Sword of Dawnbreaker

Chapter 301 - 300: Got You

The scene before him gradually stabilized, and the golden palaces and spires of the dream city once again appeared in front of Gawain.

As he looked at the Eternal Sleepers’ "avatars" coming and going, and the city quietly operating, Gawain couldn’t help but breathe a sigh of relief.

It seemed that the disguises he set up in the network were functioning well, and the backdoors he planted for infiltration weren’t detected by the Eternal Sleepers.

But after all, who knew what antivirus software was before computer viruses emerged?

This wasn’t the first or second time he had infiltrated this world—it was the third, and his actions in this mental network were now well-defined.

Steal technology, plant backdoors, monitor the actions of the Eternal Sleepers, and if possible, exert some influence over them through this mental network—to guide this peculiar evil cult in line with his expectations.

Gawain bypassed the crowd, reaching the area where the Node Crystal was located. After connecting to the main channel, he first confirmed that everything in his "experimental field" was normal, then quietly exited the hidden connection and began to search for potential technical information with the aid of the Node Crystal.

Although previous attempts had failed to yield effective information, Gawain didn’t come away empty-handed. Through analyzing and learning the knowledge he absorbed from the Eternal Sleepers and the experience gained from resource theft in the mental network, he had vaguely grasped the principles and structure of this network. He discovered he could do more with the network’s breach than he initially imagined.

This network was directly connected to each Eternal Sleeper’s mental world, which meant theoretically it could link to each one’s thoughts and memory space. Of course, the Eternal Sleepers were aware of the risk, so they protected and isolated their conscious worlds when connecting to the network to prevent reverse intrusion. However, from Gawain’s perspective, their defenses were clearly insufficient.

Perhaps it was because the Eternal Sleepers never imagined that someone would harm their church brethren on this ’home’ network, or perhaps Gawain’s own soul mutation was too severe, giving him an exceptionally strong control over his subconscious world. To him, all the deceptive, covert shielding measures in this mental network seemed to not exist at all...

The Node Crystal emitted a faint glow, floating silently in front of Gawain. He gazed at the surface of the crystal, while his magical power gradually spread out. He could sense the hidden truths beneath the crystal’s deceptive exterior—a vast amount of data was being exchanged, distributed, and reconstructed here, with the thoughts of countless Eternal Sleepers surging and fluctuating at the bottom of the data sea. Some thoughts were strong, others weak. Those strong thoughts were tightly connected to the network’s entire structure, with any slight disturbance risking triggering a network-wide alert. However, those weak thoughts...

They floated like seaweed and plankton among the waves, lacking both protection and vigilance.

These were the lower-tier Eternal Sleepers, the most basic group of evil cult followers. Their greatest value in this network was to contribute computing power and to act as a "buffer" to bear data pressure when the network experienced severe fluctuations. For this immature network, fluctuations were a common occurrence, and the Eternal Sleepers chose the simplest and crudest method to ensure overall network stability.

Gawain cautiously let his magical power continue to diffuse, mapping out those thoughts’ patterns through the Node Crystal’s transition, and roughly judging the potential strength of their owners. He also started trying to read the surface memories of those thoughts—this was one of the Eternal Sleepers’ most basic abilities. Although Gawain had acquired this knowledge through absorption, it was his first time actually putting it to use.

He had to be extremely careful—if his infiltration into the network got exposed, who knows what extreme reactions those already tense evil cult followers, anxious about "Wanderers from Outer Realm," might have? They might just unplug all the servers in a panic...

A vague vision emerged in Gawain’s mind, and he saw countless light dots flickering and flowing within the hazy outline of the dream city. Most light dots were on the city’s outer layer, with fewer in the inner layers and several exceptionally bright ones gathering in the large palace area at the city center.

He cautiously avoided those targets that were too powerful or too close to the central area, and began to engage with those that seemed suitable for his intervention.

He observed a few fleeting surface memories—some were of unfamiliar crowds holding gatherings, others of the mundane life in gloomy, desolate ancient fortresses. Among these rapidly flashing surface memories, he suddenly saw a particularly special scene.

An elderly Mage living in seclusion, a deviant man who had veered off the path, someone tempted and fallen by the Eternal Sleepers, willingly becoming a slave to dreams...

He slowly approached...

In the mountains of the southwestern frontier of the Typhon Empire, an ancient Mage tower stood silently atop a craggy peak. The dim twilight shrouded the black roof of the ancient spire, cascading down its mottled exterior walls, outlining a hazy golden edge around the tower’s body. This light, however, could not dispel the tower’s persistent gloomy aura, instead rendering it as if it were mysteriously torn from the sky.

The villagers living at the mountain’s base always harbored fear for the Mage tower atop the mountain. They knew a terrifying Mage resided in the black tower. Every night, the silhouette of this fearsome Mage would appear through the highest window of the tower. The ignorant villagers regarded the mountain’s strange winds, lightning, and fog as signs of the Mage’s anger, cautioning their children to stay away from the peak to avoid being enchanted by the Mage, turning into statues in the tower, or one of those tamed, talking owls. Such was the villagers’ imagination of Magic.

In fact, their fear was not unfounded, for a terrible, mentally unstable old Mage did indeed reside in that black tower. It was rumored that the old Mage came from the Imperial Capital Oldennan and was banished here by the emperor for researching forbidden knowledge. He lived in isolation, with a peculiar temperament, never communicating with the villagers. He had several equally gloomy apprentices, who would occasionally descend to buy food or conduct other trades. The villagers often detected a bloody smell from these black-robed apprentices, thus fueling more unsettling and horrific rumors about the black tower.

The black-haired, slender Mary carried the procured food away from the village amid the villagers’ fearful eyes. Their uneasy, absurd speculations seemed to still swirl around her ears as she tightened her black Mage robe around herself, using the hood to shield against the chilly mountain night air while walking alone on the mountain path.

There was only one road leading from the mountain village to the Mage tower, though the impulse to flee it was countless. Mary raised her head to look at the Mage tower door already in sight, and then couldn’t help but glance back at the road from which she came.

She touched the metal collar around her neck, reluctantly withdrawing her gaze, and step by step approached the Mage tower.

The Mage tower’s door opened automatically, and the dark doorway made her instinctively step back. The next second, however, a withered arm reached out from the darkness, pulling her into the door.

A hoarse, aged voice came from the side: "Don’t dawdle, the master won’t be pleased."

Mary nodded, quickly handing the basket she carried to the servant who was as gloomy and ancient as the entire Mage tower. Then she walked heavily to the second floor of the Mage tower.

The old Mage, robed in black, sat within the magic laboratory. The walls and floor around him were drawn with bizarre, blood-red magic symbols, flickering with dimly shifting light. As Mary entered, the old Mage slowly lifted his head.

His sparse, white-haired head looked withered, as if air-dried, his wrinkled skin marked by the passage of time. He seemed so aged he could die any moment, but Mary knew this old Mage was far from dying—she even suspected he would live forever, outlasting her own life.

"You’re back... get to work," the old Mage stated, casting a muddy glance at Mary. His voice, deep and slow, bore a peculiar lethargy, which Mary knew stemmed from his being in a special "connection" state, a term she didn’t fully understand since her mentor never allowed her to access such knowledge. All she knew was that this "Spell" differed entirely from traditional Magic. Her mentor, Daniel, had discovered this "Spell" at the height of his madness, then became obsessed with it, provoking the mages of the imperial capital and thus ending up in this desolate frontier...

Whenever in the "connection" state, the old Mage’s reactions would slow to this degree. Yet, the lethargy was merely an illusion—his mind remained sharp, and his reactions could be quite swift. The wisest choice was immediate compliance with his orders to avoid punishment.

Mary showed compliance, quickly walking to the corner of the laboratory where a dissected specimen was already set upon the table, maintained in an optimal research state through magic. Mary recognized it as a monkey, a common creature in the mountains.

She began processing the specimen according to her mentor’s prior instructions. Despite its slight twitching, she mechanically set to work—peeling flesh, connecting nerve lines, immersing it in magical oils...

Yet, halfway through these mechanical motions, she suddenly heard a strange noise from her mentor’s direction.

Stunned, she looked up to see her mentor’s eyes wide open, immense terror rapidly overtaking his aged, withered face. As if faced with an unspeakable entity that could frighten him to death, this typically fear-inducing old man opened his mouth to emit an odd exhalation. After stiffening for two seconds, the old Mage abruptly extended his arm, seemingly trying to block something in front of him, but uttered an inexplicable phrase:

"Stand there, I’ve already caught you."

That wasn’t how her mentor usually spoke.