A Psychiatrist's Bizarre Game Journey / Dream of the Mist

Zhou Ke'er didn't turn around, but casually replied, implying, "What you see with your own eyes isn't necessarily the truth. You only saw me touch those things; how can you be sure they really exist?"

Long Aotian was speechless for a moment, unsure how to refute it. But something about this logic felt off—if that's the case, even in reality, there's no reason to prove that everything in reality is real, right? Maybe it's all an illusion, like the brain in a vat?

However, Long Aotian didn't press the matter further. He roughly understood that this was probably Zhou Ke'er's special investigative ability, but she just didn't want to tell him.

At this moment, Zhou Ke'er had closed her left eye, and all the colors in her vision finally disappeared, leaving only gray and black. The pedestrians that could be seen on the street just now also disappeared without a trace.

After all, Zhou Ke'er's right eye, which displayed double pupils, was essentially a pure eerie sensory imaging device. The buildings and streets around her appeared as blurry images due to the inherent difference in the concentration of eerie energy they were imbued with compared to their surroundings. However, the pedestrians on the street, who were normally visible, appeared to Zhou Ke'er as the same color because their location was not actually any different from the eerie energy concentration in their surroundings.

The further you walk, the more you can see a certain direction, a certain point, a deeper blackness appearing in the darkness, becoming more and more obvious as you get closer.

However, as she walked, a strange thought suddenly popped into Zhou Ke'er's mind—although these "people" were indeed illusions, since they could be "seen" and "touched"—what would it be like to kill them?

Thinking of this, Zhou Ke'er immediately opened her left eye, ready to test this idea.

Unexpectedly, when he opened his left eye, he found that the scene he had just seen had completely vanished. There were no pedestrians, no buildings that seemed undamaged; now, Zhou Ke'er saw nothing but emptiness and desolation. Even the buildings on both sides were dilapidated and abandoned, completely different from what she had seen before.

And most importantly, when I turned around, even Long Aotian had disappeared.

But it definitely wasn't a journey to another place or anything, because in Zhou Ke'er's right eye's vision, all the eerie images remained unchanged—it was just that his five senses were manipulated again, causing him to see different scenes.

Long Aotian is definitely still here, it's just that Zhou Ke'er can't see him right now—at least she can still see the sinister outline representing Long Aotian with her right eye.

It's just unclear whether it's only Zhou Ke'er's five senses that have been altered again, making her unable to see Long Aotian, or whether Long Aotian's perception has also been changed at the same time.

Thinking about this, Zhou Ke'er suddenly realized—this was very likely some kind of screening mechanism. Clearly, that ancient book, which was very likely left here by those beings, was definitely not intended for Zhou Ke'er at all.

So, after using some method that Zhou Ke'er hadn't yet discovered to determine who was suitable and who wasn't, a separation and screening mechanism was activated, directly isolating Zhou Ke'er and Long Aotian. Then, by influencing the five senses, Long Aotian was guided to the location of the ancient book so that he could obtain it.

If Zhou Ke'er is unable to sense her surroundings through the supernatural, or if the person who came with Long Aotian is just an ordinary guild member under his command, then she will definitely be trapped here by this mechanism. She will either die here directly, or she will be trapped until Long Aotian obtains that ancient book before she can escape.

Unfortunately, those beings overlooked one thing—it's Zhou Ke'er here now! She can find the location of that ancient book directly by herself.

As for Long Aotian...

Well, Zhou Ke'er didn't intend to steal his things; she was just checking things out for him beforehand, just in case he got scammed by that obviously unreliable ancient book...

After all, the situation here is far too complex, and Zhou Ke'er is afraid that Long Aotian won't be able to handle it. It's better to let Zhou Ke'er handle it; she's more capable of managing it.

At most, it's just borrowing a few hundred million for a short period of time.

Then, Zhou Ke'er closed her left eye again and walked towards the darkest color in her vision.

If she remembered correctly, there was a wall directly in front of Zhou Ke'er's line of sight just now, but when she looked with her right eye, it was completely unobstructed. Sure enough, the scene in the hallucination had been altered.

Zhou Ke'er walked straight ahead.

Then...

"boom!"

He then slammed his head against the wall.

Oh, he just realized now that he had forgotten... Although he could use his supernatural abilities to discover the true nature of the scene, he was still in a state where his five senses were being clouded.

What he just did was like seeing a wall in front of him, closing his eyes and pretending the wall didn't exist, then crashing into it headfirst—his sense of touch was still being affected by some factor, so he would naturally have this feeling, and it wouldn't change whether he saw it or not.

"That does sound a bit troublesome..."

Zhou Ke'er frowned slightly, then stretched out her right hand and used the evil energy to explode violently in her palm.

Reaching forward again, they found that a hole had been blasted open in the wall in front of them.

Fortunately, this illusion at least conforms to general rules.

"boom!"

Just then, Zhou Ke'er suddenly felt a violent impact and was caught off guard, staggering from the impact.

But he couldn't detect any strange fluctuations, and nothing was approaching him at all.

Wait... I see! Zhou Ke'er suddenly realized—

## Chapter 531, Section 526: Stripping Away the Five Senses

This so-called illusion can naturally conjure up monsters to hinder Zhou Ke'er's progress.

Even so, this situation still made Zhou Ke'er feel a little suspicious, and... she realized that there was a loophole to exploit?

Zhou Ke'er didn't pay any attention to the thing that had suddenly bumped into her from who-knows-where, and didn't even open her eyes to look at it. She just remained in place, pondering carefully.

The most important question is—is it really necessary to create a monster in the illusion to stop Zhou Ke'er from moving forward?

After all, according to Zhou Ke'er's guess, this so-called monster did not have a physical body. Instead, it created the illusion of the existence of such a monster by manipulating Zhou Ke'er's sense of touch—and possibly vision after she opened her eyes.

But if you can completely control Zhou Ke'er's five senses, wouldn't it be a piece of cake to get rid of her? For example, a sudden act of justice... or a massive earthquake, with a small pebble flying from afar and smashing Zhou Ke'er's skull open—that would be a very simple matter.

However, this did not happen. So, upon closer examination, there are only two possibilities: First, although the mastermind could control Zhou Ke'er's five senses, they could not kill her simply because she felt that they were dying. Therefore, they did not do so to avoid Zhou Ke'er discovering the loophole.

Secondly, perhaps the other party only wanted to temporarily stop Zhou Ke'er, and did not intend to kill him directly.

Zhou Ke'er herself prefers the latter.

That's probably an ancient text left by a great being. There's no reason why it could manipulate the five senses but couldn't kill anyone. That would be too low-class. It shouldn't be that bad.

Although, in theory, the ability to completely control the five senses is already quite overpowered.

Such a useful ability, wouldn't it be amazing if it could be taught to Zhou Ke'er?!

Thinking of this, Zhou Ke'er directly withdrew her divine sense completely back to her spiritual platform, and then used the evil technique to cut off the remaining instinctive external senses—in this way, Zhou Ke'er essentially shut down her five senses.

Immediately afterwards, Zhou Ke'er used her divine sense to manipulate the evil spirit, using it to guide her body towards the location of the ancient book.

It's like Zhou Ke'er is piloting her own body; since she has no sense of the outside world, she naturally won't be affected by external illusions.

"Hey, speaking of which," Zhou Ke'er thought as she traveled, "could this be a way to leave this body? If I could just separate my consciousness..."

But in the end, he shook his head in his mind and rejected the idea. After all, he didn't have a suitable body to house his divine sense, and besides, he was just a novice at the Foundation Establishment stage. Thinking about leaving his body now was just asking for trouble. Moreover... Zhou Ke'er didn't really resist the current situation; she just found it a bit troublesome at times, but she didn't necessarily need to resolve it quickly.

As expected, thanks to Zhou Ke'er's actions, she encountered no further obstacles from the illusions. Occasionally, she would run into a few monsters wandering the road, but she had already detected them through her supernatural abilities before encountering them and they were not insurmountable. Therefore, Zhou Ke'er directly used her supernatural abilities to control her body and fought her way through without ever opening her eyes.

However, this is indeed a bit strange. Even though it's close to the area with the highest concentration of evil, the closer you get, the fewer monsters there are. Perhaps they're suppressed by the massive amount of evil, instinctively afraid to approach?

As for Long Aotian... Zhou Ke'er could naturally sense his location. It must be said, his speed in approaching the ancient book was anything but slow; he must have been propelled there in some way.

However, he didn't really know what he was supposed to do; he was just being forced to go that way because his five senses were being manipulated. Naturally, he wasn't as fast as Zhou Ke'er.

Before long, Zhou Ke'er finally arrived at a place very close to the ancient book. The intensity of the evil energy here was basically the same throughout the entire area, so everything in Zhou Ke'er's evil vision was the same color, making it impossible to continue in her current mode of action.

Zhou Ke'er had no choice but to leave her mind and regain her five senses, opening her eyes to look ahead.

Upon opening her eyes, Zhou Ke'er saw a cloud of black mist, which seemed to have coalesced into a human form, sitting on the sofa. In front of it was a table, upon which sat a single, unopened ancient book. Just one glance was enough for Zhou Ke'er to feel the barely suppressed malice emanating from it.

Immediately afterwards, the humanoid figure made of black mist moved, seemingly gesturing for Zhou Ke'er to sit down.

Zhou Ke'er raised an eyebrow. Good heavens... has she run right into some kind of being?

However, he had nothing to fear, so he naturally sat down on the sofa opposite the black mist without any politeness, crossed his legs, looked at the other party, and preemptively asked, "Who are you? What are you waiting here for? Could it be... that you are waiting for me, your destined one?"

The black mist couldn't help but chuckle upon hearing this—though Zhou Ke'er couldn't quite figure out how it made the "laugh" gesture, since it had no face—and replied, "You're quite interesting, and you've passed the test. Although I don't know how you did it, it's a pity... if you hadn't already been chosen by another being, you would have received this book."

"If other beings chose me, can't you choose me too?"

Zhou Ke'er tilted her head, looking completely innocent, and said, "Perhaps you could try to compete with that being? I think I'm still worth fighting for. What do you think?"

The dark figure nodded seriously: "I think so too. But it is indeed a very troublesome matter—if you can throw away what the being that chose you gave you and swear to give up that being's choice of you, then I can give you this book right now, how about that? I am still quite reasonable."

Good heavens, this is an old scoundrel, a real sly fox.

Zhou Ke'er's smile remained unchanged. "Then forget it. After all, they've already told me their real name. I don't think you can do it anyway. It seems your rank isn't as high as His. This is just a piece of stuff. I'll ask Him to give me ten or eight when I get back. I don't care about yours. But, it seems like you're planning to give this to the guy who came with me?"

"After all, there's no one else."

The shadowy figure ignored Zhou Ke'er's sarcastic remarks and simply shrugged.

Upon hearing this, Zhou Ke'er raised an eyebrow and immediately asked, "Then are you sure he wasn't chosen by another being?"

## Chapter 532, Section 527: The Revelation of Gerald

The black mist did not answer Zhou Ke'er's question, but instead changed the subject, saying, "Once he takes this book, this secret realm will be immediately closed."

Zhou Ke'er raised her eyebrows, leaned down, rested her chin on her hands, and looked at the other person with an innocent expression: "Doesn't that mean that all the hard work I did here was for nothing? Just to be his backup? That's a bit unreasonable, isn't it?"

The dark figure nodded solemnly upon hearing this, "From a generally rational point of view, it certainly doesn't make sense."

After saying that, there was no follow-up.

Zhou Ke'er had no choice but to be more direct. She stretched out her right hand and rubbed her index finger and thumb together: "Since you also think it's unreasonable, how about giving me some compensation? I think that would be barely acceptable, right?"

The dark figure didn't answer immediately; the black mist just slowly swirled around it, as if it were deep in thought.

Zhou Ke'er, however, remained completely calm. Instead, she stood up and strolled around the room, looking around at the surroundings.

At worst, he'd just anger this being and it would kill him. Leaving aside whether this being would disregard the other beings behind Zhou Ke'er and act recklessly, even if it did make a move—dying in this secret realm wouldn't be a huge loss.

Besides... if things really turn bad, Zhou Ke'er can just use her school wristwatch to make a quick getaway. She's not afraid at all.

However, after looking around, Zhou Ke'er found that the scene in this room was rather...unique.

The corners of the room were densely covered with things that looked like eggs, but at first glance they looked strange. These eggs had sharp, pointed spines that were waving wildly, and their color was like that of colorful metal.

A green liquid slowly seeps out from it, gradually forming one after another earth-shaped objects of varying sizes, resembling tumor vesicles, bulging as if filled with green pus.

Fortunately, those ghostly things didn't spread to Zhou Ke'er's area; even Zhou Ke'er found them disgusting.

Zhou Ke'er thought for a moment, then walked back to her original spot, sat down casually, crossed her legs, and tilted her head to look at the other person: "Do I need to think about it for so long? If you don't want to give it to me, you can just refuse. Anyway, I can't force you to give me anything, can I?"

As she spoke, Zhou Ke'er casually glanced at the ancient book on the table.

The cover of the ancient book was covered with bizarre images, each stroke seemingly conveying a mournful cry. On the lower half of the cover, there was a line of writing that looked like some kind of ancient script.

Wait...ancient script?

Zhou Ke'er's gaze, which had been wandering, returned to the cover of the book. She narrowed her eyes slightly and unconsciously began to try to decipher it.

The distorted characters were reflected in Zhou Ke'er's pupils, like wriggling dots or seeping ink spots, as if spreading out many tentacle-like traces, as if baring their fangs and claws.

But with this change, the meaning of this line of text inexplicably began to emerge in Zhou Ke'er's mind.

"Revelation....ofGla`aki..."

Zhou Ke'er seemed to lose focus, and her right pupil, as if it had been subjected to some strong impact, suddenly began to tremble violently, with the number in her pupil flashing and jumping wildly from "one" to "seven".

Just then, the dark figure reached out and gently covered the cover of the ancient book, obscuring what was written and drawn on it.