Chapter Summaries

Xiya blasted the unknown creature on the second floor, and Lu Ban found that its corpse contained countless smaller tentacled creatures. After Xiya cleared the room, Lu Ban found manuscript pages mentioning detectives visiting a novelist’s residence before going to North Cold Town.

• Trist armed himself while Lu Ban prepared to attack the presence on the second floor, but Xiya fired through the ceiling with Penetrating Burst Art.
• Lu Ban found a badly damaged, barely living tentacled monster in the bedroom, and Trist lost three Reason after seeing its mouthpart.
• The monster’s abdomen swelled and exploded after Lu Ban noticed something moving inside it, revealing countless smaller creatures.
• Xiya used magic to compress the creatures into a lump, while Trist watched in astonishment.
• Lu Ban picked up stained manuscript pages that described detectives visiting a novelist’s residence before heading to North Cold Town.

Lu Ban, Xiya, and Trist found a manuscript at Gudu's house that matched their investigation and debated whether it predicted their actions or had been planted to create that impression. They decided to head for the Cold Ruins, but at a car-rental shop they encountered Gudu's novel and a cashier who recognized Lu Ban.

• Lu Ban suggested that the monster might have brought the manuscript to make the group's actions seem prewritten, and Trist and Xiya considered his explanation.
• The three searched Gudu's house again, found no further clues, and decided to leave for the Cold Ruins without waiting two days for public transportation.
• Trist rented a car from a gang-run business after Lu Ban teased him about not owning one and Xiya warned that the abnormal situation could worsen.
• At the rental counter, Lu Ban recognized Gudu's Dog in the Painting, whose cover monster resembled the creature they had fought.
• The cashier introduced himself to Lu Ban as Stone after recognizing him.

Lu Ban reunited with Stone in the Ruined City, took Gudu’s books from him, and left with Trist and Xiya for Cold Ruins. During the drive, the distant lights vanished, and Trist hit a creature in the darkness.

• Lu Ban recognized Stone, who had become an accountant at a rental-car company, and learned he still read Gudu’s books.
• Stone told Lu Ban that no one had recently rented a car and left without returning it.
• Lu Ban took Stone’s copies of The Rat in the Painting and Old News of the Ruined Capital, claiming he was protecting him.
• Lu Ban, Trist, and Xiya left the Ruined City by car, and Xiya became motion-sick before falling asleep.
• Trist noticed the distant lights had disappeared, turned on the high beams, and drove into a creature ahead.

Trist, Lu Ban, and Xiya encountered ratmen and strange suited figures while driving through the darkness, then emerged into a sunny inhabited area. They arrived at North Cold Town, where Xiya found several pages of manuscript paper beneath the seat.

• Trist hit a ratman with the car, and it rose as a swarm of ratmen appeared from the darkness.
• Lu Ban fought the ratmen with his crowbar and Last Words while Trist drove them away; Xiya vomited and punched a ratman off the car.
• Trist drove past suited figures whose heads twisted to keep watching the car.
• The darkness vanished, and Xiya found manuscript pages under the seat as Trist stopped at a sign for North Cold Town.

Lu Ban, Trist, and Xiya reached the uncanny North Cold Town described in Gudu’s manuscript and followed its townspeople toward a church. They discovered that imitating the townspeople’s strange walk made the crowd stop watching them, and Lu Ban entered the church.

• Xiya read a manuscript describing the detectives’ arrival in North Cold Town and their decision to investigate its church.
• Trist drove into town, where Lu Ban saw a townsman whose neck twisted unnaturally as he walked away.
• Church bells rang, and the townspeople gathered in the streets and hurried toward the church with their heads turned toward the newcomers.
• Lu Ban imitated the townspeople’s furtive steps, and Trist and Xiya followed until the crowd faced forward and stopped watching them.
• The group reached a church whose stained glass depicted humans being tortured and transformed into monsters, and Lu Ban entered with the crowd.

Lu Ban, Trist, and Xiya visited a church where the priest preached a story resembling Trist’s encounter with a ratman and claimed Gudu was the Lord. After the sky abruptly turned to night, they went to an inn, ate dinner, and discovered spiders descending from the ceiling.

• The priest told a horror story at the church and led the townspeople in prayer to the Lord, whom he identified as Gudu.
• The priest warned Lu Ban, Trist, and Xiya about the coming night, and they saw the sky change from day to sunset.
• The three entered an empty inn, where the innkeeper gave them a room key without charge and prepared the meal Lu Ban requested.
• Lu Ban and Xiya ate while Trist hesitated, and Lu Ban joked that he should have ordered rarer dishes.
• Trist spotted a spider on Lu Ban’s shoulder and looked up to see countless spiders descending from the ceiling.

Lu Ban, Trist, and Xiya escaped an inn overrun by spiders and encountered disguised monsters in the street. After Lu Ban’s babble incapacitated them, the three reached the church, where the priest pointed Trist toward a manuscript.

• Trist shot at the spiders while Xiya used Mistra's Void Burst Technique to destroy many of them, and the three fled the inn.
• Lu Ban approached a crowd of suited people and saw one man transform into a tentacle monster.
• The suited people turned on Lu Ban and began transforming, so he unleashed maddening babble that made them collapse.
• Lu Ban rejoined Trist and Xiya, and the three went to the church.
• The priest pointed Trist to a manuscript, and Trist picked it up to find the words, "Spiders. Spiders everywhere. Spiders falling from the sky."

Trist, Lu Ban, and Xiya found Gudu in a chamber beneath the church and learned that North Cold Town was inside a story he had written. Gudu identified them as its protagonists, while the mission to witness the story’s end remained unresolved.

• Trist threatened the priest with the Simulated Sunflare, but the priest said Trist would not fire because the event was not written in the Holy Scripture.
• Lu Ban questioned the priest about his lord, while Xiya sensed someone beneath the church and the priest opened a hidden passage.
• Lu Ban, Trist, and Xiya descended to a basement where something struck at a sealed bronze door and found a man writing at a desk.
• The man finished writing, introduced himself as Gudu, and the mission system confirmed they had found the missing novelist.
• Lu Ban asked where they were, and Gudu explained that they were inside a story, with the priest and townspeople as characters and the three visitors as protagonists.

Gudu explained that he was a gatekeeper who kept a story-seeking being asleep by reading it frightening stories, which had begun to affect reality. He revealed that the stories were chasing Trist, Lu Ban, and Xiya, and the chapter ended with the bronze door still holding the dangerous being inside.

• Gudu told Trist, Lu Ban, and Xiya that they were the protagonists of a story and discussed how authors create characters.
• Gudu explained that beings beyond human understanding had transformed stories in pursuit of perfect stories.
• Gudu showed Lu Ban a harmonica left by a former friend and said its melody had helped lull the being behind the bronze door to sleep.
• Gudu revealed that he read stories to keep the being asleep, but it increasingly demanded frightening stories that spilled into reality.
• Trist confronted Gudu about the stories harming people, and Gudu explained that the story was chasing them rather than them following its plot.

Gudu explained that he had woven himself into a horror story to contain the Unnamable Great Being’s influence within the town. With Lu Ban and the others as witnesses, he gave the story a real ending and prepared to pay the price himself.

• Gudu explained that his stories became part of the Unnamable Great Being’s dreams and that the world would eventually be destroyed whether he continued writing or not.
• Gudu revealed that he had spent twenty years creating a town where the stories and their protagonists would converge, limiting the Great Being’s influence elsewhere.
• Gudu explained that he had written himself into Mouth of the Madman as its true protagonist, using the Great Being’s dreams to make the story’s events real.
• Lu Ban realized that Gudu had turned the Great Being’s power and the witnesses’ presence into a means of imprisoning it through a story.
• Gudu said the price was himself, then wrote the story’s ending on the manuscript paper.

Lu Ban, Xiya, and Trist left Gudu behind after helping him complete his story, and Lu Ban took a melody fragment and a title page for Gudu’s former lover. As Lu Ban returned from the Ruined City, an emerald eye appeared in the strange passage before he awoke at his computer desk and saw the book Mouth of the Madman vanish.

• Gudu told Lu Ban, Xiya, and Trist that he had become a person in the book and gave Lu Ban Du Danping’s Melody Fragment.
• Gudu asked Lu Ban to deliver a title page to his former lover and tell her that he was gone; Lu Ban said she was doing fairly well and that her child had grown up.
• Lu Ban, Xiya, and Trist left through the wooden door as Gudu returned to writing before the bronze gate.
• At dawn, Lu Ban gave Trist the completed copy of Old News of the Ruined Capital for Stone and speculated that earlier Chosen of the Gods had failed similar missions.
• Lu Ban and Xiya declined Trist’s offer of a ride, and Lu Ban began returning when the mission ended.
• Lu Ban saw a pupil-less emerald eye during the disorienting return, then awoke at his computer as the book titled Mouth of the Madman disappeared.

After completing the task, Lu Ban received a huge Silence Points reward and watched a video of the bronze gate that left him unconscious. He woke at home to find Feng Yu cooking dinner, and asked how she had gotten in.

• Lu Ban received 84,500 Silence Points and the item Mouth of the Madman after completing the task perfectly.
• Lu Ban watched the video labeled "Door" and saw a glimpse of an immense figure from inside the gate, which caused him to collapse.
• Someone entered Lu Ban's room, turned off the video, put him in bed, and cleaned the blood from his face.
• Lu Ban woke in the afternoon and smelled dinner cooking, then found Feng Yu preparing a meal in his kitchen.
• Lu Ban washed his hands, joined Feng Yu at the table, and asked how she had gotten in.

Lu Ban reflected on the danger that had followed him back from Ruined City and planned how to make his next film work for both new viewers and the wider Silence Project. As he continued preparing the film, Li Zijian contacted him to ask whether he would advise a young actor in a horror-thriller role.

• Feng Yu reassured Lu Ban that she had deleted the strange video and warned him to avoid strange things, then went home after dinner.
• Lu Ban reviewed the remaining videos and considered how to fulfill the Career Development Task without making a careless film that could hurt the Silence Project.
• Lu Ban spent the rest of the holiday studying and working, then returned to his careful film preparations after the Lantern Festival.
• Li Zijian told Lu Ban that a young actor wanted advice on an upcoming horror-thriller role, and Lu Ban agreed to share his contact information.

Lu Ban met Ye Cheng, a variety-show performer who had landed a role in the low-budget horror film No. 9 Huangmei Street, and tested his acting. The meeting left Lu Ban worried that the commission would be difficult, while Ye Cheng learned that Lu Ban thought his performance was poor.

• Lu Ban met Ye Cheng at a café and learned that Ye Cheng had appeared on the farming variety show Beautiful Fields and was making his first film.
• Ye Cheng told Lu Ban that No. 9 Huangmei Street had been rushed into production after Lu Ban's horror film succeeded, and that his family had invested in it.
• Lu Ban asked Ye Cheng to perform a frightened expression, but Ye Cheng's exaggerated acting made Lu Ban suggest he play the faceless killer instead.
• Ye Cheng asked whether his acting was really that bad, and Lu Ban wondered if Ye Cheng's family had invested in Yannan Academy of Drama.

Lu Ban tried to improve Ye Cheng’s acting by helping him experience real fear, then invited him to stay overnight for a more intense training exercise. The chapter left Ye Cheng signing an accident waiver and being asked to write a will, with no idea what Lu Ban had planned.

• Lu Ban studied Ye Cheng’s performances and concluded that Ye Cheng struggled to act naturally despite working hard.
• Ye Cheng asked whether his bravery kept him from portraying fear, so Lu Ban watched Crying with him in Ye Cheng’s home theater.
• After the film frightened Ye Cheng, Lu Ban had him act out fear but judged his performance too weak.
• Lu Ban offered Ye Cheng a special overnight training method, and Ye Cheng agreed to stay at Lu Ban’s place.
• After dinner near Lu Ban’s residential complex, Ye Cheng signed an accident liability waiver, then Lu Ban asked him to write a will.

Lu Ban put Ye Cheng through a terrifying overnight exercise to help him learn how to portray fear. Ye Cheng woke after fainting beneath a clown doll, and Lu Ban was pleased with his convincing expression of terror.

• Ye Cheng questioned Lu Ban's request for a last letter, and Lu Ban explained that he planned to make him experience fear firsthand.
• Ye Cheng went to Lu Ban's house, where Lu Ban told him to lie in bed at midnight, count five hundred heartbeats, and look under the bed.
• As Ye Cheng counted, he heard a wardrobe open, felt unable to move, and endured overwhelming fear until he reached his five-hundredth heartbeat.
• Ye Cheng looked under the bed, saw a grinning clown doll, and fainted.
• Ye Cheng woke to Lu Ban congratulating him on the successful training, then reacted with a convincing expression of terror.

Lu Ban released a cryptic teaser for his new film, Mouth of the Madman, and watched critics debate its lack of information and speculate about his career. As he worked on another trailer, an article warned that he would fall from his supposed position at the top if he kept making horror films.

• Lu Ban registered the intellectual property for Mouth of the Madman and uploaded its brief teaser to major video sites, where it quickly gained views.
• Lu Ban read online criticism that the teaser revealed little and agreed that the film was only about a third complete.
• Lu Ban considered speculation that large investors were behind his success and dismissed it, since he had not relied on Song Yunyan's company for funding.
• Lu Ban continued working and assembled a second trailer while online attention around his new film grew.
• Lu Ban found an article predicting that he would fall from the altar if he kept making niche horror films instead of pursuing bigger productions.

Lu Ban ignored calls for him to leave horror films behind and released a second trailer for "Mouth of the Madman." The trailer’s disturbing images and polished production left Wang Qing wondering how close the film was to completion.

• Lu Ban concluded that adapting pollution was vital to preserving civilization, but rejected the idea that he had to prove himself by making films in other genres.
• Lu Ban posted the second trailer for "Mouth of the Madman" in late March.
• Wang Qing noticed that a mirror in Lu Ban’s living-room photo showed no reflection, then clicked on the newly released trailer.
• The trailer showed people describing monsters and spiders emerging from shadows and bodies, followed by a montage of dangerous scenes and Xiya vomiting.
• A monster appeared outside a car window just before the trailer ended, and Wang Qing judged that the film’s high production quality suggested filming was nearly complete.

After Mouth of the Madman’s second trailer drew massive attention, industry insiders questioned Lu Ban’s casting choices and extraordinary production speed. Just before the April Qingming holiday, the Yannan Film Bureau received the film master for Mouth of the Madman.

• Viewers were unsettled by the second trailer’s scenes of shadows, eerie colors, and spiders, while praising its mix of adventure, comedy, suspense, and horror.
• Industry insiders discussed Lu Ban’s effective but obscure actors, and Yannan Little Six said Lu Ban had coached a formerly poor actor into giving a convincing performance.
• A screenwriter recalled that a friend had rejected Lu Ban’s horror script when Lu Ban was still a production assistant.
• Mouth of the Madman’s trailer surpassed thirty million views in a day and pushed the film to the top of online anticipation rankings.
• Film professionals questioned how Lu Ban could finish another film so quickly, while rival companies hurried to produce horror films after the success of Crying.
• Before the Qingming holiday, the Yannan Film Bureau received a film master labeled Mouth of the Madman.

Mo Guangyuan, a weary Film Bureau reviewer, began watching Mouth of the Madman and became engrossed in its tense horror opening. When he spotted something writhing in the shadow beside his own desk, the chapter left him startled and unsure whether it was real.

• Mo Guangyuan finished reviewing a melodramatic romance and prepared to spend the last half hour of work watching a film.
• He found Mouth of the Madman, recognized director Lu Ban as the lead actor behind last year's box office champion, and started the movie.
• The film showed a gunman fleeing through a dark alley and warning another man that monsters lurked in the shadows.
• A writhing creature appeared beneath the second man's clothing, and the first man fired at it.
• Mo Guangyuan glanced away from the screen and saw something writhing in the shadow by the corner of his table.