In the distance loomed a range of towering mountains.
And at the far end of those mountains… there were only more mountains, stretching all the way to the horizon. Whether it was the glow of the purple moon or the depth of the starry sky, the endless peaks were shrouded in a faint, dusky violet, extending toward the very edge of the world.
The lofty summits seemed hidden within a mass of deep gray mist, revealing only vague, overlapping ridges and crags, countless and unending, like waves on the surface of the sea. It was as though the mountains and the land themselves were rising and falling like ocean swells, ready to topple and crash down at any moment with the surging tide of the fog.
For a moment, Li Pan felt himself swallowed by this violet world, almost forgetting his own name, an inexplicable shiver rising in his chest, instinctively making him want to fall backward.
Suddenly—woof!—a dog's bark snapped him back to reality.
He stepped back, catching himself, and turned to see a massive black dog crouched by his feet.
It looked like a black Tibetan mastiff—broad-headed, wide-mouthed, with a pair of pitch-black eyes. Its shoulder height was a full meter, its coat thick and jet-black, tail curled upward, body solid and powerful, with a glossy patch on its chest that looked as if something was hanging around its neck.
Li Pan crouched, reaching out to pat its head, and from the dense ruff of fur he spotted the glint of a silver key. Slowly, his thoughts began to clear.
Oh. This must be a dream.
It definitely wasn't a hyperdream from a virtual machine—the body sensations were wrong, and there was no system prompt asking if he wanted to fast-forward, increase realism, skip ads, or renew his membership.
It clearly wasn't some drug- or alcohol-induced hallucination either—his mind was still under his own control.
Woof! The mastiff barked again, then bounded up the ridge ahead, looking like a dark cloud rolling away.
If he hadn't been told anything, Li Pan might have just wandered aimlessly in this dreamscape.
But with Mr. 007's earlier warning, and seeing the key around the dog's neck, he knew—this was likely the so-called Formalwear/Guardian's Trial.
By now Li Pan had some idea of Monster Corp's quirks, and a big dog was a lot more reassuring than an eyeball on a pen. So instead of panicking, he followed the mastiff upward along the ridge.
Man and dog climbed toward the deep-violet mountains shrouded in mist, beneath a sky full of stars.
The mastiff would stop now and then to wait for him; when Li Pan caught up, he'd give it a pat before it bounded ahead again to lead the way.
He didn't know where the dog was taking him, but the mountains were strange.
Maybe it was a dream illusion, but he could swear the stars themselves were moving as they climbed.
Time and space stretched unnaturally here—he felt like he'd been walking for ten days at least, always along a bare ridge, never out of the gray fog, never seeing the end of the mountains.
At least the dog was with him. Sometimes dogs really were more reliable, more loyal, more trustworthy than people.
Maybe "company dog" was meant as a compliment to some people. In fact, he himself had almost been trained into one.
These days, only the very rich could afford to fund their own education. Most people had to take out corporate student loans and attend company-owned trade schools or universities—after graduation, they became corporate blue- or white-collar workers. Poorer families who couldn't even afford corporate trade school often sent their children to cheaper military academies. Graduates were listed as reserves, conscripted if the company went to war—survival odds slightly worse than nine out of ten—but at least the academy provided food and lodging, and sometimes, if you were lucky, a shot at climbing the social ladder. Like after the recent fleet battle—so many died that they didn't have enough pilots, and a handful of reserve infantry slots were promoted to starship crew.
Li Pan remembered in military school, he'd once been dragged from bed in the middle of the night and beaten by a group, just because he had the highest composite score. It was peacetime then—corporate war had just ended, and many soldiers were forcibly discharged. There was only one starship officer slot that term. He suspected his near-death at the hands of a hacker was also thanks to his "good classmates," who had smuggled a demon-puppet into the school network to give the hacker a backdoor.
The funniest part? After years of scheming and fighting these scumbags, he still placed first in the written exam—only to be rejected in the interview for "improper appearance." As the saying goes: "A soldier who doesn't want to be a general is not a good soldier"… but from generals to recruitment officers, they all have sons.
Well, starship crew were "already in the coffin," but at least they didn't have to do stratospheric combat drops in powered armor carrying portable nukes, flinging themselves like moths at fortress strongholds.
So in the end, Li Pan lost both the opportunity and the desire to "be a good dog."
Anyway—pet ownership in Night City was long since a privilege of the very few. Tokyo had been annihilated thirteen times, nuclear wars and corporate conflicts had scoured the earth repeatedly, and Earth-0791's ecosystem had collapsed countless times. Most people clung to life in places like this ruined metropolis because outside a few urban clusters and the private estates of the rich, the environment was too toxic to survive.
Wild animals carried legacy viruses and bioweapons from past centuries. All domestic pets—cats, dogs—were monopolized by genetic biotech companies. You couldn't breed them at home, and a living dog required biosecurity inspections and a license that started in the five-figure range. Most folks could barely feed themselves, much less a dog—better to keep cockroaches.
And to be fair, cockroaches, rats, and flies were still doing fine. Not because humanity lacked the tech to wipe them out—just no one wanted to foot the bill.
So, taking advantage of this dream, Li Pan petted the mastiff to his heart's content, teaching it to lie down, roll over, spin, and play dead as they climbed.
Eventually, the dog had enough, bolting ahead into the fog and ignoring his tch tch tch calls.
The further they went, the thicker the mist, until even the distant mountains and the stars vanished. Li Pan could only follow the sound of the dog's barks.
Then, suddenly, a black brick wall loomed before him. He knew he had reached the trial's destination.
It was like the wall of an old Chinese courtyard house, vanishing into the fog, height unknown. Following the wall and the barking, he reached the main gate—a traditional Chinese archway, its plaque's inscription unreadable.
The mastiff sat at the entrance, giving him a look.
"What, you're not coming in? Fine, wait here."
Li Pan gave it one last pat and stepped inside.
The mist was thinner here. He could make out the layout—a courtyard that looked like… a Daoist temple.
In the middle stood a massive alchemy furnace of cold-forged steel, yet gray smoke curled from its top, merging with the sky of fog above. For a moment, it seemed all this endless mist came from that furnace.
He circled it. The side rooms' doors were shut, but the main hall stood open, so he went in.
It was pitch black inside. The plaque above bore three ancient seal-script characters—completely unreadable to him.
On the altar stood a huge stone statue.
It was a coiled serpent, its body covered in thorn-like black scales. Its head was tucked within its coils, as if sleeping.
The snake's body was two meters thick, carved so realistically that if not for recognizing the dark-violet stone from the mountains outside, he'd think a real serpent lay there.
On the stone shrine before the altar, instead of incense or offerings, there was a single stone drawer. Inside, he found a black bamboo scroll, its surface faintly inscribed.
Taking it outside into the light, he saw it bore four characters on the outside, and inside, each slip was densely written.
He hesitated, unsure of the next step—then the dog barked frantically at the gate, warning him.
Out of the corner of his eye, he saw movement in the hall.
A sound followed—crack… crack…—like mountains collapsing, stone grinding against stone.
He turned his head.
The serpent was moving—lifting its head from the shadows—and… wait. That was a human head!
"Holy shit!"
Li Pan bolted from the hall. The dog turned and fled down the mountain, and he followed, legs weak, the ground rising and falling underfoot like a trampoline. He stumbled, rolled, scrambled back up, and kept running toward the barking.
They ran and ran—and then, suddenly, it was daylight.
The light poured down, driving away the fog.
Li Pan looked up—and saw, beyond the storm, two enormous golden suns falling rapidly from the distant heavens.
The barking faded, swallowed by the wind, until it was gone.
Li Pan's body gave out. He dropped to his knees, clutching a jut of rock.
Because it wasn't an illusion.
The mountains themselves were rising and crashing like waves, shaking the earth, tearing open the sky. The fog was swept away, the land surged upward like a tsunami, mountains overturning, the galaxy tilting, the very stars hidden.
And in his vision, the mountains coiled like a serpent, gliding through the Milky Way toward a void-black whirlpool in the deep.
He wept blood, hearing his own blood vessels rupture, feeling the warm liquid seep from his eyes, ears, nose, and mouth.
But he did not blink.
Because he truly saw it.
A snake.
A snake beyond description.
Those two golden suns were its eyes.
It coiled and emerged from the darkness, gazing at him.
And its face… was his own.
…
Li Pan's eyes snapped open, heart pounding.
He looked up—and saw his own face staring back from a short distance away, like the serpent's in his dream, nearly making him scream.
Then he realized it was only the bathroom mirror.
He was sitting in his cramped one-bedroom apartment. The clock on the mirror flashed—2:00 a.m.
Though in the dream he'd climbed that mountain—or serpent's back—for days, in reality he'd only been asleep for about an hour after getting home from work.
"…What the hell kind of dream…"
His voice was hoarse as he wiped sweat from his face—then froze.
In his hand was the bamboo scroll.
"…What the fuck…"
He crawled to the window, peering out at the filthy, overcrowded tenements—no giant snake in sight. He let out a shaky breath.
He didn't know which was worse: that he had truly crossed into another world and stolen the scroll from a human-headed serpent, or that someone had broken into his apartment in the dead of night just to put it in his hand.
He rushed to the shower. No injuries, no burst blood vessels like in the dream. His prosthetics were intact. The only link to the dream was the scroll.
"Xingtian, pull up the last hour of apartment footage. And my sleep data, physiological readings."
The scans showed nothing unusual—he had simply come home, sat on the sofa, and fallen asleep. No hackers, no ninjas, no intruders. Even the bite marks from that vampire girl after work were still there.
There was only one problem.
In both the footage and the mirror, the bamboo scroll didn't exist.
Though he could see and touch it, it was invisible to cameras, reflections, any system at all.
In the mirror, it looked like he was clutching empty air, glancing up and down like some lunatic performing a skit.
Not optical camouflage, not stealth tech.
It was something that existed only in the dream.
"…Damn it. Monster…"
He couldn't make sense of it. For now, he could only chalk the whole thing up to the Formalwear Trial.
Frowning at the ancient script on the scroll, he had the feeling the trial wasn't over yet.
Back in reality, he transcribed the characters and ran them through the net.
When the translation came back, he stared in disbelief—half thinking someone was pranking him, half questioning his own sanity, even wondering if he should get a psych evaluation.
Because the damned thing read: The Nine Yin Manual.
.
.
.
⚠️ 30 CHAPTERS AHEAD — I'm Not a Cyberpsycho ⚠️
The system says: Kill.Mercs obey. Corporates obey. Monsters obey.One man didn't.
🧠💀 "I'm not a cyberpsycho. I just think... differently."
💥 High-voltage cyberpunk. Urban warfare. AI paranoia.Read 30 chapters ahead, only on Patreon.
🔗 patreon.com/DrManhattanEN