The thought detonated in his mind like a grenade, and Mo Fan's entire body snapped taut in an instant.
Simultaneously, a surge of violent, frenzied danger-sense erupted from somewhere deep in his gut—no warning, no trigger—and shot straight to his head.
He stared at the vendor. Still smiling that simple, warm smile. Eyes still clear and guileless.
In that moment, a single impulse blazed through Mo Fan's mind: Draw the poison dagger from my sleeve and split this guy—who knows whether he's human or ghost—clean in half from head to toe!
His knuckles had already gone white around the hilt. The icy killing intent was so cold it was nearly bleeding through his skin.
"Im... Immortal Master?"
The vendor seemed to sense the sudden, terrifying shift in Mo Fan's presence.
The smile froze on his face and curdled into raw, instinctive fear.
He stumbled back two steps, not even noticing the pastries tumbling off the stall to the ground, and stammered out a desperate plea.
"Immortal Master... what's wrong? Did... did this lowly one do something to offend you, My Lord?"
Looking at this mortal vendor—trembling, genuinely terrified, looking as real as could be—Mo Fan's body shuddered violently.
Ugh—
He abruptly bit down hard on the tip of his own tongue.
Sharp pain bloomed through his mouth, the rusty taste of blood spreading across his tongue.
The agony hit like a basin of ice water dumped over a brain that had nearly been swallowed whole by killing intent. It forced a sliver of clarity back through the haze.
"It's nothing."
Mo Fan released his grip on the dagger. His expression was dark enough to wring water from.
He dropped the remaining chunk of cake back onto the stall without a word, turned, and walked away at a pace that was just short of running.
Moving through the village's narrow paths, his mind began pulling every fragment together at a frantic pace, conducting a blind deduction.
The golden, exaggeratedly plump ears of wheat... Modern sponge cakes with the exact same texture... And that industrial vanilla extract flavor that only exists on Earth...
This isn't some mere illusion spell!
A chilling truth that made his blood run cold gradually surfaced.
Whatever is behind this fundamentally doesn't know what cakes on Earth taste like. It couldn't have conjured vanilla extract out of thin air.
It's interfering with cognition directly.
Through some extremely covert method, it's reaching into the observer's mind and making them unconsciously "remember" or "autofill" whatever they personally consider most perfect, most familiar, most right!
The moment that conclusion landed, a layer of fine cold sweat soaked through Mo Fan's back in a sheet.
Too terrifying.
This was a perfect, seamless "cognitive brainwashing."
Whether it was the perfectly flawless crops that defied agricultural laws or the sweet, delicious pastry—they were all baits tailor-made for the prey.
If he weren't a transmigrator.
If he were a native, traditional cultivator of the Mystic Realm who had never encountered a single product of modern industrial civilization...
He would have looked at this prosperous village, tasted this delicious food, and thought: What a Xanadu rich in products. He would have let his guard down completely in this subtle comfort, thoroughly falling for the trap without ever realizing he was sinking!
Don't panic. I must maintain my rationality.
Mo Fan moved quickly back toward the side courtyard, Mo Yan keeping pace beside him.
But he noticed something that unsettled him further—his steps, normally rock-steady no matter what danger he faced, felt slightly messy and floaty at this moment.
"Immortal Master, have you eaten yet?"
"Immortal Master! Fresh-picked fruits, care for a taste?"
Villagers kept appearing along the path, enthusiastically approaching him from time to time to express their care and concern.
This scene, which originally should have made one feel warm and full of human touch, twisted in Mo Fan's strained eyes—distorted by cognitive confusion—into death warrants.
He didn't know exactly what was hidden in this village. He didn't know what would happen in the next moment.
He couldn't find the core of the array. Couldn't identify a poison source. Couldn't detect even a single shred of death energy or demonic aura in the air.
This extreme sense of passivity—like being blindfolded and thrown onto the edge of a cliff—caused an uncontrollable manic rage to rise in Mo Fan's heart once again.
"Scram! Don't block the way!"
Looking at an old farmer smiling and leaning in, the nameless fire in Mo Fan's chest was ignited once more.
He even had a strong urge: Pull out the dagger, find a random person to stab a few times, tear this fake picture scroll to shreds, and properly vent this foul breath in my heart!
Just at the instant this killing intent was about to spiral out of control again, his hand even brushing the edge of the dagger...
Mo Fan felt like he had been struck by lightning, abruptly shuddering!
Wait. WAIT.
He stopped dead in his tracks. Stared at his own hands with wide, horrified eyes, as if he had seen a ghost.
Am I the kind of perverted madman who would randomly slaughter unthreatening mortals just to vent my emotions because I'm feeling annoyed?!
He killed Spirit Beasts for EXP. He killed devil cultivators for survival. When did he become so bloodthirsty, so prone to anger?!
In the instant of re-awakening, Mo Fan felt as if he had fallen into a bottomless abyss of ice.
He realized in horror that not only were his senses and perception being deceived, but even his core emotions and personality were being subtly misled, amplified, and tampered with by this invisible force!
This was exactly like the Bat Lord's Sonic Resonance Death Array in the underground mine shafts!
Except, that time it had been physical strangulation. This time, it was a Mental Maze operating directly upon the soul and subconscious!
It made a person unknowingly turn into a lunatic who had lost control of their emotions, ultimately bringing about their own destruction!
Realizing he was acting like a marionette, being frantically "brainwashed" by something unseen, Mo Fan became uncharacteristically impatient.
This impatience directly caused the Qi and blood and Necromancer Mana circulating within his body to experience severe disorder.
Buzz...
A sharp tinnitus rang in his ears. In a daze, the world before Mo Fan's eyes began to twist and melt.
The outline of that thatched hut blurred, and a few pieces of thatch actually turned into cold steel-reinforced concrete in his vision.
The large locust tree used for shade not far away twisted and stretched its trunk, gradually transforming into a modern laboratory teaching building erected with various exhaust pipes!
"Th-This is..."
The cross-dimensional overlap gave Mo Fan a severe headache.
He lowered his head and discovered in horror that what he was gripping in his hand was no longer a dagger stained with beast blood, but a thick stack of experimental data reports covered in complex formulas!
His coarse cloth changshan also seemed to transform into a slightly yellowing lab coat.
He had reverted back to that miserable corporate slave intern!
No— WRONG!
An illusory yet stern voice exploded in his mind.
In this moment, the memories of two lifetimes formed the most solid firewall, issuing the most mournful alarm!
GET... THE FUCK OUT!!!
Mo Fan let out a hysterical roar from the bottom of his heart, clutching his head dead tight with both hands, shaking it forcefully and madly!
He bit the tip of his tongue until it bled, even digging his fingernails deeply into his palms...
Using the sensation of pain to forcefully tear apart and cast away those absurd, chaotic thoughts trying to drag him into the abyssal illusion!
Huff... huff... huff...
The laboratory teaching building before him shattered like a soap bubble, reverting back into that rustling large locust tree.
The experimental data in his hand also changed back into the cold dagger.
Mo Fan gasped heavily for air, looking as if he had just been fished out of the water. Cold sweat poured madly down his spine.
This illusion was monstrous!
This wasn't an ordinary bewildering array; this was a direct strike at the deepest layer of a person's desires, fears, and subconscious!
If he hadn't possessed the memories of two lifetimes—causing his worldview to be fundamentally incompatible with this unilateral cognitive tampering, thereby triggering a "rejection reaction"...
If he had just been a simple native cultivator...
I absolutely would have completely succumbed by now!
Mo Fan looked at Mo Yan standing beside him—still as a piece of dead wood, completely unaffected—and felt a wave of retrospective fear in his heart.
Wait...
His head snapped up, a trace of extreme horror flashing in his eyes.
If someone like me, with such high Soul Strength, almost fell for it. Then Wu Feng and San Niang, those two Qi Condensation robber cultivators who only know how to kill and loot, whose entire mental landscape is nothing but greed...
Are they... completely lost by now?!
With no time to delay, Mo Fan moved without hesitation.
Pulling Mo Yan with him, moving as fast as possible like two ghosts, they quietly sneaked back into that seemingly calm side courtyard.
Inside the side courtyard, it was dead silent.
Mo Fan held his breath, his footsteps as light as a cat's, slowly arriving outside the window of the guest room occupied by Wu Feng and San Niang.
He used the tip of his dagger to extremely carefully poke a tiny slit in the window paper. He pressed his eye to the gap and looked inside.
When he saw the scene clearly, Mo Fan felt a blast of cold air shoot from the soles of his feet straight to the crown of his skull, making his scalp go numb!
Inside the room, there were no signs of a struggle, nor any bloodstains.
However, that pair of robber cultivators—who should have been razor-alert, primed to rob and kill at a moment's notice—were currently exhibiting a highly bizarre, grotesque state of carnival.
Wu Feng and San Niang were both kneeling on the cold floor.
Their faces bore an extremely unnatural flush. Their eyes were unfocused, their pupils dilated to the absolute limit.
Yet, the corners of their mouths were stretched all the way to their ears, wearing manic, ravenous smiles of people drowning in absolute satisfaction.
Their hands were continuously waving in the empty air, performing frantic "grabbing" and "counting money" motions, as if a mountain of gold and silver was piled up right in front of them.
Disgusting drool even leaked from the corner of Wu Feng's mouth, dripping onto his lapels.
While he frantically raked non-existent treasures into his arms from the void, he was viciously and smugly muttering to himself:
"Heh heh... hahaha..."
"That little bastard... finally took the bait..."