Warlock Apprentice

Chapter 2892: Chapter 2893: The Masked Man

Laplace, surprised, began to take in her surroundings.

All around were blooming roses, and on the ground was a garden path paved with long stones. In the distance, a red-topped white-walled house was faintly visible; from the first impression, this seemed to be a wealthy family’s little garden.

But this "wealthy family" is likely not nobility, otherwise the house in the distance wouldn’t be so modest.

Since this was a new place, Laplace did not know the details here, so she restrained herself from moving and instead controlled her power of transmutation to release perception outward.

The perception spread roughly a dozen meters and reached the exit of this small garden.

The archway at the exit was quite festive, not only wrapped with bright roses of various colors, but also had several colorful balloons tied to the top, leisurely floating in mid-air.

It appears that this wealthy family is in the midst of celebration?

Laplace’s perception continued forward, and soon she passed through the little garden and came to the outside of the red-tiled white-walled house.

Near the house, there was also a conservatory, more exquisite than the garden.

However, apart from the conservatory, there was nothing else noteworthy; the fence, gravel path, street lamps, neatly trimmed horticultural trees, lush fruit trees, and the swing under the trees were all very ordinary objects.

Laplace perceived the surroundings and confirmed there was nothing special before focusing on the only two roads available.

One road naturally led into the house; the other path went through densely layered small woods, leaving this home and heading into the outside world.

Faced with these two choices, Laplace did not overly hesitate. She had a premonition that her unexplained appearance nearby wasn’t without reason; with the surroundings so calm, the only sealed location was the large house. So perhaps the answers are hidden inside.

Since she believed the answers were within the house, she decided to leave it for last and first explore the outside world to ascertain her location before returning to the house later.

Having made her decision, Laplace controlled her perception and walked outward.

However, upon passing through the small woods and coming to the gate, Laplace found that outside was a realm of "illusion."

From a distance, one could see abundant "phantoms" of houses, presumably neighboring street houses; but upon closer inspection, it was found that this was not due to distance but because everything outside, regardless of houses or numbers, were phantoms.

Completely illusory, they only had rough outlines; across seemed to be a bell tower, while next to it was a row of cottages?

This should be a city street? Yet only this household she was in was very clear, like truly existing, while other places were vaguely dreamlike.

Hmm... dreamscape?

While Laplace was pondering, the word suddenly flashed across her mind.

From the mirror world before, it showed eliminators from the dream realm; following this logic, could other crystal creations also be related to dreamworld sweepers? For instance, the whip that drew her in here, could it also be a dreamworld sweeper transformed?

Furthermore, could this strange space itself be a dream realm? An actual dream?

The main reason Laplace thought this was due to the odd illusion of the external environment.

This illusory circumstance greatly resembled the scenes ordinary people dream of. In dreams, only the dreamer’s location is vividly visible, while other places are shrouded in illusion because they’re not important; the important thing is the dreamer’s will.

The dreamer perceives the current environment as important, so they only remain in the current setting, and the dream revolves around the events occurring at the present scene, thus the scene during a dream is the clearest. All other places unrelated to the dream can be casually outlined.

It’s like a landscape portrait, where the focus is on the figures in the foreground, with the background needing only a few simple lines to sketch out mountain shapes.

And so, the external illusory street Laplace saw now seemed to be the so-called "background," needing merely a rough outline; the area she occupied surrounding the large house was the "foreground," requiring detailed depiction.

Thinking this way, it indeed lines up with a dreamscape.

If this truly is a dreamscape... does it suggest that the dream’s "entity" is nearby the house? Or rather... within the house?

Laplace pondered while slowly pulling her perception back from the gate.

Now she decided to focus on the large house; she wanted to see if it held the "answers" she sought and if the so-called "dream inhabitant" existed there.

Soon, her transmutation of perception returned to the vicinity of the house.

The house had two entrances: the front door and the back door. The front door was closed, and seemingly there was some kind of law in this house: isolating all probing.

Even Laplace’s perception couldn’t penetrate the locked areas.

Since the front door couldn’t be perceived, Laplace turned her attention toward the back door.

The back door opened in a secluded place, precisely between the glass conservatory and the rose garden, not only narrow and hard to traverse, but also lined on both sides with Big Mary Roses.

The Big Mary Roses grew extremely tall, with thorns on the rose vines sharp and long; ordinary people brushed by them might leave deep wounds.

And due to the ease with which Big Mary Roses prick people, many who cultivate flowers refer to their blooms as blood roses. First, to signify that Big Mary Roses are hosted by the blood of pricked individuals; secondly, because Big Mary Roses have only one color, a vibrant red, really like blood-stained roses.

The road leading to the back door was narrow, and there were easily bruise-inflicting Big Mary Roses, so logically inferred, this shouldn’t be the master’s path.

As expected, it ought to be the path walked by servants.

When Laplace’s perception reached the back door, she found the back door was also locked.

Yet... the difference with the front door was, despite being locked, the back door constantly shook. Like someone inside was shoving the back door.

Along with the door’s incessant trembling, sounds of terrified wails echoed from within.

This scene stirred Laplace’s imagination that perhaps someone was indeed being chased behind the door... the pursued couldn’t flee through the locked front door, thus ran to the back door, and it too was locked, leading to their desperate shaking of the door to try and escape; however, the pursuer had already arrived, leaving the pursued shaking the door and crying out desperately.

The back door’s shaking grew more intense, the wails from inside escalating from fear to a shrill.

From underneath the door crack began the trickling flow of fresh blood...

This seemed to tell Laplace that the hopeless escapee inside was caught up by the pursuer and the attack commenced. The blood on the ground and the shrill screams came from the person trapped in despair.

While Laplace conjured a series of scenes and stories in her mind, the back door was suddenly pushed open forcefully.

As the door swung open, a plump girl, covered with wounds and bruises all over, dashed out from within, running as she screamed in despair.

If the story Laplace envisioned was true, then this somewhat chubby girl should be the one being chased?

And the pursuer?

Unable to help herself, Laplace’s perception darted into the house, and upon seeing, realization dawned on her.

Indeed, just as she had suspected, this strange "dreamscape" was connected to the eliminators she previously killed.

Because inside the house stood the "pursuer," one of the dreamworld sweepers she had slain previously.

A tall man wielding a long whip, clad in semi-transparent plate armor, exposing the large, inflated muscles of his body; yet, such a strong man wore a childish, laugh-worthy mask, creating a stark contrast.

And this man was one of the Eliminators killed by Laplace in the past. Back then, Laplace thought this was a human, not a magic monster. But when she took off his mask, she found out that the man had no face; that childish mask was his face.

Therefore, Laplace internally named this Eliminator: the Masked Man.

Now, this Masked Man has transformed into a chaser, launching an attack on a girl. What kind of a scene is this supposed to be?

Laplace couldn’t guess the reason behind it, but she had recognized the Masked Man, and the long whip in his hand was the same one that dragged her into this Strange Dream.

Undoubtedly, the answer to leaving here should lie with the Masked Man.

Since discovering the core figure of the Masked Man, Laplace hesitated no more and decided to go "meet" him.

However, right at this moment, new Transmutation appeared in the chase scene over there.

The girl being chased by the Masked Man naturally wanted to run away, but the path was too narrow, and she was fat, inevitably scraping against the thorns of those Big Mary Roses around.

Even with immense pain, the girl couldn’t stop, enduring the agony and continued fleeing.

But just as she was about to escape this narrow path, the Big Mary Rose began to move. It seemed to be revitalized by absorbing her blood, regaining activity.

The Big Mary Roses bloomed with bright flowers, yet the flowers bore big mouths with sharp teeth, and their long tongues protruded like whips, flogging the girl continuously.

Some even wound around the girl’s feet and hands, dragging her back.

Being torn and whipped by the Big Mary Roses, the girl let out even more piercing and miserable screams.

Meanwhile, the Masked Man seemed very pleased with the Big Mary Roses’ actions, no longer pursuing, but instead stood by, watching this scene of slaughter.

The girl was relentlessly killed by the Big Mary Roses; her blood continuously absorbed by them until the once-fat girl became slender, ultimately collapsing into a pool of blood...

The girl chased down faced an unfortunate ending.

On the other side, as Laplace withdrew her perception, she wasn’t concerned about the girl’s ending but was stunned by another change around her.

Previously, she was in a Rose Garden blooming with various roses, and although it still was, the once quiet roses were now turning insane, just like those Big Mary Roses before.

Every rose grew sharp teeth, attempting to attack Laplace with their tongues, even trying to bite her.

However, Laplace was not a helpless girl; her thigh muscles swelled, and she jumped high, even without using scales, just relying on sharp hooves and terrifying speed, crushing all the nearby flowers into a pile of debris in seconds.

Debris that couldn’t be reassembled even if collected.

Dust and particles of debris floated in the air, creating a Mist with a faint floral scent.

Laplace ignored the dust and Mist and walked toward the exit of the Rose Garden.

Along the way, Laplace also encountered other attacking roses, but all were easily torn apart by her.

The roses’ Transmutation also caused this "dream" to mutate.

The originally splendid garden became a killing ground of man-eating roses, and the celebratory archway at the garden’s entrance also transformed.

The arch itself hadn’t changed, but the roses on it began to act mischievously.

The several balloons above the arch now transformed into floating human heads.

Male and female, old and young. Notably, the plump girl’s head was also hanging on the gate.

Clearly...she was just killed by the Big Mary Rose, and so quickly had her head detached? And placed on the arch?

Laplace felt puzzled but didn’t delve deeper, instead quickly stomping repeatedly at the arch.

The arch fell, the roses shattered, as for the heads...they were crushed by Laplace.

However, when trampling these heads, Laplace noticed they had no reaction, unlike the roses which attacked her.

This is probably because these people are truly dead.

After Laplace destroyed the arch, she swiftly charged toward the side path, which led to the back door, the very path the fat girl tried to escape earlier.

Seeing Laplace, the Big Mary Roses on both sides launched attacks unhesitatingly.

But the result was no different from the previous roses, easily dealt with by Laplace.

Regarding the Big Mary Roses’ thorns? Not to mention piercing the molting scale, it would count as Laplace’s loss if they could leave even a white scar on the scale.

Soon, Laplace arrived at the place where the girl collapsed before.

To Laplace’s surprise...the girl was still lying there, and her head was still intact.

But before, Laplace clearly stomped the girl’s head into pieces?

Looking at the girl on the ground, Laplace’s thoughts became somewhat chaotic...what exactly is going on here?

Laplace couldn’t figure it out and finally gave up thinking, jumping over the girl directly, rushing toward the back door.

Perhaps once dealing with the Masked Man, the answer will be revealed.

The back door wasn’t closed, but the Masked Man was already gone. Laplace didn’t see any trace of the Masked Man outside, so undoubtedly, the Masked Man entered the house.

Laplace didn’t hesitate, and rushed into the door without delay...

...

While Laplace was trapped in the Rose Garden, outside—the Crystal Origin of Dreams, was actually undergoing a momentous event.

Laplace experienced the beginning of this event, witnessing the cracking of the Crystal Origin, and the birth of numerous Crystal Creations.

However, these were only the beginning of the event, its climax was yet to occur after those Crystal Creations concealed themselves.

According to Angel, this event should be the opening of the historical record of the Crystal Origin of Dreams, and if named, could perhaps be called "Creation Battle".

Of course, if Laplace were here and heard Angel’s naming, she would undoubtedly sigh at it.

Unfortunately, Laplace is not in the Crystal Origin of Dreams at the moment, or rather, she is at a corner of the new Authority world created within the Crystal Origin of Dreams...

What is "Creation Battle"? Since it’s a battle, it must be side versus side, or even more parties, competing for a determined goal.

And the "Creation Battle" defined by Angel is a contention between the new Authority released from the Principal Body of the Nightmare Domain and the Mirror World’s Law within the Forest of Memories.

The target of the contest is the ownership of the Crystal Origin of Dreams.

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