Seriously? That was actually a thing?

Marcus stood there staring at the notification, wondering if the system had decided to mess with him personally. After spending days grinding monsters and finally filling his experience bar, he still hadn’t reached Level 50. He was about ready to lose his mind.

Naturally, Amber was the first to ask.

"Brother, did you make it to fifty?"

Marcus immediately felt awkward. "Not yet."

He rubbed his forehead and let out a sigh. "I’m still Level 49. The experience bar is full, but the system says I need to complete some kind of trial before I can level up."

"A trial?"

Jade’s eyes lit up at once. "Marcus, what kind of trial?"

"No idea. The notification says I need to return to Dragon’s Peak Citadel and speak to someone there first."

"Then let’s go back!"

Jade immediately grabbed his arm and started pulling him toward the teleportation point. "Maybe there’s a reward for completing it too."

Marcus hoped so. If the system was requiring a special trial before advancing, that probably meant there was a chance of failure as well. Reaching Level 50 clearly wasn’t supposed to be as simple as gaining enough experience.

Still, he wasn’t particularly worried. With his current strength, he found it hard to imagine a trial that could truly threaten him. If anything, it might finally break the monotony of endless grinding.

"Alright. Let’s head back."

A flash of light engulfed the group. Moments later, Marcus and the women appeared inside their mansion in Dragon’s Peak Citadel. Without wasting time, they left the estate and headed directly toward the city’s temple district.

---

Dragon’s Peak Citadel was vast, but no structure was more imposing than the imperial palace.

Occupying nearly a fifth of the entire city, the palace dominated the northern district. Towering walls, sprawling halls, and countless pavilions stretched across the horizon, displaying the wealth and authority of the Dragon Dynasty for all to see.

The Dragon God’s Temple stood northeast of the palace grounds.

Although smaller than the imperial complex, its influence was no less significant. For the people of the Dragon Dynasty, it was the spiritual center of the nation. The priests who served there enjoyed tremendous prestige, and the High Cleric’s position carried authority comparable to that of the empire’s highest-ranking officials.

More importantly, the city’s guardian Divine Beast, the Five-Clawed Divine Dragon, rested within the temple’s restricted grounds. Specifically, it slumbered within the Dreamland Temple atop Dreamland Immortal Mountain.

Across the Dreamland Continent, more than ninety-eight percent of humanity worshipped the Goddess of Dreams.

According to history, humanity had once been little more than prey. Demons, beasts, ghosts, and countless other races had hunted and oppressed them for generations. Under the Goddess’s guidance and protection, however, humanity gradually rose to power. Not only did they survive, but they eventually pushed those hostile races back and sealed many of their greatest threats away.

Among all human nations, the Dragon Dynasty was considered the most devout. Legend claimed that the dynasty’s founding emperor had been the reincarnation of one of the Goddess’s celestial dragons, and the empire itself had supposedly been established under her direct protection.

Because of that connection, the Dragon Dynasty built the magnificent Dreamland Temple atop Dreamland Immortal Mountain shortly after its founding. 𝙛𝓻𝒆𝓮𝒘𝙚𝙗𝒏𝙤𝙫𝓮𝒍.𝓬𝒐𝙢

The temple served two purposes. It was humanity’s foremost place of worship for the Goddess of Dreams, and it was also prepared as a residence for her whenever she chose to descend into the mortal world.

Ancient records claimed that before the Great Demon War, the Goddess would occasionally appear there in person whenever major conflicts threatened humanity. At other times, she would send divine decrees or trusted envoys to guide the dynasty’s rulers. Aside from the Dreamland Sanctum itself, no location on the continent held greater religious significance.

Things changed after the Great Demon War. The Goddess withdrew to the Dreamland Sanctum and entered her long slumber. Since then, she had never returned to Dreamland Temple. No new decrees arrived. No divine envoys appeared.

Yet the temple’s importance never diminished.

Before departing, the Goddess had left behind countless martial arts, sacred techniques, and divine inheritances. Over the centuries, those treasures transformed Dreamland Temple into one of humanity’s most powerful institutions. Its reputation was built on more than faith alone.

Five hundred years ago, the Western Demon Sovereign, Malice the Soul-Devouring Darkness, became infatuated with the newly appointed Saintess of Dreamland Temple. Convinced that the temple had weakened after the Goddess’s departure, he decided to seize the Saintess by force.

Confident in his own strength, Malice personally led four of his strongest lieutenants toward Dreamland Immortal Mountain.

The outcome shocked the entire continent.

According to historical accounts, Malice barely reached the third of the mountain’s five defensive passes before two of his lieutenants were killed. Furious, he abandoned caution and charged directly toward the summit. There, he unleashed his Demonic Artifact, the Ten-Thousand-Year Soul Banner.

Dark spirits flooded the skies. Countless wailing souls covered the mountaintop, devouring everything in their path. The air itself seemed filled with death, and the residents living near Dreamland Immortal Mountain believed a catastrophe had arrived.

Then, less than half an hour later, the battle ended.

Malice fled.

His remaining two lieutenants sacrificed themselves to cover his retreat, and one of his treasured weapons, the Thousand-Soul Shuttle, was left behind. To this day, the artifact remained on display near the temple entrance as a reminder of that defeat.

No outsider knew exactly what had happened during those thirty minutes, but what everyone did know was that one of the Demon Clan’s greatest rulers had suffered a humiliating loss and had never dared return.

That single battle elevated Dreamland Temple’s reputation to an entirely new level. People realized that whatever strength the temple possessed, it was far beyond what outsiders could measure.

Not everyone learned the lesson.

Three hundred years ago, one of the Ghost King’s Four Great Lieutenants, the Phantasmal Shifter, boasted that his stealth and transformation abilities were unmatched. After making a wager with the other lieutenants, he declared that he would sneak into Dreamland Temple and steal its Divine Artifact, the Celestial Jade Vase.

He entered Dreamland Immortal Mountain under cover of darkness.

No one ever saw him again. Neither the Ghost King nor the other lieutenants were able to discover what happened to him.

Then, two hundred years ago, during the great war between the Nine Great Sects and the Demon Clan, Dreamland Temple once again demonstrated its power by playing a decisive role in humanity’s victory. After that, very few people questioned the temple’s strength.

Even now, countless years later, demon cults avoided Dreamland Temple whenever possible. Few were willing to provoke an organization with such a terrifying history. That was also one of the major reasons the Demon Clan had never attempted a full-scale invasion of the Dragon Dynasty.

Some enemies were simply too dangerous to challenge, and Dreamland Temple was firmly at the top of that list.