Data-Driven Daoist

”We’ll bait it!” Yu Han said as Fei Rui jumped from one tree to another like a flying squirrel. ”Take this pearl. The moment the worm charges at you, project it—”

A line of green fire tunnelled through the canopy, the heat searing off the green leaves to ashes.

”Fuck!” The fire had almost touched his Coverall helmet, but Fei Rui had pulled them down quickly enough.

「What does that word mean?」 Fei Rui asked.

”Forget I ever said that,” Yu Han shouted back. ”We’ll wait until the worm does its charge. Then you’ll—”

The worm charged. Fei Rui struck down with one claw and shielded Yu Han with the other. The worm dodged as usual, but Yu Han swiftly rolled aside.

The worm dug into the mountain.

A chance! Yu Han sent the pearl to Fei Rui.

He had echoed a large amount of seawater into it. As an object echo rather than a scene of the ocean, and it had taken time. After a hundred breaths had passed, Yu Han realised he couldn’t echo anymore. But that was enough!

”Next time the worm charges, project this right onto its face. I’m this amount of water will put it down!”「What do you mean, put it down?」

”Douse the fire, kill the worm,” Yu Han explained. The ground under them quaked. ”It’s coming!”

Fei Rui grabbed his Coverall and leapt ontp a tree right as the Parasitic Fireworm burst out from the ground.

「I have a better idea. Can I try it?」 Fei Rui said.

Yu Han had finished memorycasting the second pearl. He quickly echoed two giant sacks of salt in two more pearls, sacks he’d seen in the Verdant Blade Sect’s ship kitchen.

”Go ahead.”

The worm aimed at them like a firehose. The green coat of flames dimmed, concentrating on its mouth.

「Bully! Bad ugly worm wants to cook us,」 Fei Rui hissed. His eyestalks glared at the offender.

The worm blasted its flamethrower. Fei Rui jumped left and the line of fire followed, boring through three tree trunks. Fei Rui pinched the pearl, and the lime-green light started glowing. A sign before the object was projected.

But the glowing speed was slower.

He chucked the pearl at the worm. The orb hit the monster right below its mouth and the worm’s upper body staggered slightly back, but continued spewing fire.

「I missed!」 Fei Rui cried. 「I was aiming for its mouth.」

”It’s fine, we have more—” Yu Han tried to comfort the crab.

He didn’t have to.

A pool’s worth of water suddenly appeared underneath the worm in a sphere. For a split second, the worm was drowned in the salty solution.

But then the sphere broke, the water falling away.

A screech like teeth scratching glass howled out into the night sky. Yu Han covered his ears, but realised the Coverall helmet blocked his palms. His brain rattled.

T-This is worse than the ghouls’ sound attack. He felt dizzy. Strangely, no lifeforce was lost. Was it because he had instantly activated Thousand Petals Awareness to mute his hearing?

「Yu Han, I think it worked!」 Fei Rui cheered. He jumped forward, blitzing towards the worm.

Yu Han got a better view of the monster. It was shaking left and right, the section of the body outside of the hole convulsing. A large amount of water must have flowed down the hole too, so it squirmed like a rope tying itself up and wiggled out of the hole.

The fire was gone. Its translucent skin looked muddier; other than that, there was no physical change. But by its howling and mad thrashing, it was definitely feeling it.

Yu Han handed Fei Rui the two pearls with salt sacks. The crab projected them.

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As the duo approached the writhing worm, Yu Han noticed another change. Parts of its body swelled, especially near the mouth. But the parts that had been in the hole had contracted.

He ripped open a salt sack and poured the contents on the Parasitic Fireworm. Fei Rui did the same.

A second later, the crab grabbed Yu Han and hurriedly jumped back. A giant green flame engulfed the creature, followed by a scream.

The salt visibly liquefied from the intense heat, and a pungent smell wafted out. The concentrated saline coated the worm’s body with a glass-like glaze that swiftly turned muddy in colour.

”You goofed up,” Yu Han said.

The worm thrashed. Crusts of salt flew out, stuck to pieces of the worm’s own body. Cooked. Charred. Over-seasoned. The salt would run down its length, and spread inside its body through its wounds. The osmosis damage would cause intense dehydration and tissue damage.

The minutes passed. The thrashing slowly grew quieter. Suddenly, the worm’s body ignited again.

”Is it that stupid?” Yu Han prepared three more pearls filled with salt-sacks.

「It is. It so is!」 Fei Rui had a patronising attitude. He looked at the charred portion of his claw with one eye and glared at the worm with another.

The fire lasted ten minutes. Green, like emerald. It spread from the worm to the surrounding foliage, covering an area of about ten feet in diameter.

”It’s not going to start a forest fire, is it?” Yu Han doubted it. The forest was damp, as if it had just rained. And the green fire from the worm’s previous attacks hadn’t spread.

As expected, the flames died down. It left a circular area where the ground had become almost completely flat, albeit slanted since it was on a mountain.

”Is this... clay? Chalk?”

It was white.

The same colour as his dreamscape wall.

In the middle of the white circle, there was a smaller inner circle where the surface reflected the moonlight like a mirror. From this inner circle, ripples undulated out to the white outer circle, and then the mountain ground. As if they were on water, not land.

By the hole, there were some small objects. White triangles with veins of green, as if ceramics had been glued together by liquid emerald.

”Are those teeth?” Yu Han’s breath rose and fell, as did the tension from his shoulders. He let go of the halberd and removed the helmet from his face. He could feel sweat dripping down his forehead, and each of his muscles ached.

It all felt real. Too real. He had never known his dream body could give him such accurate feedback.

Why the hell doesn’t practising in the dream transfer to real life, then?

「Yu Han, what is this place?」 Fei Rui scuttled around the white circle, taking care not to let the ripples touch him. His eyestalks were aimed at the sky. 「Where are all the stars?」

”I don’t know,” Yu Han said. ”I might know.” He checked his body. It was definitely that of Yu Han, not Johan. Fat, but far fitter than five months ago.

”Let’s take a look that way.” Yu Han pointed at the direction of the skyglow. If it really was a skyglow, that had to be a city.

「How do we go back?」 Fei Rui asked. 「Maybe we can find a way to go back first and then we can go towards the dome of terrible light?」

”We can easily find our way back here,” Yu Han pressed. It would be a lie if he said he didn’t care about going back. But if this really was Earth, then there was no choice to even consider.

He would stay here.

”Maybe there are treasures in this place,” Yu Han said, trying to convince the crab. ”Food we’ve never had before. Places of infinite knowledge. Enough money to buy anything in the world!”

「Can I add them to my collection?」

”I’ll open you a bank account,” Yu Han said. ”A savings account? How about a high-yield Savings account? Heck, if you want to store some artwork in Switzerland I can even—”

「What’s a bank account?」 Fei Rui’s eyes glowed. Something about that phrase seemed to have tickled a primal part of its being. 「What’s a Switzerland?」

”It’s—”

Ripples spread from the circular mirror, swaying beneath their feet. Yu Han felt as if he had been transferred to a ship sailing the high seas. He lost his balance and fell. His body sank in the ripples. Like quicksand.

There was no escape.

”No—!”

The world of Earth vanished. He reached out, trying to grab something. Anything.

He grasped nothing.

With a plop, he was flung back to his dreamscape, followed by Fei Rui, the worm’s teeth, and his halberd.

「That was fun!」 Fei Rui cheered, both his claws clicking the air. 「Again!」

Yu Han flung himself to his feet and started tapping the white shelled ground. The taps evolved to thuds, and finally punches.

”No! Fuck!” No ripples. Nothing. It was as if the other side of the white wall didn’t exist at all. ”Where is it—”

「Yu Han, you dummy,」 Fei Rui said with a childlike laugh. 「It’s here.」 The crab scuttled a few metres away from Yu Han, nearer to the centre of the dreamscape, but not quite. It was directly below the highest point of the dreamscape’s bowl-shaped ceiling.

”...Oh, right.” Yu Han jumped up. He was glad that Huang Niuniu wasn’t here to see his shameful display. He neared the location where Fei Rui was tapping with his feet.

There was a circular mirror embedded into the white-shelled wall. It was about a metre wide, the same size as it had been on the other side.

His face reflected back. The sweat was drying. There were no bruises. Hair stuck to his forehead.

He touched the mirror. A small ripple waved outwards, and between each peak of the ripple, the scene in the mirror changed from Yu Han and this side of the dreamscape to the green foliage of that side.

And as each second passed, Yu Han felt something drain from his body.

Otherworldly Taint Purified.

Pure Qi Acquired: +150

Trial Overcome: [Investigate the Outerplanar Threat - Completed. Vanquished Ghost Dreams Parasitic Fireworm (Outerplanar): 1.]

The ripples erupted into violent swells.

”Not enough—” It was as if Yu Han’s very being was being drained to break whatever barrier existed between the realities.

Fei Rui said something, but Yu Han could not hear. He did not care. All he wanted was to go back.

See his dad one last time.

Tell his siblings he was sorry.

+1 True Qi.

You Have Levelled Up.

His vision shattered, the dreamscape falling apart like reflections on a broken mirror. What replaced it wasn’t Earth, but the dark void of sleep.