Chapter Fifty-Four: Stay Where You Are!

Dreamcross Tower.

The Eightieth Floor.

President’s Office.

Tang Nai, the president of the Jiangling Dreamwalker Association, dressed in a traditional Tang suit and wearing reading glasses, was, at this moment, reviewing the list of newcomers for the invitational tournament under the dim glow of an old-fashioned desk lamp.

The day after tomorrow would be the Newcomer Dreamwalker Invitational, and this year, the venue for the provincial tournament was right here in Jiangling.

Naturally, Tang Nai had to devote extra attention to this event.

The Newcomer Dreamwalker Invitational was important as well; it was a competition designed to let new dreamwalkers feel the pressure of rivalry, to inspire those who had only just awakened to continuously grow stronger.

If the National Dreamwalker Championship was akin to a military exercise, meant to deter the dream fiends lurking within the city,

then the Newcomer Invitational was about nurturing and selecting new power, allowing the world to witness hope rising in an endless stream.

In reality, the Newcomer Dreamwalker Invitational also exerted a tremendous deterrent effect on the dream fiends.

Thus, each year, core seeds specially cultivated by the Dreamwalker Association would participate in the invitational.

“The newcomers from the Wildfire Squad: Chen Xi and Du Fang…”

“Du Fang… that’s probably the young man who only recently joined Wildfire, isn’t it? If I recall, Wen Ji mentioned he awakened the Infinite Dream Spirit…”

Tang Nai set down the list, removed his gold-rimmed glasses, and wiped them with a cloth, muttering to himself.

“But without awakening a special ability, relying solely on the Infinite Dream Spirit won’t get you far in the invitational.”

Tang Nai chuckled softly.

Suddenly—

Tang Nai tilted his head back, and beneath his white hair, those kindly eyes abruptly sharpened.

“Such dream spirit fluctuations…”

“A city-destroyer class dream fiend?”

“Who is it?”

With a swoosh, the elderly man in the Tang suit vanished from the office in an instant.

The next moment—

At the very summit of Dreamcross Tower,

Tang Nai appeared, standing silently at the highest point.

The higher one stands,

the stronger the wind.

The old man stood with his hands clasped behind him, his white hair fluttering in the wind.

He closed his eyes slightly, and the air around his body began to distort.

The wind, it seemed, became almost tangible.

A wave of searing heat drifted in.

“This is Zhang Changlin’s special ability—Lionfire Mode…”

A suffocating dream spirit swept past,

“This dream spirit… one of the Dragon Kings of the Celestial Fiend Organization?”

Tang Nai’s eyes snapped open, his expression growing impossibly grave.

“The Dragon Kings of the Celestial Fiend Organization… every one of them is a will that escaped from a city-destroyer class dream disaster, incomparably troublesome to deal with—and now one appears in Jiangling, clashing with Zhang Changlin…”

“What luck does Zhang Changlin have?”

“With a world this vast, why is it always you who runs into a Dragon King…”

Tang Nai felt a headache coming on.

He’d always heard Zhang Changlin was unlucky, but when, back during the assault on the nightmare disaster that shrouded the whole island, all his teammates perished and only Zhang Changlin survived, he thought,

Little Zhang’s luck couldn’t be all that bad.

So, Tang Nai always assumed it was just rumor—

Now, at last, he was seeing the truth.

“A Dragon King has entered Jiangling… I must sound the alarm.”

Tang Nai’s face was solemn.

However—

Just as he was about to alert his subordinates and raise the alarm,

Within his perception,

The Celestial Fiend’s Dragon King seemed to encounter something truly terrifying,

Its dream spirit fluctuations shuddered violently.

Then, it fled in a frenzy.

Tang Nai’s mouth hung open, stunned for a moment.

“This little Zhang… hiding such depths?”

…

…

“Return the ‘Hand of God’ to me.”

“What hand?”

“The Hand of God.”

“What god?”

“The great god.”

“Of what?”

“MDZZ!”

“How dare you insult me! Of what, exactly?”

“Mr. Zhang, I can overlook your theft of the Calamity Mud, but please, stop playing dumb…”

The elegant old man spoke politely,

Yet his tone was laced with barely suppressed rage, as if the fuse of a powder keg had already been lit and was about to explode.

Zhang Changlin entered Lionfire Mode, gripping his broken blade.

The will of the shadow within the forbidden blade emerged, and before the old man, it seemed ready to retreat back into the blade.

If not for Zhang Changlin’s furious roar echoing in his mind, the shadow would likely have already surrendered.

To be saddled with such a cowardly sequence forbidden artifact—Zhang Changlin felt truly exasperated.

“You’re the one playing dumb—your whole family’s playing dumb!”

“What Hand of God? I didn’t take it!”

Zhang Changlin, too, had a temper, and growled in reply.

The elegant old man flushed with shame and anger.

So you refuse to show respect when shown mercy.

Behind him, the dragon-shaped apparition formed from dream spirit seemed to roar thunderously.

In the next instant,

The elegant old man vanished from sight.

When he appeared again, he was already before Zhang Changlin.

The tip of his umbrella descended lightly,

Aimed at Zhang Changlin’s chest.

A tingling sensation shot across Zhang Changlin’s scalp, as if a current jolted through his entire body. He thrust the broken blade forward to block the umbrella’s thrust.

Bang!

Invisible dream spirit energy rippled outward in a blast.

A gale howled at the epicenter.

The pavement split apart, dust billowed upward, and a shockwave surged, rebounding along the street.

Zhang Changlin’s body spun as he was knocked backward, skidding and shattering the street, until he crashed brutally into a lamppost, snapping it in two.

“As expected… I knew it, time to take another beating…”

“It’s always me who gets hurt!”

Blood trickled from Zhang Changlin’s mouth. Lionfire Mode faded, and his dream spirit perception waned.

He laughed bitterly at himself.

Damn it,

In this lifetime,

He, Zhang Changlin, would never gamble again.

“Hand over the ‘Hand of God’.”

The elegant old man leaned on his umbrella, shod in polished black shoes, striding step by step toward Zhang Changlin.

In the distance, Old Chang the driver trembled with excitement.

This is the master!

Powerful, terrifying, invincible—uh.

Suddenly,

The excited driver’s face froze.

His one remaining eye fixed on the distance.

There, two figures were rushing over.

One was Su Jiuming in a pink suit. The other… was him!

It’s him, it’s him, it’s him!

That unnameable presence!

“Master!!!”

The driver shrieked.

“He—he—he’s coming!”

“Run!”

The elegant old man, walking toward Zhang Changlin, shuddered, suddenly looking up, his gaze landing on the approaching Su Jiuming and Du Fang.

At that moment,

His dream spirit perception reached its peak.

In that instant,

His entire world narrowed to only one thing: the little girl at Du Fang’s side, carrying a pink pig plushie.

The little girl spotted him from afar.

Her face, seemingly stitched together from flesh and blood, dripped with the blood of the superior, exuding oppressive might.

She tilted her head, grinning with a maw full of sharp teeth and drooling saliva.

A barbed, slender tongue slid from her mouth, swaying as if the very space around it fractured with its movement.

Cold sweat began to bead on the old man’s forehead.

This time, his perception was clearer than ever before.

That soul-deep sense of oppression—

It was the absolute suppression of a higher existence over a lower one!

And this oppressive force—

Damn it,

There wasn’t just one!

The elegant old man struggled to tear his gaze from the little girl, snapping his eyes to Du Fang.

He discovered that, as Du Fang ran closer, there was a bloody hand perched on his shoulder…

A superior’s pressure, flawless crimson, a dreamlike aura—

This was… the Hand of God!

The old man’s breath caught in his chest,

Yet before he could focus on his long-coveted Hand of God,

He realized that as Du Fang ran closer, his black hair occasionally flashed with silver.

Each time the silver appeared, a terrifying pressure crashed into his heart like a waterfall cascading from the heavens.

Silver, black,

Black,

Silver!

The aura would flicker, appear, vanish,

Again and again, coming and going in waves.

The elegant old man’s composure shattered; all courage to fight deserted him.

Restlessness,

Horror,

Despair—

All coalesced into a single thought:

Don’t come any closer!

…

Su Jiuming’s pupils contracted, all trace of his flirtatious expression vanishing from his face.

He was deadly serious, cold sweat beading on his brow.

“This dream spirit pressure… that’s a dream fiend from the 'Celestial Fiend' organization!”

“So powerful! Too powerful!”

“This is absolutely beyond a Grade Nine Nightmare!”

“A Dragon King of the Celestial Fiend?”

Su Jiuming said gravely.

“Captain Zhang is in danger!”

He immediately sent out a distress signal.

Clutching a white rose, he spun it sharply, and instantly, the petals scattered.

Boom!

Countless petals appeared behind Su Jiuming, forming the image of a white cat.

Then, his pink shoes hammered the ground, and with the rapid click-clack, his speed skyrocketed. Like an agile white cat, he darted through the night!

He raced directly toward Zhang Changlin.

Du Fang had stopped running because—

He couldn’t catch up with Su Jiuming.

He paused, exhaled, and stood still.

He watched quietly as Su Jiuming, shrouded in a flurry of white rose petals, charged forward like an enormous white cat.

A look of awe flashed in his eyes.

“So this is Brother Su’s special ability? That’s really cool!”

Du Fang marveled.

In the distance,

The elegant old man had no time to continue beating or finishing off pitiable Old Zhang.

He panicked, turned, and fled without hesitation.

He swept past Old Chang the driver, scooped him up, and in a flash appeared beside the stretch limousine.

“Master, Old Chang will drive right away!” the driver shrieked.

“Drive your damn car!”

But the elegant old man yanked open the car door, hurled Old Chang inside,

Then, seizing the stretch limousine with both hands, he took off running,

Striding down the street at breakneck speed.

In the cold, sorrowful moonlight, their shadows stretched long,

And gradually faded into the night.

PS: Asking for monthly votes, asking for recommendations~