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Lucien looked around and realized that he was in the small cabin where he lived in when he found Elvis. Everything looked the same in the cabin, including the strong alcohol smell lingering in the air. Right now Lucien was sitting in a wooden armchair, while Elvis was sitting on his left side next to the fireplace. Lucien could still hear the noise outside, from the adventurers’ campsite. The only difference was that the wooden ladle that should be in Elvis’s hand was now on the floor, and the copper pot fell over in the fire. The tomato cream soup that spilled out from the pot made the fire sizzle.

Lucien realized what was going on here and the words escaped his lips, "Your Excellency... Nightmare King?"

Elvis did not deny, although his face looked gloomy, "Are you... really a middle-rank mage?"

Lucien recalled the mathematical exercises in the maze in his dream. He put on a slightly awkward smile and answered, "I’ve been working on my fundamental mathematics, so the questions should be mostly for senior-rank mages."

Pausing a little, Lucien switched the topic, "Your Excellency, may I ask why did you put me into the dream? And... am I still in another dream?"

Waking up from his dreams twice, everything felt so real and also not real. Lucien was confused with the difference between dream and reality. Although he had successfully entered his spirit library, Lucien was still not sure whether he had come back to reality.

This was the most creepy magic that Lucien had ever seen!

Elvis—no, Lucien should respect him as the Nightmare King—looked very serious. Stennis, the Nightmare King, said to him, "An old friend of mine requested my help. He thinks your level of magic cannot match your arcana level. So he asked me to put you into a dream constructed by me and let you go through things in the dream to fully develop the potential of your soul. You may feel it right now."

Hearing that, Lucien immediately entered his meditation world. He felt something real in this virtual world. Hurriedly opening his eyes, Lucien was very surprised, "It is stronger... Now the power of my soul is indeed at the fifth-circle level. Is it because of the electric shock from the old witch? No... it was a dream, but what I experienced in the dream helped me in reality..."

Lucien’s soul was now as strong as a fifth-circle sorcerer, however, it would still take some time for his spiritual power to catch up.

The Nightmare King, slightly nodded, "All the dreams were built upon your own cognition foundation, mental activities, and your own memories. What you have experienced in your dream has also affected your body and soul. However, for most people, the power from their dreams was too weak for them to make any actual signs of progress. In this world, I am the only one who can make the full use of dreams and use them to develop the potential of one’s soul. Of course, a person’s potential is also based on his or her actual power. Using dreams cannot solve all the problems."

"I see..." Lucien finally realized why the dream about the old witch was a bit weird, for example, the part when the old witch asked the mirror who was the most beautiful woman in the world.

Lucien asked subconsciously, "So, electric shock can improve the strength of my soul?"

Stennis put on a cold smile, "What do you think?"

"...Never mind," answered Lucien awkwardly. He had so many questions to ask, but finally, he chose the most bothering question in his mind, "Your Excellency, how can I tell the difference between dream and reality? How do I know if I’m still in a dream?"

Stennis was more than used to questions like this. He put on a vicious smile like the old witch and said, "Why is it so important? What is a dream? What is the reality? They are both your response to the outside stimuli. When my class reaches the highest level, maybe I will be able to create a dream of reality."

"So, that being said... if my certain response in my dream cannot be predicted or is mistakenly designed by the dream maker, that would be the time for me to know what is a dream and what is reality." Lucien murmured. At the same time, he thought to himself that he could also get out of a dream if his cognition world way surpassed the cognitive ability of the dream maker, and probably the dream maker’s head would explode because of this. Lucien thus decided to try to think about something complicated later such as the wave-particle duality of light or quantum theories to testify if he was still in a dream.

Stennis was quite impressed with Lucien’s answer, "Good. No wonder my friend appreciates your talent. In fact, in your dream, I was trying to avoid things related to arcana research. In the maze, I also purposefully chose the field of mathematical basis, but it turned out..."

The look on Stennis’s face was a bit complicated.

"No wonder the old witch wasn’t interested in arcana at all!" Lucien was suddenly enlightened, and then he laughed, "So you were playing the role of the old witch. I have to say that your playing was quite impressive."

Stennis said seriously, "Technically speaking, I’m only one part of the role of the old witch. The other part of the witch consisted of your own fear. By the way, I am also Adam, Carina, Alva, Ophelia, and Bullard."

Lucien was a bit embarrassed knowing that this dream was all about him, so he hurriedly asked another question, "So... bringing a letter to you isn’t the true task. The task is an opportunity for me to be able to see you and get myself improved in your dream, is that right? Can I know who your friend is? I’d like to know who I should be grateful to..."

A friend of the Nightmare King... Lucien guessed that the person must be a legendary archmage.

Stennis was a bit gloomy, "This was also a test. If you failed to bring the letter here, you would not be the person that my friend is looking for. As for my friend... he probably appreciates your talent and potential and wants you to be his student. You should have already experienced something strange like a test for you before."

That reminded Lucien of his strange experience in the castle, but it seemed to be true that the legendary archmage, Viken, also had something to do with the missing legendary archmages including Maskelyne. Lucien was confused, having no idea whether what happened in the castle was just a pure test or a combination of things, so he asked again, "May I know..."

"You’ll know when you get back to the Congress." It seemed that Nightmare King was very reluctant to mention his friend’s name, "The letter you were bringing is actually a special magic scroll. A fatal attack can activate the scroll and bring you back to a certain Demiplane. If you want to save some time getting back to the Congress, you can activate it on your own."

Lucien guessed that the special scroll was at least of ninth circle, and he wondered how valuable it was. Lucien knew that he would feel really regretful if he had somehow lost the scroll.

At the same time, he also stopped blaming the Congress of Magic, because, after all, they never meant to put him in mortal danger.

Then, Stennis waved his hand to Lucien and said, "You may leave now. I’m going back to the magic tower now."

"Yes, Your Excellency." Lucien stood up.

The power of Lucien’s soul had surpassed the fifth circle, and his arcana knowledge was never a problem, but the only problem was that his knowledge in illusion and transformation spells was still insufficient. Lucien at least should make sure that his fundamental knowledge in all fields was solid. He was deeply impressed by Nightmare King’s power, and that made him want to know more about the magic in other fields.

Stepping out of the cabin, the strong smell of alcohol in the campsite sneaked into Lucien’s nose. Feeling relaxed after completing the task, he walked casually in a good mood. However, a question suddenly jumped into his mind:

As an ancient sorcerer, why did Nightmare King suffer a recoil when seeing the mathematical questions in Lucien’s brain? If he totally had no idea of what those questions were, he could just let Lucien himself complete the dream.

...

In the cabin, Stennis, Nightmare King, did not leave immediately. Instead, he murmured to himself,

"Enclosed devil’s place... High tower as a prison... These are the things that he fears the most. It seems that these are the representatives of this world. But why does he feel imprisoned in this world...

"Staying calm in danger... it’s a very good quality. But when Ophelia died, he accelerated his pace to escape the tower. This reveals the fact that his mindset has been greatly changed probably because his friends or family members were once hurt or even died before.

"As for Adam... Adam should be the collective reflection of the male friends who have helped him before. Someone once sincerely helped him, and once also tried to make use of him. Carina represented his female friends. There were things ambiguous and romantic in the dream. And that means he’s still not sure about his inner feelings, or he feels very worried about these things.

"After becoming a prisoner, he had the hope that the Congress would send legendary archmages to save him. So he is more or less mentally dependant on the powerful people who once helped him.

"The old witch was smart, vicious and crazy, representing the enemies he has encountered so far. The Church, the ancient sorcerers, the arcanists... but why was the representative a female?

"Furthermore, what does the electric shock stand for? Why did the old witch ask the mirror who was the most beautiful woman in the world?

"He’s definitely got the side that was decisive and coldhearted, as he was willing to lose an arm to bring himself a chance to escape. But no one actually died in the fight when he tried to escape, which means he’s still got a soft side in his mind, and he valued friendship and help a lot.

"As for the underground remains... This is a secret in his mind. Maybe it is the representation of real remains somewhere. Also, his unique magic is pretty interesting, and his ways of removing the magic circles and spiritual imprint were also quite smart."

Opposite Stennis, there was a wood armchair. A figure sitting in the armchair slowly appeared. An elder man wearing a bright red robe had mixed white and black hair but still looked hale and hearty. His red eyes stared at Nightmare King vigorously as he said, "The progress that arcana researches have made way surpassed the achievements of the ancient magic empire. Stennis, get real. Don’t let yourself go too far in the wrong direction."

Stennis remained silent for a while and said, "Give me some more arcana books, then. But I don’t want the books related to what appeared in the boy’s dream. They’re... a bit too much for me."

Translator’s Thoughts

Kris_Liu Kris_Liu

Congratulations arcanists and ancient sorcerers!

We’ve completed this volume! And more great stories of Lucien’s adventure are waiting for us ahead! Thank you for being with us!