Chapter 1: The Dream World of the Song Dynasty

Wu Pifu's eyes were blood-red, yet he didn't look back as he ran past the corpses of Wang Xiuting and Li An. He stumbled, nearly falling, but fortunately, his Tiger Demon Art had deeply tempered his lower body, preventing him from falling and losing his life at this critical moment.

A Rank Two Nightmare!

It was actually a Rank Two Nightmare!

Wu Pifu had never even imagined he would encounter a Rank Two Nightmare. Of the three of them remaining, two had died in an instant, and... there was no longer any place outside that could isolate a Nightmare!!

Although Wu Pifu was filled with despair, he was not a man to sit and wait for death. Driven by the will to survive, he began to sprint madly toward the corner ahead.

Moving like a tiger, wild as a demon—this was the first time Wu Pifu had ever been so close to the state of mind required by this technique.

This was a remote warehouse near Lujiazui on the Bund in Shanghai, across the river from the French Concession. His goal was the French Concession on the other side!

By now, the sky was completely dark. This was not the future of the 21st century; although the Shanghai of the Republic of China era was a world of flowers and debauchery, outside of the various concessions and bustling areas, other regions lacked the infrastructure of the future. Thus, after Wu Pifu ran out from the dim streetlights of the warehouse, everything ahead was pitch black.

Yet Wu Pifu dared not show the slightest hesitation or pause. He charged directly into the darkness, rushing out along the reflections of the river's faint light ahead.

He knew the Nightmare was watching him playfully, treating his escape with the mindset of a cat toying with a mouse.

This was Baseline Reality 0.9, and this Rank Two Nightmare came from Baseline Reality 0.8, so it could exert its full power here, perhaps even with a boost in strength. Just a moment ago, in a single encounter, this Rank Two Nightmare had killed both Wang Xiuting and Li An. That he had survived was absolutely not due to his strength, but rather his luck...

This Nightmare just wanted to savor the fear he was radiating!

But...

How could a man just sit and wait for death!?

Even if he were to die, he must die on the path of the charge!!

There was still a chance of survival ahead, the only chance...

In this Baseline Reality 0.9 Dream World, there were three Rank One Sanctuaries: his, Wang Xiuting's, and Li An's.

Li An's sanctuary had been destroyed last year, in 1934, due to the influence of the Shanghai serial murder case; because Li An had joined the Red Team operations to gain influence, he ended up being sabotaged by Nationalist intelligence agents.

Wang Xiuting's sanctuary was the warehouse from just a moment ago, which was also destroyed when the Rank Two Nightmare penetrated through. Now, only his sanctuary remained, right ahead in the French Concession. That was his only hope for escape!

Rushing from inside the warehouse to the river surface, Wu Pifu leaped, his body in the shape of a tiger, pouncing forward, and with a splash, he fell into the water.

He was not naturally good at swimming, but the Tiger Demon Art included methods for training in water and a tiger-style swimming technique. However, Wu Pifu had not yet mastered it. Now, forced to perform, he began to splash madly forward.

Gradually, he felt a bone-chilling coldness coming from his back. It was June in Shanghai, and the weather was starting to turn hot; even if he were splashing in the water, it was impossible to feel such bone-chilling cold. Therefore, this coldness could only mean one thing...

The Nightmare had already arrived behind him!

(... Give me more time, give me one more chance.)

Wu Pifu continued to splash forward madly. At this moment, his skin was flushed with a pale red, and a cloud of steam rose from the top of his head. He had pushed the blood circulation of the Tiger Demon Art to its limit. This state could not last long, but it allowed his hands to exert two or three hundred jin of force. Swimming and splashing forward with all his might, his speed was astonishingly fast.

But... he still couldn't shake the coldness behind him.

That was a Nightmare from the Baseline Reality 0.8 Dream World, a terrifying curse-like ghost existence, formless and without substance, possessing speed that transcended logical concepts, teleportation, and the ability to alter and distort physical space and laws. It could also manipulate human hearts, causing hallucinations. Without a technique or power to restrain it, it could kill an entire legion of people in a minute!

The Tiger Demon Art, while circulating blood and stimulating potential, could provide immunity to hallucinations, but it could not resist the life-force extraction of this Nightmare. Nothing else was needed; if the Nightmare touched him even lightly, he would immediately sink to the bottom of the river, dead beyond all doubt.

But whether it was his prayer that took effect, or the Nightmare wishing to toy with him a while longer, Wu Pifu only felt the coldness on his back without suffering any other attacks. It actually allowed him to cross the river and charge into the territory of the French Concession ahead.

This year was 1935. Although the Japanese had already invaded China, they had not yet attacked Shanghai. While the various international concessions were somewhat wary of the Japanese, the arrogant foreigners did not believe the Japanese had the guts to infringe upon the concessions. Therefore, apart from normal patrols, there were no searchlights or checkpoints on the border of the French Concession.

Wu Pifu charged toward the location of his sanctuary in the darkness of the night.

He didn't know if it was his imagination, but the coldness on his back grew even more intense...

No... it wasn't his imagination. This thing could directly infiltrate the human mind and cause hallucinations, so it must also be able to perceive his thoughts. The closer he got to his destination, the more likely this thing was to kill him.

Judging by the terrifying and malicious nature of the Nightmare as he knew it, the moment this Rank Two Nightmare was most likely to kill him was... at the very instant he was about to be saved!?

Wu Pifu immediately began to empty his mind of thoughts.

This had been proven to be an effective method for dealing with a Nightmare's perception of thoughts.

However, there is great terror between life and death, and he was but a mortal; how could he possibly empty his mind completely?

Wu Pifu could only desperately recall the various details of the Tiger Demon Art: form like a tiger, spirit like a demon...

Although the Tiger Demon Art was similar to Xingyi Quan, with the tiger form as the core of its practice, when it came to storing spirit and thought, it did not imitate a real-life tiger, but rather madness!

Thoughts chaotic and mad; within the movement of madness lies the true intent, guarding the heart to reflect one's true nature.

This was a martial art completely different from conventional national arts.

Other national arts required a clear and calm mind, where the so-called reflection of true nature is emptiness. But this Tiger Demon Art was the opposite; it not only required you to be filled with madness while practicing, but the more chaotic and mad your thoughts were, the better. When you practiced the Tiger Demon Art to the point where you could remain calm amidst the madness, maintaining a single point of mental tranquility amidst chaos and distracting thoughts, then this Tiger Demon Art could be considered to have entered the hall.

Wu Pifu naturally hadn't reached this realm yet. Strictly speaking, he had only just begun. On the Mainframe interface, his Tiger Demon Art indeed only showed entry-level proficiency.

At this moment, Wu Pifu could only use distracting thoughts to replace the emptying of his mind, his head filled with all sorts of memories and questions.

Parents, what kind of feelings were they going through when they bid me farewell back then?

It's already 2877, and I don't even have a sexual partner; backward, pathetic!

I'm hungry. Ever since I started practicing national arts, I can eat so much.

Can I... survive?

I can survive!

The destination was right ahead. Wu Pifu looked at the street with signs of life and the tailor shop on the edge of the French Concession, and he gathered all his strength to charge forward madly.

Since he started circulating the Tiger Demon Art, he had been stimulating his life force for over ten minutes. At this moment, he looked terrifying; blood was seeping from his mouth, ears, nose, and eyes, and his skin was flushed and scorching hot, with beads of blood seeping to the surface. The pedestrians nearby were so frightened that they retreated repeatedly, which instead cleared an empty path for him to run forward.

Fifty meters, forty meters, thirty meters, twenty meters...

At the final ten meters, Wu Pifu roared and leaped forward. It was the "Mad Tiger Pouncing on the Ravine" move from the Tiger Demon Art. His whole body soared into the air, his speed surging several times over. Just as he was about to charge into the tailor shop with the red door, suddenly his left arm was fixed and locked by a huge force, leaving him just one step away from the red door, yet unable to enter.

Space!

Wu Pifu immediately understood what had happened. This Nightmare had altered the rules of space, locking his left arm in space, leaving him in a final desperate situation just one step away from escape.

That bone-chilling coldness suddenly intensified. Lines of sound, like moans, like wails, like weeping, flooded into his mind. At this moment, even though he was still circulating the Tiger Demon Art, his vision had gradually become distorted. This was the precursor to the arrival of hallucinations.

His life hung in the balance of this very breath!

"Ahhh!!"

Wu Pifu suddenly roared loudly, his voice like a tiger's howl, like a mad demon. One could see long green tendons rising on his skin, his muscles bulging high, and even some skin tearing open. Then, in the next instant, Wu Pifu actually tore off his left arm, leaped with his whole body, and crashed into the red wooden door. With a crisp crack, the red wooden door was smashed to pieces, and Wu Pifu disappeared.

In the blink of an eye, Wu Pifu appeared in a future high-tech hibernation chamber. He didn't get up, but raised his intact right arm and roared loudly: "Mainframe, activate random Dream World penetration! Confirm!"

"Whether... confirmation achieved, penetration activated."

Just at this moment, a pale arm appeared out of thin air beside the hibernation chamber, reaching toward Wu Pifu's head.

At the same time, Wu Pifu's vision went black. In the next instant, he fell into a patch of mud. It was drizzling, and he saw a building some ten meters ahead. He couldn't see clearly what it was, but he mustered all his remaining strength to stagger forward, then used all his might to slam his head into the paint-peeled wooden door, making a thudding sound.

In the final moment before losing consciousness, Wu Pifu opened his Mainframe personal information interface with his mind and looked at the Dream World he was in.

Baseline Reality 0.7.

Finally, Wu Pifu fainted with a slight sense of relief.

(End of chapter)