Chapter 1: Nightmare Island
From a bird’s eye view through the wispy clouds, the deep blue ocean could be seen. With this perspective, the entire body of water became a curvy mirror, reflecting the beautiful skies.
There were many verdant islands dotting the boundless ocean, but under a certain raincloud lay a more special one, an island of about forty kilometers wide.
It was a somewhat rhombus shaped island, with a perfectly straight peak at its center. From far away, the vast island looked as if a sword was lodged into it.
This island was entirely surrounded by massive cliffs, without a single beach.
The waters below the cliffs were unusually turbulent; and the sound of angry tides ramming into the disarrayed reefs was often heard.
With this structure around the fringes of the island, it meant that it was a sealed off island upon which no ship could berth!
On the south side of the island, at a protruding cliff, a fifteen year old young boy, wearing thin clothes, sat at the edge of the rocks. He watched the seas and the unknown land beyond with wistful eyes, yet there was also a mysterious trace of grief.
This was a gloomy face that did not match his age. However, he maintained it without any disguise. It was his genuine feelings that were shown…
The storming waves battered the cliff, occasionally spraying upwards. The ocean winds bit into the young boy’s thin clothes, tousling his messy hair.
The young boy sat silently on the cliff like a statue, his insignificant body facing the violent tides……
After a period of time, a horn sounded out from the depths of the forest.
“Wuuu~~”
Hearing the horn, the boy showed a loathe expression, but nevertheless stood up and walked towards the sound.
The boy looked thin, but his movements were agile. In the intricate forest, he dashed with ease. Very soon, he arrived at an open area within the forest.
The open area was circular, with a radius of about 100 meters. Around the open area was a wall made up of thirty meter high wooden pikes, creating a village-like campground.
The campground only had one entrance. At the entrance were four men in green clothes.These four men were all about thirty years old, with nothing that stood out.
But what did stand out were the frightening fangs of the wolf-like beasts beside them!
“URAGHH!!! UHHH!!”
The four fierce wolves saw the boy walk in and immediately growled, baring their bony white teeth and threatening to pounce on the lean boy.
“Get your ass in here! Coming here this slowly, do you wanna die? Humph, Your body won’t even satisfy my coyote’s nightly snack!”
The young boy stayed out of the coyotes’ reach and ran inside the base.
Looking at the back of the boy, the spiky haired man spat with disdain. “If only I knew who brought this kid in. He looks too weak to do anything, nevertheless withstand the torture of our Nightmare Camps.”
“It was Boss Xia, I heard……”The other red haired man paused, and in a deep voice continued.
“You know…the kid’s already a dead man.”
“A dead man,” Gulei snorted. “Which one of these little bastards aren’t already dead men?” Gulei said carelessly.
“You don’t understand. That kid used to be the young master of a clan. He offended somebody, so they hired people in the Nightmare Palace to get rid of him.”
“Boss Xia is responsible for this mission, so after he kidnapped this kid, since he was supposed to die anyways, he thought he might as well let him sign a soul pact with a White Nightmare. This way, we would have another slave to work with.”
At the mention of the White Nightmare, the three men beside him all drew in a breath. One man said in a whisper, “How does Boss Xia have things like the White Nightmare? And is that kid really that special? Can he withstand the White Nightmare?”
“No way. If that kid had that sort of power, he’d have been sent to White Nightmare Island already, how would he still be here?”
“I don’t know how Boss Xia got hold of a White Nightmare, but I know Boss Xia’s just using the kid as an experiment, with the mentality that the kid’s dead already. I believe it won’t take long before the kid is devoured by the White Nightmare.” The red-haired man laughed, not caring at all about the death of the boy.
“Ha, so that’s how it is. I’ve always hated that kid anyways, he might as well die. Back to the main topic, Boss Xia doesn’t seem simple, having a Nightmare we haven’t even seen before. I’ll let you know, the leader of the other Nightmare Islands only have one or two Cyan Nightmares at most.”
“That’s to be expected….Oh, times about up, let’s close the door. Tonight, we will feast upon their shrieks, haha….”
The other three laughed along with the first, careless about the lives of the people within the camp.
The boy that sat on the cliff silently was called Chu Mu. What was supposed to be a young boy shining with youthfulness was sharpened to become a concealed dagger.
The reason Chu Mu appeared on this island was indeed because he was kidnapped. And the reason he hadn’t been killed was also exactly because of the devilish experiment Boss Xia did on him.
In reality, on this entire island, other than the aforementioned foremen, all the kids had had this devilish experiment done on them: being forced to sign a soul pact with a Nightmare.
This was the world of soul pets. Those with talent could become soul pet trainers.
Trainers could sign soul pacts with soul pets, making the soul pets fight for them.
The relationship between soul pets and humans were master-servant relationships; humans could command their soul pets to do anything.
But on this completely isolated Green Nightmare Island, things were a bit different.
Every once in awhile, there were many kids like Chu Mu who were sent to this isolated island and subjected to these immoral experiments.
The nightmares they speak of are evil soul pets. Evil soul pets were very unique within the soul pet system. They could also sign soul pacts with humans and fight for them.
However, they had the ability to devour their master’s souls!
The kids, trapped within this place on their first day here, would all be forced to sign soul pacts with Nightmares.
At one point in time, the parasitic Nightmare would eat their master’s soul as food, and humans without souls will soon perish.
The only way to prevent their souls from being devoured was to become stronger, let their cultivation become greater, and let their soul become stronger.
In other words, they had to be stronger than the Nightmare forever in order to live!!
This was the cruellest part of hell. Children deal not with the earnest teachings of teachers, but the fiendish, merciless savages that might take their lives at a moment’s notice!
Here, weaklings would become food for their evil pets quickly, while stronger people were chased by Nightmares forever…forever…
It’s like a never ending nightmare!!
The moon wasn’t visible tonight. The sea winds whipped the low-lying clouds, driving them further into the ocean.
The woods wavered in the gale, incessantly crying like a grieving woman.
In the campground, on the spacious flat area, there stood a hundred teens in the whistling wind. Their clothes were all flimsy, but their faces showed a numbing resolve, their blank eyes showing sharpness like that of a beasts.
The hundred of them lined up in a ten by ten squad, standing neatly together.
Around them, standing near the wooden pike walls were ten adult foremen.
These foremen all stood in place. In their eyes were only coldness and indifference. Their gazes were fixed on the hundred children, constantly vigilant.
Near the wooden gate, three men in dark clothes stood with very apathetic expressions.
The burly, middle-aged man standing in the middle took a few steps forward, swept his gaze through the kids, and smiled cruelly.
“Today is the fitness training. You have to face your own savage pets.”
“I can tell you right now, I will only allow fifty of you to continue on training here. That means that half of you will die today in this test!”
“Haha, enjoy the sweetness of death! Only people who frequent the edge of life and death are worthy of entering the Nightmare Palace.”
Hearing this, the hundred kids all showed signs of panic, eyeing the ten foremen restlessly.
Within the hundred, only fifty could survive, meaning that each person had only a 50% chance of living. How cruel was that!
But, these villains wouldn’t have any sympathy for the children. With the command of the middle-aged man, the ten foremen standing beside the wall started chanting a string of strange incantations.
Everytime they pursed their lips, a translucent glowing symbol would appear magically around them. The symbols were like words, projecting a blue image onto the ground and creating a glittering light phenomena.
“Awoooooooo!!!Awooooooooooo”
“Awooooooooooo!! Awooooawooooooooooo!!!”
Suddenly, wolf howls sounded out from around them. The smell of blood engulfed the not-so open campground, buffeting the lean children.
Bone white claws dug into the dirt below, with grey hair spiking up. Razor sharp teeth peeked out of their mouths, shining malevolently.
When the ten foremen finished their summoning, ten predators appeared in the campground —-Hunting Wolfs! The savage soul pet known for its sharp and terrifying teeth!
Seeing the ten threatening wolves howling right at them, the children all became pale. A few girls even bit their lips, crying tears.
Regardless of whether or not they were faced against soul pets or the helpless children, Hunting Wolves are very scary creatures. For food, they would attack without the slightest hesitation with all their might until their prey dies.
And in most areas, even adult soul pet trainers had a tough time against a single Hunting Wolf, let alone these unarmed, unlearned children.