Goddess of Fortune Event

Wang Zhifan then turned his gaze to the screen of the device in Chu Wei's hand.

He saw that the upper half of the screen displayed an image: a faceless classical stone statue of a graceful woman draped in gauze. The statue held both hands out in front of her, one seemingly gripping a dagger while the other supported a tray of apples.

The lower half of the screen, beneath the image of the statue, contained some explanatory text:

"Gray Domain special event, designation E556, also known as the Goddess of Fortune or Goddess of Calamity Event. No obvious pattern has yet been discovered regarding its appearance. It is presumed to appear randomly in Ash Domains of all levels.

When encountering E556, players may touch the statue with their hands within a certain time limit, triggering one result. Every player present has only one chance to trigger it.

No obvious pattern has yet been found in the triggered results. They are presumed to be determined randomly and fall into two broad categories: good results and bad results.

According to statistics from recent years, good results include players receiving equipment, skills, potions, beneficial status effects, healing for injuries, fatigue removal, enhanced attributes, and so on.

Bad results include players being electrocuted, burned, frozen, struck by falling rocks, hit by flying arrows, stunned, and so on. The severity of these injuries varies, but no one has yet been found to have suffered serious injury or death because of them..."

After quickly scanning the contents on the screen, Wang Zhifan immediately understood. The Ash Domain was far more complicated than he had imagined. Besides all kinds of monsters, it could also contain special encounters—so-called special events. Calling them players' lucky encounters would probably be more fitting.

"Mm... A Wei, are you sure the thing hidden inside this rock wall is that Goddess of Fortune statue?"

Wang Zhifan turned to confirm it with Chu Wei beside him. He was a cautious person; even after she had shown him the information, he still was not entirely at ease.

"Almost certainly."

Chu Wei raised her head and answered him. Then she lifted a finger and pointed at an inconspicuous rocky protrusion near the top of the wall ahead. "Brother Fan, my summon found a rather unusual structure here in the rock wall. It might be a trigger mechanism. You're taller, so try pressing it and see whether anything happens."

"Pressing it directly is too dangerous. Let's step back a couple of paces first."

Wang Zhifan immediately shook his head. He had Chu Wei move some distance away, while he himself retreated into a nearby passage. Only then did he pick up a stone from the cave floor, which was currently littered with monster corpses, and toss it lightly toward the spot on the rock wall Chu Wei had indicated from several meters away.

Thanks to his Agility stat of seventeen, he found this sort of precision work quite easy now. With a single throw, the stone accurately struck the target spot on the rock wall.

The rock he hit sank slightly into the wall. A vertical crack nearly two meters long appeared in the entire section below it, and the rock wall on either side of the crack slowly parted, revealing a humanoid statue hidden inside. With a dagger in one hand and an apple tray in the other, it looked exactly like the one Wang Zhifan had just seen on the device screen.

"Sister Weiwei, did you find something fun?"

Only then did A Liao, who had been resting against the wall with his gun at the end of the passage more than ten meters away, come over after being drawn by the noise of the separating rock wall. Under the converging beams from the miner's lamps on their heads, all his attention was fixed on the woman's statue revealed within the wall.

"It's a Goddess of Fortune statue. According to the Administration's records, each of us now has one chance to touch it and receive a random result. It could be good or bad. Who wants to try first?"

Chu Wei had already hurried over to the statue. She looked eager to give it a try, though she was also slightly hesitant.

"Seriously? Sister Weiwei, you're not messing with me, are you?"

The teenage A Liao, who had just come over, was doubtful of Chu Wei's claim. The idea that touching a statue could trigger a random result was simply too bizarre to him; he had never even heard of anything like it before.

"I'm not lying to you. The information is right here. Look for yourself."

Chu Wei immediately handed the Administration's special device to A Liao, letting him view the page Wang Zhifan had already read.

A Liao read extremely quickly, getting the general idea in barely five seconds.

Then, brimming with interest, he walked up to the statue in the rock wall. After carefully examining its appearance and confirming that it matched the information, he reached out to touch it.

However, just as one of his fingers was about to touch the statue, he suddenly stopped. Turning to look at Chu Wei and Wang Zhifan on either side, he said:

"Sister Weiwei, Brother Fan, if I get hurt, you have to carry me out."

"No problem. But if you're scared, you'd better not touch it."

Chu Wei replied immediately. After all, she herself was somewhat hesitant about whether to touch the thing.

"Heh. How could I not try something this interesting? Worst case, I'll spend a few days in the hospital."

Chu Wei's words instead stirred up A Liao's gambling instinct. He quickly tapped one finger against the statue embedded in the rock wall, then pulled it back like lightning.

As he did so, the woman's statue in the wall instantly reacted. The apple on the tray held in one of its hands suddenly emitted a faint glow, and the others heard something land beside A Liao.

Wang Zhifan lowered his head, and the light from his miner's lamp shone directly at A Liao's feet. There, he saw an extra object that looked like a pair of shoes.

A Liao immediately bent down and picked up the item he had clearly received from touching the statue. But after looking at it for a few moments, he began grumbling in displeasure.

"What the hell... all I got was a pair of ordinary cloth shoes? What a waste of my feelings!"

Before A Liao could finish venting, Chu Wei walked over as well. After hesitating slightly for two seconds, she placed one finger on the statue before her.

This time, unlike when A Liao had touched the statue, it was the dagger held in the statue's other hand that emitted a faint glow.

Wang Zhifan, who had been watching closely, saw a fist-sized rock suddenly break loose from the cave ceiling above Chu Wei and fall straight toward her head!

"Watch your head!"

Wang Zhifan shouted a warning, but it turned out he had worried for nothing. Before Chu Wei could react, her female ghost summon suddenly emerged from a nearby rock wall. With one sweep of its clawed hand and long, sharp nails, it shredded the falling rock above Chu Wei's head into dust.