Chapter 635: [Radiant Dream Realm] → [Sinful Dream Realm]

Chapter 635: Chapter 587: [Radiant Dream Realm] → [Sinful Dream Realm]

Shi Ming frowned.

The voice was both familiar and strange. Its owner was, without a doubt, the Xiaobai that Shi Ming knew—the Star Spirit who had once resided in the Lamp of Wishes. Yet, the emotion and power it held were utterly alien, filling Shi Ming with a boundless, ice-cold killing intent.

Along with it came thorny roses and frantically spreading briars.

The nature of this power belonged neither to the creatures of the Star Sea nor to the Star Spirit Race. Shi Ming had spent a considerable amount of time with Xiaobai, albeit through the Lamp of Wishes, and he knew her abilities inside and out. She absolutely did not possess this kind of power!

This came from an Aberration!

The ancestral land of the Star Spirit Race, the Radiant Dream Realm, had been contaminated once again!

…

…

…

The moment it arrived in the ancestral land of the Star Spirit Race, an irrepressible rage surged like a tide from the depths of the Colorful Insect’s soul.

This rage was rootless; it seemed to spring from nowhere, yet it ran bone-deep.

It couldn’t put the feeling into words, but to the Colorful Insect, it felt as if a power that once belonged to it had been stolen by another, as if its own child was now calling a thief ‘father’.

This sent the Colorful Insect’s blood pressure skyrocketing!

Rage! Shock!

The thorny briars, the blooming roses… these symbols and powers were so familiar, like a spouse and child it had once lived with day and night. Now, they were being commanded by another creature! This was betrayal! Usurpation!

As for why this was happening, the Colorful Insect couldn’t understand. That unfounded sense of familiarity washed over it again, yet the truth remained just out of reach, like something seen through frosted glass. Unable to trace the feeling to its source, the Colorful Insect could only feel an inexplicable shock and rage, causing it to stir restlessly, struggling against its restraints.

“Master…”

“She’s been contaminated! Kill her! That power, I’m so familiar with it… It seems to be… it seems to be…”

It wanted to seek Shi Ming’s help.

It could *only* seek Shi Ming’s help.

“Don’t worry,”

“I will purify them.”

A layer of armor forged from pristine ice already covered Shi Ming’s body, effectively blocking the contamination that was spreading through the space. At the same time, an intense coldness surged from within him. The frantically growing briars and roses seemed to hesitate and shrink back from it. Any plant that touched this cold aura, whether briar or rose, immediately withered and died.

Back when he was dealing with the Flower of Malevolent Thoughts, Shi Ming had discovered that the power of absolute zero was unusually effective against these aberrant plants, like a weed killer.

“Eye of the Divine, gather intelligence!”

But in truth, he already had a rough idea.

If he wasn’t mistaken, the symbolism of the briars and roses originated from one of the Four Great Ancient Evils: [Sinful Heaven]. The power of the roses was the very Ancient Evil skill that the Colorful Insect—the former Sinful Heaven—had lost: [Rose of Sin], the symbol of evil. The power of the briars was another Ancient Evil skill, [Thorns of Eternal Suffering], the symbol of hardship.

The source power that the Colorful Insect had lost was now transferred to Xiaobai.

Information flashed through his eyes.

And in the background, countless thorny roses and briars pierced through one magnificent bubble after another. Not far from Shi Ming’s line of sight, they wove themselves into a throne of thorns covered in flower buds.

A familiar figure slowly materialized upon it, sitting as elegantly as an empress.

It was Xiaobai.

Her curvaceous figure was the same, but now adorned with emerald and crimson rose tattoos. The silver bell tied to her ankle was gone, replaced by a black fruit grown from a thorn. Her aura was no longer one of passionate exuberance, but of colorless indifference and ruthlessness.

Xiaobai, who had stayed behind alone to guard the Star Spirit Race, had been contaminated once again.

The difference was, last time, she had been contaminated by the wishes of all living beings, and the Purifying Marrow from the Bodhi Tree of Suffering could easily cleanse that corruption. This time, however, the source of the contamination was far more powerful—

[Intelligence has been generated.]

[Sinful Dream Realm]

[Ever since Sinful Heaven chose the ancestral land of the Star Spirit Race as the Secret Realm for its source power backup, the Star Spirit Race has been accompanied by the abyss and sin…]

[…]

[The sole surviving member of the Star Spirit Race discovered the Ancient Evil’s source power slowly breaking its seal in the deepest part of the ancestral land. As she had not yet reached the Nirvana stage, she was easily and utterly contaminated by it. Consequently, the Radiant Dream Realm she guarded plunged into defilement once again, becoming a source of suffering, an abyss of sin—the Sinful Dream Realm.]

[She has become a puppet of the Aberration.]

[She has lost herself.]

[It can make rudimentary use of Sinful Heaven’s skills and source power.]

[Without intervention, this former Star Spirit will be able to use the dream realm to subtly spread the Ancient Evil’s aberrant power from within the ancestral land, causing an even greater catastrophe in the future.]

…

Shi Ming watched the figure that was at once familiar and not, staying purely on the defensive.

An even colder voice emanated from the throne of thorns and flowers.

“Those who trespass here shall die!”

She seemed to have sensed a threat.

Shi Ming sighed.

Back then, after resolving the contamination in the ancestral land of the Star Spirit Race and imprisoning the Colorful Insect, Shi Ming had specifically used the Eye of Destiny to conduct an additional scan of the area. At the time, he hadn’t discovered any other sources of contamination. The Colorful Insect, as the main ‘boss,’ had been dealt with.

‘Who would have thought there was a hidden boss? Above a Calamity, there was still an Ancient Evil.’

And at that time, the [Eye of Destiny]’s rank was temporarily lower than that of an Ancient Evil, so it was understandable that it failed to detect the power of [Sinful Heaven] hidden in the depths.

‘But,’ Shi Ming thought, ‘even if it had detected the problem, it most likely would have hidden the information, just like when it encountered the Active Wormhole devouring the Creation Celestial Pillar on Mount Everest. It was a form of proactive protection. A single drop of an Ancient Evil’s source blood was enough to contaminate Bertutan, a Pillar Stone, slowly swaying his mind and causing him to backstab a god. Back then, I had only just left the Star Sea. Even with a Spiritual Power of thirty million, I wouldn’t have been immune to the invasion of a higher-ranked Aberration’s power.’

After Shi Ming left the ancestral land of the Star Spirit Race, Xiaobai had stayed behind.

Her original intention was to take the place of her fallen ancestors, to watch over the last home of the Star Spirit Race and manage the thousands of ancient and radiant dreams left there. But she had unwittingly triggered the deepest contamination and become its most direct victim.

As a puppet of an Ancient Evil, although she now wielded immense power, she had lost herself forever. The moment she was contaminated, her original consciousness was subtly erased. At this stage, even if Shi Ming completely purified the power of Sinful Heaven, it would be of no use.

“Should I call you Xiaobai,”

“or Sinful Heaven?”

“Or perhaps… you have a new name?”

“Don’t be so hostile. Perhaps we can cooperate. This Star Spirit’s body is only at the Holy Hall level; she can’t possibly withstand such a high-tier power… But I suppose you had no choice. She must have been the only living being you could come into contact with all this time, right?”