"I'll come back to you once you get your finger back."
The Soul Merchant was saying this and was about to turn around when Jiang Ran called him back.
"No need to wait."
"What, you're thinking of giving up without even trying? That won't do, the compass is..."
“No.” Jiang Ran opened his palm. “No need to waste time. I’ll exchange my own finger.”
"ah?"
"You heard me right, that's exactly what I mean."
"Interesting, interesting. Kid, you've got guts..."
The Soul Merchant smirked, took out a compass in one hand and a ghostly green dagger in the other.
"Don't worry, I guarantee you a painless service."
"Whatever, let's get started."
With the effect of the Thousand Jewel Seal: Sheep, injuries like severed fingers can be healed in no time. It's not that Jiang Ran is reluctant to attack other ghost storytellers, but finding people would take an unknown amount of time, and he would also have to find a way to kill them, which would be too much of a waste of time.
Jiang Ran wouldn't mind giving up some insignificant things if he could get the compass sooner and gain an advantage.
"Haha, looking forward to our next deal."
The Soul Merchant turned and disappeared into the black mist.
Jiang Ran got the compass, but the pointer pointed in the direction he had just walked. If he followed the compass, wouldn't he have to go back to the River Styx?
Jiang Ran shook his head: "Sure enough, the sense of direction is completely disrupted in the black fog. If you're close by, it's fine, but once you get a distance, you can't find your way around."
Just like the bell tolling earlier, it was impossible to tell which direction it was coming from.
Jiang Ran thought he was going in a straight line, but who knew how many turns he took along the way?
If you keep going like this, you'll eventually reach the edge of the deserted island.
"Miss Gwen?"
As Yu Cheng carried the soul lamp forward, a petite blue-haired loli walked towards her, which surprised her somewhat.
Gwen's presence here is, in Yu Cheng's view, equivalent to Jiang Ran's presence.
"Brother Jiang Ran? Are you there?"
“I got separated from Jiang Ran…” Gwen shook her head helplessly. “We were together at first, but he suddenly started walking forward as if he were possessed. No matter how I called him, he wouldn’t answer. I couldn’t see anything in the black fog, and soon he disappeared from sight.”
"Is that so?" Yu Cheng knew that the black fog was not just a simple obstruction of vision. Gwen's extraordinary eyesight was useless here, and Jiang Ran must have fallen into an illusion, which caused him to ignore Gwen even though she was right next to him.
"It's alright, Miss Gwen." Yu Cheng squatted down and rubbed Gwen's little head. In fact, she had wanted to do this for a long time.
"You can come with me for now, let's go find Brother Jiang Ran together!"
"Um."
To prevent the two from getting separated, Yu Cheng even held Gwen's little hand.
It's warm and soft, and feels amazing!
After taking a few steps forward, Yu Cheng stopped in place, squeezed Gwen's small hand twice, and then let go of her.
"What's wrong?"
"Stop pretending, you're not Miss Gwen."
Yu Cheng closed his eyes, rested his head on one hand, and leaned against the tree.
"Damn illusion... Why does this one feel so real?"
Gwen is a bizarre creature whose true form is just a doll. How could her hands have a temperature?
The last illusion that Yu Cheng encountered was the SSS-rank ghost storyteller from the land of cherry blossoms, Yamagami!
Yu Cheng was startled at the time, and her mind raced as she thought of how to deal with him, but "Yamagami" actually pointed his gun at her directly!
If it weren't for the strange stiffness in Yamagami's expression and movements, and his speech patterns, one wouldn't be able to tell that he was a construct of an illusion.
This time, Gwen's demeanor and movements were almost flawless. If it weren't for that tiny flaw, even if Jiang Ran were here, he might not be able to tell the difference between the real and the fake so quickly!
Yu Cheng asked herself honestly, if the previous "Yama no Ya" had been this accurate, she didn't know much about Yama no Ya to begin with, and she hadn't realized the existence of the illusion at that time. If all these factors were added together, she probably would have died there!
When she opened her eyes again, "Gwen" had disappeared.
"The illusion keeps intensifying? What are the factors? Time or location?"
In any case, we must be more vigilant against illusions in the future, as the rules say: we cannot trust everything.
"Cough cough."
Yu Cheng coughed lightly and continued walking forward.
Soon, she also discovered the first bounty poster.
[The wanted person: codenamed Joker]
[Reward: 100 (approximately 2.63 bottles of lamp oil; under standard lighting conditions with a radius of 5 meters, each bottle of lamp oil can keep the soul lamp burning for 20 minutes)]
[Description: The Joker is a cunning stealth operative. He is insidious and ruthless. Don't let him target you. Note that if you tear down this bounty poster, the Joker's hatred towards you will reach its peak, and he will actively hunt you down.]
Yu Cheng glanced at her dwindling lamp oil. Now, no matter how dangerous it was, she had no choice but to accept the offer.
Yu Cheng tore down the bounty poster and then pasted it back on the tree.
Tearing it off signifies accepting the bounty, and even if you stick it back on later, it won't change that fact.
The program suspects that the bounty order is a tool for locating the person being targeted, so it's always good to be a little more careful!
She crouched in the bushes nearby, waiting for the clown to arrive...
For a long time, nothing happened.
Yu Cheng felt a chill run through her body. She turned her head instantly and met a smiling clown mask!
Hello, miss!
A volatile butcher will charge forward recklessly, but a cunning clown will not.
The clown crept silently over, trying his best not to make a sound. When he found no one near the bounty poster, he immediately began searching the surroundings even more carefully.
A dagger was thrust at Yu Cheng!
A transparent light screen appeared, and Yu Cheng created a one-time life-saving prop, while using the momentum to roll and create distance!
"Go to hell!"
The clown raised his dagger and attacked again, his blood-soaked smiling mask looking especially terrifying in the light!
Yu Cheng took the water bottle from his waist and threw it at the clown!
The water bottle was slashed to pieces by the dagger, and black liquid spilled all over the clown!
Yu Cheng raised his umbrella to block the splashing black liquid!
"Ah! What, what is this thing?!"
The clown's body was extensively corroded, his dagger fell to the ground, and he knelt on the ground in agony, black smoke rising from his body as his flesh and blood evaporated!
"ah--"
The clown turned into a pool of blood.
"call......"
While marveling at the power of the Styx River, Yu Cheng breathed a sigh of relief.
That's right, the bottle contains water from the River Styx!
After arriving at the River Styx, Yu Cheng used her abilities to create a water bottle and fill it with some Styx water. She realized that this thing might be useful in some situations, and even if it wasn't, the cost of creating a water bottle was negligible.
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