Chapter 388: Nightmare Come True

What the mysterious black water represents, those who have had nightmares know all too well what life becomes once it touches that blackness.

However, there are always unavoidable moments, and someone still accidentally touched the black water; just as in the scenes seen in the nightmare, the terrifying event was fulfilled in reality.

Someone was swallowed and digested by the black water, becoming a part of it.

Seeing the scene of the nightmare coming true, the General, almost subconsciously, glared viciously at that child born of unusual circumstances—his own child.

In the nightmare, the General had seen that it was his own child who caused all of this.

No, at this moment in the General's eyes, that thing sleeping innocently in his wife's arms was not his child; it was another monster born from monsters, disguised as a harmless human child.

His birth had cursed this town and harmed the people he protected.

He could not let the nightmare truly come to pass; he had to do something!

The insane idea gradually solidified, and that very night, he "disposed" of his child.

Even though his wife collapsed because of it, he did so without looking back.

Miraculously, not long after, the flooding stopped, the mysterious black water receded, and no one's life was threatened anymore.

The General felt he had done the right thing; even though he had committed the cruel act of killing his own child with his own hands, he had saved the safety of an entire city.

The General's wife went mad, searching for her deceased child day and night.

Only when facing his wife did the General feel infinite guilt; his conviction that he had sacrificed his child for the greater good to save the city's lives would waver.

Soon, longing turned into illness, and the wife fell ill, bedridden.

The General was anxious, seeking medical help and advice everywhere, hoping to find a way to cure his wife.

This search lasted for several years, until one day, he met a Daoist who told him that the root of his wife's illness lay in her heart; her heart belonged to the child who had passed away, and as long as he could find something to replace that child, the General's wife would recover without medicine.

The General looked troubled after hearing this; how could such a thing be easily accomplished?

The Daoist then told him that he possessed a treasure, and if the General was willing to try, he could help the General create a child who looked exactly like his own; his child was still young and ignorant when he died, and children were all basically the same—as long as the General brought him back, his wife, even if she had doubts, would accept him out of deep love for her child.

Although the General felt something was amiss, he accepted the idea.

The Daoist was a master living in seclusion, and the General followed him to his cave dwelling, where there was actually a Lianhuachi.

The treasure the Daoist spoke of was a lotus root from the Lianhuachi; he took the lotus root and, while performing rituals, had the General recall the appearance of his child while alive, so that the lotus root would ultimately transform into the image he imagined.

After the General followed his instructions, the lotus root in his hands truly turned into that child—it was exactly the same!

It was so similar that the General's hands were trembling.

Yet the General knew that the child was already gone; this was not the monster from back then.

He brought the child back to the mansion and placed him beside his severely ill wife.

When his wife, dazed by her illness, woke up and saw the child sleeping beside her, she was simply incredulous, then overjoyed, weeping uncontrollably as she held the child.

Feeling the joy of having what was lost returned, the wife believed she had experienced a dream, and the General also ordered everyone in the General's Mansion and the town's residents to cooperate—to cooperate with his wife.

Because the General was highly respected, everyone honored him and readily agreed to cooperate.

As time passed, the child grew up, the wife was happy, and the General slowly came to view the child he had brought back as his own, watching over him with genuine sincerity.

However, another rainy season arrived, and nameless winds blew through the town, just like the signs before the black flood years ago; for some reason, the General felt a heartfelt palpitation.

The more one fears something, the more it comes; the black flood arrived once again.

The black water returned, sweeping through the entire city, and it was even more menacing than last time, with countless lives swallowed by the black water.

Seeing such a disaster, the General's face turned pale; he was not stunned by the disaster before him, but realized that he seemed to have committed an unforgivable act in the past.

The black water was not a calamity brought by the child from back then; the child was innocent, and he had wishfully believed in the illusion of a nightmare and killed his own child with his own hands.

The General was in immense pain, and this time he no longer had firm conviction, nor could he think of a way to save the town.

He could only watch helplessly as he sank into the vortex of black water, watching the city be swallowed by the nameless, terrifying black water.

Finally, the black water surrounded the General's Mansion, which was built on high ground.

The gale howled, and the General's Mansion was like a lonely boat drifting on a stormy sea, small and fragile.

The black water suddenly lashed out with waves several zhang high, crossing the General's Mansion's walls, which were several meters tall, and invaded.

The people in the General's Mansion looked at this desperate scene in terror, and then the black water swallowed the General's Mansion as well; everyone turned into nothingness under the erosion of the black water, and the General was also being slowly corroded, only he did not die immediately because he was wearing precious armor to show his authority while commanding the others.

As his life faded, the General suddenly felt that this scene was so familiar.

In a trance, he heard an ancient roar and the crying of an infant.

Looking back, he saw a giant ball of flesh; the flesh ball split open, opening like wings, and a youth was crying out to him, "Father, I don't know why I turned into this."

The General suddenly realized that this was the child he had created with the lotus root.

When he created this child with the Daoist, he had imbued all his imaginations of the child from back then into those few inches of lotus root.

It was he who had personally created such a monster, making the nightmare come true.

Lin Ling finished telling this story, and everyone in the shop felt an indescribable aftertaste, sighing endlessly.

"This story is meant to say that parents and children should trust each other more, right? Such an ending is truly distressing." Chen Xiaolin sighed and shook her head; she had once been a reporter, so she was naturally more sentimental.

Wei Jiang, however, said calmly, "It's hard to judge everyone in the story, but I have reason to suspect that the Daoist is very problematic."

Li Duojin: "Indeed, it is highly likely that he is the mastermind behind the two black water disasters."

Li Jiahong, however, kept his head down and said nothing, his expression uncertain and his eyes drifting; his thoughts were different from the others, and his focus was not on the story itself, but on other aspects—he had substituted Li Yuning into the role of the General's child in the story, suddenly feeling that Li Yuning's experiences seemed to correspond to it.

In other words, his child Li Yuning might very well encounter a life-or-death crisis.