Chapter 148 Hidden Room on the Fourth Floor: An Apartment Renovated for City God Temple Worshippers...
Zhou Fangdong replied to the message sent by Duan Wenyu, saying that he would reserve a room for this young investigator who was eager to rent a room.
Now that the cursed ghost has been dealt with, there's no need for the investigator to stay in the apartment to observe. So Zhou Fangdong opened the cleaning staff recruitment page and had the cleaners escort the investigator out of the apartment.
After all, the Bureau of Supervision is currently short-staffed. Although this investigator likes the apartment, he still has to work and can't stay in the apartment all the time.
After dealing with the things he had forgotten, Zhou Fangdong continued the apartment renovation work.
He currently has 185,000 ghost coins on hand, which is more than enough.
The first step is to identify and address any omissions or deficiencies on other floors.
The floors and ceilings from the first to the third floor have been finished, but the walls on these floors are not yet finished; only the wall where the tenant's door is located has been renovated.
Each floor requires renovation of four walls, and each wall costs 5,000 ghost coins, meaning each floor would require an additional 15,000... A mere 45,000 ghost coins is manageable.
With his vast wealth, Zhou Fangdong waved his hand and, without the slightest hesitation, ordered the walls of all three floors to be painted clean.
These walls together gave a total of 339 decoration points.
The achievements page had just given him a [Apartment Decoration - String Lights] worth 20 decoration points, which Zhou Fangdong casually hung on the wall of the first-floor tenant's room.
After hanging the document, Zhou Fangdong opened the floor plan to take a look.
In the pixelated preview page, a row of fairy-like string lights appeared above the doors of the first-floor tenants' rooms. Unfortunately, these strings of lights were indeed the same as described in the decoration description—ordinary warm yellow light—and the color could not be changed.
Other people sell string lights that change color and flashing frequency with the touch of a switch, but this system's is too monotonous. No wonder it's given away for free; if it were actually placed in the [Decorations] section of the home improvement interface, it definitely wouldn't sell.
As usual, Zhou Fangdong complained about the system's aesthetics before starting to make sweeping changes to the fourth floor's renovation.
The three floors below were all being renovated according to the system's schedule, and it's time for him to take charge of the fourth floor, since he is the apartment landlord.
After finishing the renovation of the walls of the three floors below, he still had 140,000 ghost coins in hand.
Zhou Fangdong clicked on [Ceiling] to check how much other colors of ceiling would cost.
He fell silent after reading it.
The unscrupulous merchant system is robbing people again...
The simple white ceiling on the renovation page costs only 7,500 yuan, but if you change it to another color, the price doubles.
The starry sky-style ceiling that Zhou Fangdong had his eye on, which included neon strips and a disco ball, was actually selling for 75,000 ghost coins.
...Aesthetic freedom and the pressure to save money are at odds.
After a long silence, Zhou Fangdong finally leaned towards his savings account.
There's really no need to make it too fancy. Changing the color won't add much to the overall aesthetic; plain white is perfectly fine. If it feels too monotonous, you can always add more decorations later to adjust it.
After spending 7,500 and 20,000 Ghost Coins to finish renovating the walls and ceiling of the fourth floor, Zhou Fangdong belatedly felt a pang of heartache as he looked at his rapidly shrinking Ghost Coin balance and decided that the renovation project could end there.
He still has 112,500 ghost coins left. He should keep some ghost coins in savings in case he needs money urgently in the future.
The system believes there shouldn't be any major issues requiring the host to keep 110,000 ghost coins for emergencies.
[If you're really short on money, you can also try to rob the auction house; there are still 100,000 ghost coins there.]
Upon hearing the system's explanation, Zhou Fangdong corrected it, "The auction is my business. How can taking my savings be considered robbery?"
[Sorry, the system used the wrong wording. Correction: The host still has 100,000 in savings at the auction, which can be withdrawn at any time when needed. The host does not need to worry too much about the Ghost Coin balance.]
[A new feature will be unlocked when your renovation value reaches 3000. Please keep up the good work, host!]
Zhou Fangdong checked the apartment's renovation value, which was currently 2695, indeed almost reaching 3000.
Let's pick a few more decorations and try to keep the expenses under 12,500.
He opened the [Decorations] interface and started choosing ceiling lights for the hallway where the tenant's room was located.
The first and second floors have ordinary ceiling lights, while the flower-shaped ceiling light on the third floor was a gift from the system. All of them are very simple and do not quite match the style of Liwan Apartment.
After looking around, Zhou Fangdong finally settled on a ceiling light shaped like a vertical pupil and a ceiling light shaped like a human face.
He previewed the lighting effects of the two lamps on the decorations page, but felt that the orange-red light of the eyeball lamp was too common, so he finally chose the face lamp that emitted a cyan light.
Speaking of which, back when the ghost that occupied the fourth-floor corridor was still around, the corridor was covered in blue light. Although this cyan light has a slightly greenish tint and is lighter than blue light, it should still give the ghost in the corridor a sense of homecoming.
These creatively designed ceiling lights aren't expensive. Although they cost twice as much as regular lights, they're only 200 ghost coins each, which is affordable.
Zhou Fangdong selected five different faces and placed them on the ceiling of the apartment corridor, increasing the decoration value by 100.
The current renovation cost is 2795... almost 3000.
Zhou Fangdong spent another 500 ghost coins to install a cool skull wall lamp that emits pink and purple light in the fourth-floor corridor, and spent another 1,000 ghost coins to buy neon light strings and upside-down man light strings to hang in the fourth-floor corridor and hallway.
The wall lamp gave 60 decoration points, and with the two string lights giving 160 decoration points, the total decoration points reached 3015. The Ghost Coin balance was also kept at 110,000, perfect.
I wonder what 3000 decoration points will unlock. I hope the system won't disappoint him.
[Renovation value detected: 3,000. Reward: Keys to the hidden rooms on the third and fourth floors.]
Two keys appeared out of thin air and automatically merged with the landlord's key.
Two hidden rooms on two floors have been unlocked... Judging from this trend, there should be hidden rooms on every floor.
Zhou Fangdong planned to check the hidden room on the fourth floor first.
The hidden rooms on the first and second floors are all in the hallway. As usual, he went to the fourth floor hallway and began to search the walls.
As he walked to the center of the corridor, a red light flashed on the wall, outlining a simple wooden door.
Zhou Fangdong pushed open the wooden door and went inside.
The hidden room was much cleaner than he had imagined; it had clearly been renovated and cleaned, unlike the bloody and filthy hidden room on the second floor.
The room wasn't big, only about 30 square meters, and it was divided into two parts.
Upon entering, you'll see a desk and chair placed in the center of the room.
To the left of the desk, against the wall, is a closed compartment with the door tightly shut, resembling a makeshift changing room.
Several open books lay on the table, their pages slightly curled up, as if their owner had only left temporarily and would return at any moment to continue reading.
Zhou Fangdong approached the desk, intending to see what books were on it, but as soon as he got close, his attention was drawn to something under the desk.
The lower half of this desk is enclosed by a wooden partition, creating a secluded space. If someone is sitting here, only their upper body can be seen from the doorway.
Now, this hidden space under the table has been turned into a drawer by someone and is filled with clutter.
There are too many things, and I don't know where to start.
Zhou Fangdong temporarily abandoned checking the clutter under the table and first looked through the books on the table.
These are game setting collections and books related to game design, all of which are management games that Zhou Fangdong is particularly interested in.
These books must have been read frequently, with many annotations on each page.
Looking at the familiar handwriting on the page, Zhou Fangdong paused for a moment, then picked up a pen from the side and wrote the same sentence on the page.
...They are 90% similar, clearly written by the same person.
This must be a place he used to live in.
Thinking of this, Zhou Fangdong turned around and walked to the small room that looked like a changing room, and opened the door.
Inside, there was an iron clothes rack with many familiar-looking black funeral clothes and black suits hanging on it.
The black shroud and brass pendant he wore in the photo were exactly the same. The black suit was also the same style as the blood-stained suit in his wardrobe.
Zhou Fangdong used the [Heavenly Eye] skill to appraise the clothes and found that they were all very ordinary, with no talent bonuses and no inventory.
Seeing this, he returned to his desk and began tidying up the clutter under it.
The mess was just like the pile of eerie items on his desk... It seems his habit of leaving things lying around hasn't changed.
Zhou Fangdong sat in his chair, taking out the pile of junk from under his desk and using his [Heavenly Eye] skill to appraise it.
Hmm, the waist tokens of the day-roaming deity and night-roaming deity (damaged), several sets of ghost soldier uniforms (tattered), a broken soul-binding lock, a broken mourning staff, an extinguished soul-guiding lamp, wooden shackles of ghost messengers (damaged), a broken City God's seal, a broken horse-slaying sword, a broken bull-head fork, a ghost-slaying sword (damaged), a judge's pen (damaged)...
By the time Zhou Fangdong reached the end, he was sweating bullets.
These items all seem to be related to the underworld...
I don't know why they're all damaged. Anyway, it definitely wasn't him who did it. He's just a pragmatist who collects junk, and he probably picked these up from the trash can.
【Host……】
"Alright, system, shut your mouth. You don't need to add any settings here."
Zhou Fangdong sifted through the pile of junk and picked out all the equipment related to the City God Temple, intending to study whether there was a way to repair it. If it could be repaired, he would equip his City God Temple staff with it.
After making his selection, Zhou Fangdong said to the system, "System, please designate the hidden room on the fourth floor as [Landlord's Domain]."
This feature was unlocked a long time ago, but he has never used it.
Zhou Fangdong can freely designate any room in the apartment as his landlord's domain, expanding his birthplace room. The landlord's domain belongs exclusively to him, and neither humans nor ghosts are allowed to enter.
[Renovation successful! The hidden room on the fourth floor has been upgraded to [the landlord's room]]
The [Return] skill defaults to returning to the first-floor room. To change this, please adjust the skills in the character attribute panel.
The location of the [Return] skill doesn't need to be changed. He designated this area as the landlord's territory mainly because tenants and ghosts can enter after the hidden room is opened. He just doesn't want others to enter this room.
The hidden room on the fourth floor had quite a lot of items, so he needed to process them first. He'd leave the hidden room on the third floor for later and look at it when he had some free time tonight.
After inspecting the hidden room, Hou San's furniture had not yet been delivered, so the rental process for room 306 could not proceed for the time being.
Zhou Fangdong originally wanted to clear out another room for the investigator before Hou San returned.
But before he could leave the hidden room on the fourth floor, a notification suddenly popped up on the City God Temple page.
[A large number of worshippers have been detected praying for the same thing at both the City God Temple and the Linjiang District Temple. Should we go and handle this?]
Zhou Fangdong sat back down in his chair and opened the City God's page.
The City God Temple, which had been transformed into a multi-story building, had two rows of pixelated figures lined up outside the main hall.
A row of large incense burners lined up at the entrance to offer incense, while another row stood at the entrance of the main hall.
In the lower right corner of the City God Temple page, there is a record of the historical activities of worshippers. Zhou Fangdong clicked on it and checked the information inside.
[Ordinary citizens who come to offer incense and pray for blessings will have their incense points increased by 10.]
A citizen possessed by supernatural forces requests protection. The temple keeper grants the City God's decree, the supernatural forces are dispelled, and the incense offering value increases by 100.
[A famous movie star comes to offer incense and pray for blessings, incense value +50, triggering a promotional buff, doubling the number of worshippers for three days]
[Ordinary citizens come to offer incense and pray for blessings, incense value +10 - if a citizen prays twice within half a day, they may evolve into a devout believer, and a mark will be automatically added.]
[A passionate admirer of an investigator comes to offer incense and pray for blessings, increasing incense offering value by 30. Special worshippers may lower an investigator's mood, affecting their work efficiency; a marker will be automatically added.]
[When the incense offering value reaches 200, new equipment in the City God Temple, namely the Holy Grail and the Fortune Sticks, will be unlocked and automatically placed.]
The City God Temple has added divination by tossing divination blocks as a service.
[Citizens troubled by love come to cast divination blocks and shake the fortune-telling tube; the temple keeper is interpreting the fortunes...]
[The temple keeper's lack of proficiency in interpreting divination slips has significantly lowered the public's satisfaction level, and this worshipper is about to be permanently lost...]
[The temple keeper, whose fortune-telling failed, summoned the Director of the Inspection Bureau. The Director of the Inspection Bureau's inherent prestige buff increased the citizens' trust, the citizens' mood improved, and the citizens began to offer incense and pray for blessings, increasing the incense offering value by 10.]
[Unlock the temple keeper training function; you can train temple keepers to increase their proficiency.]
Zhou Fangdong temporarily skipped the newly released feature of training temple priests and continued scrolling down through the City God's historical records.
The following are records of citizens offering incense and praying for blessings. The City God Temple is located in the office building in front of the Supervision Bureau, so most of the citizens who come to offer incense are in a state of being 'possessed by supernatural forces', and the incense value of the City God Temple increases particularly rapidly.
The City God Temple, which Zhou Fangdong opened last night, officially opened for business this morning, and in just one morning, it gained more than two thousand incense offerings.
After scrolling down for a while, he finally found the record that the system had mentioned of a large number of worshippers praying for the same event.
While the citizens pray with their eyes closed in front of the City God statue, they do not speak, but Zhou Fangdong can see the inner thoughts of those pixelated figures, and all the worshippers' prayer records are also preserved in the historical record.
Zhou Fangdong initially thought that these citizens had all encountered the same supernatural event, so the system prompted him to decide whether he wanted to handle it personally.
However, after reading the thoughts of these petty people, Zhou Fangdong felt somewhat helpless.
...What they were praying for was that the City God would bless them so that they could successfully snag tickets to a fan meeting of a certain idol.
What's so unusual about fans scrambling for tickets? Does he really need to handle this personally? Does he expect him to spend his own savings to buy tickets for worshippers? These pixelated figures aren't his tenants; he's not going to waste resources on them.
But the system wouldn't be so bored as to pop up a reminder about something like this... so there must be something else fishy about this ticket-grabbing thing.
Thinking of this, Zhou Fangdong directly focused his consciousness on the nightmare clone inside the statue in the City God Temple.
He decided to see for himself whether there was anything unusual about the worshippers who were begging for tickets to the City God Temple.
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