“What if I refuse?” Victor questioned, with a slightly raised voice.

  “Oh, I wouldn’t recommend that.” The cat’s tail flicked, but Victor could sense the dreamforce gathering subtly around it, coiling like an invisible thread. “The marsh is a maze. Without my guidance, you might as well wander forever, trapped in endless, unbreakable twists.”

  Is it trying to threaten me? Victor squinted his eyes in thought. Attacking the creature was an option, but it came with risks. Using his limited mana in the Dreamscape wasn’t ideal, especially when he couldn’t gauge the cat’s strength. Dreamscape creatures were unpredictable, and his understanding of this realm was far too lacking.

  In addition, the marsh was its turf, so who knows what kind of trickery the cat had laid.

  Victor clenched his fists, keeping his voice steady. “What kind of game?” he asked cautiously.

  The cat purred, its grin widening. “Oh, it’s simple.” With a simple wave of its paw, a large, ornate wheel materialized in mid-air, hovering between them. The wheel was segmented into six sections, each inscribed with text that was too blurry to read.

  Victor watched as the cat leapt lightly onto the wheel’s edge, balancing perfectly atop it. “This is a special wheel that will decide the game.”

  Before Victor could respond, the wheel began to spin on its own. In a few seconds, the wheel slowed and began to settle. Victor’s sharp eyes caught glimpses of the games as they flickered by: Riddle of Reality, Race Against the Shadows, Imagination Duel…

  What kind of games are these? Clearly, this was not going to be so simple, and Victor had a feeling that the black cat was trying to trick him in some way.

  Finally, the wheel came to a stop, and the text that the arrow landed upon crystallized into clarity — it was “Truth or Trickery.”

  The cat’s chuckle was low and pleased. “Truth or Trickery. Perfect. My favorite game.” Its golden eyes gleamed with mischief as it fixed its unblinking stare on Victor. “Shall we begin, traveler? The rules are simple: I will ask you three questions. You may answer with either the truth or a clever lie. Then, I will decide whether you spoke honestly or wove a falsehood. If I guess correctly, you lose the round. If I am wrong, you win. Two out of three rounds are required for your victory. Do you understand?”

  The rules might be simple, but they heavily favored the black cat. As a Dreamscape creature, it was likely adept at reading subtle cues, faint flickers of emotions that Victor couldn’t completely suppress. In this surreal realm, where the laws of reality bent to the whims of imagination and will of the cat, he was at a total disadvantage.

  “Very well. But I want to be allowed to use magic spells and other magic items,” Victor demanded.

  “Suit yourself, Magus,” the cat replied with a purr of amusement. It leapt down from the signboard, circling Victor slowly, its tail flicking with a casual grace. “Let’s begin. Tell me, traveler — have you ever been betrayed by someone you cared about?”

  Victor’s expression remained neutral, though his mind raced. The answer was an undeniable “yes,” but answering truthfully might lead him straight into the cat’s trap, while lying would demand flawless execution. No, it’s likely this game has more layers than I can see…

  “{Demonic Eye},” Victor silently chanted. Several spectral puppets materialized around him, wandering to see any sort of illusion or hidden trickery in the surroundings. Yet, there was nothing. No distortion, no manipulation of the Dreamscape itself. The question, it seemed, was exactly what it appeared to be.

  No trickery? It’s just a psychological game? He wasn’t convinced. Unfortunately, this spell was only an Aleph tier, so he couldn’t be certain if what he saw was everything there was to it. He wasn’t even sure if it could detect Dreamscape energy, to begin with.

  Victor clenched his jaw. No wonder the cat doesn’t care if I use spells or not. It knows I won’t find anything with this level of magic. He clicked his tongue in frustration. If only I’d come more prepared… But even if he had a Bet-tier spell designed to see through illusions, he wasn’t certain it would make any difference in a realm as enigmatic as the Dreamscape.

  Deciding on his answer, Victor said calmly, “I never cared enough about anyone to feel betrayed.”

  The cat paused mid-step, its glowing yellow eyes narrowing as though it were peering straight into his soul. The air around them rippled faintly, the Dreamscape itself seeming to react to the weight of his words.

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  Victor remained steadfast, subtly circulating his mana beneath his skin as a precautionary measure in case the creature attempted something more insidious. He knew the Dreamscape thrived on emotions and intent, so he suppressed every flicker of doubt and kept his expression steady.

  The cat purred, resuming its lazy circle around him. “Ah, using trickery? Quite clever,” it mused, the edges of its grin curling further upward. “But not clever enough. That’s a lie.”

  Victor’s jaw tightened. Damn it.

  The cat looked delighted at winning the round. “One point to me.”

  The cat hopped onto a nearby fence post, still grinning wide. “Let’s try something more reflective. If you were given the choice to redo a certain mistake in your past, would you do it?”

  Victor’s fingers brushed the sigil on his hand as he considered the question. This one was even trickier than before, yet not unfamiliar. It was a thought that had crossed his mind countless times. Oftentimes, the best lies were hidden within half-truths, but when both truth and deceit seemed equally risky, there was only one option left.

  Taking off the Twilight Moon Pendant that had accompanied him for a long time, Victor exhaled slowly and cast a spell upon himself. Then, with a confident tone, he answered, “No. Every mistake made me stronger. Men shouldn’t dwell on past mistakes and only look forward so as to not make the same mistake again.”

  As before, the air around them rippled subtly, the Dreamscape reacting to his words. But this time, the cat’s grin faltered for the briefest moment. “Hmm… truth… or is it? I can’t tell.”

  Victor smirked faintly. It worked.

  Unbeknownst to the cat, he had cast {Curse of Nightmare} upon himself. Though the spell was technically a curse and not an illusion spell, its effects could be manipulated by the caster to distort their own perception. Victor had used it to cloud his mind just enough to mask his true emotions, even from himself.

  The cat finally sighed. “You win this one, traveler. But how curious — you’ve become far harder to read than the first time. How amusing.”

  It hopped back onto the signboard, as though it were announcing the grand finale. “The final question, then. Are you truly here to save the girl, or is it for yourself?”

  Victor’s heart skipped a beat. It was a direct hit, aimed squarely at his true motives. Of course, he was here to save Lillie, but was that the entirety of it? Deep down, he couldn’t deny the sliver of wanting to leave this dreadful place. The Dreamscape was no place for a small Magus like him to linger, and yet if he were purely selfish, he never would have jumped into the portal in the first place.

  Steeling himself, Victor met the cat’s gleaming eyes. “I’m here for her.”

  The words were out, and the Dreamscape responded with faint ripples on the surroundings again. Victor maintained eye contact, suppressing every flicker of emotion that might betray him. The spell he had cast earlier worked wonders, seamlessly burying even his own doubts beneath a carefully crafted mental fog.

  The cat narrowed its eyes, stepping closer. It studied him intently, its grin almost fading entirely. “Hmm… truth, but incomplete…”

  Finally, the cat’s grin on its face, albeit smaller this time, as it stepped back. “I can’t tell. Well played, traveler. This round is yours.”

  Victor internally heaved a sigh of relief. This way, he should be able to pass this marsh without having to resort to confrontation and reach the white castle.

  “Next question—”

  “Wait!” Victor interrupted sharply, his voice cutting through the air. “We agreed there would only be three questions. Are you going back on your word?”

  The black cat’s grin widened maliciously, its eyes gleaming with predatory light at Victor. “Did I ever say that? Can you prove it, Magus?”

  Although Victor could prove it through the Shadowlink Mark, the creature didn’t wait for his count and instead suddenly expanded outward like ink spilled across water, obviously intending to attack him. So, a confrontation is unavoidable, after all.

  Without hesitation, Victor raised his hand and cast {Gap Hole}. A jagged rift in space tore open before him, swirling hungrily as it threatened to consume everything in its path. Yet, as the rift began to stabilize, the surrounding Dreamscape energy surged around it, coalescing into a chaotic force that disrupted the spell. The rift flickered erratically, struggling to maintain form, as though the Dreamscape itself were resisting his magic.

  The black cat chuckled at the spectacle, knowing full well that this would happen. Even though it was the esoteric Cosmo spell, it was being suppressed by the Dreamscape and almost unable to do anything. Damn this place.

  Victor clicked his tongue, quickly switching tactics. He activated the second sigil, channeling the infused mana he had accumulated in it.

  “{Blink}!”

  In an instant, Victor vanished from his spot, reappearing more than one hundred meters away, deeper into the marsh. The spell had been empowered by the sigil, and its range and precision were far beyond its normal limits. However, even with the boost, the Dreamscape’s unstable nature made the teleportation jarring.

  Victor staggered slightly upon landing but quickly regained his balance. He glanced over his shoulder to see the black cat’s form dissolving into shadow. Its form quickly reformed closer to him with unnerving speed and growing into a towering, nightmarish monstrosity, causing him to feel a shudder all over his skin.

  “The Dreamscape itself has witnessed my victory,” Victor muttered, gritting his teeth as he sprinted forward. “The marsh shouldn’t become an inescapable maze now. But with this creature on my tail, I can’t explore this place slowly to find a way out.” He cast {Blink Step} and {Zephyr Dash} in rapid succession to increase his speed.

  As if to affirm its power, the surrounding marsh warped instantly, reshaping itself in a way that sent Victor hurtling toward his destination with unrelenting force. Behind him, the desperate cries of the black cat echoed through the air. “No! No!”

  As the twisted landscape receded into the distance, Victor was thrown into a foreign land, managing to escape by the skin of his teeth.