Facing an Ancient God for a Year

[Clear Dream Ring: After activation, it induces a brief shared dreamscape within a certain radius.]

Fu Qian checked the rewards from the two super deities and to his surprise, the Clear Dream Ring turned out to be another ring!

However, saying “another” might not be correct, since the Tyrant’s Fist, although shaped like a ring, is defined as a weapon.

Compared to the Tyrant’s Fist, the appearance of the Clear Dream Ring is much more normal.

The silver-white metallic ring is carved with intricate patterns, and its face is set with tiny gems, clustering into a spiral nebula.

With a gentle motion, ice-blue light flows around, dreamlike and illusory.

Inducing people within a certain range into a dreamscape sounds a bit like hypnosis, but the special part must be this shared dreamscape.

...Making a group of people have the same dream? Inception, huh? That could be interesting.

He couldn’t think of any immediate use for it, but the design of the ring was quite beautiful, so Fu Qian immediately slipped it onto his other middle finger.

Moving on to the next reward, Fu Qian shifted his attention to the [Feast].

[Feast: Substantially enhances life vitality and cannot be deactivated after activation.]

[The form of the body is not important, only the joy of the soul constitutes the Feast.]

By the name, I thought it was some kind of skill like regenerating health by eating corpses, but it seems like the target of the Feast is myself.

Substantially increases life vitality?

Fu Qian was puzzled, it seemed his current life vitality was already high enough, how could it increase further?

And the part about it being irreversible once activated looked rather serious.

It’s another point of no return!

Unfortunately, Fu Qian was a person with strong curiosity. After hesitating for a few seconds, he persuaded himself and chose to activate the skill.

A soft glow lit up from the Feast, and then it disappeared into the void.

At the same time, Fu Qian felt a series of vibrating ripples appear within his body, quickly sweeping through his entire form.

Bones, muscles, tendons—all resonated with the ripples at every location, and finally overlapped on the skin, creating echo after echo.

After a long while, the vibrations slowly ceased.

“Looks like there’s no obvious change!”

Fu Qian clenched his fists, feeling that his strength hadn’t increased noticeably.

The next moment, he felt something, and swung out a punch into the void.

The rush of wind howled, and at the end of the punch, his index finger suddenly stretched straight out. Accompanied by a whooshing sound, the index finger extended a whole arm’s length, transforming into a finger spear.

I think I understand what this enhanced life vitality is all about.

Fu Qian retracted his finger and took a deep breath.

With a tearing sound, a huge mouth opened at his chest, revealing numerous sharp fangs.

Just as I thought!

This transformation, which used to be quite strenuous, could now be achieved in an instant, even without first creating a wound.

Fu Qian quickly returned to his original form, essentially confirming the change brought about by the [Feast].

If the Thug Form lifted the limits of strength as a human being, then the Feast lifted the traditional restrictions on physical form.

He could now freely control any part of his body to transform, without worrying about his body collapsing.

Impressive! Just a bit freakish!

But all in all, it was worth the effort.

Overall, Fu Qian was quite satisfied with his gains.

Having checked his rewards, he chose to replay the incident.

Just then, he realized he had overlooked something.

The notice of containment failure had only appeared after he exited the barrier, which was not in itself unreasonable.

However, he distinctly remembered the scene when [2-292]leak occurred previously.

When Wen Li lost her chance for advancement due to Wen Xiuxian being killed, leading to her mental breakdown, he’d received the mission failure notification immediately.

Comparing the two, it actually suggested something—that up until he walked out of the barrier in a state of breakdown, there was still a chance to complete containment.

That meant there must be a way inside the furnace to reverse his mental breakdown.

Rushing through to the end, Fu Qian watched himself, who had already stepped outside the barrier, in a state of both physical and mental collapse.

His body was severely misshapen, covered in faces wanting to escape, so clear that even the expressions on the faces could be distinguished.

Among the faces, men and women could be discerned, many correlating with the Blood Faces from after Feng Yunhong’s self-detonation.

But it seemed to be missing something!

Frowning, Fu Qian rewound to the moment of Feng Yunhong’s self-detonation and, upon close inspection, indeed spotted an anomaly.

After Feng Yunhong exploded into a storm of flesh and blood, all the Blood Faces diffuse in the area had acquired a strange mark, shaped like four hands rotating counterclockwise.

This…

Considering Feng Yunhong’s condition the first time he’d seen him, even Li Weixuan hadn’t noticed anything off, which implied that he’d suppressed the consciousness of these Blood Faces effectively.

Feng Yunhong was clearly hiding something secret, utilizing a special method to suppress mental breakdown to a certain extent, allowing himself to avoid a state of confusion.

This probably explained why he had angrily criticized his actions at that time as reckless.

It seemed necessary to find a way to have a deep conversation with him.

After reviewing the footage several times and confirming he hadn’t missed anything, Fu Qian decisively touched the Mist Gate again.

[1 SAN Point consumed for another containment attempt, current SAN Points: 54]

[…1%…5%…15%…50%…75%…99%…100%, containment scene loading complete]

“Strange, is this place on the map?”

Yuan Xin’s voice came from ahead as a half-collapsed wall appeared, and the team began discussing a halt to regroup.

Action had begun!

Stretching lazily, Fu Qian walked from the back of the group to the front under the incredulous gazes of his teammates.

“Fu Qian, what’s the matter? Don’t change the formation without permission.”

Yuan Xin, who was discussing with Ji Liushuang, noticed his odd behavior and called out unhappily, but the latter turned a deaf ear.

“I’m talking to you!”

Annoyed, Yuan Xin reached out to grab Fu Qian’s shoulder, but unexpectedly missed as Fu Qian had already moved several meters away from the team.

“I’m going to scout ahead.”

Without looking back and not stopping, Fu Qian stepped over the barrier wall in his path.

Without so much as a glance back from Fu Qian, Yuan Xin was first stunned, then a wave of annoyance washed over him.

However, he wasn’t about to lose his composure over this, and after taking a deep breath, he looked at Ji Liushuang with a questioning glance. She hesitated before shaking her head.

“It seems Fu Qian doesn’t want us to follow. To be safe, let’s stick to the plan and rest here for now. We’ll try to inform Director Li later—”

Before Ji Liushuang could finish speaking, her gaze suddenly froze.

From within the shadows, a cluster of black spikes shot out from behind the wall, densely targeting Fu Qian’s back.

Amidst gasps of alarm, Fu Qian’s back seemed to grow eyes as he lightly stepped on the ground and leaped forward. He just managed to dodge the sneak attack, his body swiftly disappearing into the mist.

The nine-person team stood dazed in place. It took a while for them to react and jump away from the wall’s position.