"Hm?"
"Interesting."
Yang Ling held several photographs showing the arrangement of words inside Room Thirty-Six.
"Find a container."
"Put me inside."
"Bring me to the surface."
"I will repay you."
That was what the jumble of words on the wall said.
Though somewhat scrawled, both Yang Ling and Jiang Qiao could make them out with ease.
"A special weird tale?"
Jiang Qiao glanced at the exploration team's report, which detailed what had happened inside Room Thirty-Six, along with several team members' theories about the evil spirit.
"Most likely."
Yang Ling nodded.
"The biggest difference between special weird tales and ordinary weird tales is that they possess a degree of self-awareness. Although that awareness is still bound by their own rules, they can already communicate in simple ways."
"Weird tales can break through the limitations of the Eighth Tier."
"And that is entirely thanks to this little bit of awareness."
"Rules don't need conscious activity, just as most regions of the human brain operate on autopilot."
"When conscious activity exists but isn't comprehensive enough..."
"It only gets in the way."
"Their strength is greatly diminished, and they cannot bring out the effects of their rules."
"Once they possess self-awareness..."
"They begin trying to control and rein in their own power, and to make planned improvements to their rules. That makes the power they unleash greater than that of ordinary weird tales."
"But it is still inferior to rules operating on their own."
"The living are actually no different."
"Those of the Ninth Rank are said to be the spokespeople of rules, but their actual utilization of those rules is very low."
"Once they reach the divinity staircase..."
"The rule may still be the same rule."
"But their understanding of it and ability to use it grow stronger, so the increase in