Zhou You's asshole clenched.
"—Holy crap, no way. You put a jump-scare trap here? This place is tiny as hell. How am I supposed to play your 'game'?"
But after he waited on high alert for a long while, the charred child didn't move at all.
It merely tilted its little head up and "looked" at Zhou You with its deeply cracked face for a while. Then it suddenly turned around and walked toward the door.
"So... it doesn't want to play a game? Wait, it seems like it wants me to follow..." After thinking it over, Zhou You decided to follow the monster.
After all, he was completely in the dark about this place. Rather than waste time searching the rooms one by one, he might as well follow this seemingly friendly child and see what it was trying to do.
Of course, the main reason was that he still had plenty of Resurrection Coins. Even if he died here, he didn't need to worry—and, looking on the bright side, he might even reset the daytime while he was at it.
The child didn't walk very fast, but its figure kept flickering. It seemed different from the one he'd seen at night; it had trouble taking solid form. Especially under the sunlight, its whole body would suddenly disappear, only to reappear somewhere else after a long while.
It led Zhou You through the two doors and all the way to the second floor. But it didn't stop at any of the rooms. It didn't even glance at suspicious places like the Staff Dormitory, Archives, or Director's Office. Instead, it went straight to the very end and stopped in front of an utterly ordinary wall.
Then the charred figure stood still, raised its head, and simply looked at Zhou You.
"You mean... you want me to go inside?"
It neither confirmed nor denied it. It only stared.
Zhou You had to go over himself. First, as usual, he knocked on the wall, but didn't hear anything strange. Then he searched around, but still couldn't find any mechanism to open it.
It looked like an entirely ordinary wall.
But Zhou You didn't give up. After a little thought, he suddenly turned around and walked a few steps to a window that had long since burned out. He leaned out and examined the building's exterior again.
A few seconds later, an amused smile appeared at the corner of his mouth.
The wall was the wrong size.
Compared with the end of the corridor, the exterior wall clearly had a much larger blank space. No house would normally be built like that unless the designer had something wrong with their head. That left only one conclusion.
"There has to be a hidden room here, or maybe a concealed space between the walls."
Once he realized that, Zhou You searched much more carefully. He didn't even spare the nearby rooms. After searching for a full ten minutes or so, he finally found a hidden switch beneath a desk.
He reached into the narrow gap and, with considerable effort, pulled it down. A dull rumble followed, and the wall swung open.
After crawling out covered in dust, Zhou You looked at the silent, wordless ghost again. The other still showed no reaction, so he could only shake his head and step into the hidden room.
—At first glance, it was just a cramped room a little over two meters across. It was just as dusty as the rest of the building, but unlike the outside, there were no signs of fire damage. The lighting, however, was just as dim as ever. Zhou You switched on the flashlight he'd brought with him and shone it inside.
But the next second, something caught his eye.
It was a Bodhisattva Statue.
Yet unlike the Bodhisattvas commonly seen in temples, this clay sculpture showed not a trace of mercy or compassion. It sat cross-legged on a Lotus Throne, its expression twisted and crazed. Its right hand rested on its knee, with a finger touching the ground—the Buddhist gesture for subduing demons. But beneath the throne were no demons or monsters. Instead, countless spirits writhed and twisted in a sea of blood, howling and shrieking without end...
—At that moment, it looked at Zhou You as if he were an offering on an altar.
There was no other emotion in its eyes, only pure appetite.
Then, right before Zhou You, the clay deity opened its mouth as if alive, and piercing Buddhist chants rang out.
"Om mani padme hum, Om Amitabha Ayus Siddhi Hum..."
Each syllable of the Buddha's chant pierced his ears. In a daze, Zhou You saw the Bodhisattva covered in blood. Every spirit struggled in that sea of blood, begging to be freed, but all they received was the despair of knowing they would never be reborn. Amid their countless howls, the Bodhisattva's face grew more and more ferocious. Spiral rows of sharp teeth sprouted inside its throat, and it was just about to swallow Zhou You's head—
"Fuck your mother!"
At the very instant before he was devoured, Zhou You gritted his teeth and activated Wuwo Ruding.
His rapidly plummeting Sanity Value finally stabilized. Then all the scenery receded like a tide.
When he looked again, the Bodhisattva Statue was still ferocious, but there was no sign of movement.
As if... everything before had just been an illusion.
"You have discovered an Erosion Point."
"You have received a reward of 70 Soul Stones."
"Current number of Soul Stones: 260"
"You have discovered a key point in this world. The hidden story has revealed a corner to you. Please note: if you uncover the complete worldview before the scenario ends, you will receive an additional reward."
Only then did Zhou You wipe his forehead and realize it was drenched in sweat.
Normally, given his temperament, he wouldn't react like that no matter what terrifying ghost he encountered—but what had just happened was completely different. It was nothing like that. Facing this Buddha statue, Zhou You had felt like a mouse being watched by a cat: utterly overpowered by a natural enemy, unable to resist in the slightest, with no choice but to close his eyes and wait for death.
Even now, he still felt shaken.
Fortunately, Zhou You was good at adapting—or, more accurately, at regulating his own emotions.
He closed his eyes and took a moment to steady his breathing. When he opened them again, the extra emotion was gone from his gaze.
"—It looks like this Gui Bodhisattva is another key point in this instance. There's no direct proof, but it should be directly connected to the Liu Family Richest Man. I just don't know the details..."
Zhou You lowered his head and noticed several lines of tiny writing carved into the Lotus Throne.
"What is good belongs to Guiyuzhou; what is evil belongs to Guiyuxiao."
"The living belong to Guiyuzhou; the dead belong to Guiyuxiao."
"What has not taken shape belongs to Guiyuzhou; what has taken shape belongs to Guiyuxiao."
"Those who have not gone mad belong to Guiyuzhou; those who have gone mad belong to Guiyuxiao."
"Use life as an offering, and death as a rite."
"Obtain what you wish for; offer up what is in your heart."
It wasn't a poem or a sacrificial prayer. Not a single line rhymed, and the whole thing was written in a clumsy mixture of classical and modern Chinese, like something an illiterate person had strained to write while pretending to be cultured.
But these lines still provided a great deal of information—so much that he was only a little way from connecting all the clues.
After mulling it over for a while, Zhou You suddenly wore a strange smile. Then, without looking at the Bodhisattva again, he turned to face the charred child.
Whether Zhou You opened the hidden room or was struck by the illusion, the ghost hadn't moved once from beginning to end. Only when Zhou You turned back did it seem to have finished all its tasks. It slowly faded away in the sunlight.
Zhou You fell silent for a few seconds, let out a soft sigh, then turned and left.
Before you continue