Chapter 115: Whose Dream?

Chapter 115: Whose Dream?

Friday, deep in the quiet of night, inside Audrey’s bedroom.

After receiving a look from her, the large golden retriever Susie opened the door on her own and went out, lying down outside to prevent anyone from disturbing them.

Audrey took the Dreamwalker Beyonder characteristic, the corresponding supplementary materials, and the utensils for concoction from different hidden places where she stored things. Most of those supplementary materials had come from the City of Silver and could be exchanged for with only a small amount of merit. As for the payment, Audrey had not yet made it, because Little Sun still had not thought of what he wanted.

With practiced movements, she finished concocting the potion. Looking at the dark, dim liquid dotted with grayish-white specks of light, Audrey took a step back, clasped her hands, pressed them before her mouth and nose, and recited in a low voice in ancient Hermes:

“The Fool that doesn’t belong to this era…”

No sooner had her prayer subsided than countless shadows of indescribable form appeared before her eyes.

They rapidly wandered and intertwined, as though active within a vast ocean. At the very top of that ocean were seven pure lights of different colors, each seeming to contain endless knowledge.

Above those seven pure lights was a boundless expanse of grayish-white fog. Above that grayish-white fog, a towering, majestic palace could vaguely be seen.

At that moment, the palace doors opened, and a figure condensed from golden light spread twelve pairs of wings made of scarlet flames. It flew down, descending before Audrey.

Those twelve pairs of flaming wings layered over one another, wrapping the blond-haired, green-eyed girl within.

The scene lasted only one or two seconds before vanishing, as though it had been an illusion. Yet every time, Audrey still felt herself slightly immersed in that sacred, exalted sensation.

She calmed her emotions and sincerely thanked Mr. Fool.

With Angel’s Embrace, she would be able to maintain clarity inside dreams, waking whenever she wanted. She no longer needed to worry that she might sink into a dream and become unable to pull herself free.

This was equivalent to having already performed the ritual corresponding to Dreamwalker, and the effect was certainly better than the original version.

After all, not every Hypnotist could receive such favor from a hidden existence and be embraced by a special angel… Audrey, do your best! Audrey muttered a few words inwardly and hesitated no longer. She picked up the glass bottle and gulped down the potion inside.

The potion was not as difficult to drink as she had imagined. It was a little sour, a little sweet, a little bitter, a little dreamlike, and a little stimulating—like a willful, indulgent dream.

Before Audrey could sense what effects the potion had brought to her body, her mind abruptly blurred. Then clarity returned.

She saw the world outside the window move from night into morning. The sun rose on the horizon, dyeing a patch of sky red.

Inside the garden, flower after flower bloomed. On the tips of the emerald-green grass, crystal dewdrops trembled faintly.

Audrey seemed to have become the master of that world. Her consciousness floated upward, and from a bird’s-eye view, she saw scene after scene:

Her father and mother walked arm in arm along the garden path, bathed in morning sunlight and gently smelling the fragrance of flowers;

Her two elder brothers, Hibbert and Alfred, had dissolved their estrangement. Riding horses and followed by attendants, they entered the woods on the outskirts amid constant laughter, intending to compete over who could gain more from the hunt;

Ambassadors or special representatives from countries such as Feysac, Intis, and Feynapotter signed an agreement in Loen’s Sodelak Palace, announcing to the entire world that war would not happen. The dark clouds in the sky dispersed accordingly;

Backlund’s smog grew better and better. Factory after factory passed the dual inspection of the Alkali Industry Inspectors and the Air Pollution Investigation Committee, and those standards were promoted to other countries;

The maximum working hours and basic working conditions of laborers were all guaranteed. Every industry developed better and better. The number of vagrants fell to an unimaginable level. Various kingdom-led welfare programs covered every group of people;

More and more workers could afford bicycles. On the streets, gathered pedal bicycles were like a great army, riding toward different places amid jingling sounds;

Children no longer had to enter factories in childhood. Laughing and playing, they ran into classrooms with bright windows and clean desks and chairs. They opened their textbooks and began listening seriously. If they did not study, it was because they did not wish to—not because they lacked the conditions;

Women were no longer discriminated against because of their sex. Even a washerwoman could rely on learning, gain knowledge, and find better work. They were reporters, teachers, police officers, soldiers, miners, and government employees. In every legitimate industry, they could be seen;

All kinds of mechanical creations appeared on streets and in alleys, bringing convenience and joy to the public;

On the square before the Church of Evernight, white doves sometimes took flight and sometimes landed. People either sat or stood or played music, freely enjoying life…

This was the future Audrey dreamed of. Wild Beyonders no longer needed to live in fear. As long as they accepted regular physical examinations and mental-state assessments, they could walk beneath the sunlight and legally earn money with their Beyonder powers.

“This truly is beautiful… If I were not still maintaining clarity, I might very well sink into it, descending from the heights of consciousness, walking with Papa and Mama, hunting with my brothers, occasionally going to school to teach the children a lesson, and often running around for the continuation of world peace…” Audrey gazed upon that dream and sighed inwardly.

She then felt her Astral Body rise further, breaking through the edge of the gray world.

She saw her own dream as an enormous bubble growing from the “island of consciousness,” quietly enveloping it.

Around the “bubble” was a grayish haze. Far in the distance, other “bubbles” could be seen faintly, and beneath those “bubbles” there was often a corresponding “island of consciousness.”

Deep within the gray haze was a silent, gently rippling illusory ocean whose surface shimmered with “waves” of light and whose bottom could not be seen.

The collective subconscious sea… This is the appearance of the mind world seen from the perspective of a Dreamwalker… And a Manipulator begins to truly touch the collective subconscious sea… Audrey nodded in realization, withdrew her gaze, and no longer lingered. She forcefully broke free of the dream.

What she saw immediately returned to normal. Outside the window, it was still pitch-black. Only the gas streetlamps around the garden gave off light.

Audrey then cast her gaze toward the full-length mirror in the bedroom and felt that, compared to earlier, there seemed to be no change in herself. Only upon careful inspection could one discover that her emerald-green eyes had become even clearer and deeper, as though they could reflect another person’s soul.

She closed her eyes and experienced the knowledge brought by the potion. Audrey quickly grasped the core ability of Dreamwalker:

Through guiding and manipulating dreams, one could obtain intelligence and influence enemies.

This divided into two aspects:

The first was “guidance,” which resembled the Nightmare of the Evernight pathway. Through different changes in a dream, one could guide a target step by step into speaking the secrets hidden deep in their heart. The difference was that a Nightmare could forcefully pull someone into a dream, while a Dreamwalker could not—unless hypnosis was used in combination.

The second was “modification.” Through modifying dreams, one could influence a target over long periods of time, making them unknowingly change and do things they originally would not do. The principle of this “modification” was to use the dream as an entry point and the Astral Body as a springboard, gradually soaking into the target’s Spirit Body, only then reflecting upon the Mind Body and taking root in the subconscious. Compared with direct hypnosis, this dream-derived manipulation was gentler, more concealed, harder to detect, and suitable for targeting relatively high-level targets.

Looking at it this way, among large numbers of cases of love at first sight, perhaps a few—or even more—are hidden results of “dream modification”… Hmm. In many bestselling novels, because the heroine frequently dreams of a certain figure and has one romantic and beautiful encounter after another with him, after seeing a male lead similar to the figure in her dreams, she quickly falls deeply in love and becomes filled with yearning for romance. Mm… Audrey recalled novels she had read before and, for a moment, wanted to laugh.

For her, whether it was “guidance” or “modification,” neither represented an essential improvement compared with hypnosis. Instead, another Beyonder power delighted her more: Dream Traversal.

This allowed her body to turn incorporeal, as though transforming into a dream fairy or Dreamwalker. Not only could she directly hide inside another person’s dream, she could also leap from one dream to another, thereby completing physical “flashes.”

The restriction on this kind of traversal was that the two dreams could not be more than five hundred meters apart, and both had to belong to intelligent creatures.

Under certain circumstances, this can effectively hide myself… Hmm. Why did Hvin Rambis not directly influence me through dream modification? Because this place is protected by the Church? The Evernight pathway is also skilled in the domain of dreams… Audrey thoughtfully began restraining her spirituality.

…

Above the gray fog, inside the ancient palace.

Beside the mottled bronze long table, Klein and Leonard sat diagonally across from one another, separated by several seats.

“Why did you suddenly look for me?” Leonard leaned back against the chair, his sitting posture rather lazy as he asked.

No matter what, he always remembered that this place belonged to Mr. Fool and did not dare behave too casually.

Klein glanced at him and said,

“There is something I need your help with.”

“You need my help?” Leonard pointed at himself and asked in astonishment. “You mean Pallez, right?”

He did not feel that he could help Klein, who had already become a demigod, in any meaningful way.

“You have a very clear grasp of your own position.” Klein clicked his tongue. “However, this time, I am indeed looking for you. It mainly involves a few dreams.”

“Dreams…” Leonard showed some realization. Then, feeling a little puzzled and amused, he said, “Klein, you seem to have changed a little. I mean, you’ve become more like you were before. You’re no longer always wearing that gloomy face.”

Without waiting for Klein’s response, he tidied his slightly messy illusory hair and smiled.

“That is quite good. Mm, I can be considered fairly skilled at dreams. Whose dreams are they?”

Klein answered without any change in expression:

“A Loen soldier from over a hundred years ago, a noble from the Fourth Epoch, an ascetic from the Third Epoch, and an elf and a giant from the Second Epoch.”

“What?” Leonard’s green eyes looked rather blank as he asked back, suspecting that he had misheard.

Putting aside the elf and giant from the Second Epoch, even a noble from the Fourth Epoch would have needed to choose a specific Beyonder pathway and become a Saint to possibly survive until now!

They can’t all be angels apart from that Loen soldier, can they? Entering an angel’s dream… Better, better to ask the Old Man… Leonard’s thoughts churned rapidly, as though he were inside a dream.