Hongdou

Biodata

Power Progression

Background

Su Bai created Hongdou inside his divine kingdom from a bloodstained school uniform associated with Red Star Middle School, giant rat corpses, and accumulated resentment. The system initially identified her as an unnamed “Midnight Red-Clad” with two core rules: Death Gaze and Resentment Possession 5.

He named her Hongdou after referring to red beans growing in southern lands and contrasting that image with her birth in the wasteland. She appeared pleased with the name, and the system immediately locked her loyalty at absolute obedience 5.

Hongdou became part of the divine kingdom rather than remaining an independently surviving Anomaly. Consequently, the City Appearance Bureau’s inspection detected extreme contamination but no separate Anomaly life-form 10.

Appearance

• Red clothing: Initially wears tattered red clothes; later appears in a vivid scarlet bridal gown 22 39.
• Hair: Long black hair covers her face in early descriptions and reaches her waist in later appearances, moving without wind 22 39.
• Face and eyes: Early scenes describe pitch-black eyes without whites; later passages describe a pale, featureless face that nevertheless seems to “look” at targets 9 19 39.
• Skin: Her face and slender hands are deathly pale and bloodless 13 31.
• Third-tier changes: Solidified black resentment burns along her gown’s hem, while her hair moves as though alive 47.

Personality

Hongdou is quiet and immediately responsive to Su Bai’s commands. She commonly waits beside or behind him until summoned, communicates through slight head movements, and carries out practical instructions such as retrieving an enemy’s spatial ring without damaging it 19 22 28.

Despite her absolute obedience, she displays humanlike reactions: apparent pleasure at receiving her name and mockery when ordered to evade Gu Chengfeng’s berserkers. Against enemies, she uses chilling laughter, exaggerated smiles, and mournful murmurs; she also follows Su Bai’s orders to prolong captives’ fear before killing them 5 8 27.

Abilities & Skills

Death Gaze

Her first core rule attacks through the soul and causality, twisting a target’s neck and, under its original description, devouring their soul 5 17.

• Original trigger: After the midnight bell rings, anyone who hears her singing must not turn around. Turning triggers the fatal neck twist; Su Bai can ring the bell at any time within his divine kingdom’s domain 5.
• Counterplay to the original trigger: Recognizing the pattern and refusing to turn prevents that version of the rule from activating 7.
• Additional activation: Directly looking at Hongdou triggers an explicitly identified additional Death Gaze check against Venomous Bee. Later battles also show direct-gaze judgments 22 39 45.
• Nonhuman targets: An incomplete neck does not prevent activation. Against Resentment Real Estate Development, the rule instead twists its enormous core eyeball 15 17.
• Higher-tier resistance: Before her breakthrough, Blood Wolf temporarily resists the neck-twisting effect. After she reaches third tier, the exceptionally resilient Mist Lord also withstands immediate execution, requiring support from Su Bai’s other horrors 45 47.

Resentment Possession

Her second core rule allows her to become a red shadow and possess enemies whose fear exceeds 50%, bypassing physical defenses 5 7.

• Forces possessed enemies to attack their allies, spreading panic and creating further eligible targets 7.
• Overrides Gu Chengfeng’s commands to his possessed berserkers 7.
• Depends on continued fear: Berserk Blood Boiling reduces the berserkers’ fear to zero, expelling Hongdou and ending her control 8.

Ghostly Movement and Intangibility

Hongdou floats, moves as a red blur, and can fade from one location before appearing elsewhere within Su Bai’s horror domains 15 17 22.

• Psychic-energy bullets pass through her without causing damage during Venomous Bee’s attack 21.
• Appears through Su Bai’s divine kingdom rifts to intercept threats, including a mutated dog and Wang Meng’s punch 13 39.
• Enters the Thirteenth Step’s hidden maze to execute trapped enemies 22.
• Her speed is not an absolute defense: the Benevolent Heart Director’s teleporting chainsaw strike reaches Su Bai before she can return to protect him 32.

Physical Strength and Rule Suppression

Despite her intangible form, Hongdou can exert substantial physical force and interfere with hostile rules 15 21 31.

• Bends the Resentment Contractor’s heavily contaminated rebar with her bare hands 15.
• Knocks Venomous Bee onto the Thirteenth Step, forcing him into its labyrinth 21.
• Catches and crushes the causality-based scalpel produced by Benevolent Heart Hospital’s Forced Surgery rule 31.
• Stops Wang Meng’s punch, described as carrying the force of ten thousand jin 39.
• Becomes a vast red net to restrain the Benevolent Heart Director; her resentment corrodes its coat while the other horrors help interrupt its self-destruction 33.
• Holds open Gu Chengfeng’s divine kingdom passage until Su Bai orders her to release it 9.

Known Escape Conditions

Her original system profile lists two survival openings 5:

• Call her name from life while she sings: Dazes her for three seconds. The passage does not identify that former name.
• Close one’s eyes and take thirteen steps backward before she attacks: Temporarily escapes her lock-on.

Equipment / Associated Items

• Rusty bronze bell — Purchased by Su Bai and installed atop the abandoned school building as Hongdou’s trigger medium. Its toll initiates the original singing-based Death Gaze sequence 5 6.

Relationships

• Su Bai — Creator and master. Her loyalty is locked to absolute obedience; he directs her attacks, supplies advancement resources, and later considers buying her new clothes 5 36 37 49.
• The Thirteenth Step / Thirteen Steps — Complementary defensive urban legend. Its labyrinth traps and weakens enemies before Hongdou attacks. Their connection is described as instinctive resonance between rules, not affection 17 19 22.
• Midnight School Bus — Fellow combat asset. Hongdou rides in its front passenger seat and is assigned to watch its fourteen evil spirits; they later cooperate against the Benevolent Heart Director and Mist Lord 28 29 33 47.

Story Role / Major Arcs

Divine Battle Against Gu Chengfeng

• Kills approximately a thousand berserkers in ten seconds through the bell-and-song trap, then switches to possession when Gu Chengfeng orders his troops not to turn around 6 7.
• After Berserk Blood Boiling expels her, follows Su Bai’s order to evade the troops and lead them through the abandoned school building. She resumes killing once their berserk state ends 8.
• Prevents Gu Chengfeng from severing the connecting passage while Su Bai’s kingdom drains his resources, releasing it only on command 9.

Sunshine Waterfront Investigation

• Protects Su Bai from a mutated stray dog and kills the second-tier Resentment Contractor, enabling the rescue of three trapped Bureau agents 13 15.
• Twists the core eyeball of the peak second-tier Resentment Real Estate Development, leaving it vulnerable to absorption by Su Bai’s divine kingdom 17.

Gu Family Assassination Attempts

• Forces Venomous Bee into the Thirteenth Step, later executes him inside the maze, and retrieves his spatial ring for Su Bai 21 22.
• Helps torment five captured assassins to extract fear before their deaths during Su Bai’s warehouse trap 27.

Benevolent Heart Hospital

• Accompanies Su Bai aboard the Midnight School Bus and protects him from Forced Surgery 28 31.
• Uses her singing to trigger mass Death Gaze executions among the director’s mutant corpses 32.
• Joins the bus and staircase in suppressing the director’s attempted self-destruction, allowing Su Bai to finish it 33.

Mist Canyon Assessment

• Intercepts and kills Wang Meng, a Gu Family sleeper agent, then later instantly kills Poison Wolf’s third-tier Blood Shadow Wolf King 39 43.
• Holds Blood Wolf in a Death Gaze stalemate until the Thirteen Steps removes his arm and disrupts his divine power. She then breaks his neck and advances to third tier from the resulting spoils 45.
• In her first third-tier battle, immobilizes and twists the Mist Lord’s skull while the Midnight School Bus attacks. Their combined assault helps force the creature into containment by the Forbidden Hospital 46 47.

Notable Quotes

“It hurts so much...” 15 22 45 47

“Stay... keep me company...” 9

“The sky is dark... the rain is coming...”
“Who is behind you... watching you...” 17