Lu Yuan did not know when he had fallen asleep.
He only saw an incomparably vast river before him.
Its surface spread out to both sides, all the way to the edge of his vision, making it impossible to tell where the river ended and the sky began.
The water was filled with dreamlike colors.
Many colors churned together, flowing slowly.
Some places glimmered with dark gold, others sank into deep blue. Occasionally, a wisp of exceedingly faint white surfaced, only to be quickly swallowed by the other colors.
The river kept flowing, but it made no sound.
Lu Yuan stood on the water.
There was no sensation beneath his feet, nor any sign of sinking. He simply hovered there.
He lowered his head and looked into the water.
Something was moving beneath the surface.
Words.
They surged up from the depths of the river before sinking back down, dense and countless, like flocks of migratory birds sweeping over a lake too deep to fathom.
Every word glowed, but the light was swallowed before it reached the surface.
Lu Yuan wanted to make out what those words said.
But he could not see them clearly at all.
They were too far away and moved too quickly.
Ripples suddenly spread across the river.
It was not the wind.
Something was growing in the distance across the water.
Lu Yuan raised his head.
It was a tree.
It grew from the very center of the river. Its trunk pierced the surface and extended straight upward, so thick that its outline could not fit within his field of vision.
Its bark was a dark grayish green, covered in vein-like patterns. The same colors as the river flowed through those patterns.
Its crown spread out even higher above.
So high that Lu Yuan could