Mishan is a mercenary.

Mercenaries are not common in the Realm of Reality, usually only needed when venturing into lawless, chaotic areas. He once worked for the Three Smiling Faces caravan, mainly traveling between the Dorne Region and the Dagon Region. Due to some fortuitous events, Mishan was promoted to an Extraordinary warrior several years ago, and as a result, he became the captain of the mercenary squad. Being a Transcendent allowed him to thrive, but the good days didn’t last long. At some point, Extraordinary Relics started appearing in the black market, and there were more and more Transcendents in the Realm of Reality.

The Realm of Reality gradually became turbulent, mercenaries had more work than before, but as the number of Transcendents continued to increase, Mishan’s work became increasingly difficult as there were always some Transcendents scheming for wealth by any means.

At this critical juncture, the caravan Mishan worked for went bankrupt. Fortunately, a large consortium quickly acquired the Three Smiling Faces and also took on their batch of mercenaries.

Mishan’s job didn’t change much.

Except that the trade route changed from Dorne to Dagon, to Dorne to Dele. Recently, he had just traveled to Dele’s forest with the caravan. After crossing the forest, dense with towering trees, the caravan finally reached a place called Shadow Town.

His life should have returned to normal, but at some point, Mishan noticed something was off.

He had been having nightmares constantly for the past couple of days.

The continuous nightmares left him incredibly exhausted, even his robust constitution as a Transcendent couldn’t withstand such torment. What was worse, was that it seemed he wasn’t the only one affected. On the third day, he found other members of the caravan were also bloodshot-eyed and extremely fatigued.

"Are we encountering something unclean?" Another mercenary from the caravan, Bobby, came over.

His eyes were blood-red, looking at Mishan before him, he said, "I just took a nap, for less than twenty minutes, and again I dreamt of that damned ghostly thing!"

Mishan’s voice was hoarse as he asked, "What did you dream about?"

He hadn’t slept for nearly twenty-four hours, but the invisible drowsiness persisted. What was worse was that according to the original plan, they should have been out of the forest by now. Yet, they were all exhausted, even the mules and horses pulling the carts were extremely tired, forcing the time to be delayed by more than a day.

Bobby shook his head and said, "Don’t know. Gray mist, sometimes you can see something, sometimes nothing at all."

"Just now during my nap, I seemed to see a massive cocoon, no, maybe a chrysalis."

"I feel very uneasy!"

Upon hearing this, Mishan’s expression turned serious. He said in a deep voice, "I also dreamt of endless gray mist and a massive throbbing chrysalis, don’t know what that ghostly thing is."

"But we might be in trouble."

Bobby lowered his voice and said, "Have you noticed? Only Transcendents in the entire team experience those damned nightmares, others, those ordinary people, seem merely exhausted and sleepy."

Mishan asked in a hoarse voice, "Has Kanbra not returned yet?"

"Are we lost?"

"We were supposed to get out of the forest yesterday afternoon, why are we still wandering inside today?"

Upon hearing this, Bobby showed a trace of fear and said, "Don’t know."

"But I feel he might be gone."

A weird howling sound echoed.

Mishan instantly gripped the long spear in his hand tightly. Compared to hot weapons, he was more skilled with cold weapons. He once killed three ghouls consecutively with a spear, though he also carried hot weapons, as there were quite a few factories in the Dorne Region.

"Who?!"

The two rushed toward the direction from which the sound came. The caravan was resting by a nearby river, as everyone was in poor spirits, they might have to stay another night.

In the reflection of the forest.

A burly figure clad in a simple robe, holding a staff made of vinewood, appeared with an extremely thick beard and hair.

Druid.

Mishan, as if encountering a savior, hurriedly walked over and said, "Is it Dele’s Forest Sage?"

"We seem to have encountered some trouble."

"The caravan is lost."

The opposite figure was a bit blurry. When Mishan approached, the druid’s image suddenly disappeared like a ghost, and then started flashing, constantly flashing, like a phantom, seemingly searching for something but unable to see the near-distance Mishan and others.

"Did we encounter a ghost?" Mishan felt his skin crawl instantly.

A nervously weapon-gripping Bobby also lowered his voice and said, "What’s happening? Is he a ghost?"

At this point, the figure had already come before them.

The druid figure passed straight through them, then seemed to sense something. The powerful perception and insight made him stop and frown, observing everything around.

"Doesn’t seem like a ghost!"

"But he seems unable to see us or hear us?" Mishan said quietly. 𝘧𝓇ℯ𝑒𝓌𝑒𝑏𝓃𝘰𝘷𝘦𝘭.𝒸ℴ𝓂

At this moment.

The druid raised his hand, the vinewood magic staff in his hand emitted a faint glow, and a deep voice echoed, "Are you here?"

"If you can hear."

"Find a large tree nearby, the older the better, put your hand on its trunk."

Upon hearing these words, Mishan and the others hesitated.

But after a moment of hesitation, he turned to search for a nearby large tree. His intuition told him they had encountered a paranormal event, and if they didn’t seize the chance to escape, they might end up trapped here.