Everyone turned to look.
A bright vermilion sedan chair, decorated with two pairs of white strips, suddenly appeared in the plaza. Four maids in long pink dresses carried it forward at a brisk pace, moving as lightly as dragonflies skimming water. Their movements were stiff, their faces pale, and their cheeks painted with red rouge.
The singing came from the four maids.
The crowd quickly scattered to clear a path.
"Get out of the way!"
"Right, bro, let's hurry and move aside."
The man in the Gorilla mask who had sold Wu Heng the handbook dodged aside and called out to the two of them as he went.
Seeing this, Wu Heng quickly moved aside with the others.
His expression turned strange. Wasn't this the song "Ghost Bride," the accompaniment from Mr. Vampire?
"What are you afraid of? The plaza's a safe zone. They've just been through a few more instances than us; we're all the same. If we hide now, we'll keep retreating forever and lose our nerve!"
Seeing the people around him scatter because of the sedan chair still some distance away, Duanmu Ruixiong gave a cold snort. A fearless aura surged from him, and he remained where he stood, calmly flipping through his booklet.
'A female ghost seeks her lover!'
'One look, one look, one look—and your heart's in a panic!'
The sedan chair drew slowly closer with the song.
Wu Heng's extraordinary eyesight let him make out its details:
The joints of the sedan chair were lightly fastened with U-shaped strips. Its four sides were smooth as paste, and its carrying poles were neither wood nor iron.
The four maids carrying it had clothes with sharp, angular folds that didn't loosen even as they walked. Their faces looked like painted patches of color and shadow.
They were clearly four paper figures carrying a paper sedan chair. Wu Heng retreated again and hid far behind the man in the Gorilla mask.
Duanmu Ruixiong stood calmly in place, his back to the sedan chair. His left arm was folded across his chest, and his right hand held the booklet aloft. He stood ramrod straight, his brows furrowing and relaxing from time to time as he read. No one knew what insights he was gaining.
The sedan chair reached Duanmu Ruixiong and paused briefly, as if its occupant hadn't expected anyone to leave the path blocked.
"Interesting!"
A shrill, effeminate male voice came from inside the sedan chair.
A flicker of delight crossed Duanmu Ruixiong's eyes, then vanished. He continued calmly reading where he stood, paying no attention to the background music around him.
A visible gust of sinister wind suddenly swept through the area. Through the slightly swaying curtain, Wu Heng saw a man seated inside the sedan chair. His face was pale, a white cloth cap covered his head, and a paper flower was pinned to his right chest. He wore ancient wedding clothes.
The sedan chair seemed to dim all at once, as if a movie had suddenly switched from Blu-ray to high definition. Then it continued forward, passing straight through Duanmu Ruixiong.
Duanmu Ruixiong's face instantly turned pale and rigid. Expressionless, his body stiff, he walked straight beyond the Lighthouse's illumination. In the darkness, a commotion of footsteps and shrill cries rang out.
The vermilion paper sedan chair followed the narrow path of light stretching from the Lighthouse, drifting toward the distant cluster of branch towers that resembled candles.
"Idiot! Hahaha!"
In the crowd, a huge Crow's head cackled.
It grew from the left shoulder of a burly man who stood with his arms crossed. He stared straight ahead, his expression cold, his muscles powerfully built.
"Young people don't know their place."
"Did he think the handbook's promise of safety applied to the Tower Master too?"
"Of course the handbook doesn't cover Tower Masters. But the Tower Master will have to pay some survival points for that move."
The crowd murmured among themselves.
"Brother, who's the big shot in that sedan chair?"
Wu Heng walked a dozen or so steps forward and stopped beside the man in the Gorilla mask to ask.
"That's the newly promoted Paper Person Tower Master from last month's instance. Only new Tower Masters still come to the main plaza."
Seeing that it was a customer, the man in the Gorilla mask casually explained.
"As expected of the Paper Person Tower Master—so imposing, so terrifying, with the makings of the strongest!"
Wu Heng exclaimed. After a moment, he asked the man in the Gorilla mask, "Bro, do you have any information about Tower Masters?"
"Don't talk nonsense. I don't."
The man in the Gorilla mask glanced around warily and answered in a cautious voice.
He quickly moved away from Wu Heng.
Seeing how wary he was, Wu Heng said nothing more. He decided to go back and look over the Lighthouse information first.
"Return to reality."
With a thought, Wu Heng returned to his room.
He looked out the window, then compared and read through the two books about the Lighthouse.
They only recorded some information about the first two stages. The so-called thousand tips were mostly filler—even things like not spitting on the ground.
Only a few were actually useful. One said that you could communicate with the Lighthouse and spend 500 survival points to apply for a personal room.
The personal room came with a Testing Room and an appraisal function. Once your strength tested at the first tier, you could learn the name of the next instance in advance and spend survival points to refresh the current instance world.
The first refresh cost 500 survival points, the second 1,000, and the cost doubled after that: 2,000, then 4,000.
Wu Heng looked through the supplementary information, then put it down with a sigh.
"Brother Duanmu, you didn't deserve to die like that!"
The two pieces of information said:
In The Old Corpse of the Mountain Village, there was a lake near the protagonist. Drinking its water could protect you from being possessed by ghosts.
In The First Commandment, grabbing a possessed person by the neck could restrain the ghost.
In 1408, you could escape the ghost by climbing out the window and going to room 1407.
The first piece contained two tips, and the second contained one.
But anyone who believed this information, entered those worlds, and followed its advice would probably die without even understanding how they had died.
Wu Heng couldn't understand why the Tower Masters who compiled the Lighthouse handbooks would deliberately spread such obviously deadly false information. The handbooks didn't mention Tower Masters at all.
But one thing was certain: he couldn't casually share what he knew about those fictional worlds. Otherwise, the Tower Masters might set their sights on him.
Wu Heng entered the Lighthouse again and touched the Lighthouse Mark with a thought.
"Unlock personal space."
[Spend 500 survival points to unlock personal space?]
"Yes."
[Survival points deducted successfully. Personal Lighthouse Space unlocked.]
'Remaining survival points: 7,697.'
A grave rose from the ground in front of Wu Heng. Its entrance opened, revealing a hole like a shimmering ripple, with no way to see inside.
He walked through the opening. Inside were only four plain walls. With a thought, Wu Heng changed the room's style to resemble the interior of Dean's villa.
He sat on the familiar sofa and touched the Lighthouse Mark.
"Enter the Testing Room."
The surroundings changed in an instant. He found himself on a barren yellow-earth plain that stretched beyond sight in every direction. Silence reigned, and the scene was bleak.
[You have entered the Testing Room. 100 survival points will be deducted per minute.]
Wu Heng brushed the dirt off his butt and stood up. This space had changed without warning.
He already knew from the handbook how testing worked. Whether it was healing, combat, firearms, recovery, digestion, or mental strength—even one-time destructive methods like nuclear bombs—the Lighthouse could assess your overall strength tier.
But a false strength tier wouldn't help you. It would only backfire, though the handbook didn't explain why.
Would you trade your collection and recommendation votes for two stainless-steel basins?
Before you continue