Watchtower

"Got it!"

Little Qiu hurriedly scrambled up from the Farmland and stumbled toward the open gate as fast as he could. This time, no Strange Entities charged into the Camp again.

When Little Qiu returned inside the City Wall, covered in mud and gasping for breath, and climbed the Stone Steps onto the wall, he found everyone looking at him. Their eyes held a complicated mix of admiration, respect, and...

He had never seen looks like those before.

Never in his entire life had he experienced a moment like this.

He involuntarily puffed out his chest, raised the object glowing white in his hand, and offered it to Chen Fan with a broad grin. "Station Master, I got it."

"Well done."

On the City Wall in the rainy night.

Chen Fan took the exotic treasure from Little Qiu with a complicated expression. "Why did you think to run toward the Farmland instead of back inside the City Wall?"

"There wasn't enough time."

Little Qiu's throat felt sore, perhaps because he had shouted too loudly earlier. Now that he was back, his legs felt weak and powerless. "The Strange Entities were faster than me, and they were closer to me. If I'd run toward the City Wall, I definitely wouldn't have gotten away."

"Even if they hadn't caught me, they'd definitely have breached the City Wall."

"Brother King has been good to me, and you took me in during the Rainy Season, Station Master. Everyone's trying so hard to survive it. I didn't want everyone to die because of me alone. If someone had to die, then just me would be enough."

"Besides, I thought the Arrow Towers must be steadily reducing their numbers. As long as I reached the traps and held out a little longer, maybe we'd make it through this crisis."

"..."

Chen Fan said little. He simply took the exotic treasure from Little Qiu, stepped forward, and patted his shoulder. "Your name is Little Qiu, right? You made a decisive call. You did very well this time."

In truth.

The wall would not have fallen and everyone died as Little Qiu had described.

If there hadn't been enough time, he would have closed the gate.

It was just...

He hadn't expected Little Qiu to handle it so perfectly. The decisive judgment was one thing, but most important was his willingness to sacrifice himself for others. In all honesty, very few people could have resisted running toward the City Wall in that situation simply out of fear of getting everyone killed.

He certainly couldn't have done it himself.

He could keenly sense that Little Qiu's actions had stirred something different in everyone's hearts. Their emotions showed openly now. If another crisis arose, perhaps others would make the same choice.

Humans were social creatures.

Emotions were contagious.

For now, no more Strange Entities had charged into the Camp. He narrowed his eyes slightly and looked into the darkness beyond the rainy night. He suspected what had just happened wasn't a coincidence. Could the timing really have been so perfect that the Strange Entities in the darkness attacked just as Little Qiu left the City Wall and reached the edge of the Camp?

And...

This wave of Strange Entities resembled Mantismen and moved extremely fast, even faster than the Bamboo-Pole Strange Entities in the first wave.

They clearly weren't suited to attacking walls, but to pursuit.

The Bamboo-Pole Strange Entities, on the other hand, stood just over three meters tall and were better suited to attacking walls.

He strongly suspected that the Strange Entity outside which had let out that eerie laughter at the start possessed some intelligence, could see the Camp's layout, and was ready to launch an encircling attack at any moment.

Still, it probably wasn't very intelligent—or rather, the Strange Entities it controlled probably weren't very intelligent.

Otherwise, they wouldn't have walked straight into the traps.

"..."

He lowered his gaze to the exotic treasure in his hand and narrowed his eyes slightly. It was a piece of Wraith Hide as thin as a cicada's wing, with a texture somewhat similar to the Ghosthide Map. Scarlet lines traced a building on its surface.

A building resembling an Arrow Tower.

Only taller.

And narrower.

It was a Building Blueprint, an extremely rare exotic treasure. Even among exotic treasures, Building Blueprints were unquestionably rare. This was also the first Building Blueprint he had obtained.

-

"Exotic treasure name": Building Blueprint.

"Exotic treasure grade": White Grade.

"Exotic treasure effect": Can be used to build a Watchtower. The Watchtower provides visibility up to 50 meters outside the Camp.

-

Without the slightest hesitation.

He immediately crushed the Building Blueprint in his hand. Unlike other Builders, he didn't need to study it. Once he crushed the blueprint, a new buildable structure, "Watchtower," appeared on the Endless Night Lord Panel deep in his mind. Building it cost only 10 eerie stones.

He still had 130 eerie stones.

The next moment—

The phantom of an extremely narrow tower, a full ten meters tall and formed from countless white lines, floated in the air. Ten eerie stones shattered in his palm, turned into milky liquid, and flowed into it.

The phantom tower gradually solidified and stood beside the Wooden Hut inside the wall.

Its base was only one meter long and one meter wide.

It was wider below and narrower above.

At its very top was an object resembling a luminous pearl.

The instant the Watchtower solidified, their field of vision expanded. The area around the Camp had been pitch-black, as unnerving as an abyss, but now the darkness within 50 meters beyond the Camp's edge turned pale gray.

Beyond 50 meters, the darkness remained thick.

Through the pale gray mist, they could clearly see hundreds of Strange Entities moving in groups, rapidly passing their Camp and heading deeper into the darkness, like a great animal migration.

They flashed past.

It was hard to make them out.

But...

Four Bamboo Pole Entities were carrying a blood-red sedan chair. Rather than joining this great migration, they remained planted thirty meters from the Camp, surrounded by another hundred Strange Entities.

There were three kinds in all.

Bamboo Pole Entities and Mantis Entities.

He had come up with those names himself. The third kind was the Monkey-Head Entities he had encountered at the beginning, and they were the fewest in number.

Among these Strange Entities, one Bamboo Pole Entity and one Mantis Entity were noticeably larger than the others of their kind.

"..."

Chen Fan took a deep breath. Standing on the Enclosing Wall, he looked into the Gray Fog beyond the Eerie Fire. The Watchtower had given him more information. Those 50 meters of visibility were an immense help.

At last, he understood what had happened.

Unless he was mistaken.

Those two larger Strange Entities were probably minor chiefs. The Monkey-Head Entities were the fewest because he had killed so many of them, and they had no minor chief because he had killed that one too.

After dying, it had even provided him with two exotic treasures: the Ghoststone Vein Seed and the Godslaying Spear.

The fellow inside the sedan chair was probably the one that had laughed at the start. After discovering its subordinate had died, it had come to take revenge on him.

Fortunately.

A flicker of relief crossed his mind. The Watchtower let him see exactly how many Strange Entities were passing his Camp. If all of them charged in without restraint, he would undoubtedly die!

There was no way he could hold them off.

Only this group of Strange Entities waited outside the Camp, itching to attack. All the others passing by ignored the Camp's existence, as though they were hurrying somewhere.

Two Level 2 Arrow Towers definitely wouldn't be enough anymore.

Back then, the two Level 2 Arrow Towers hadn't killed the Monkey-Head Wraith Chief on the spot. It had escaped the Camp and bled to death several dozen meters away. Now there were two chiefs like that, plus an even stronger major chief.

Level 2 Arrow Towers definitely wouldn't suffice.

He needed Level-3 Arrow Towers.

Fortunately, he had kept enough eerie stones to upgrade the Arrow Towers.