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Chapter 181: 181

“Carlot Doctors,

In the times of peace, you fight for harmony.

When the whole world is collapsing and imploding and when humanity has nowhere else to turn but horror,

You will not turn back.

You shall use your sharp surgical knife to slice through the darkness.”

As the shadows materialized into being, it burned through Gu Jun’s store of mental power. To pour the notes and illusion from the incomplete spell page into this dream, it weakened his heart and halted his breath. Some of the illusions were awakening within his mind. The great Carlot Academy, the young faces, he seemed to be hearing them learning this little ditty. The cold rain drenched the faces that had come into details. Teacher Orlem appeared to be a serious-looking middle-aged man, his beard was meticulously trimmed; there were 11 students following him, the guys were handsome and the girls imposing. Raybundy was a picture of honesty and kindness while Landon…

“Dirty-minded Jun, that guy looks so much like you.” Wu Siyu commented in surprise. After the swirl in the whirlpool, her face was now a bit pale. The person she was referring to was the ‘Mr. Landon’ on the young watcher’s lips. He had the facial feature of the foreign race but there were features of his face that were startlingly similar to Gu Jun. And even his name tasted salty on Wu Siyu’s lips!

“I have some history…” Gu Jun bit on his lips until they tore open. The taste of blood and pain sharpened his focus. “With that guy.”

“Itoch, the Carlot Doctors are here, stop making a fool of yourself.” It was the mayor who said agitatedly. “Snap out of it. And stand to the side.” The mayor was nothing more than the watcher’s own mental projection but he seemed too deep in his own dream to tell the difference. He nodded hurriedly, “Of course, what was I doing? There is no reason to be afraid now that they are here!”

At the same time, the murder of crows had flown away, the storm was receding for the first time and the chanting from the second floor had stopped. However… The demented smiles of the carcasses standing beside the window had not disappeared.

“Child, you always manage to surprise us but you still do not realize the kind of nightmare that you are currently in.” The throaty voice that came out from the dead bodies did not carry any emotion, there was no mockery, shock or condescension, there was only indifference. “Your imagination cannot even start to comprehend how deep this nightmare is. Even if the real Carlot Doctors are here, they won’t be able to do anything, much less these illusions created by you.”

The chanting resumed with renewed fervour!

The old manor morphed and it caused the watcher, mayor and the rest to retreat in gasps of terror.

“Hmm…” Gu Jun felt a force press on his mind. The exhaustion from earlier meant that he was unable to escape from its grasp. It filled him with pain, horror and madness. The old manor suddenly expanded in size like a balloon. It gave off a shadow like darkness, attempting to consume and corrupt everything around it. Before their eyes, the already towering manor grew bigger to be as tall as a menacing monster. Around them, the constant pouring rain had loosened the decaying ground. Right then things appeared to be climbing out from the soil. They were highly decomposed bodies. Rotten soil and decomposing juices dripped off their dead bodies and their flesh was barely hanging onto their frames. The dead bodies permeated the air with their horrible stench and overwhelmed the thunder and rain with their groaning. They complimented Ol’ Uncle Dog who was mumbling something. It was the spell of the zombies, but it was far more powerful than the one used by Chen Defa.

“Child, haven’t you realized your true origin?” Ringing above the cacophony of madness, it was the eerily level voices of the dead carcasses, “You are our creation, we know you better than you know yourself. Is it this your first time coming to this place? No, so why can’t you remember anything about it?”

In that moment, Gu Jun was given snatches of his memory. There were sounds of familiar music, it tingled repeatedly like the beeping from an answering machine. No, it was not just a normal beeping, it was Meeping… Glibbering…

‘No wonder I can use the spell of the zombies, this explains it, no? The resentment Chandler has towards Landon is yet another ploy for these people to draw out the Son of Misfortune within me…?’

“Ah!” The pain in Gu Jun’s mind eclipsed the pain from his pinkie. His mind was fraying. The group of Carlot Doctors stood there motionlessly like mannequins and their shapes started to blur again.

“Dirty-minded Jun, Dirty-minded Jun…” Wu Siyu wanted to do something but she was in the grip of the darkness herself.

“Child, it is this nightmare who brought you into this world.” The dead bodies said, “Your soul is derived from a part of this nightmare.” Gu Jun and Wu Siyu watched helplessly as the nightmare continued to unfold. Behind the second floor window of the old manor that was expanding, more shadows walked out. They were children less than 10 years old, some of them were just toddlers. They shuffled to the window expressionlessly, there were tens of them, hundreds of them, no, thousands of them.

“They are those ESP children…” Wu Siyu confirmed, she could recognize among them the faces of the children who were used to harm Elder Tong inside the classroom so many years ago.

‘Try to listen to the voice of the dream… Is this nightmare part of that dream?’ Gu Jun could feel his mind swaying… Even the spirit of the ESP children had arrived at this place…

“Gu Jun.” The children said in unison and their tone was equally devoid of emotion, “Mother is very disappointed in you.”

“Shut up…” The pain was still increasing. His mother’s gentle smile flashed across his mind…

And then more people appeared behind these children. Was it part of his illusion or they were really there? The members of the Phoenix team who died. They too were staring at him and they began slowly, “Gu Jun, it was Huang Guotong who murdered us in cold blood.”

Then more people walked out, it was Ivanov and his crew, the Russians who died at Wrangel Island. Then more faces appeared at the window. It was the mayor of Warsong and the rest of the villagers, but their frame had shrunk and their faces rendered unrecognizable by madness.

“Child, can’t you see, you still do not understand this nightmare near enough.” The voices of the dead bodies continued, “Even if you manage to burn off a layer and cut off another, you will still be buried by the rest of it. In fact, this nightmare is not even created by us but we know how to use it.” The chanting picked up and the strange sermon drilled into people’s hearts.

“Welcome to this eternal nightmare,

The paradise of the mad,

The abyss of the despair,

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The circus of the fallen,

The morgue of the living,

Millions of spirits haunt this place,

In the raging illusions,

Only the Great Ones rule everything!”

Gu Jun was pulled deeper into the chanting and he could feel himself sinking. But at the same time, he heard some other voices cutting through. “Ah Jun? Ah Jun?””I am Zixuan, can you hear me?””Are you there? Ah Jun?” He heard Cai Zixuan, Wang Ruoxiang, he heard Xue Ba, Uncle Dan, Lou Xiaoning, Elder Tong… What a weird time to start missing them… There were also Dirty-minded Yu, Prof Gu, Prof Qin, Brother Qiang and many more…

‘When the whole world is collapsing and imploding, someone needs to stand up to the horror.

‘This nightmare has to be destroyed, and this darkness has to be vanquished.’

“So everything is just an illusion…” Gu Jun said slowly. Gradually he stopped hanging his head in pain, instead it was held high staring at the group of shadows gathered behind the second floor window. “These Carlot Doctors might just be an illusion to you but that matters not, because a real Carlot Doctor is here and Gu Jun is his name!”

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