Chapter 1
Passing through the water surface condensed from moonlight, Hao Ren felt an icy chill spreading from his limbs to his very core.

It wasn't a cold sensed by the nerves, but something deeper, more soul-stirring – a cold that seemed to emanate from the depths of his consciousness. As this cold struck, Hao Ren realized that he had entered a world governed by the power of shadows.

The disorienting sensation of inverted gravity was fleeting. Hao Ren felt as if he had tumbled in the air. One moment, everything was spinning; the next, he regained his footing. The scene before him quickly stabilized, and he found himself still standing in the castle courtyard, but the entire castle and the sky above had been utterly transformed.

Everything in sight was desaturated, with varying shades of black and white outlining everything. The whole world resembled a black-and-white photograph – monotonous, bleak, and eerie. While the "outside world" castle was more than half collapsed, here it appeared intact. Not only was it intact, but it was also many times larger than Hao Ren remembered. The castle courtyard had become an enormous plaza, dotted with static fountains and bizarre sculptures, none of which had existed in the "outside world." The four towers of the plaza had become towering, cloud-piercing behemoths, like four pillars supporting the heavens, standing at the distant horizon. The tops of the towers supported a heavily clouded sky, and at the point where the spires met the sky, enormous and terrifying vortexes slowly swirled. Part of the castle wall extended from the east to the west side of the courtyard, expanded countless times to resemble a giant dam, with hundreds of slender, Gothic-style carved windows lined up on the wall. Each window emitted a pale light, as if an endless banquet were being held inside the castle.

And high in the sky, black-and-white clouds were frozen in place, covering the entire world.

Hao Ren stared in astonishment at the huge and complex structures around him, realizing that the vast structures he could see were only a small part of the castle. This collapsing "Harroween Fortress" from the real world was presented in a bizarre state in this shadow world, perhaps an asymmetrical projection that had transformed it into this scene.

The witches also emerged from the pool one by one. The last to jump out was Lily, eyes closed and yelping, but the sight of the shadow world instantly silenced the husky girl. Her eyes widened as she looked around, then turned back to the pool she had come from: the original pool, less than ten meters in diameter, had also expanded several times, surrounded by a large number of gloomy, twisted sculptures and patterns. Lily blinked and exclaimed, "Wow—so this is what the shadow world is like?"

"The shadow world can take any form, depending on the controller's command and the twisted projection of the real world," Hesperiana said. "Shadows are always abstract, so the forms they can take often exceed your imagination."

Madam Marie opened her hands, looking at a small ball of black flame dancing in her palm: "The magical concentration in this world is unimaginable... I have never so easily captured the free-floating magical power in the air... This is simply a paradise for dark magic!"

"Restrain your desires, witch," Hesperiana warned coldly. "The magical power of this world belongs to Mistress Vivian, and even this entire world is an extension of her. You are welcome to indulge in it, and I will not stop you. Anyway, you will soon become part of the shadow, digested and absorbed by Mistress Vivian's dream."

Lily blinked, as if thinking of something else: "So this is Vivian's dream?"

"You could say that," Hesperiana replied casually. "Mistress Vivian transforms the 'domain' she is in while sleeping. This domain is detached from the real world, forming a highly protective 'shell.' Within this 'shell,' Mistress Vivian's subconscious dominates and creates everything."

Lily scratched her head: "So it seems she dreams of having such a big house..."

Hesperiana: "..."

Hao Ren: "..."

Damn, this dog's words are so incisive! Could it be that the essence of this shadow world is to show that Vivian can only dream if she wants to live the life of a wealthy person?

The husky girl's unintentional words caused a considerable period of awkwardness. After a long while, Hao Ren coughed twice to regain his senses: "Ahem, we can slowly study these things after the incident subsides. Hesperiana, which way do we go next?"

"Wait, I need to observe as well," Hesperiana said, opening her hands. A pair of huge bat wings appeared in the air behind her, and countless shadowy, phantom-like little bats flew out of the shadows beneath her wings, scattering in all directions. "This is also my first time entering this place. Mistress Vivian usually... doesn't like me to disturb her. My understanding of this place mostly comes from my own long-term investigations."

Lily curled her lips: "So you're just a theorist."

"But this theorist knows a lot," Hesperiana glared at Lily. "Although Mistress Vivian doesn't like to be disturbed, she once told me about this shadow world in a dream. At the very least, I know where the control center of the Soulless Guardians is!"

As she spoke, the little bat spirit's expression suddenly changed slightly, and her gaze turned in a certain direction.

Hao Ren asked curiously, "What's wrong?"

"I saw a shadow node being interfered with. That wizard... that wizard named Barn has indeed entered."

The witches immediately stirred slightly: the wizard Barn was equivalent to the "insider" they had brought in, so any information about him made them quite nervous, and Hao Ren immediately asked, "Can you track him?"

"It's difficult," Hesperiana frowned and shook her head. "That wizard's strength is a bit unexpected. He is very proficient in shadow magic, and he also has that key in his hand... He erased most of his traces, and at the same time, he used the environment of this world to hide himself."

"Anyway, he will always go to the depths of the seal," Hao Ren looked up at the black-and-white sky, and some vague shadows appeared behind those solidified clouds at some point. "What are those?"

"Those are the Soulless Guardians," Hesperiana looked up and her expression immediately became serious. "The shadow world has sensed our 'trespassing' this time, and the Soulless Ones are gradually awakening. Follow me, let's go to the North Tower immediately, we must first gain some control over this world!"

"Um..." Lily looked around, "I think those Soulless Ones you mentioned have already arrived..."

Almost as soon as the husky girl finished speaking, a series of "crackling" sounds of stone breaking suddenly came from all over the plaza.

In this plaza, which had expanded several times compared to the real world, there were black stone sculptures with grotesque shapes, mostly with human bodies and beast limbs, with barbed, bat-like wings and long tails on their backs. Now these strange stone sculptures were breaking one by one, revealing their shapeless, smoke-like bodies after the stones fell away. Fragments of shattered stone swirled between the smoke, forming the monsters' extremely bizarre shapes.

"Damn it... the Soulless Ones actually hid in the gargoyle statues..." Hesperiana cursed in a low voice, and with a wave of her hand, a blood-red whip appeared in her hand. "Everyone, retreat towards the North Tower! Don't engage in prolonged battles, the Soulless Ones cannot be killed!"

As she spoke, a living "gargoyle" let out a shrill scream and charged over like a cloud of dust!

A flash of light passed, and the high-temperature flames of the plasma gun blade cut the monster, made of a combination of shadow power and stone, in half. Hao Ren, holding a spear, stood at the forefront of the team, and in his other hand, he had pressed the three locking buttons of the graviton hand grenade: "Lily, just take care of Hassu!"

After the graviton hand grenade was thrown out, it exploded, instantly forming a gravitational collapse with a radius of five meters. Several gargoyles that were charging rapidly were instantly captured by this force field, no less than a small black hole, and were sucked into the dark, lightless spot in the center of the explosion while screaming shrilly. This strange power instantly startled the witches and stunned Hesperiana, who looked at Hao Ren in disbelief: "What power is this? This is not witchcraft!"

"I have quite a connection with those guys in Northern Europe," Hao Ren casually made up a story.

Lily carried Hassu and kicked a gargoyle away, shouting unhappily, "This uncle is so troublesome to carry! I don't want to carry him, I want to fight! Landlord, can't you just throw him into your portable space first!"

"My perception of portable space is not so sensitive in this place, I wouldn't know if something happened to him inside!" Hao Ren said, throwing Lily an extremely heavy alloy two-handed sword. "Here, take this, just protect the two of you!"

Lily threw Hassu over her other shoulder, caught the long sword with her free right hand, and swung the huge two-handed sword, which looked like a movie prop, a few times: "Okay, it's at least a stick!"

After she finished speaking, she slammed the "stick" on a gargoyle, directly smashing it into a cloud of smoke.

Hesperiana and the witches also took action one after another, and various spells and summons flew across the battlefield, creating a chaotic battle!

However, Hao Ren quickly saw that those gargoyles that had been scattered or even vaporized reappeared in the air before long, and some monsters even split and multiplied after being scattered. The enemies on the square were actually increasing!

He finally realized what Hesperiana meant by "the Soulless Ones cannot be killed"—the root of these monsters comes from Vivian's dream, and as long as Vivian doesn't wake up, these nightmare monsters will never truly decrease!

On the contrary, with external stimuli, this nightmare will escalate more and more, and the number of monsters will also increase!

Everyone realized this, so under Hesperiana's lead, they fought and retreated, and began to move towards the North Tower of the castle.