Doll Island Amusement Park

After hanging up, Qin Feng sank into the soft sofa in his new home and let out a long breath, savoring the peace of having survived the ordeal.

With a thought, a pale blue screen rippled open before his eyes like water. Data flowed across it before finally settling.

[Host: Qin Feng]

[Cleansing Points: 60]

[Spiritual Sense Level: Form Observation Realm (Early Stage)]

[Legendary Armament: Scissors of Truth (D-Class), Gluttony Stomach (D-Class), Death Notice (D-Class)]

[Mastered Ability: Item Affinity (Passive)]

As he looked at the faint glow emitted by the three D-Class Legendary Armaments, Qin Feng felt an unprecedented sense of security well up within him.

This was his greatest foundation for surviving in this bizarre world.

He focused his mind on Origin Enhancement, and a new prompt appeared.

[To advance to 'Form Observation Realm (Middle Stage),' Cleansing Points required: 460.]

"Four hundred sixty... forty less than I expected." After thinking for a moment, Qin Feng understood what was going on.

With great interest, he examined his body inwardly. At his dantian, the tiny vortex formed by [Gluttony Stomach] was greedily devouring the thin, stray Spiritual Energy around him like an insatiable black hole.

Meanwhile, the Qi Gathering Returning to Origin Art functioned like a precision purifier, automatically refining the mixed Spiritual Energy into pure inner energy that nourished every part of his body.

One automatically restored mana, the other automatically restored health. They were practically the perfect perpetual-motion combination.

"At this rate, even if I lie around doing nothing every day, I'll reach the threshold of the middle stage in twenty days."

The instant that thought arose, Qin Feng rejected it.

"Twenty days? By then, The Vanishing Bus will probably have finished hauling away even the ashes!"

A C-Class nest-type Anomalous Event—The Vanishing Bus.

According to scattered intelligence leaked from within the Special Cases Department, a C-Class Anomalous Event was itself a mobile aggregation of anomalies.

At the thought that the bus might be packed with D-Class and E-Class "experience packs," Qin Feng's heart burned with excitement.

By then, demons and monsters of every sort would gather there. If he tried pulling something like the Vigorous God of Essential Balm or talking ghosts insane again, he would probably get wiped out by someone else's area-of-effect attack before he could even open his mouth.

If he wanted to get the fattest piece of meat while surrounded by wolves, the only way was to make every flashy trick pale before absolute strength!

"I have to pull off a few big jobs within three days!"

Qin Feng's gaze sharpened. He sat up straight and opened the Huangquan app again.

The [Mission Hall] list refreshed. After becoming a Soul Custodian, his permissions had indeed increased considerably. Several C-Class commissions had lit up green for him.

[Commission: C-011. Investigate 'Kisaragi Station.' Recommended team size: 5. Spiritual Sense Level: Form Observation Realm or above.]

[Commission: D-045. Deal with 'Slender Man.' Location: abandoned forest farm on the city outskirts. Beware of mental contamination.]

Qin Feng merely glanced at them before swiping past them without interest.

Official missions meant forming a team, filing reports, writing operation reports, and then splitting the meager rewards at the end. It would not even be enough to fill the gaps between his teeth.

Rather than wait for someone else to divide the cake, why not make one himself?

A bold idea took shape in Qin Feng's mind.

His fingers tapped across the screen. He exited the Mission Hall and entered the app's vast internal database.

Donghai City was enormous, and countless strange rumors emerged every day. The Special Cases Department could not possibly cover everything.

There had to be some "wild" anomalies hiding in the city's dark corners, growing unchecked as they waited for the first "lucky person" to discover them.

And he would be the hunter who came knocking to harvest them.

Introduction to Anomalous Environment Formation, <On the Differences Between Urban Negative Emotion Aggregates and Earthbound Spirit Transformations>, <Statistical and Analytical Report on Unofficial Paranormal Incidents of the Past Decade: Donghai City Edition>...

To outsiders, these documents were dry and boring. To Qin Feng, they became maps leading to treasure.

The Item Affinity talent once again demonstrated its full potential.

As he immersed himself in using his phone, this "item," the words on the screen seemed to come alive. Useless information automatically dimmed, while key entries glimmered faintly, linked and reorganized in his mind by invisible threads.

"The birth of an anomaly cannot be separated from 'emotion' and 'obsession'..."

"High-incidence areas: hospitals, schools, cemeteries, abandoned factories..."

"Emerging breeding grounds: online information cocoons, long-abandoned unfinished housing developments..."

Qin Feng's brain worked like a supercomputer, rapidly comparing and filtering these patterns against Donghai City's digital map.

Suddenly, his finger stopped. He opened a link to a local urban legend forum.

[Post Title: [High-Energy Warning] Does anyone know about the abandoned 'Doll Island' amusement park in the south of the city? My friend has already gone crazy because of it!]

[1F: Tell us more, OP. I love hearing this stuff.]

[2F (OP): My friend does exploration livestreams. Last week, he said he was going to Doll Island for a challenge.]

[That place shut down more than ten years ago. Supposedly, it was because a little girl died there. He flew a drone in at midnight, and then...]

[3F: And then what? Hurry up and tell us!]

[2F (OP): After he came back, he deleted all the videos, and he hasn't been right since.]

[I secretly asked him about it. He was trembling all over and only said that he saw a little thing in a red dress sitting on the carousel. That thing... seemed to smile at the drone's camera through the screen.]

[Now he's locked up in a psychiatric hospital. Every day, he curls up in a corner and says that little girl has come looking for him.]

Doll Island Amusement Park!

A sharp gleam flashed in Qin Feng's eyes, as though he could already hear the wonderful notification of Cleansing Points being credited to his account.

He immediately cross-checked the information in the Special Cases Department's internal database. The results showed that no officially recorded anomalous incidents had ever occurred at that location.

A forgotten place filled with "childish obsession," "rumors of death," and an air of abandonment.

Perfect! It was practically a "wild dungeon" tailor-made for him!

Anomalies born from a single, powerful obsession usually had very clear rules, making them ideal targets for a rule-breaking weapon like [Scissors of Truth].

"A little girl..." Qin Feng rubbed his chin, a nasty, expectant smile curling across his lips. "Perfect. I love playing with children. After all, I used to help my sister look after kids."

He turned off his phone, rose from the sofa, and stretched. His joints cracked loudly all over his body.

Outside the window, the night had deepened.

For ordinary people, it was time to rest.

But for this newly promoted Soul Custodian, the hunt had only just begun.

Qin Feng walked to the entryway and stuffed the M-7 pistol and spare magazines into a sports backpack. After thinking about it, he turned back, took an Alps lollipop from the fruit tray on the coffee table, casually slipped it into his pocket, and finally grabbed a bottle of soda from the refrigerator.

Humming an off-key tune, he pushed open the door and quickly vanished into the apartment corridor in the dead of night.