I will burn books and slay gods.

"The fear of conflict inputs into Nightmare, causing its concepts to become unstable," Wang Xiaoming explained.

"Yes. You guys block the guards, I'll deal with the toys."

Lin Su nodded to Instructor Gui Chi and faced the guards who rushed forward again.

Wang Xiaoming then began to set up a more complex causal network to interfere with the ritual array.

Chen Ye knelt in front of the pile of toys and put on the highest resolution mode of the cognitive enhancement glasses.

In the field of vision, each toy is broken down into conceptual structures: the core of the doll is "anthropomorphic unknown", the soldier is "a symbol of violence", the building blocks are "the threat of collapse", and the balloon is "the sudden burst".

He needs to add an opposite to each core element.

He picked up the doll first.

The doll's glasses are two black buttons; in the realm of perception, those buttons are two smiling, fear-absorbing openings.

Chen Ye placed his hand on the doll's head, activating the "Bridge" and "Heartbeat" cards in the cognitive blueprint.

Bridges connect opposites, heartbeats represent life. This puppet... is alive, yet dead. It moves, yet remains still. When it looks at you, it's a threat; when it doesn't, it represents a greater unknown.

Concept flow injection.

The doll's button glasses flashed with an eerie colored light before returning to normal, but the conceptual level had changed—it now simultaneously emitted two contradictory signals of fear: "movement" and "stillness."

Then came the plastic soldiers.

It represents violence, but also protection. Aggressive, yet vulnerable.

Toy guns can fire imaginary bullets, but those bullets could injure the enemy or the user.

Building blocks: the achievement of building, but also the fear of collapse.

The joy of creation is also a harbinger of destruction. The higher you pile it up, the more shattered it will become.

Balloon: the joy of expansion, but also the horror of bursting.

Floating freedom, but also uncontrollable panic. Holding it in your hand will cause it to slip away, letting it go will cause it to explode.

One after another, Chen Ye rewrote the concept of toys.

With each rewrite, his soul fire dims a little, and the fog of karmic obstacles thickens a little.

Fine cracks are beginning to appear on the cognitive blueprint—this delicate conceptual operation is too costly.

"Chen Ye! Hurry up!" Lin Su shouted.

She was surrounded by three guards, and the wall of flames was shrinking.

The cocoon of nightmares had split open more than halfway, and the distorted monster was crawling out.

Its three heads turned, and Liu Zhi's deep red glasses locked onto Chen Ye.

"Just one more..."

Chen Ye picked up the last toy—a music box.

Opening the window reveals Li Mina as a spinning ballerina, accompanied by a fragment of "Für Elise" music.

In a cognitive perspective, the core concept of a music box is "the distortion of beautiful memories".

The person at the door wasn't afraid of the music box itself, but rather of the fact that "something they once loved has become terrifying."

This is the hardest to rewrite.

Because the contradiction that needs to be injected is not a simple opposition, but a doubt about what is good.

Chen Ye closed his eyes, recalling whether he had similar things in his childhood—items he once cherished but later became unfamiliar with.

He had an idea. A picture book in the orphanage had once been his only solace, but it had been torn up by the other children.

Looking at the fragments, he realized for the first time that even beautiful things can be destroyed.

That feeling wasn't just fear, but the panic of losing trust.

He infused that feeling into the music box.

The music stopped.

The ballerina stops spinning and then begins to spin in the opposite direction, while the music becomes an inverted, distorted audio.

carry out.

All the toys have been rewritten.

Chen Ye piled them together and then pushed them forcefully toward the direction of the Nightmare Cocoon.

The guards tried to stop them, but the flames from the space rift box of the Ruler Instructor blocked their path.

The pile of toys rolled under the cocoon.

The broken conduit is reconnected—not physically, but conceptually through automatic adsorption.

Paradoxical fear energy begins to infuse into childhood nightmares.

The monster, which had only crawled halfway out, froze.

Its three heads began to turn in different directions, and the red light in its six eyes became chaotic.

The limbs began to twitch uncoordinatedly, as if being controlled by different people.

"It worked!" Wang Xiaoming shouted.

But Chen Ye knew that this was only temporary.

Conflicting fears weaken childhood nightmares, but do not kill them.

To completely destroy it, the core must be attacked.

He looked at the cocoon that was collapsing.

In the cognitive field, there is a deep red dot of light at the center of the cocoon—that is the core consciousness of the nightmare, the convergence point of all fear energy.

To destroy it, you need a pure belief that can overcome all fear.

It's not courage, it's not hope, but something more fundamental—the certainty of existence.

"I need to get close to the core," Chen Ye said.

"That's too dangerous!" Lin Su turned around. "That thing is extremely unstable right now; it could explode at any moment!"

"I know. But only I can do it." Chen Ye stood up, his soul fire dim but still burning. "Make a way for me."

Lin Su gritted his teeth, then nodded. He clasped his hands together, then suddenly opened them.

"Nirvana - Pure Fire Ring"

A pure white ring of flame erupted from her center, sweeping across the entire room.

The guards were forced back, and even the Nightmare Face Monster shrank back.

The flames burned a path in front of Chen Ye, leading straight to the core of the cocoon.

Chen Ye rushed over.

The Nightmare Monster let out a shriek, and six hands simultaneously reached for him.

However, under the influence of conflicting fears, those hands moved uncoordinatedly and interfered with each other.

Chen Ye dodged the first hand, but the second hand grazed his shoulder—his clothes instantly corroded, leaving black burn marks on his skin.

He was in excruciating pain, but he didn't stop.

A third hand reached for his head.

Chen Ye ducked and lunged forward, rolling right under the cocoon.

Looking up, the deep red core was three meters above him, like a beating heart.

He took off his cognitive amplification glasses—which were now actually a distraction.

He wanted to use the purest self-awareness to construct the belief that could counteract fear.

What belief?

He thought of the children he had seen at the hospital entrance, their ordinary smiles.

I remembered Lin Su saying, "You are Chen Ye."

I remember Lao Li saying, "Your choice is genuine."

These moments, these connections, these choices—they define who he is.

And he wants to protect these definitions.

Chen Ye raised his hands, not in an attacking stance, but in an embracing stance.

He condensed all his remaining strength, all the anchor points in his cognitive blueprint, and all the real moments in his memory into a single, simple declaration:

"I am Chen Ye. I exist. I choose to protect. And you—you are merely fear. Fear will pass, but existence will endure."

This is not a conceptual attack; it is an existential declaration.

The deep red core trembled violently.

The input of contradictory fears, coupled with this purely "declaration of existence," caused its internal conceptual structure to begin to collapse.

Just as when absolute light shines into chaotic shadows, the shadows will dissipate.

The core began to crack.

The Nightmare Monster let out a final shriek, then its entire body began to collapse, turning into pinkish-purple specks of light and dissipating.

The cocoon shattered completely.

The ritual array dimmed.

The guards were stunned, then began to retreat—not to flee, but to move in an orderly fashion toward the exit.

"Don't let them go!" Instructor Gui Chi wanted to chase after them, but was stopped by Wang Xiaoming.

"No...look at the ground."

Chen Ye looked down and saw that the guards had left glowing footprints on the ground as they retreated.

The footprints connected to form a new pattern—an arrow pointing to the deepest part of the earth.

There are three underground floors?

The communicator suddenly rang; it was "Venetian Blinds'" emergency call: "Attention all teams! The energy readings at the three nodes haven't dropped! The Nightmare Child is just a decoy! The real core is... the underground pipe network! The Cult intends to use the entire city's sewer system as a 'concept amplifier'!"

Chen Ye looked at the glowing arrow on the ground.

He got it.

The nightmare is bait, used to lure them here.

The real attack will soon spread to every corner of the city through its blood vessels—the sewers.

Thunder roared overhead.

The downpour finally arrived.