Chapter 830: Prepare to Face the Judgment of Knowledge and Truth!
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 830: Prepare to Face the Judgment of Knowledge and Truth!
"..."
Faced with such a request, even I found it difficult to respond immediately.
It wasn't that I was unwilling to grant them power, but rather that even now... I possessed no power myself.
This was the Primitive Dream Realm. Stripped of the order and rules of reality, I couldn't even cast a basic spell. The laws here were incompatible; even the concept of Rune Rituals was warped within the dream.
As for the power of my two Great Spellbooks... even with the ability to anchor to reality, they could only affect me personally. Moreover, neither of those Great Spellbooks was offensive in nature.
"I apologize... I was far too forward... asking for power from you the moment we met, Sage Xiao Han..."
"We are truly sorry, Village Chief. We are strangers to everything here," Yulan added from the side.
"Ah... the three Braves..." The Village Chief looked at Yulan as she spoke, suddenly realizing she had somewhat neglected the three heroes.
However, the fact that these three Braves no longer recognized them filled her with profound regret. Just how much determination must these warriors have possessed to step out of the comfort of Fool's Village and seek that final sliver of possibility within the boundless Primitive Dream Realm?
As the Village Chief, she naturally knew the "Scroll Story" of that time.
The previous chief had tried desperately to make them stay, yet they had resolutely set out to find the last hope for the Fool's Dream race.
How could she not know? To step outside Fool's Village was to be incessantly eroded by endless nightmares. They could only rely on Holy Relics to maintain their consciousness, using sheer willpower to resist the distortions of the nightmares...
Without the Dream Scroll to carry their memories, it was inevitable that the Braves would forget. But the fact that they had found the Sage proved that the persistence rooted in their instinctive consciousness had allowed them to find hope for the Fool's Dream race after all!
"I apologize. It is not that I am unwilling to grant you power, but rather that I do not know how to grant it to you," I said with a hint of regret. "I come from reality, as I told you before. I haven't visited this Primitive Dream Realm many times, and the power I originally mastered cannot manifest its true strength here."
"But... you possess a Holy Relic! The power of a Holy Relic is..." As she spoke, the Village Chief's voice gradually trailed off.
"Yes... I do have the Holy Relics." Hearing her words, many thoughts crossed my mind. "However... since you honor me with the title of Sage, I naturally will not fail your expectations!"
"As you said before, a Sage possesses vast wisdom and masters countless stores of knowledge. Therefore, wisdom shall be my power, and knowledge shall be my weapon! But I need time to decipher the mysteries hidden behind that knowledge before I can transform it into actual strength."
"Truly?!"
The Village Chief had been dejected just a moment ago upon hearing I couldn't help, but my words immediately reignited her hope!
"Yes, of course," I nodded, giving my promise.
Regardless of whether I had encountered this unexpected group of Fool's Dreams, I would have continued to explore and utilize the "rules" of the Primitive Dream Realm. Now, I just happened to have a group of Fool's Dreams with me. Being called "Sage Xiao Han" by them... honestly, it was hard for anyone to resist that kind of treatment.
"Wonderful! I... I will go tell everyone in Fool's Village this good news immediately! We shall hold a grand banquet for you, Sage!"
"There's no need for such a grand gesture," I said, waving my hands dismissively.
This reminded me of the Fool's Village Secret Realm back at the Witch Academy; those adorable Fool's Dreams seemed to love throwing banquets for visitors as well.
"This is a return gift for your arrival and your promise to help the Fool's Dream race! Otherwise, we truly wouldn't know how to thank you..."
"Very well then..." I didn't push back further. Sometimes, when in Rome, it was best to do as the Romans do.
After all, who could refuse such a cute group of Fool's Dreams?
Watching the Village Chief leave, even leaving me alone with the Dream Scroll atop this Starlight Tower, I couldn't help but marvel at the innocence of the Fool's Dreams.
However... I would not betray their trust. No matter the consideration, I would not take the Dream Scroll at this moment to perfect my Tree of Great Wisdom Enlightenment.
I simply stared at the long scroll, lost in thought.
I was pondering a question.
For instance... was everything I was seeing real or fake?
Why did the appearance of these Fool's Dreams perfectly match the forms I had fabricated for them?
Or was this a characteristic of the dream—that not only did language bypass the level of textual understanding, but even sight bypassed the level of visual cognition?
Did everything simply conform to my perception? It was just like when I first arrived in the Primitive Dream Realm; I couldn't see the dream creatures, yet the Fool's Dreams could.
Whether one could see, or whether what one saw was familiar... these concepts had long been blurred.
After all, only my consciousness was here. Even my Five Senses were merely derivative products of habitual cognition within my consciousness...
Nothing here could be understood using the logic of reality.
"Sister Xiao Han..."
At that moment, Yulan tugged at the corner of my skirt.
"What's wrong?" I knelt down and patted Yulan's little head. "Are you feeling out of place here?"
"Mm... a little... but there's also an instinctive sense of closeness..."
"Perhaps you, Yu Yun, and Yu Guo—the three of you, including everyone back at the Witch Academy—all came from here?" I suggested.
"Is that true? We have no memory of it at all... and suddenly there are so many sisters..."
"I know you're uneasy, and some facts might indeed be undeniable, but I don't want you to force yourselves to accept all of this. You are still the Fool's Dreams I know. The time you spent with me is real. We only came here under the anchoring of the Great Wisdom Enlightenment Art."
"Then... are they sisters just like us? How should we look at them..."
The three little ones were clearly caught in a dilemma. It was a sense of confusion born from facing a lost past. Everything was happening so fantastically that they found it hard to accept.
"Of course they can be sisters~" I patted Yulan's head to comfort her. "Once I complete the true Life Project and make you and the Fool's Dream race a true life race, they can become true Fool's Dreams as well, can't they?"
"Is that so?"
"Isn't it? You are all working hard to become true life. You call yourselves Fool's Dreams to distinguish yourselves from ordinary dream creatures. You have a unified goal and a unified dream. So why can't they be your sisters? Even if you've forgotten them and they don't remember you, can't a relationship start over?"
"Start over?"
"Exactly~ Didn't you see many Fool's Dreams on the way here? They live very fulfilling lives. Don't you want to be friends with them just like you are with each other?" I continued my persuasive push.
"But... we want to go back to reality with Sister Xiao Han... the dream... we don't like it here..."
"We are definitely going back to reality~ But that doesn't stop you from becoming their friends. Once you're friends, you can lead them together to become true life, to become the true Fool's Dream race, and come to reality. Wouldn't that be great?"
I did my best to guide them through this. The Fool's Dreams might not be able to think deeply, but I could guide their efforts.
"Yes! Okay!" Yulan and the other two nodded repeatedly, seemingly won over by my reasoning.
In the end, whether one accepts something often comes down to whether the excuse they find for themselves is acceptable.
While I was comforting the Fool's Dreams, a new image suddenly surfaced on the Dream Scroll floating above the Starlight Tower.
The Dream Scroll didn't preserve memories for the village based on a timeline. Instead, it used event nodes. After all, the concept of time in a dream was abstract; only the nodes of events left a lasting impression.
A dark scene was suddenly depicted on the Dream Scroll. Then, the sky seemed to tear open, and twisted, monster-like creations were drawn onto the scroll.
Even the innocent and cute art style couldn't hide the monsters' ferocity. They were like wolves entering a sheepfold, beginning to recklessly threaten the safety of every Fool's Dream.
"What's happening?"
I looked at the scroll in shock. It was unbelievable—how could this happen so suddenly in such a short time?
As I moved closer, I noticed a record that looked like narration.
“The long-peaceful Fool's Village welcomed back its long-lost Braves. The Braves led the Sage into the village, and the Sage promised to protect them...”
“But no Fool's Dream noticed that after the Sage arrived, the concept of Fool's Village was briefly exposed, attracting countless evil existences to invade. They bared their hideous teeth and attacked the Fool's Dreams who were preparing a banquet for the Sage. The disaster of Fool's Village has begun...”
"Damn it... was there such a blunder?" Looking at the monologue on the scroll, I understood the situation.
Because of my arrival, the "location" of Fool's Village in the Primitive Dream Realm had been temporarily exposed. So... those dream creatures just walked right in?
While those creatures were nothing to me in the shallow dreams, this was the Primitive Dream Realm!
This was life-threatening!
Moreover, I had learned from the Village Chief earlier that the nightmares carried by these dream creatures were "curses" that the Fool's Dreams had to avoid at all costs.
This really was a case of wolves among sheep.
I leaned over the edge of the Starlight Tower and looked toward the direction we had come from. This was the highest point in the village, offering a view of the entire area. Near the distant main gate of Fool's Village, a visible "commotion" was indeed taking place.
"Let's go! We have to help them!" I made a snap decision. I wasn't going to waste any more time and prepared to leap down from the high tower.
But the moment I was about to jump, I hesitated.
This was a dream, not reality. In reality, I had many ways to fly or even teleport directly. But those spellbooks and spells were useless in the Primitive Dream Realm. Even my physical strength from Body Cultivation...
In the end, I didn't gamble. I led the Fool's Dreams and ran down the stairs.
In a dream, the essence of individual strength didn't seem to follow the same principles as reality. A powerful exterior—what power needed to express—had to be an expression of fundamental strength.
Even with spells, what was powerful was the energy; a spell was simply a means or a technique to utilize transcendent energy. But there was no transcendent energy in the dream, nor was there actual matter. This was the fundamental reason why spells and Body Cultivation couldn't be used.
So, what was in the dream?
As I rushed toward the scene, I urged myself to find a solution. If I couldn't, I would just be delivering myself to the slaughter.
Ultimately, the spells that worked in dreams before relied on a framework of reality as the dream's structural rules. Once deep within the Primitive Dream Realm, the information channels between reality and the dream could not be established at such a depth.
So... what did the dream have?
I thought of my other spell: "Dream Rewriting Spell."
Though it was still part of the spell system, what I needed wasn't the spell itself, but the essence the spell utilized—Information!
What was omnipresent in a dream?
Information, of course!
If you compared the relationship between dreams and information to the relationship between reality and matter, everything became much easier to understand!
So, were there rituals and basic runes developed from rituals in the dream? Even a similar concept?
I couldn't find a corresponding concept. But I did think of something else!
Ley Lines!
Ley Lines existed even within dreams; this was something I had known for a long time. Even the Dream Overlap in the Expansion Realms was part of world repair, because the dream portion of the Main World Ley Lines still belonged to the Main World.
Therefore, theoretically, Ley Lines existed in the Primitive Dream Realm as well.
Did Fool's Village have such Ley Lines?
I instinctively looked back at the Starlight Tower. As the most iconic building in the village, it was reasonable to guess that it might be the convergence point of the Ley Lines.
But I quickly set aside the idea of Ley Lines. Because of their regional nature, I couldn't command their energy.
So, in the Primitive Dream Realm, what other way was there to utilize information? Even the simplest, most primitive method!
By now, I had reached the vicinity of the incident at full speed. Perhaps because I was so anxious, I seemed to have crossed the concept of space itself to appear here. After all, the concepts of space and time in a dream were truly distorted and fragile.
"It's... it's the Sage!" At that moment, some Fool's Dream suddenly noticed me.
"It really is the Sage! Has the Sage come to save us?"
"Sage!"
As those voices full of hope rang out, it felt as if I had stepped onto a stage play dictated by a script. All the spotlights were on me!
At this moment, I felt like an actor who had forgotten her lines, looking on in confusion as the story unfolded this way.
But I noticed that everything around me had slowed down, as if my intense inner desire allowed me more time to deal with this sudden chaos... it was my Time Sense.
And just now, I seemed to have crossed space to get here from the distant Starlight Tower. What was that? Space Sense?
I didn't have the spare energy to analyze it all. But I seemed to know how to harness the dream now.
Perception channels!
Isn't information perceived by consciousness?
The Five Senses, the Sixth Sense, the Seventh Sense... even Mental Power!
The derivative methods included Witch Meditation, Enlightenment Meditation Art...
Everything happened so fast, almost like instinct.
A book appeared in my hand. Its form was strikingly similar to the Book in the Box, but I knew very well it wasn't. This was merely the form information took within the dream.
I gripped the spine with my right hand, the corner of the book pointing diagonally at the rampaging dream creatures. I admit... at this moment, I was fully in character, immersed in this stage play of Fool's Village.
And I spoke the lines that belonged to me.
"I... Yang Yuehan! Sage of the Fool's Dream race! I shall spare no effort in fighting the evil that dares invade Fool's Village!"
"Prepare to face the judgment of knowledge and truth!"