefully, it’s become clear that this is the only soul land of its kind. It’s too strange. It’s nothing like any we’ve ever visited.”

“You’ve been to other soul lands too?” Does that mean that the mirror’s understanding of Panlong City was wrong?

He had only asked casually, and yet he had stumbled onto something unexpected.

“Dreams and soul lands sometimes intersect by chance. When we travel at night, we occasionally wander into them.” The grotesque head’s gaze flickered restlessly. “Soul lands all form naturally, and they often vanish naturally too. They aren’t controlled by human power. But this one, this one... Your place feels alive.”

By the time it said the last few words, its fear was plain and palpable.

Something stirred in He Lingchuan’s mind. “Alive? What do you mean?”

The grotesque head thought hard, but it was only after He Lingchuan pressed it twice that it finally answered, “When we answer a curse master’s summons, we sometimes have to enter the waking world. Crossing from the unreal into the real meets tremendous resistance, and not every nightmare can break through that barrier.”

He Lingchuan nodded. That much made sense. The line between two worlds ought to be clear and firm; otherwise, if everyone could just wander back and forth all the time, the worlds would fall into utter chaos.

“When we found you, we thought this was only an ordinary dream.” Remembering how it had been trapped left the grotesque head full of grievance and bitterness. “It wasn’t until we tried to reshape it that we discovered it wouldn’t obey us at all. That powerful resistance was something that we’ve only ever felt in the waking world, because nightmares can’t alter reality. As for soul lands, my true body, Hundred-Face, once used its vast power to forcibly alter part of one.”

Your true body got dragged into a bottomless abyss by this world’s guardian, He Lingchuan thought, but he kept the remark to himself.

There was no doubting the Hundred-Faced Nightmare’s strength. Its sheer size and presence on entering had made that obvious enough.

If the giant red figure had not intervened, He Lingchuan would never have been able to defeat it.

“This place even knows how to disguise itself and trick us into coming in. If that doesn’t make it alive, what does?” the grotesque head added. “What we refer to as alive are simply those that have a will of their own, knowing what they’re supposed to do. You could even say it’s awake. What other soul land is like that?”

Only now had the thing finally grasped what had happened, and it felt utterly stifled by it. After all, He Lingchuan had been no match at all for the true Hundred-Faced Nightmare, but the creature had lost before it could use even a single one of its real powers.

He Lingchuan asked, “So what sort of place is this, exactly?”

Even this well-traveled avatar of the Hundred-Faced Nightmare could only answer honestly, “I don’t know. I only know it bears us deep malice, and it has been watching us the whole time!”

This soul land—or rather, Panlong City—had been watching them all along?

He Lingchuan remembered the first two times he entered Panlong City. Back then, he had also felt as though someone were tailing him, as if nothing he did could escape those unseen eyes.

That sensation had later vanished, but he had never forgotten it.

Now that the nightmare had brought it up again, He Lingchuan felt the strangeness of it all more sharply.

Indeed, what other soul land is like this? Compared to Panlong City, the Soul-Stealing Mirror’s mirror realm, which is a soul land of its own, was as pure as a newborn infant.

So what exactly is this place?

Is everything that happened here truly no more than a replay of a piece of past history?

He knew one thing the nightmare did not: Panlong City was inside the Generous Pot.

Then are these anomalies coming from the Generous Pot?

“What’s that eye on your forehead for?” The vertical pupil on its brow was closed now, reduced to a narrow slit.

He Lingchuan had not forgotten what it felt like to be stared at by that enormous eye. It had been deeply unpleasant, as though the secrets buried within the depths of his heart and self were being spied on.

“It can see a person’s deepest fear.” The nightmare licked its lips. “That lets us reshape the dream accordingly. But there was something very strange about you.”

“Oh? And what was that?”

“I couldn’t find any true fear in your heart.”

“Oh?” He Lingchuan scratched his head, rather pleased with himself. “So I really am fearless?”

“Fear doesn’t necessarily mean cowardice. It can just as easily come from attachment or regret. In short, every human heart has its weaknesses. Otherwise, you cultivators wouldn’t spend so much effort refining your state of mind and cutting away the Three Corpses in pursuit of the Dao. But you...” The grotesque head studied him with an odd look. “You had nothing.”

At the bottom of this man’s heart, there was no fear, no attachment, no anger, and no regret. At most, there was a trace of worry, but his concern over life and death was too abstract. There was no way to make it concrete, no way to turn it into something usable.

The grotesque head finally asked, “What kind of aberrant creature are you, exactly?”

He Lingchuan gave a wry smile.

What was he supposed to make of being asked that by an aberrant creature?

Could it be because his life before transmigrating had been a blur of dull routine, flat and uneventful?

But that was just ordinary life, wasn’t it?

In my old world, didn’t most people live exactly that way? Working themselves half to death at their posts, and only after going smoothly into the ground were they finally allowed to rest.

If a person’s emotions ran too violently, how were they supposed to be a diligent little cog in the machine?

He Lingchuan changed the subject, “Enough. Since you’ve answered me fairly honestly, I’ll let you choose: life or death?”

“If you want death, there.” He pointed toward the juluo tree by the water. “If you want to live, then help me find Cheng Yu!”

“Find Cheng Yu?” A flicker passed through the nightmare’s eyes. “I made a pact with him. As long as he doesn’t move against us, we can’t harm him.”

When dealing with an aberrant creature like this, a curse master would naturally make sure to secure his own safety first.

“I don’t need you to attack him. I only need you to locate him for me, or at least direct me toward him.” He Lingchuan smiled faintly. “You’re not going to tell me you can’t even manage that, are you?”

“If he doesn’t summon me, then I need something personal of his.”

“Will blood do?”

“That would do.” This time, the grotesque head answered much more readily. “But I need rest! Right now, I have the will but not the strength. I can’t break through the barrier and pinpoint him in the waking world.”

“So when can you?”

“For the next seven or eight nights, I’ll need continuous incense offerings. It would also be best if you found me some food.”

“Food?”

“Souls.”

“Oh.” He Lingchuan shook his head. “No.”

There were certainly souls in the soul land, but those were heroic spirits. The nightmare would probably break its teeth trying to chew them.

The grotesque head let out a long sigh. “A pity our idol is gone. It had stored up the power of incense for a very long time.”

“The original vessel?” A thought flashed through He Lingchuan’s mind. “Carved from wood?”

“Yes, yes, it’s made of seabed wood.” The grotesque head looked at him eagerly. “Did you snatch it back?”

He had brought back some wooden fragments from the fire. Put together, they indeed formed an idol. “I did get some broken pieces from Cheng Yu. But this is the soul land, and, well...” That thing had been left behind in reality. Surely it shouldn’t be possible to bring it into the Panlong Dreamscape, right?

“Take it out, take it out! Of course you can bring it in!”

He Lingchuan tried reaching into his robe, and to his surprise, he really did pull out a cloth bundle.

When he untied it, there were the idol fragments inside.

The grotesque head cried out again and again, “Give it to me, give it to me!”

He Lingchuan held the bundle in one hand and weighed it. “If you eat these, you’ll recover?”

“Yes! I’ll recover a fair bit! More than enough to help you find someone.”

The more urgent it sounded, the calmer He Lingchuan became. “Then first we enter a contract.” Otherwise, how am I supposed to trust you to work properly for me?

The nightmare had no choice. It could only swear a vicious oath, promising that if it ever dared to disobey in deed while pretending obedience, or harm He Lingchuan, or even try to fob him off carelessly, then it would be devoured soul and all by a hundred worms, tormented to death in endless agony.

It did not even know what those “hundred worms” were, and inwardly it was rather pleased, thinking it had gotten away with nothing worse than a toothache curse, when suddenly, several wisps of pale red mist drifted in from the south. At first glance, they seemed unremarkable; now and then, they would briefly condense into red in midair, only to scatter again at once.

As soon as they arrived, the grotesque head’s voice began to echo through the air.

The oath it had just sworn replayed itself several times over. Murmuring whispers filled the air everywhere, as if a hundred grotesque heads were all swearing together.

The moment the grotesque head heard it, its face changed. It looked at those patches of drifting red mist as though it had seen a ghost in broad daylight.

“Three Corpses Worms!” it shrieked. “Why are there Three Corpses Worms here? And how are you still alive?!”

This was the first time it had ever seen Three Corpses Worms—creatures whose very nature was to bewitch the heart and feed on evil thoughts—appear inside a soul land, and actually coexist peacefully with the natives here, and with this man standing before it.

This completely shattered everything it thought it knew.

Even nightmares disliked being too close to Three Corpses Worms.

Smiling, He Lingchuan raised a finger. The Three Corpses Worms circled around his fingertip, oddly docile. “Remember this. It was to them that you swore your heavy oath just now. If you break it, they’ll be the executioners.”

The grotesque head shuddered violently.

Truthfully, He Lingchuan himself was a little surprised too.

He saw these Three Corpses Worms every time he passed through the city gate, but they had never paid him the slightest attention.

So why had they suddenly changed their temper now? Were they giving him a bit of face in front of an outsider?

Or was it because he had lured in the true body of the Hundred-Faced Nightmare and given them a splendid feast, so they had developed some favorable feeling toward him by association?

Then again, could Three Corpses Worms even have favorable feelings toward anyone?

These things barely count as alive, right?

They circled lazily around his fingertip, emanating a cold that penetrated the bone. Before his upper and lower teeth began chattering, He Lingchuan hurriedly pulled his finger back. The Three Corpses Worms immediately flew toward the grotesque head and, under its horrified gaze, burrowed into its nostrils and ears.

“No, no, no, no, don’t!”

As if resistance would help.

The Three Corpses Worms still burrowed into its brain.

The grotesque head screamed, “Don’t eat me!”

“As long as you keep your word, they won’t eat you.” He Lingchuan yawned. “They’re only lurking inside, keeping watch.”

Otherwise, with how shallow his understanding of aberrant creatures like nightmares was, it would be all too easy for the other party to trick him.

The nightmare’s face went long with misery, as if someone had died in its family.

“Enough, get to work!” He Lingchuan ignored its feelings entirely and brought the grotesque head closer to the idol fragments.