Jinhua Mountain, Blessed Land Where Heaven and Earth Gather Their Splendor

"Ah!"

With a startled cry, Shen Yao woke from his dream.

He looked blankly at the bamboo-and-wood roof above him, then gradually came back to his senses.

Wiping the sweat from his brow, Shen Yao let out a long breath. Another nightmare.

Ever since childhood, Shen Yao had occasionally dreamed the same nightmare, one that had haunted more than a decade of his life.

The nightmare was strange. Every time, Shen Yao dreamed that he was drowning in a pitch-black, filthy chaos. He could not struggle, could not move, and could only watch helplessly as that black filth swallowed him whole.

It was always the same. Every time, he could clearly feel that suffocating despair.

Shen Yao did not know why he kept repeating such a nightmare. Yet after entering the immortal sect, he discovered that the dream had changed. Whenever he was about to be submerged by that pitch-black filth, Shen Yao could feel an eye watching him from within that chaos.

Recalling the nightmare, Shen Yao could not help rubbing his brow.

Shen Yao did not come from any great household. Compared to the ghost-and-god aristocratic families of the Yu Dynasty, his parents were merely a pair of Rogue Cultivator companions who, after finding no hope on the road ahead, had founded a small cultivation clan.

Shen Yao's birth had thrilled his parents, but when it came to his persistent nightmares, they had exhausted every possible method without finding a cure. They had prayed to gods and sought medicines, yet none had worked.

Fortunately, Shen Yao did not suffer nightmares every day. As time passed, he grew used to them.

Shen Yao had thought he had long since become accustomed to them, but the sudden changes in his nightmares over the past few days had unsettled him. He