Wu Pifu's eyes were bloodshot, but he ran past the corpses of Wang Xiu Ting and Li An without looking back, almost stumbling in his haste. Fortunately, his Tiger Demon Skill had deeply trained his lower body, preventing him from falling at this critical moment and losing his life.
A Level Two Nightmare!
It was actually a Level Two Nightmare!
Wu Pifu had never imagined he would encounter a Level Two Nightmare, so out of the three of them, two died instantly. And… there was no longer any place outside that could isolate the Nightmare!
Although Wu Pifu was filled with despair, he was not one to sit idly by. Driven by his will to survive, he began to frantically sprint towards the corner ahead.
Moving like a tiger, wild like a demon – at this moment, Wu Pifu had never been so close to the true essence of this skill.
This was a secluded warehouse near Lujiazui on the Bund in Shanghai, directly across the river from the French Concession. His target was the French Concession on the other side of the river!
By then, it was completely dark. This was not the 21st century; while Shanghai in the Republic of China era was a decadent, extravagant world, apart from the various concessions and bustling areas, other regions lacked the infrastructure of the future. So, after Wu Pifu ran out from the dim warehouse lights, the path ahead was completely dark.
But Wu Pifu dared not hesitate or stop for a moment. He plunged directly into the darkness, heading towards the faint reflections of light on the river ahead.
He knew the Nightmare was watching him mockingly, treating his escape like a cat playing with a mouse.
This was Baseline Reality 0.9, and this Level Two Nightmare came from Baseline Reality 0.8, so it could exert its full power here, possibly even with an increase in strength. Just a single encounter, and this Level Two Nightmare had killed Wang Xiu Ting and Li An. He was only alive not because of his strength, but because of his luck…
This Nightmare merely wanted to savor the fear he was exuding!
But…
How could a man sit idly by and await death!?
Even if he died, he had to die on the charge!
There was still a chance for survival ahead, and it was his only chance…
In this 0.9 Baseline Reality Dream World, there were three Level One Sanctuaries: his, Wang Xiu Ting's, and Li An's.
Li An's Sanctuary was destroyed last year, in 1934, due to the Shanghai serial murder case. Li An had joined the Red Team operation, hoping to gain influence, but it was sabotaged by Zhongtong agents.
Wang Xiu Ting's Sanctuary was the warehouse just now; it was also destroyed when the Level Two Nightmare penetrated it. Now, only his Sanctuary remained, located in the French Concession ahead, which was his only hope of escape!
Bursting out from the warehouse to the river, Wu Pifu leaped directly, his body like a tiger, pouncing forward, and splashing into the water.
He wasn't good at swimming, but the Tiger Demon Skill included methods for water training and tiger-form swimming. However, Wu Pifu hadn't mastered them yet. Forced into action, he began to frantically paddle forward.
Gradually, he felt an icy chill spreading across his back. It was June in Shanghai, and the weather was starting to get hot, so even while paddling in the water, he shouldn't have felt an icy chill. This chill could only mean one thing…
The Nightmare had already reached behind him!
(…Just give me a little more time, give me another chance.)
Wu Pifu continued to frantically paddle forward. His entire body was now faintly reddish, and a plume of steam rose from his head. His Tiger Demon Skill's qi and blood circulation had been pushed to its limit. This state couldn't last long, but it allowed his hands to exert two to three hundred pounds of force. Swimming forward with all his might, his speed was astonishing.
But… he still couldn't shake off the chill behind him.
That was a Dream World Nightmare from Baseline Reality 0.8, a terrifying, curse-like spectral entity, formless and intangible, possessing speeds beyond logical conception, capable of teleportation, altering and distorting physical space and laws, and manipulating minds to induce hallucinations. Without a counter-skill or power, it could even kill an entire army in a minute!
The Tiger Demon Skill, when circulating qi and blood and stimulating potential, could grant immunity to hallucinations, but it couldn't resist this Nightmare's life force extraction. Nothing else was needed; just a light touch from the Nightmare, and he would immediately sink to the bottom of the river, dead beyond recovery.
But whether his prayers worked, or the Nightmare wanted to toy with him a bit longer, Wu Pifu only felt the chill on his back but suffered no other attacks. He actually managed to cross the river and rush into the territory of the French Concession ahead.
It was 1935. Although Little Day had invaded China, they hadn't yet attacked Shanghai. While the various concessions were wary of Little Day, their arrogance led them to believe that Little Day wouldn't dare to violate the foreign concessions. Therefore, apart from regular patrols, there were no searchlights or checkpoints at the French Concession's border.
Wu Pifu rushed towards his Sanctuary in the darkness of the night.
He wasn't sure if it was his imagination, but the chill on his back intensified…
No… it wasn't his imagination. This entity could directly infiltrate human thoughts and cause hallucinations, so it could certainly perceive his thoughts. The closer he got to his destination, the more likely this entity was to kill him.
Judging by the terrifying and malicious nature of Nightmares that he knew, the most likely moment for this Level Two Nightmare to kill him would be… just as he was about to be saved!?
Wu Pifu immediately began to empty his mind of thoughts.
This was a proven and effective method for dealing with Nightmare thought perception.
However, between life and death lay great terror, and he was but a Mortal. How could he completely empty his mind?
Wu Pifu could only desperately recall the various details of the Tiger Demon Skill: shaped like a tiger, spirit like a demon…
Although the Tiger Demon Skill was a form of Xingyi Quan, with all its movements and training centered on the tiger form, when contemplating and meditating, it didn't imitate a real tiger, but rather a mad demon!
Chaotic and mad, with true meaning found in mad movement, while maintaining the heart's original nature.
This was a martial art completely different from conventional National Arts.
Other National Arts required a calm and clear mind, with the so-called contemplation of one's original nature being emptiness. But the Tiger Demon Skill was the opposite: it not only required you to be utterly mad during practice, but the more chaotic thoughts in your mind, the better. Only when one practiced the Tiger Demon Skill to the point where madness itself became calm, and a speck of tranquility remained unextinguished amidst the chaos and Random Thoughts, was the Tiger Demon Skill considered to have reached mastery.
Wu Pifu naturally hadn't reached this Realm. To be precise, he had only just begun; the Mainframe interface indeed showed his Tiger Demon Skill at only an introductory level of proficiency.
At this moment, Wu Pifu could only replace mental emptiness with Random Thoughts, his mind filled with all sorts of memories or questions.
My parents, what were their feelings when they said goodbye to me?
It's already 2877, and there are still no gender partners. Backward, pathetic!
I'm hungry. Ever since I started practicing National Arts, I can eat so much.
Can I… survive?
I can survive!
The destination was just ahead. Wu Pifu looked at the populated street and a tailor shop on the edge of the French Concession. He gathered all his strength and charged forward madly.
From the moment he activated the Tiger Demon Skill until now, he had been stimulating his life force for over ten minutes. At this point, his appearance was horrifying: blood oozed from his mouth, ears, nose, and eyes, his skin was crimson and scorching hot, and beads of blood seeped from the surface. This terrified the surrounding pedestrians, who retreated rapidly, inadvertently clearing a path for him to run forward.
Fifty meters, forty meters, thirty meters, twenty meters…
At the last ten meters, Wu Pifu roared and leaped forward, executing the Mad Tiger Pounces into Ravine technique from the Tiger Demon Skill. His entire body soared through the air, his speed increasing severalfold. Just as he was about to crash into the red door of the tailor shop, his left arm was suddenly fixed and locked by a huge force, leaving him just a step away from the red door, yet unable to enter.
Space!
Wu Pifu immediately understood what had happened. This Nightmare had altered the rules of space, locking his left arm in place, and thus trapping him in a final desperate situation when he was just one step away from escape.
The bone-chilling cold intensified abruptly. Lines of sound, like moans, like wails, like cries, flooded his mind. At this moment, even though he was still circulating the Tiger Demon Skill, his vision gradually became distorted—a sign that hallucinations were imminent.
His life hung in the balance!
“Aaaah!!”
Wu Pifu suddenly roared loudly, his voice like a tiger's roar, like a mad demon's. His entire skin surface showed bulging blue veins, his muscles swelled, and some skin even tore open directly. Then, in the next instant, Wu Pifu actually ripped off his left arm, and his entire body leaped and crashed into the red wooden door with a crisp crack. The red wooden door shattered, and Wu Pifu vanished.
In a flash, Wu Pifu appeared in a high-tech hibernation pod chamber of the future. Without getting up, he raised his intact right arm and loudly shouted, “Mainframe, initiate random Dream World penetration! Confirm!”
“Confirming… confirmation achieved, penetration initiated.”
Just then, a pale arm appeared out of thin air beside the hibernation pod. This arm reached towards Wu Pifu's head.
At the same time, Wu Pifu's vision went black. The next moment, he landed in a muddy area, with a light rain falling from the sky. He saw a building about a dozen meters ahead, though he couldn't make out what it was. Still, he mustered all his remaining strength and stumbled forward, then used all his might to ram his head into a peeling wooden door, producing a thud.
In the last moments before losing consciousness, Wu Pifu mentally opened the Mainframe's personal information interface. He looked at the Dream World he was in.
Baseline Reality 0.7.
Finally, Wu Pifu passed out, slightly relieved.