“Teacher Wang, how does the crashed fierce ghost you mentioned do it?”
“An extreme conflict of rules, or suppression by a powerful supernatural force—both are very difficult.
Suppression by a powerful supernatural force isn’t something you can come into contact with right now. As for an extreme conflict of rules, that differs greatly for every person and every ghost. It has to be handled according to the situation; it needs to be ‘customized.’ And two ghosts whose rules can clash to that extreme are also very hard to encounter.
Your best choice right now is to find a second ghost suitable for you, and establish a basic balance with your ghost eyes, extending the time before your fierce ghost revives.
There’s no need to pursue a crash caused by extreme conflict too much at this stage. I can’t help you much with that. You’ll have to try and explore it yourself.”
“All right. Oh, right, Teacher Wang, this walkie-talkie was on Zhou Zheng. I happened to come across it earlier in that old man’s ghost domain.”
After thinking for a moment, Yang Jian took out the satellite phone he had been carrying and handed it to Wang Liang.
Wang Liang took it and, looking at the satellite phone belonging to the Ghost Controller Headquarters in his hand, decided to keep it with him for now.
He needed to come into contact with a large number of supernatural incidents as soon as possible, accumulate eerie points, and control the film-and-television ghost.
Going out alone to look for supernatural incidents and accumulate eerie points would be like groping around in the dark.
Wang Liang knew where that supernatural location, the Caesar Hotel, was, and it could serve as a future target of action.
But that place was very dangerous. Even an alternative restart wouldn’t necessarily guarantee safety. He couldn’t rely solely on that place to obtain eerie points.
As for other places, the supernatural had not yet fully erupted across the world. If one person truly wanted to encounter a supernatural incident, it wasn’t exactly that easy.
He was unwilling to become Ye Zhen’s underling in the Supernatural Forum. Given enough time, it would be more like Ye Zhen becoming his underling.
Building his own force was also very difficult and troublesome right now.
It wasn’t something that could be accomplished with strength alone. He would need to recruit people and spend time spreading out a vast information network. Only a fully developed force like that would be meaningful to Wang Liang.
Although an official organization like the Ghost Controller Headquarters often did not treat people as people, through the Headquarters, Wang Liang could indeed obtain information and resources more quickly, preparing for his future development.
There was no need to abandon it outright and run off to develop in the wild. It was just that even if he became a city handler, he still had to negotiate conditions with the Headquarters. He wouldn’t be taken advantage of.
By becoming a city handler, he could make use of its powerful information channels to quickly come into contact with some supernatural incidents, thereby accumulating eerie points and obtaining the descent location of the film-and-television ghost.
Wang Liang had not forgotten the system’s reminder back then. If he failed to collect enough eerie points in time and missed the film-and-television ghost that was about to descend most recently, then sooner or later in the future, that overlooked film-and-television ghost would come looking for him.
A film-and-television ghost, no matter which movie or drama it came from, would probably have terrifying potential once it appeared in the world of Mysterious Revival.
Allowing it to grow freely would definitely bring him enormous trouble in the future.
However, Wang Liang would not obediently be a traditional city handler, working tirelessly like an employee, going wherever he was pointed, receiving a fixed salary, and even having to hand over fierce ghosts in exchange for pitiful bonuses that were completely mismatched with the market value of fierce ghosts.
Even for the sake of eerie points, he did not want to do that. It wasn’t worth it. It was too stupid.
This method was simply treating ghost controllers as less than human. It was caused by the fact that the supernatural had just erupted and the Headquarters’ systems were still imperfect and unreasonable.
So Wang Liang was still more inclined to deal with them through hired cooperation, mutually benefiting each other.
He was not afraid that the Headquarters would refuse. Counting the ghost blood, he had already controlled two crashed fierce ghosts. As long as he showed some value, the Headquarters likely would not reject him. The requirements he would raise would not be too excessive.
“Fine, I’ll hold onto it for now. Before long, an official organization of ghost controllers may contact you. Whether you join or not is up to you.”
Hearing Wang Liang’s words, Yang Jian looked thoughtful. He suspected it was probably the organization Zhou Zheng had belonged to, so he nodded, indicating that he understood.
After the two finished talking, they gathered together with the others again.
At this moment, Yang Jian took out his phone and pulled up a forum website to show everyone.
“I almost forgot. You’d better go online less recently, especially don’t read ghost stories on this forum. See that audio file up there? Whatever you do, don’t click it. Be careful, or Qian Wanhao’s grandfather might come looking for you.”
“Quick, take it away, take it away.”
“Back off, back off, back off~!”
On the forum Yang Jian opened, there was a photo of the Knocking Ghost. When Zhang Wei and the others saw it, they immediately cried out that they couldn’t take it.
Wang Liang, however, memorized that website address and prepared to buy a new phone in a while, then seize the time before the website was sealed to save the audio file.
This was a powerful weapon capable of summoning the Knocking Ghost. If used well, it could also be considered a trump card.
Thinking of this, Wang Liang suddenly felt as though he had forgotten something. He looked left and right, and only when his gaze swept over the bluish-black handprint on Wang Shanshan’s neck did he remember what he had forgotten.
The ghost slave mark, the ghost infant, the Starving Ghost!
It seemed that the plot after he left had not changed. Earlier, in the Knocking Ghost’s ghost domain, after Zhou Zheng died, the ghost infant that crawled out of his stomach had attacked Wang Shanshan as usual.
Although Yang Jian had saved her in time, it had left behind a ghost slave mark.
With this mark present, the ghost infant would follow the sense it gave off and continuously attack Wang Shanshan.
This also gave Wang Liang an idea.
He planned to go capture the ghost infant. It would be something done in passing.
Obtaining eerie points from a fierce ghost like this, one he was familiar with and easy to contact, was one aspect.
Another was that unless, even while knowing the original plot, he still watched with his eyes wide open as the Starving Ghost incident erupted, causing an entire city to nearly fall, almost everyone dying, he was definitely going to try to cut off the fuse.
It wasn’t some saintly compassion. It was simply because he still counted as a person—at least for now.
Although if the ghost infant was captured, Yang Jian’s ghost child would be gone, that was not something impossible to resolve. Many supernatural products seemed accidental on the surface, but in reality were inevitable. There would always be a way.
Moreover, Yang Jian—or rather, the future Yang Jian—was the ultimate safeguard for everything. But if he did nothing purely for the sake of that safeguard, then he might as well commit suicide right now and stop causing trouble for this world.
But Wang Liang obviously could not possibly have the foolish thought of, “I’m very sorry for causing everyone trouble. I’ll go kill myself right away.”
Once he had an idea, after everyone had recovered, Wang Liang took several one-inch photos from the pocket of his coat and handed them out to the seven students present. They were mainly for Yang Jian and Wang Shanshan.
After Yang Jian returned home, he would encounter a Newspaper Ghost capable of altering people’s memories. The timing was very tight, and this was also a good opportunity to leech a wave of eerie points. Letting it pass would be unreasonable.
He could also conveniently try to capture the Newspaper Ghost. A newspaper that could alter people’s memories was a good thing. He wanted it.
However, Wang Liang would only use Sadako’s curse to attack from a distance. After all, the Newspaper Ghost could invade consciousness and alter memories.
Before he had corresponding means of resistance, he did not want to face the Newspaper Ghost head-on.
He just didn’t know whether attacking remotely like this would allow him to gain eerie points. This was also an opportunity to experiment.
These ghosts were all, at the very least, fierce ghosts whose abilities and locations he knew because he had read the original work. They were relatively safe and within his grasp. If he didn’t leech eerie points from them, it would really be hard to justify.
Seven people, seven one-inch photos. That was equivalent to the seven chances Wang Liang gave them, and could be considered an explanation to his predecessor.
This book is taking the Headquarters’ city handler and captain route, because I feel titles like Captain Wang and Captain So-and-so are relatively cool.
Of course, there’s also a main reason: with the way this system works, no matter how you look at it, joining the Headquarters makes it easier to come into contact with supernatural incidents and quickly accumulate eerie points. It’s more convenient and more reasonable.
But I definitely won’t write the protagonist as someone’s dog or an honest pushover. The protagonist’s image at the Headquarters will definitely be the mysterious, powerful, and awe-inspiring type.
Rather than saying he joins the Headquarters, in reality he’s only using the Headquarters’ name, and what he adopts is a hired cooperation system.
If even that is unacceptable, then there’s nothing to be done. A book is destined to have a hard time satisfying every reader’s tastes.
As for coming into contact with the Newspaper Ghost and capturing the ghost infant, please don’t dislike me for mixing in the original plot. These are familiar fierce ghosts that appear around this point in time. If he doesn’t come into contact with them quickly to obtain eerie points, that would truly be unreasonable. Once that’s done, he’ll head to Da’an City.
And regarding capturing the ghost infant, some people might criticize it as saintly and unnecessary.
But I think that if I arranged for the protagonist to capture the ghost infant, absorb the eerie points, and then release it again, allowing the Starving Ghost incident to erupt in Dachang City as usual, I believe even more people would criticize me then than those criticizing the saintly choice.
It’s hard to please everyone. Only when you truly write a book do you discover all kinds of problems. Even earlier, when the protagonist casually shouted during the confrontation with the Starving Ghost, some people said he was trying to play the hero.
I feel that at this level, it shouldn’t count. It was something said in passing, and I also wrote that he was influenced by an inexplicable emotion.
In any case, I’ll do my best to write this book well.