In room after room, including rest areas, soft sounds of recitation could be heard.
In the distant Hub Town, inside the private compound inaccessible to ordinary people.
Boboli sat at the desk by the window, quietly waiting for the dusk to settle.
Time ticked by minute by minute.
[I have obtained a finalized Training Contract.]
A model materialized, with a glimmer of light flashing in an instant.
[I have acquired Training Contract: Dwight Croft’s Design Notes, Page 3, Completeness 100% .]
Boboli closed his eyes, and this contract was used directly without being displayed.
Disjointed pieces of information emerged in his mind.
A few minutes later, another two glimmers appeared.
[Training Contract: Dwight Croft’s Design Notes, Pages 4-5, Completeness 100%]
[Training Contract: Dwight Croft’s Design Notes, Page 3, Completeness 100%]
Boboli took a deep breath. He gradually applied these appearing finalized contracts and began activating Crystal Perception to relieve mental fatigue.
As the night grew deeper, more and more light points gathered, densely clustering around nine or ten o’clock.
[Commission Contract: Dwight Croft’s Design Concept Draft, 6 pages, Completeness 100%]
[Commission Contract: Yuwen Haowen’s Design Concept Draft, 5 pages, Completeness 100%]
[Commission Contract: Dwight Croft’s Design Concept Draft, 10 pages, Completeness 100%]
[Commission Contract: Principles of Demon Hero Hall Design, 10 pages, Completeness 100%]
[Commission Contract: Presentation and Modification of Mental Domains, 7 pages, Completeness 100%]
As more and more content converged and was applied, a comprehensive and profound design theory gradually took shape!
Though exhausted, Boppoli felt even greater excitement, thrill, and immense happiness upon experiencing it!
The halo that had already formed showed no signs of stopping.
Unnoticed by Boppoli, a faint light point flickered slowly among them.
It resembled the blinking “insert cursor” at the end of computer code.
……
Zhao Xuemei looked at Li Mi before her.
He was using a screwdriver to dismantle the core of an electrical device from Earth.
“Is there anything else you need to do?”
Li Mi’s slightly thin face lifted up.
“For now, we don’t need to do anything else but wait.”
Having said that, he continued dismantling the machine whose identity was unclear.
Zhao Xuemei thought for a moment.
“Earlier, you asked me to mention to Zhu Yin about joining the security team. I thought you were planning to visit other cities.”
“That’s just because the materials I purchased required it.”
Li Mi answered without lifting his head. Click — an old, worn component fell into his hand and was casually tossed into the box at his feet.
Mentioning the materials, Zhao Xuemei looked at him with curiosity:
“You’re really strange. You’re supposedly Yang Zicang’s liaison, yet you spend chronology to buy information about him from that fat guy.”
Li Mi smiled:
“Luo Bin has been providing intelligence to our headquarters for three years. Without it, given our city’s ranking, we’d have been utterly crushed by the Xiongying team long ago. Buying his information now allows us to keep our data up to date and maintain our client relationship.”
He plunged the screwdriver deeper into the slightly deformed gap between the iron sheets.
“So, no matter what he—now a key figure around Yang Zicang—sells, we have to buy it. Even if certain queries could get answers with just a question, that chronology must be spent. That’s a rule I’ve laid down.”
“Alright, I guess you have a point.”
Zhao Xuemei propped her chin on both hands, looking a bit bored.
Li Mi paused, raised his head, and looked at the woman before him with a gentle gaze.
“If you’re bored, go find those portrait artists in the Hub Town. Use the time while you still remember their faces to make some keepsakes.”
Zhao Xuemei let out a huff and shot a glance at the man.
……
The slightly flustered Director Gong returned from the telepathic field.
There was only a month and three days left, but the structures of the Green Lotus Crown were being dismantled more and more, with replacements that grew increasingly shoddy.
A man in a black velvet coat trimmed with gold edges pushed open the office door.
“Officer Gong, Jiaoma has been acting a bit strange these past few days.”
“How so?”
The section chief from the Spectrum Department, who had come to find Gong Huanwu, hesitated and said:
“As of this morning, in the past seven-plus days, she’s already applied to mobilize over a thousand Frequency-Loss Psychic Fields.”
Pfft! Gong Huanwu nearly spat out the water he had just drunk.
“That far exceeds any reasonable limit. We noticed the anomaly and came to ask—do we really need that many lost-mind frequencies for the progress of our Magic Hero Hall?”
“Alright, I understand!”
“And what about Squad Leader Jiaoma…”
“I haven’t been paying close attention to the matter over at Croft’s side recently. Perhaps that’s the case.”
The Section Chief thought for a moment and then said, “I see. Sorry for taking up your time, Secretary Gong.”
……
“That’s unbearable.”
Yang Zicang, on the verge of a mental breakdown, leaned against the wall as soon as he stepped out of the office, pressing the back of his head against it while panting heavily.
Passing colleagues and employees patted him on the shoulder.
“Hard work.”
“As expected of a comrade from the number one cleanup squad.”
“Stay strong. Your hard work keeps all of us going smoothly.”
Seeing that the crowd had mostly dispersed, Wang Dingshan approached Yang Zicang.
“I thought you guys were planning something special, but it’s been so long and nothing’s happened yet.”
Yang Zicang glanced at him: “Oh yeah, you’re still here.”
“Still here?” Wang Dingshan froze. “What do you mean by that?”
“Hmph. A good comrade from the First Operations Department.”
Yang Zicang reached into his pocket and pulled out a wooden arbutus pendant.
Wang Dingshan knew exactly where that thing came from; his eyes widened.
“What do you want?”
“Cover my shifts for two days while I sleep. I need a good rest—I can’t hold on anymore.”
Without further ado, he hung it around Wang Dingshan’s neck.
Jiaoma walked to the door and said, “Hey, just wear it. Go to bed early tonight. Preferably right after dinner.”
“You guys…” Wang Dingshan glanced back and forth between them and whispered, “Hey, what the hell are you all up to?”
Jiaoma turned her head to look, then suddenly darted out from behind the door, raising a finger to her lips.
From the wide, towering doorway, a green-skinned figure emerged. Croft cast a sidelong glance at them, then turned and walked off toward the other end of the corridor.
……
After dinner, once he felt reasonably settled, Wang Dingshan bid farewell to a few friends and returned to his own room.
Lying in bed, he placed the Demonic Nightmare by his pillow and pulled the thin blanket over himself.
“What the hell are these guys up to?”
He looked at the pendant on his chest—was he about to take part in some secret meeting now?
“They’re not secretly plotting some damn thing, are they?”
Before long, Wang Dingshan, wearing the wooden arbutus pendant, woke up from his dream.
On the cyan grass ahead, the girl was already bustling around a small table.
Here in this place, it manifested a glass tube with a shimmering spectrum. Although not an absolutely necessary item, the girl always felt that without it by her side, her heart could not find peace.
So, even if it was just an image, Jiaoma had manifested it.
She looked at the newly appeared Wang Dingshan: “Today, you’re the last one.”
“I’m the last?” Wang Dingshan pointed at himself. “There are others?”
Noticing Jiaoma’s smiling gaze toward the distance, the man turned his head and saw a boy’s back sitting on the ground at the far edge of a hillside slope.
It was a stranger.
“Who is that? Hey, you’re definitely up to something, aren’t you?”
Wang Dingshan curiously walked toward the edge of the slope. The grass beneath his feet gently slanted, revealing the world below the hill. When he reached the boy’s side, Wang Dingshan looked down in astonishment.
In the valley lay a winding city like a nine-curved corridor.
“This…”
Wang Dingshan turned his head toward Jiaoma.
The girl smiled and said, “Tonight, it’s not my spirit world.”
Boboli looked up at Wang Dingshan and said in even more fluent Chinese:
“Hello, nice to meet you. I am one of the directors of Park Myung Group. You can call me Boboli.”
Wang Dingshan turned his head in disbelief.
“You… since when did you get in touch with Yang Zicang’s teammate?”
He pointed to the spirit phantom below: “And, what in the world is that down there?”
The boy braced himself and stood up from the ground.
“This city is called ‘West City’.”
Boboli’s curly hair gently swayed in the wind, “Of course, it’s just the West City in my imagination.”
With a flick of his hand, the city vanished, and the boy turned to look at the person beside him.
“Thank you for existing, allowing my fantasy world to be manifested.”
Boboli walked toward the table where Jiaoma was seated.
Only then did Wang Dingshan realize that the boy before him did not possess the Right of Mental Manifestation.
“Hey, hey, explain yourselves clearly. What exactly are you trying to do?” Wang Dingshan chased after him from behind.
“We’re going to build our own Magic Hero Hall.” Standing with his back to him, the boy spoke in a calm but firm tone.
“Wha—t!”
Wang Dingshan felt as if struck by a thunderbolt.
A “Group Leader’s Badge” suddenly materialized in Jiaoma’s hand, and on the table, a phantom glass tube had patterns begin to fluctuate.
A psychic pressure, heavy and slow as rolling tides, radiated from her body.
The girl looked at the stunned Wang Dingshan and said, “Welcome to our ‘Magic Hero Hall Top-Secret Production Action Team.’ You absolutely cannot leak this information. From now on, you’re our fourth member.”
“Th—the fourth!”
Wang Dingshan felt dizzy. Four people trying to build a Magic Hero Hall?
“This is impossible.”
“Hmph. I don’t know if it’s possible to succeed, but I do know that if you don’t try, it’s never possible.”
Jiaoma waved her hand, and the various glowing spectacles produced by the fluctuating light scattered like projections across the space, even up into the sky.
She said solemnly, “Mr. Wang Dingshan, an elite employee of the First Action Department, please begin initiating and develop the scene transformation.”
“Hmph.” Wang Dingshan helplessly put his hands on his hips.
“Alright, alright. Maybe this is why we get to be selected into the Lost Illusion Company!”
With that, Wang Dingshan raised his hand and materialized his Action Team member card.
Golden lines lit up on the dark card face, shimmering like the trajectories of constellations.
Whiz! The lines spread outward like layers of a complex armillary sphere.
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