A Helpless Nangong Chong

The city blazed with lights, its nighttime scenery beautiful. A man and a woman stood on a balcony, admiring a river of lights that looked like a reflection of the starry sky. Behind them was a wall of televisions—an actual wall of televisions—broadcasting the news. The female anchor spoke with unusual gravity:

"Breaking news, breaking news. A widespread power outage has suddenly struck the Xiannan region. All civilian power lines are suspected of malfunctioning. The power department is working around the clock to investigate, and service is expected to be restored before dawn."

"How long has it been since we last had a major blackout?" The couple turned around in puzzlement.

Beyond Xiannan, who knew how many people were listening to this report and speculating about its possible causes?

Meanwhile, Nangong Chong stared at the culprit behind it all, trembling. His mouth hung open, and only one thought circled in his mind: I've run into a ghost! I've run into a ghost! The boss from the game chased me from the online world into the real one... I must be dreaming. I must be dreaming...

Smack! He raised a hand and slapped himself hard across the face. The pain numbed half his face, and tears nearly sprang to his eyes. He had never felt more lucid, yet when he looked ahead, the slightly weathered man in the blue-green robe was still standing with his hands behind his back, sizing him up with an amused smile.

Nangong Chong's vision went black, and he nearly fainted. But a fine current of electricity coursed through him, jolting him instantly awake. It was quite the sensation.

"Can you tell this old man what's going on?" Meng Qi pointed at the big box labeled A Game-Changing Masterpiece: Black Mountain Old Demon and asked with a