Warlock Apprentice

Chapter 2672: Chapter 2673: Starting Over After Death

"...The basic rules of immersive live streaming are roughly like this."

After Angel finished explaining the basic rules, he finally stretched lazily, stood up, and walked toward a large door in the distance.

"You’ve probably examined the situation in this room as well. The Wood Spirit doesn’t seem to be here, so let’s move forward."

Watching Angel’s somewhat slender back, Vay couldn’t help but ask, "Sir, should we follow you?"

Angel nodded, "That’s right."

"Can your computing power handle it, sir?" Vay looked worried. Even just in this one room, he felt that the computational power required for reconstruction was enormous. Angel had to lead them while constantly synchronizing illusions along the way, which undoubtedly consumed a terrifying amount of computing power.

Angel was even younger than him, could his computational power really sustain such a huge consumption?

"It’s manageable." Angel nodded, as Vay’s thoughts were written all over his face, just a glance was enough to guess what he was thinking.

"Don’t worry," Angel explained after a moment of reflection, "In the Illusion Series, there’s a term called illusion logic."

"To deceive others, the first step is to determine the type of deception, such as reconstruction, recreation, induction, mind-bafflement, etc... Then it’s important to have a self-consistent logic chain. This logic chain allows the illusion to autonomously develop in the direction of self-consistency according to established trajectories. This autonomous development is known as illusion logic."

"Once the illusion logic is set at the beginning, it will naturally become more coherent afterward, significantly reducing the caster’s consumption."

"As we continue forward, it becomes a self-improving logic chain. With our progression, the speed of coherence will also increase, and the consumption will instead gradually decrease."

Of course, what Angel described was the ideal situation. He didn’t mention the greatest obstacle to illusion logic.

—Variables.

If illusion logic encounters variables that exceed its limits, it will stop evolving, and the logic chain will break.

For example, illusions generally do not fear confronting elemental Spell Techniques, because illusions rely on "deception," while elemental spell techniques require a "target." When you can’t locate a target due to deception, elemental spell techniques become useless.

But nothing is absolute. If the elemental spell technique reaches a magnitude that illusion logic cannot overshadow, like large-scale destruction, or rapid pinpoint destruction, this would create various unknown variables. If there are too many unknown variables, it would break the logic chain and naturally dissolve the illusion.

This is also why elemental Wizards, when trapped in an illusion, generally opt for wide-range indiscriminate attacks. Because this creates a considerable amount of variables.

How many variables a Wizard can endure within illusion logic has become a criterion for measuring the strength of an illusion.

Angel didn’t mention this point merely because the variables he could withstand were terrifically immense. Even he didn’t know his limit because it was untestable.

As for why Angel could endure such formidable variables, one reason is the high stability of the Power of Nightmare Illusion, and the other is the Wilderness of Dreams as his safeguard.

The essence of the "world," or rather the very foundation seen beneath the glamorous surface, is its operational logic.

In simple terms, even the world is composed of countless types of logic.

Though the Wilderness of Dreams is not yet a world per se, it has already started forming the embryonic stage of a world, where countless life forms, numerous vegetation, and innumerable variables occur every moment.

Angel usually wouldn’t care about these variables. But when he encounters a moment needing to endure variables, the Wilderness of Dreams becomes his strongest shield.

One could say, as long as Angel remains the Controller of the Wilderness of Dreams, the variables he can withstand would far surpass those of Illusionist Wizards of the same realm and even higher realms.

As the Wilderness of Dreams continues to improve, the variables Angel can bear will keep increasing.

This can be considered a unique inheritance of the Illusion Demon Island lineage. The Nightmare Realm’s existence can be used not only for combat but also for variable evolution. And everyone in the Illusion Demon Island lineage possesses a Nightmare Realm; the most powerful of which is Angel’s Wilderness of Dreams.

"I see now, I thought continuing would gradually increase the computational power needed." Vay scratched his head sheepishly.

"Purely from the environmental background perspective, the computational power consumption is not too high," Angel said. "However, if you physically interact with everything on the way, it will consume a lot of my computational power."

"So, try not to touch things randomly unless you find something particularly special."

Looking toward Kaier beside him, Angel continued, "Of course, you’re an exception. However, there may be some traps here. You’re different from them; they can ignore traps as illusions, but you need to be cautious."

Kaier nodded, "I understand."

"Oh, and the spatial properties here are quite chaotic, so remember to be mindful of the surrounding space rifts."

The destruction caused by space rifts is surely smaller than traps that have been left for a hundred thousand years. But Angel emphasized Kaier being wary of traps; as for space rifts... Kaier himself is an apprentice of the Space Series, and despite having poor combat abilities, the knowledge from the Academy Faction stands there, allowing him to immediately detect any spatial energy changes.

After addressing the precaution points, Angel proceeded toward the open doorway.

Angel had been here before in Naraku City of the Nightmare Realm. He distinctly remembered that there was a smaller room beyond the door, followed by a staircase going up.

This part could be considered the zeroth level, whereas reaching the first level would still require climbing the stairs for a while.

After opening the door, Angel paused slightly, his pupils contracted.

He partially understood why the Black Earl had previously advised him to be prepared... because a fracture had already appeared on the zeroth level.

This was originally a wooden room, but now, there were only broken planks floating in the dark void.

The planks would occasionally part and close, making short planar shifts. Overall, they seemed like floats on a water surface. The floats had ropes tying them, preventing them from drifting far, whereas the planks were fixed by the energy net of the Magical Energy Array and wouldn’t drift deeper into the void.

So, it only appeared frightening, but as long as you didn’t step off, there was no danger.

The planks continued moving, resembling some game levels Angel had seen on a holographic tablet, where you needed to time your jumps correctly to pass.

For ordinary people, it might be essential to be extra cautious. For Angel and Kaier, however, these jumps were hardly challenging. They didn’t even need to step on the planks and directly leaped to the opposite platform.

This platform, Angel recalls, used to be a buffer zone between the room and the stairs. It originally should have had wall candles. But now, all walls have vanished, let alone the wall candles.

Fortunately, the stairs at the end of the platform had not been entirely damaged, although only relatively intact. Originally, these stairs should have been in an enclosed space, akin to the passageways of a tomb: somber, dark, narrow, and long, but now the ceiling and walls of the stairwell had disappeared.

There was only a lone staircase, leading into the unknown void.

Observing the stark contrast between this place and the Hanging Jail Stairway in the Nightmare Realm, Angel was quite emotional. Merely from the desolate scenes here, one could imagine how terrifying a Spatial Tempest must have been when it occurred here back then.

"Let’s go upstairs. The Wood Spirit shouldn’t be here," Angel said to Kaier.

Kaier nodded, looked around, and noticed the platform was empty. The drifting wooden planks didn’t show any signs, making the chance of the Wood Spirit being here nearly zero.

However, just as Kaier was about to follow Angel up the staircase, he heard a scream from behind.

Kaier was startled, thinking they were under attack, and immediately assumed a defensive stance.

But when he turned around, he saw no one was attacked; it was Vay who had stepped off a plank and fell into the dark void, and the scream was indeed from Vay.

"Master, he..." Kaier wanted to ask Angel why Vay, as an illusion, could fall into the void? But before he could speak, he saw Vay re-entering through the opposite door.

Kaier widened his eyes: "Didn’t he fall below?"

Not only Kaier, but others also curiously looked at Vay.

Dox even directly started his mockery mode: "Stepping off a plank, you managed to slip; perhaps you should just remain a recluse in the future."

With the Wise Sovereign beside him, Vay dared not retort, fearing the other might notice something. He could only pretend to be respectful and innocent: "I thought stepping on the plank might add to Master’s computing burden, so I didn’t step. Little did I know I’d fall directly."

The Black Earl then asked, "And how did you come back?"

Vay scratched his head: "I have no idea what happened. Anyway, after falling, everything went black, and I saw a character representing ’death’ in front of me, with a white skull below it."

"I thought I was truly dead, but when my eyes opened again, I was at the doorway outside."

After hearing Vay’s account, everyone turned uniformly to Angel. This bizarre display was undoubtedly Angel’s doing.

Angel: "What you saw, they are all illusions, how could they be dangerous? As for starting over, this is just part of the setup."

Dox: "You mean, if we ’die’ here, we have to start all over again?"

Angel nodded: "That’s roughly the idea."

"Is there any point in doing this?" Dox was somewhat puzzled by Angel’s thought process.

Angel: "It has a point. Starting over can clear off the extraneous information on you, reducing my computing burden. And all you need to do is go through the path once again."

"This was also inspired by the Wise Sovereign."

The Wise Sovereign looked at Angel with a confused expression, wondering what inspiration he had supposedly given without knowing?

Angel: "The Wise Sovereign mentioned before, cherishing life and understanding its preciousness is a rare virtue. I agree, so I set up a small barrier in the broadcast to remind you that even in an illusion, one should maintain respect for life, and not recklessly court death."

The Wise Sovereign: "..." Was this how his words were interpreted?

Amidst everyone being speechless, Vay, on the other hand, was deeply moved: "So it was for my own good, to maintain reverence for life... I understand now!"

Listening to Vay’s bewildering statement, everyone else’s expressions became similarly puzzled. What kind of spirit does it take to self-move this quickly?

The Wise Sovereign curiously observed Vay and Angel, secretly speculating about their relationship.

Dox: "Let’s leave other matters aside. But what’s with the character for ’death’ and the skull illusion?"

"Although it’s fake death, it still needs a sense of ceremony."

A sense of ceremony?!

Listening to Angel’s earnest nonsense over there, for a moment, Dox felt like he was dreaming back to the Princess Town. This guy seemed serious, but he had a sly heart, and sometimes his actions were full of mischievousness. Just like before at the Princess Castle, moving from the second to the third floor, despite being able to go directly up, Angel insisted on setting up a test for those Talented Ones.

And later, with ’Cha Cha the Rabbit’, it was the same. There really was no need for any challenges, but Angel insisted on creating a "Twelve Zodiac Palaces," making everyone exhausted, and the reward for passing the challenge was just slightly more luxurious housing.

From all these details, one can see that Angel has issues.

To put it nicely, it’s called a test. To be straightforward, it’s mischievousness and amusement.

"It’s just a harmless little setup, as long as you don’t court death yourself, you won’t die." Angel: "Let’s go, don’t waste any more time. If the Wood Spirit is here and sees me talking to the air for half a day, it might get scared too."

Angel turned smoothly and gracefully ascended the hanging stairway.

Vay promptly followed, this time without stepping off, and he successfully hopped onto the platform.

Even the person involved, Vay, seemed carefree, so others didn’t think much of it either. As Angel himself said, just pay attention and don’t court death yourself, and you won’t die.

...

Angel’s pace was not fast, and could even be said to be slow.

Just like a mortal, stepping up level by level. It was said to be cautious, but it didn’t look like Angel was meticulously observing the surroundings, rather he appeared relaxed, as if strolling in a courtyard.

Initially, everyone found it odd, but later thought, besides exploring, he also needed to synchronize updates of the illusionary realm around them, and thus understood.

Perhaps, this was also a way to reduce computing power consumption?

However, they were all wrong. Angel’s slow pace was purely because he was imitating... imitating himself back in the Nightmare Realm.

Angels’ mind at this time, seemed to split into two scenes. One scene, is Angel as a mortal, walking alone in the Hanging Jail Stairway of the Nightmare Realm; the other scene, is the real scene in reality.

The primary consciousness overlooked these two scenes from above.

Moving forward, comparing the differences between the scenes.

By comparing the differences, Angel can understand what has been damaged here, or perhaps, what has been added. Through this, he might be able to find traces of the Wood Spirit.

The zero level to the first level was much shorter than Angel remembered.

He remembered that back in the Nightmare Realm, it took about ten minutes to walk to the first level. But now, at the same speed, it only took half the time to see the first level’s door.