Chapter 139: Master Hypnotist

The gale cut my face like a knife, and my eardrums throbbed. I tried to scream but couldn't make a sound, leaving my body to plummet into endless darkness.

"Ah!" I don't know if anyone else has ever experienced the sensation of falling from a great height in a dream, but my body jerked forward. My head violently jolted, and my eyes snapped open.

I pressed a hand to my chest, feeling my heart pounding wildly.

I sat up and looked around. I was right back in Huang Xue's ward at the Jingying Sanatorium. 'Did I escape the nightmare?'

Cold sweat broke out across my back, soaking through a patch of my clothes. Just thinking about what had happened a moment ago left me with a lingering sense of fear.

'That was far too close. If I had hesitated even a fraction of a second at the very end, I probably would have been left in that terrifying room forever, trapped in an endless cycle of nightmares.'

Taking a deep breath, I looked over at Sakurako beside me. Her expression was strange in a way I couldn't quite pinpoint, but she felt inexplicably distant compared to her usual friendly self.

"Sakurako, what's wrong?" I reached out to pat her head, but she instinctively shrank back, as if she didn't know me at all.

"Are you okay?" I was just about to tell her what I had encountered inside the dream when I moved my hand, accidentally pulling an object out from my clothes.

It was a family portrait. A mother holding a baby and a father stood in the center, flanked by an older brother and sister.

"What is this?" Seeing the photograph, my outstretched hand froze in midair as if I had been electrocuted. "This is the family portrait from the nightmare!"

'How could something from a dream be brought back into reality?' I thought. 'Unless... I'm still dreaming!'

I thought I had awakened from the nightmare, but I had actually plunged straight into another layer of the Dream Realm.

'There's no need to despair. At least I found Sakurako; everything is still proceeding according to the original plan.' I tried communicating with Sakurako, but the little girl remained exceptionally cold, refusing to say a single word.

'Sakurako can't speak so easily,' I recalled. 'The last time I asked her, she told me she could only speak a single sentence inside a dream.' Thinking of this, I didn't push the matter any further and instead looked over at Huang Xue, who was still sound asleep.

It was hard to imagine that she was actually fast asleep inside her own dream. For all I knew, she could be having a dream within a dream right now.

I didn't wake Huang Xue up, because I wasn't entirely sure if doing so would hurt her.

'Now that I've regrouped with Sakurako and Huang Xue in the dream, the next step should be completing the Underworld Live Show's task. I need to find clues regarding the Wordless Ancient Painting and ensure Huang Xue's safety so she doesn't get hurt by any yin souls.' By using the Paulownia Mulberry Talisman to enter Huang Xue's dream, I had brought countless evil ghosts and monsters into her mind. Yet, those ferocious-looking Little Ghosts weren't even the most terrifying part. My greatest enemy during this livestream was the Primal Destiny Divine Fiends hiding inside the Paulownia Mulberry Talisman!

Just as he had predicted, we met once again, and this time we would have to fight to the death inside the dream.

Only by destroying the Primal Destiny Divine Fiends could I truly claim ownership over the Paulownia Mulberry Talisman. Otherwise, I was nothing more than a mere custodian, wholly unworthy of being called the talisman's master.

I picked up my phone. To my pleasant surprise, the chat had finally returned to normal, and the livestream viewers' usernames were no longer displaying their full, real names.

"Fellow livestream viewers, did I do anything out of the ordinary just now?" I asked. "Because as far as I'm aware, I was separated from you all for at least an hour." Keeping my eyes glued to the livestream room, I needed to confirm a crucial detail—whether the livestream viewers chatting right now were my actual original audience. I had to verify their identities.

"LMAO! A certain Streamer abducts an underage girl in the dead of night, sneaks into a young woman's bedroom, and still has the nerve to ask if he did anything out of the ordinary?"

"Streamer, if neither morality nor the law can punish you, then allow me to humbly ask—damn it, can you bring me along next time?!"

"Are you running a pajama store or something? The last livestream also had some gorgeous babe wandering around in her pajamas!"

"Sister-in-law! Your Wu Song has returned once again!"

"Liuwei Dihuang Pills! Cures kidney deficiency, completely sugar-free!"

The screen flooded with their usual degenerate nonsense, and I couldn't help but nod. "Seeing you guys acting this unhinged puts my mind at ease. By the way, is Daoist master Wan here? I have a very important question to ask him."

Since Sakurako could only speak one sentence inside the dream, my livestream viewers naturally became the only people I could ask for help.

I waited for a long time, but to my deep unease, Daoist master Wan never appeared.

'What's going on?' Confused, I kept my eyes glued to the screen until I suddenly spotted a comment that seemed much more reliable than the rest.

The username behind the message was Master Hypnotist Fantasy: "Streamer, I don't know what kind of incentive is driving you to play such a dangerous and terrifying game. I have no intention of challenging you or the fearsome forces backing you. I simply want to remind you that you absolutely must survive. Every decision you make is tied to the fate of everyone currently watching your livestream!"

"It can't be that serious, right?" Reading this comment left me feeling a bit heavy, prompting me to ask for clarification.

Master Hypnotist Fantasy: "Take this as advice from a master hypnotist with thirty-one years of experience. The Dream Realm isn't a place ordinary people can casually wander in and out of. God's code is hidden here; it is everyone's final privacy. By invading it, you will inevitably pay a heavy price!"

I scratched my head, still struggling to grasp his meaning. "Master Fantasy, can you put it more simply? If something happens to me during this broadcast, how does that affect everyone else in the livestream?"

Master Hypnotist Fantasy: "Entering the Dream Realm is the privilege of a hypnotist, and total silence is the absolute highest requirement of our profession. There are certain things regarding the Dream Realm that are untouchable taboos, and large-scale mass hypnosis is one of them."

"What do you mean?"

Master Hypnotist Fantasy: "You used some method to enter someone else's dream, and then, via some tool, you inadvertently hypnotized everyone watching your livestream remotely, dragging them right into the dream you're experiencing. In other words, no matter where your viewers are or what they were doing, every single one of them has unknowingly entered the exact same dream."

"Everyone is having the same dream! This dream is exactly what you are experiencing right now. We are all inside the dream, and if you can't wake up, then everyone will be trapped in an endlessly looping nightmare!"

Reading Master Hypnotist Fantasy's message left me utterly speechless for a long time. If I failed to escape the Dream Realm, every single person watching the livestream would be implicated by me.

Unknowingly and silently hypnotizing everyone, the Underworld Live Show had once again bared its chilling, terrifying power.

'This explains why Daoist master Wan didn't enter the dream,' I realized. 'His Daoist magic is extraordinary, and he knows dream-making himself. Hypnotizing him probably wouldn't be easy.'

I stood frozen in the room with my phone in hand. To be honest, I had absolutely no confidence in this broadcast. For someone like me who worshipped logic, the Dream Realm was simply hell. It was completely impossible to predict what would happen in the next second; I might turn around and see a man-eating ghost, or open a door and step into an entirely different world.

Everything happened so suddenly and without warning. This place had its own rules, laws entirely distinct from the real world.

I felt some regret for not directly redeeming the Secret Dream-Making Art from the Underworld Live Show after finishing my broadcast at the Henshan Psychiatric Hospital. If I also knew dream-making, I wouldn't be in such a passive state right now.

There weren't that many "ifs" in the world. The situation had already happened, and I could only face it.

Since Daoist master Wan hadn't entered the Dream Realm, the person here who best understood it—other than Sakurako—should be this Master Hypnotist Fantasy. He might be the key to breaking this deadlock.

Calming my nerves, I lit a cigarette and spoke to the livestream, "Master Fantasy, it has already happened and can't be changed. All we can do now is figure out a way to escape. Do you have any good suggestions?"

I also explained what I had just encountered in that terrifying room, after which the livestream fell into a moment of silence.

Master Hypnotist Fantasy: "I am not an atheist myself, but what you've said is truly appalling. If all of this is true, then I'm afraid we've run into the most difficult adversary in the Dream Realm—a nightmare!"

"The academic world has yet to establish a proper definition for a nightmare. Some believe it is a fictional product formed by condensed painful memories, while others think it is a living creature that genuinely exists in our world but cannot be captured by the naked eye. There is also a more neutral perspective, which considers nightmares to be nothing more than products of self-suggestion."