Dream Eater felt that any further words with Wei Yuan were utterly pointless, but Wei Yuan truly had no desire for revenge at the moment. He only wanted to return to reality as soon as possible.

In the real world, the realm of Qingming was under attack by a blood curse and barely holding its ground solely through his ceaseless supply of fortune. Without the realm’s support, the few defensive arrays they had wouldn’t last against the blood curse.

After speaking with Dream Eater, Wei Yuan learned that a Blood Warlock would ascend to become a Shadow Warlock once they had reached the pinnacle of their cultivation, forming their own miniature world in the Coldbelow. The Coldbelow was a special world that bridged the native world to the void Outside. There were no physical forms here, only primordial spirits could move about. After a Shadow Warlock had formed their own world within the Coldbelow, they could borrow its power in reality, resulting in a qualitative leap in their mystical prowess.

At this point, Wei Yuan understood what Dream Eater was saying exactly: A Shadow Warlock was basically the Shaman equivalent of a human’s World Ruler True Lord. Take revenge against a True Lord? Wei Yuan’s ambitions weren’t that grand.

When Dream Eater discovered that Wei Yuan was worried about the state of the realm of Qingming, she expressed her puzzlement and disbelief, “You’re worried about those things who don’t even possess a primordial spirit? Those humans are nothing but trash and parasites, utterly useless and serving only to burden the world. The more of them that die, the better. Why on earth would you want to protect them?”

This remark instinctively repelled Wei Yuan, but he did his best to maintain a calm tone as he replied, “Every great cultivator starts as a mortal and works their way up; no one is born with Dao energy. By your logic, every human deserves to die from the moment they are born.”

Dream Eater retorted, “There are some among your race who are born with Dao energy though? Don’t you know that?”

This time, it was Wei Yuan’s turn to be taken aback. He really had no idea.

“Since you don’t know, I won’t talk to you about this. You can find out about it yourself when you get back. For now, I’ll give you a brief overview of the Coldbelow. You will understand why I asked if you want to get revenge then.”

According to Dream Eater, the world where the humans, the shamans, the Liao and more races lived was called the Homeworld. The world beyond the Homeworld was called the Outside. There existed all manner of bizarre and eerie worlds where the Homeworld intersected with the Outside. To ordinary humans, these worlds were all terribly strange and perilous—the Coldbelow was one such world.

Countless terrifying monsters roamed the realm of Coldbelow, some were born from the corruption of the Outside, while others were creatures who naturally appeared from the Homeworld. Dream Eater herself was a great demon who was born in the Coldbelow.

Although the Shadow Warlocks had established their own worlds within the Coldbelow, their influence was limited to bestowing additional blessings upon their chosen followers and granting them a few special mystic abilities or spells. Beyond that, they had little power to affect the realm itself. In the words of Dream Eater, they were like tenants who had leased a small plot of land that would be returned to the Coldbelow upon their death.

For a demon like Dream Eater, who was born of the Coldbelow, she could tolerate a Shadow Warlock’s existence because their world was returned to the Coldbelow upon their death, and the mystic energy expended in constructing that world would also be absorbed by the realm. However, she could not say the same for the Shamanic followers who emerged from the Shadow Warlock’s kingdom at all.

In Dream Eater’s words, these followers roamed everywhere in search for precious resources that were unique to the Coldbelow. The lairs and offspring of demons such as Dream Eater were their favorite targets.

Because of this, Dream Eater had joined forces with several powerful demons. Leveraging the unique authority of the creatures of the Coldbelow and the realm’s inherent peculiarities, they had set traps across the entire realm.

All new beings who entered the Coldbelow would fall into one of these traps. Whether or not they could emerge alive depended on the being’s individual strength and the nature of the trap they had entered. If they could break free, then they would be marked by the great demon who set the trap. From then on, they would generally be free from the great demon’s interference while operating in the realm of Coldbelow—unless they committed acts that the great demon could not tolerate.

Each great demon’s trap was unique, and the difficulty of breaking free varied. Which trap someone fell into upon entering the Coldbelow was entirely a matter of luck. Dream Eater’s traps, though, were almost always fatal. As Dream Eater herself was exceptionally powerful, the Shadow Warlocks held her in great awe and even fear.

It was precisely because of the existence of these deadly traps and the inherent, extreme danger of the realm itself that the Shadow Warlocks had developed a spell capable of projecting a target’s primordial spirit directly into it. Unless the target was a member of the Shadow Warlocks, they would struggle to survive the Coldbelow even if they managed to break free from a trap.

However, the price of sending one’s primordial spirit into the Coldbelow was tremendous. Unless the enemy was incredibly crucial, the Shadow Warlocks generally did not resort to this method.

The trap Dream Eater had set for the human race was the Ghost Bride. She had other specific traps for other races.

The Ghost Bride was specifically designed to exploit the weaknesses of the human race. Drawing upon Dream Eater’s immense power, it materialized the one the victim most desired and loved into a bride. When the victim lifted the veil, it was as if their wish had been fulfilled, and they had signed a soul contract with Dream Eater. When that happened, their primordial spirit would be swallowed whole by her.

As eerie and terrifying as the Ghost Bride was, it naturally came at a price: the karma of the bride.

For whatever reason, Wei Yuan’s bride was different in every iteration of the Ghost Bride. Not only that, their karma was only scarier than the last. It eventually grew to the point where even Dream Eater couldn’t handle it any longer.

Moreover, Wei Yuan’s primordial spirit and Dao Foundation were special. In fact, the bride—a dream puppet to be exact—had already swallowed him whole the first time he lifted the veil. However, the digestion process turned out to be exceedingly difficult, and the dream puppet’s abdomen always split open shortly afterward, causing Wei Yuan to be expelled.

Later, every time Wei Yuan lifted the veil, Dream Eater would lose a dream puppet in exchange for just a tiny bit of primordial spirit. At the rate they were going, she was going to run out of dream puppets before the bride could consume Wei Yuan—clearly a losing proposition. That was why Dream Eater had no choice but to reveal herself and enter a negotiation with him.

After explaining the Coldbelow, Dream Eater said, “Your mission is to kill the Shadow Warlocks’ followers. Some of the great demons are too old, and the traps they’ve set up haven’t changed in thousands of years. Others have chosen to collude with the Shadow Warlocks, which was why m more and more flies were gathering in the Coldbelow as of late. They need to be removed.

“Rest assured, the Shadow Warlocks can’t do anything in this place. They’re essentially the earth itself—you can kill their favorite son right in their kingdom, and still they could do nothing but watch. And all I need you to take out are their followers.

“I’ll give you my mark so that the other great demons won’t attack you. Naturally, I will reward you for killing the flies for me. But if you encounter any corrupted monsters from the Outside, do not hesitate to flee immediately.”

Wei Yuan immediately picked up on the key point. “What kind of reward?”

Dream Eater extended her hand, and a dark pearl appeared at her fingertip. The moment it appeared, Wei Yuan felt the overwhelming urge to swallow it whole. It was an instinctive craving, like a traveler in the desert spotting a pool of clear water.

This is the essence left behind by a powerful monster from the Outside after death. For you humans, it offers a certain chance to advance your Dao Foundation.”

There’s a treasure like this?!

Wei Yuan had no reason to doubt Dream Eater’s words, his body’s reaction alone proved that she was telling the truth. He assessed his own Dao Foundation and realized that, while the Great Realm might not necessarily need this essence, for others, it was unquestionably a priceless treasure. Even someone as exceptionally gifted as Zhang Sheng still had the potential to advance his Dao Foundation further.

“What do I need to do?”

“Here, all beings can only enter in the form of their primordial spirits, and they can only utilize the Dao Foundation abilities within their primordial spirit. That’s why everyone’s abilities are very limited. Even the most powerful Shamanic followers would be easy to kill here.”

“All right, I agree.” If everyone could only employ the innate abilities of their Dao Foundation, Wei Yuan believed that his own arsenal was quite extensive.

“I’ll send you back first. At the same time, I’ll implant a mark of the Coldbelow into your primordial spirit. The next time you activate the mark, your primordial spirit will be able to travel here. After that, you’ll be able to come and go on your own. Oh right, I should mention that traveling to and from the Coldbelow consumes fortune.”

A wisp of blue qi appeared in Wei Yuan’s hand. “Will this work?”

A flash of surprise crossed Dream Eater’s eyes, and she nodded.

“It will.”

“Then send me back.”

Dream Eater placed her hand on Wei Yuan’s chest. Suddenly, she asked, “When you said I was full of it just now, did you really mean it?”

Wei Yuan thought for a moment and shook his head. “I was just teasing you.”

Dream Eater’s brows relaxed. “That’s more like it!”

She gave him a push, and Wei Yuan’s consciousness plunged into darkness.

Staring at the spot where the young man had vanished, Dream Eater couldn’t shake the feeling that something was off.

In truth, Wei Yuan had prepared many candidates for the bride for the final instance. Immortal Lord Tinghai was just the beginning, there was also the Bay Laurel Immortal Tree tree branch and the shadow in the moon. If even those had failed, he still had a special toad he could call upon—not his own, but the one Bao Yun had possessed back then. That toad had an immortal sitting cross-legged on its head, and gods and demons dancing wildly in the moonlight. It was quite the extravagant line-up to say the least.

Alas, everything was settled the moment the Immortal Lord appeared. Thus, he never got the chance to reveal his many backup plans.