CHAPTER 432: CHAPTER 432: STARTLING DREAM

After Yu Sheng shared the information he currently held with the young woman in front of him, she was silent for a long time.

"I know it’s hard to accept, after all, it does sound quite preposterous," Yu Sheng sighed, gesturing helplessly around him, "But it’s the truth. Just take a look at your surroundings; this is the anomaly ’squeezed’ out on the border of people’s collective unconsciousness after the conflict between illusion and reality. I’m not completely sure why you suddenly ’woke up’, but if you recall the past carefully now, you should be able to notice those ever-present yet blurry discrepancies."

For a moment, Mo Ran said nothing, and after pondering for a long time, she finally spoke softly.

"Many years ago, on the planet Shuji, there has always been a ’strange disease’—few fall ill, but the symptoms are bizarre and inexplicable. The afflicted suffer from sudden heart demon attacks for no apparent reason or fall into frenzy in broad daylight, claiming to see eerie and terrifying visions. Yet often, in a very short time, those afflicted suddenly return to normal, not even remembering their fits of madness, though they are left severely weakened with their cultivation level stagnant...

"Moreover, cultivators living on Shuji are also slightly more prone to suffer from demon possession than those elsewhere... The proportion isn’t high, just a bit more, but no matter how much investigation or resolution occurs, the proportion remains slightly elevated.

"All along, people believed it related to the geomancy of Shuji or the extraction and refining facilities scattered across the entire planet... With time, as no one could find anything, it eventually became something taken for granted, ’Shuji is a little strange, the remote area’s energy channels are poor’, is what people say."

Mo Ran exhaled lightly, collecting her emotions before her gaze fell on Yu Sheng.

"Since you can move freely in this eerie realm and have come here to investigate, you must possess extraordinary abilities. Immortal Envoy Xuan Che must have taken precautions against me before, which is why he didn’t reveal many truths. What should we do next? Please, guide me, expert—I’ll fully cooperate."

"For now, you don’t need to do anything, but soon you might need to take the reins as the ’City Lord’ to command the situation," Yu Sheng clearly had some ideas, casually remarking, "What we need to do now is quickly find the ’Inference Star Body’, and before it completes its Feather Transformation, find a way to expel it from this planet. To achieve this, we must enter the real Shuji... we have to figure out a way to puncture this ’Nightmare Border’. "

"Puncture it?" Erin reflexively glanced at Yu Sheng, "How? Do you already have a plan?"

"The Inference Star Body hides the real Shuji using everyone’s collective ’Cognitive Barrier’, so the key is figuring out how to bore a hole in this cognitive barrier. It needs to be a large hole, enough to tear apart reality over a considerable area," Yu Sheng mused, stroking his chin, "Mo City is a large city, and the vast population within it is the best breakthrough point—if we can ’awaken’ a large number of people in a short time, I’m sure a barrier relying on the collective subconscious will show some vulnerabilities..."

Erin blinked, exuding an aura of struggling to keep up despite her efforts before she couldn’t resist blurting out, "...So how do we do it?"

"You’re asking me?" Yu Sheng glared at her, "You handle it—you’re the best at waking people from dreams, aren’t you?!"

The little puppet paused, belatedly realizing this, then glanced around before shrinking back, "Damn! Easy for you to say! Do you know how many people are in this city? Waking all of them? Even if you give me twenty thousand mass-produced machines now, it may not be enough!"

Yu Sheng narrowed his eyes slightly, "There are indeed many people—but what if you only need to intervene in one dream?"

Erin: "...Huh?"

"Did you forget what I just said? ’Collective unconsciousness’—the cognitive barrier covering Shuji is, at its base, interconnected, at least in a large ’gathering point’ like Mo City, it certainly is," Yu Sheng explained, recalling the moment when Erin unwittingly released "silk threads", "If I’m not mistaken, you likely noticed this point when you entered this ’Nightmare Border’, but instinctively ignored this ’collective dream realm’, because it’s hiding from you... to it, you are a threat."

The little puppet listened, in a trance as if gradually recalling something, as if becoming aware of something.

"Erin, carefully recall before we left the Immortal Gathering Continent—when we first saw the reminder on the glass window," Yu Sheng suggested unhurriedly, "Recall if you felt something back then, and then..."

He stopped.

Because he saw wisps of black threads beginning to spread in the air.

Erin disappeared.

Before disappearing, she first turned into an oil painting, but the process lasted only an instant, just long enough to be overlooked by a dream, and then the oil painting rose into the air, merging into the depths of stormy winds in Yu Sheng’s sight.

Black silk threads began to proliferate in the air, weaving together at an alarming pace. A massive spider web instantly covered the sky and then began to slowly envelop every inch of Mo City, endless threads hanging down from the clouds. Inside the black silk-woven "web", the entire city began to tremble and shake.

Everyone stared wide-eyed at this scene, even Yu Sheng was a bit taken aback.

He hadn’t expected that after receiving his "reminder", Erin’s power could spread in such an astonishing way within this special "Dream Realm"—she just hadn’t realized the "essence" of this dream earlier, and once she did, everything changed.

For a puppet capable of invading dreams, this was simply a "hunting ground" set up specifically for her.

And this "mountain" located at the center of the city is precisely the most suitable place for her to unleash her power.

The mineral veins have been exhausted, the city has declined, the past glory is gradually being forgotten, and the last thriving area has become a common pillar in everyone’s heart—within the Dream Realm, those buildings symbolizing past prosperity pile up and grow like living beings, the center of the city rises with mountains dotted with neon lights and welcoming speeches, and the Mind entities gather around this mountain, subconsciously reminiscing about the beautiful times when the Refining Tower could still rumble and operate... They gathered just right.

A vast black spider web spreads outward from the "mountain", wherever the web reaches, countless Mind entities turn into bubbles that shatter at a touch, buildings twist and collapse silently, chaotic city roads fall into endless darkness, a startling rift opens in the sky, wind and rain howling through the rift, the web crisscrossing, and a shadow seemingly larger than the entire nightmare manifests its presence through the rift.

That is the Weaver, crawling at the edge of the hunting ground, rapidly weaving its web, and when the entire city is enveloped in endless black threads, when Mo City’s millions of Minds are simultaneously wrapped by the web and "stripped" from Shuji’s overall Cognitive Barrier, at that moment, everyone saw... two scarlet lights reflected in everyone’s Mind.

Cold, as if it could pierce the marrow, stab into the soul.

In that instant, all Mo City people had a dream.

Whether they were wandering the city streets in the previous second, resting at home, at school, in factories, malls, chatting with friends, or arguing with others—amidst what they assumed these "normal" lives to be, a brief dream realm intruded into the depths of everyone’s consciousness.

Mo Ran raised her head and saw the entire city transformed into a miniature insect, with everyone clinging to the insect like dust.

She saw the insect fall at the center of a black spider web, and another Weaver with scarlet eyes hiding in a vast shadow, slowly crawling along the web.

She saw the Weaver cast a glance, each breath like the last warning before the end of the world.

Everyone heard the warning—

"Wake up, damn it! Get up and enjoy!"

The Weaver’s words were a bit rough.

But without any malice.

So, the city woke up.

Yu Sheng felt as if he heard a rumble, but there was actually no sound—what he felt was the collapse on a cognitive level, and after the collapse, he saw the entire city quickly stripped of its disguise.

Neither the "everything is normal" Mo City, nor the grotesque dream realm of twisted and stacked buildings—towering skyscrapers stood in the wind and rain, old and ancient, countless crystalline substances grew like mold along every building in the city, overlapping layers, stretching endlessly.

Pale crystal clusters were everywhere, opening cracks on the ground surface, precariously piled on aerial rail surfaces, entwined around distant Refining Towers like branches and vines, even growing into crystal jungles covering the wilderness outside the city, spreading from one city to another.

The "mountain" beneath everyone’s feet also reverted to its original appearance.

This was the rooftop terrace of the City Lord Mansion.

Those strange "pillars" surrounding the mountain peak were actually models of the twelve Refining Towers—as the city’s symbol, they had always stood at the highest point of the City Lord Mansion.

But even the entire City Lord Mansion had been covered with crystalline substances—perhaps for hundreds of years.

Mo Ran gazed in shock at all this before her, despite trying her best to prepare herself mentally beforehand, she couldn’t help but feel a great shock, nearly losing her mental composure.

But she immediately realized—she must immediately begin to maintain order in the city!

"It’s your turn next," Yu Sheng nodded to Mo Ran, "stabilize the situation in the city, while we deal with the bigger problem."

"Okay!"