Chapter Twenty: Nightmare

The desolate wind swept across the land between heaven and earth, as if something was brewing in this oppressive, dim, and kaleidoscopic space-time. When Yan Luo donned the mask of black, red, and gray, it suddenly transformed into a swirling blaze of three colors.

The strange glow spread across his skin, engulfing Yan Luo entirely in radiant light.

With a piercing cry, a horse leapt forth from the flames. Its shriveled, fleshless skin was pitch-black; a crimson mane and tail whipped in the wind like a streak of scarlet slashing through darkness. The horse’s four hooves blazed with hellfire, and a gray halo coiled around its body. This eerie steed seemed as ominous as if it had emerged from the depths of hell itself.

Zhu Xiaoyong, Xu Han, and Chu Qingfeng stared in awe at the black horse whose hooves trod upon fire.

Persona Mask: Nightmare.

The auxiliary program explained: The persona mask is your battle mask, worn to arm yourself against adversaries. Different emotions fused together create different masks; when you wear a mask, you become the corresponding persona.

Fear, in essence, is another name for “terror.” The so-called Nightmare—a demonic horse that sows terror in dreams—was formed from sixty points of terror, which laid the foundation of this persona. Twenty points of disgust gave it the shriveled, fleshless quality, marking it as an “undead creature,” while twenty points of madness became the hellfire burning upon its hooves.

These one hundred emotional points fused to create the persona mask—Nightmare! Yan Luo had not anticipated that donning it would transform him into a Nightmare. Different emotions and ratios yield different persona masks.

Wearing the mask even changes one's appearance! The fate talent and gene bar are similar—some are for combat, some for energy, but the transformation from the persona mask clearly belongs to “mysticism”—just as Tang Tianjie’s burst of luck was a mystical ability.

This transformation is not permanent; Yan Luo discovered that while transformed, his life source and mental source depleted with each passing second.

Both vitality and mental strength are consumed!

Yan Luo had no time to ponder. Unable to sustain the transformation for long, he galloped toward the Biochemical Abomination: Death Brain. Where the horse’s hooves struck the ground, blazing red flames sprang up.

Hellfire!

Madness, transmuted by mysterious power into fire, was Nightmare’s strongest weapon.

The crisp sound of hooves echoed in everyone’s ears.

The gray halo spun about its body.

A soul-deep terror flooded Zhu Xiaoyong, Yatari Yori, and even the fearless mortician Xu Han.

“What is that…?” Chu Qingfeng cried out in shock, “Hellfire and a halo of terror! It’s Nightmare—the Nightmare Beast! In medieval myth, a demon that traverses dreams and brings terror! Legend says the death steed is reborn from magma, wreathed in a halo of fear, breathing flames that could incinerate all! We’re saved—we’re really saved!”

Though none understood why Yan Luo had suddenly become a Nightmare, this terror-spreading monster brought hope to the group.

Hope to survive!

“Come on!” Yatari Yori’s face still glistened with tears, but she clenched her fists tightly.

Yan Luo, transformed as Nightmare, galloped and neighed. The shriveled, fleshless skin stretched over the streamlined body, revealing a beauty of power and masculinity beyond words. The dozens of meters closed in an instant beneath its four blazing hooves.

The black Nightmare, over two meters long, reared up, its cup-sized hooves flaming with hellfire, and kicked forward!

This biochemical amalgam—claws, teeth, and eyeballs all destroyed—had its massive death brain exposed, resembling a walnut’s brain tissue, its strongest part. Intense psychic force radiated, but as an undead, a demon, Nightmare had significant resistance to psychic and spiritual energy.

The rearing horse was frozen in mid-air for about two seconds, but immediately, despite its shriveled skin and lost flesh, the force erupting from its sinews shattered the psychic shackles!

Bang!

The hoof struck solidly against the Death Brain, smashing a large section of brain tissue. Thick, gray-white brain matter sprayed forth, and the burning hellfire scorched it, filling the air with a sickening stench of rot and char. Nearly a tenth of the brain tissue carbonized under the spreading flames.

The Biochemical Abomination: Death Brain seemed to writhe in agony. The remaining brain tissue sprouted sharp protrusions, twitching as if seized by extreme pain.

“Yes!”

Witnessing this, Chu Qingfeng could not help but pump his fist in relief.

Zhu Xiaoyong was utterly dumbfounded, staring in shock.

A surge of blue electricity erupted from the Death Brain. The brain generates electric waves—when neurons in the cortex interact, they create potential differences and electric currents. The Death Brain, this chaotic, twisted aberration, had the form of a brain mass over three meters in diameter, and in its pain, the current it generated rivaled magical “chain lightning!”

Chains of electrical current formed a massive net, enveloping Nightmare. The crackling of electricity scorched its skin and flesh; Yan Luo’s transformed Nightmare body was badly burned, unable to stand, and collapsed to the ground.

Yan Luo sensed his life source had plummeted below 20%.

Nightmare let out a long, piercing cry and rose from the ground. The black demon horse inhaled deeply.

The air temperature around it dropped suddenly as it drew in huge volumes of oxygen, catalyzing a surge of fire elements that burned with doubled intensity. The next moment, it unleashed a blast from its maw, fanning out across the space ahead.

Consuming “mental source,” it spewed Nightmare’s Breath!

Boom!

The massive brain tissue was engulfed in red hellfire. Under the relentless flames, the Biochemical Abomination: Death Brain—a brain mass over three meters wide—shrank steadily, the burning protein releasing a nauseating stench.

Nightmare spewed for seven seconds, until Yan Luo’s mental source fell below 10%. Only then did the Nightmare cease its breath.

The Biochemical Abomination: Death Brain died!

Upon hearing the program’s notification in his consciousness, Yan Luo, whose life source and mental source had reached their limits in such a brief time, instantly shed the Nightmare form. A three-colored blaze flashed across his body, and the eighteen-year-old youth appeared, exhausted and half-kneeling on the ground.

The mask he wore first cracked into countless fragments, then dissolved into particles of dust, drifting away on the wind.

The persona mask vanished.

“We did it—we really killed the boss!” Xu Han and Chu Qingfeng were overcome with wild joy. They had been in despair, never expecting Yan Luo to truly annihilate this twisted, dreadful boss.

“You have successfully created and worn the Persona Mask: Nightmare. Your soul pollution increases by one. You have shifted slightly toward the chaotic evil alignment.”

The notification rippled through his mind, but Yan Luo’s face remained expressionless. He saw, beside the charred Death Brain, a crystalline substance encased in a ball of light. He walked over and picked it up. The world modulation program provided an explanation:

“Strange Matter: A mysterious substance left behind when a chaos-polluted or mythic boss is slain. It can be used for fate talents, bloodlines, skills, or genes, allowing you to create items of special significance from corresponding abilities.”

“This strange matter is the remnant of the Biochemical Amalgam: brain, eye, tooth, and claw.”