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

"So what's going on?! Wasn't the mission supposed to take us from the real world to the main world?!"

Half-annoyed, Zhijiansha couldn't help but say, "How come we've been thrown into some unknown space again?"

"calm!"

Qiao Yixia flashed and instantly appeared in front of Zhijiansha, reaching out to place her hand on her forehead: "Your emotions are not right—this place is clearly affecting your senses and thinking."

Honghe nodded: "I can feel it. So far, it hasn't had any major impact, so there's no need to worry."

The sand between her fingers was startled by Qiao Yixia's move, and a wave of numbness ran through her body, which finally calmed her restless mind.

Qiao Yixia frowned slightly, then flicked her hand, forcing blood from her fingertips as she drew a talisman in the air. "This is a calming spell, which can temporarily help you stabilize your emotions."

Sand Between Fingers blinked. "You can draw talismans? I thought you weren't going down this path—after all, you're not using an old-era Western rapier, are you? It's a completely different style."

Qiao Yixia glanced at the sand between her fingers: "We've already reached that point, what's the point of talking about style? If it's usable, we have to learn it; what's practical is the most suitable."

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844. The Sealed Village

"Ah, indeed..."

Zhijiansha scratched her head and thought about it carefully. It seemed to make sense. She was stuck in her mindset. Even a sorcerer could hit people with a big wooden stick, so it was normal for Qiao Yixia to be able to draw a talisman.

Wait, then if that's the case—isn't she really too weak?! Finger Sand suddenly realized this again. Of the three present, how come she was the weakest again? And the most intelligent one might not even be her.

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Please take one day off.

I really can't take it anymore.

I stayed up all night yesterday, and I've felt groggy and awful all day today.

I haven't been feeling very well lately.

Please take one day off.

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845. The Isolated Village Transformed into an Enemy Base

"and many more……"

Upon hearing this, Qiao Yixia's eyes flashed with a sharp light, as if she had quickly made a connection to something. She strode to the sealed window on one side of the house and looked inside through the crack. Sure enough, just as she had guessed, there were no furnishings inside. There was no trace of anyone living there, nor even any sign of decoration.

These houses only look like houses on the outside; in fact, they do not serve the same purpose at all. They were merely made to serve as containers for these seals.

In other words, this place was never meant to be inhabited, nor was it a village at all—this entire area was part of the grand formation.

Furthermore, the surrounding mountains all belong to this grand formation, and this village serves as the core of the formation.

Just now, the group of them fell from the sky into the nearby grove of trees. Although it was unlikely that they would directly destroy the formation, it would likely cause some temporary disruption. Although formations of this level usually have the ability to repair themselves, their safety within the formation could not be guaranteed until it was repaired.

Moreover, and most importantly—it is precisely because the formation may be temporarily disrupted that they have a chance to escape. You must understand, this is a sealing formation; such a level of sealing is like an inescapable net for them in their current state. If they were intact, escape would be impossible.

In other words, they now not only have to protect themselves amidst the chaos of the formation, but also find a way to escape and successfully execute it before the formation can fully repair itself.

Without delay, Qiao Yixia quickly and concisely explained her conjecture to Honghe and Zhijiansha, adding, "The different angles and positions of the engravings that Honghe discovered earlier are likely because these engravings are meant to surround and point towards the very center of the array eye—the point where their angles overlap should be the center of the entire array, which is the location of the thing sealed by this array."

"Logically speaking, shouldn't we avoid that place?"

Zhijiansha thought for a moment: "Something sealed with an array of this level might cost us our lives if we even get close!"

Honghe pondered, “Under normal circumstances, what you said is completely correct. But the problem now is that, firstly, we don’t know any way to deal with this formation, and once the so-called ‘disorder’ period passes, we will be trapped. Moreover, we cannot even perceive the so-called ‘disorder,’ let alone accurately judge the time. Secondly, we didn’t enter here by accident; we were thrown in. Obviously, the entity that threw us in must have some purpose. If we don’t achieve what it wants us to do, we might be thrown in again, or we might be disposed of directly.”

Qiao Yixia tightened her grip on the sword. "Your description reminds me of a guy with a really twisted sense of humor... This is very much in her style. If it really was that guy, then we can only prepare for the worst—that guy not only acts recklessly, but he also kills people without a care in the world."

"That's really damn good news..."

Finger Sand immediately started gesturing wildly: "So, we have no other choice but to head towards the center of the formation, right?"

Honghe nodded: "If we had plenty of time and didn't mind wasting it, I would choose to first check the entire mountain range, and then thoroughly search this village—but we don't have much time now, so we can only choose the most direct and fastest method."

"There's no need to worry too much. At least there's one advantage to doing this—we don't need to find a way to break out of the formation ourselves. If we release the sealed thing, the formation will naturally be broken."

Qiao Yixia's eyes flickered slightly as she casually offered her advice: "As long as the sealed thing doesn't attack us by then, or if we escape quickly enough, we still have a good chance of surviving."

But clearly, her words of comfort had no effect; in fact, they only made Zhijiansha feel more pessimistic.

But even in their pessimism, there was no better way. After making some quick adjustments, the three headed toward the center of the formation.

The closer you get to the center, the more obvious the tilt of the surrounding houses becomes. The outer perimeter only shows a faint tilt, but the further you go in, the more you can see that these houses have even formed a ring.

Qiao Yixia's brows furrowed slightly—she had been on guard against potential dangers, but for some reason, she increasingly sensed a familiar aura emanating from this place, one that seemed somewhat familiar from her memories. However, she couldn't quite place what it was.

Soon, a high platform surrounded by village houses gradually came into view of the three.

Unlike the dilapidated wooden houses around it, this decaying platform, though neglected for a long time and appearing at first glance like a ruin, reveals, with a little attention, the slightly blurred but exquisitely carved reliefs, simple yet majestic.

Countless chains, constructed of runes and emitting faint black smoke, stretched out from the ground, tightly binding and binding the platform. Finally, they coiled at the top of the platform, forming a cocoon shape.

Qiao Yixia suddenly felt a sharp pain in her head and staggered two steps in a daze—for a moment, she seemed to remember something, but it vanished in an instant.

"What's this?"

Finger Sand gazed in amazement at this creation, which seemed to be crafted by a master craftsman. If it was such a being, even the sealing array that was originally thought to be of a sufficient level would not be worthy of it.

The phantom of the giant scythe in Honghe's hand began to flicker, as if it were absorbing some kind of free energy to replenish itself. It gradually began to solidify from its illusory state, and the connection and resonance between her and the giant scythe became more and more obvious and intense.

At the same time, Qiao Yixia suddenly stomped her toes heavily on the ground, leaped up, and flew towards the high platform.

Then came a fierce clang of swords, and the rapier in her hand swung so fast that it was impossible to catch even a blur in the line of sight, quickly severing the chains one by one.

The cocoon on the high platform grew smaller and thinner until finally, it revealed its true form, which was encased in a cocoon of chains.

It was a bronze sword, rusted and its shape completely corroded and blurred.

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846. Taijia Dingguang

Clang!

As the chains snapped, a sword's cry rang out. The mottled rust shell was shattered and fell away in an instant, turning into ashes and revealing the golden hue hidden beneath the rust.

The bronze sword fell steadily from the air. Qiao Yixia twisted her waist and used her toes to press heavily on the broken chains in mid-air to gain leverage. She immediately reached out and gripped the sword tightly in her hand before it landed on the ground with a "thud".

Finger Sand and Red Crane were still blocked by chains on the outside, unable to get close to the high platform, and could only watch Qiao Yixia's movements from afar.

The chains that had been scattered on the ground seemed to come alive, like countless venomous snakes and pythons crawling and lunging at Qiao Yixia, coiling around her.

"Dingguang...?"

Qiao Yixia caught a glimpse of the inscription on the hilt of the bronze sword and couldn't help but frown slightly. "How did it get here..."

However, now was not the time to think about such things. She immediately turned around to avoid the nearest chain, holding a rapier in one hand and a bronze sword in the other. Although she did not know how to use two swords, she could deal with the surrounding chains by simply swinging them.

Qiao Yixia moved as if she were in an empty place—well, it really is an empty place, so it's alright—in short, she broke through the encirclement with ease. Rather, it's more accurate to say that these chains were so fragile that it was reasonable for them to be cut by this bronze sword, but to be so easily broken by the rapier in her hand... it seems that their level is not that high.

"go!"

Qiao Yixia suddenly broke free of the chains and gave concise instructions to the red crane and the sand between her fingers in front of her.

The two of them were naturally extremely quick to react when it came to escaping. As soon as they saw Qiao Yixia break out of the encirclement, before she could even speak, they had already taken action and started running.

As expected, just as they had predicted, once the sealed bronze sword was removed, the entire sealing formation began to fall into great chaos. Countless houses collapsed as if struck by a natural disaster, the earth began to tremble violently, and the surrounding mountains emitted a roar like that of an earth dragon.

Qiao Yixia sped up again, first sheathing her rapier, then binding the bronze sword behind her back with one hand. In the blink of an eye, she caught up with Zhijiansha and Honghe ahead, grabbing one in each hand, and quickly escaped the village, returning to the location where the building they had just been standing had crashed down.

"A dragon?! Is that a dragon?!"

As he was being dragged along, Zhijiansha stared wide-eyed, pointing incredulously at the village behind him. There, emerging from the ground, was a gigantic creature that, amidst the swirling dust, truly resembled a legendary earth dragon in its size.

Qiao Yixia didn't turn her head, but her brows furrowed even deeper: "What kind of dragon is that? It's just an insect monster!"

"An insect... such a big insect?!"

The sand between her fingers imagined what the disgusting insect would look like if it were magnified so many times, and she immediately felt nauseous and dared not think about it anymore. She even turned her head away so that she could no longer look at the outline in the smoke and dust.

Just then, Red Crane spoke up, warning, "The fog is spreading—just like before when we were teleported here along with this building. It seems the center of the fog is still that house, and we might not be able to get there before the fog spreads!"

Upon hearing this, Qiao Yixia's eyes narrowed. She immediately flung the Sand Between Her Fingers and the Red Crane in her hand forward with force. Then, she quickly reached behind her and drew the bronze sword, tossed it into the air, made a hand seal, and leaped onto the sword.

Soon, under Qiao Yixia's control, the bronze sword carried her forward at high speed. She even caught the Sand in her hand and the Red Crane in mid-air again, giving them a free trial of sword control.

It's just a pity that it's the kind where you grab it by the back of the collar.

Red Crane was alright; she quickly shrank the illusory image of the giant scythe, gently hooked it onto the hilt, and used the leverage to flip herself onto the blade. As for the sand between her fingers…

She was literally being dragged through the air by the back of her collar. If Qiao Yixia hadn't used her skillful strength, she might have had her throat slit by her own collar before the monster even killed her.

Finally, with the speed boost from the sword control technique, the three of them managed to crash into the dilapidated house before the white mist completely enveloped them. Qiao Yixia only had time to stab her sword into the ground and activate a protective shield; before she could do anything else, the house began to shake violently again.

Not to mention, the enormous insect monster emerged from the mist and lashed the building with its body, almost crushing it.

Fortunately, before it struck a second time, the white mist had already enveloped the house and carried it far away from this awful place.

Then another dizzying sensation struck.

Sand between Fingers lay sprawled on the ground, hiding inside the protective shield, and even had the leisure to complain: "What is this? This plot development is like some third-rate puzzle game... and it's from a small company that can't afford to make a large map, so they can only make separate small maps, and have to use this teleportation method to reach other small maps - what's with this sense of déjà vu!"

“Well said, once is enough.”

The flamingo clung tightly to the illusory giant scythe hooked to the ground, preventing itself from flying around as the house spun. "Clearly, there's a mastermind behind all of this, and getting this sword is all part of that being's plan. Although we don't know what that thing's purpose is, the only thing we're certain of is—at least until we fully achieve its goal, we shouldn't be in too much danger. In that case, it's just about retrieving a few things and breaking a few seals..."

Is that so?

Finger Sand looked at Red Crane in surprise, feeling that this was not something the other person would say.

Sure enough, she noticed that the flamingo still had lifeless, emotionless eyes.

Okay, she was certain that Red Crane had just said that offhand to the possible mastermind who might be monitoring them.

At least outwardly, don't show any intention to resist, lest the other party choose to replace you directly.

Finger Sand didn't think she was irreplaceable—but Qiao Yixia might be necessary.

Honghe didn't continue speaking, but turned to look at Qiao Yixia: "That sword, you seem to know about it?"

Qiao Yixia was silent for a moment before nodding: "The Dingguang Sword—but I don't remember this sword being sealed in a place like this... Did something happen after I was sealed away...?"