Everyone turned to look.
A bright red sedan chair adorned with two pairs of white banners suddenly appeared in the square.
Four maids, dressed in long pink dresses, their movements stiff, their pale faces painted with red rouge, carried the chair with a swift, almost ethereal pace.
The singing voice emanated from the four maids.
The crowd quickly scattered, making way.
"Get out of the way!"
"Yeah, buddy, let's get out of the way."
The gorilla-masked man who sold Benjamin the manual dodged aside while simultaneously calling out to them.
Seeing this, Benjamin also quickly moved aside with the others.
His expression was somewhat strange. Wasn't this the song "Ghost Bride," the background music from the movie *Mr. Vampire*?
"What's there to be afraid of? The square is a safe area. They've just gone through a few more scenario world than us. We're all the same. If we hide now, retreating once will lead to retreating countless times, and we'll lose our resolve!
Lynas saw those around him scattering as the sedan chair, still some distance away, and he snorted coldly.
His fearless aura shone through as he calmly continued flipping through the booklet.
'It's a female ghost seeking her lover!'
'I see...I see...I see...my heart is pounding!'
The sedan chair slowly approached with the singing...
Benjamin's superhuman eyesight allowed him to see the details of the sedan chair.
The joints of the sedan chair were gently tied with U-shaped straps, the sides were smooth as glue, and the carrying poles were neither wood nor iron.
The four maids carrying the sedan chair had sharp, angular clothes that wouldn't straighten even when they moved, and their faces were painted with colors and shadows.
These were clearly four paper figures and a paper sedan chair.
Benjamin retreated again, hiding far behind the gorilla-masked man.
Lynas stood calmly in place, his back to the sedan chair, left arm crossed over his right chest, right hand holding a manual.
He stood ramrod straight, his brows furrowing and relaxing intermittently, seemingly engrossed in some reading.
The sedan chair paused slightly in front of Lynas, as if its owner hadn't expected anyone to stand in his way.
"Interesting!"
An effeminate male voice came from inside the sedan chair.
A fleeting look of delight crossed Lynas's eyes, then vanished just as quickly. He continued calmly reading the manual, oblivious to the background music playing around him.
Suddenly, a visible gust of cold wind swept through.
Through the slightly swaying curtain, Benjamin saw a pale-faced man in ancient wedding attire, wearing a white cap, a paper flower pinned to his right breast.
The palanquin seemed to dim suddenly, as if a Blu-ray movie had abruptly switched to high definition. Then, it continued forward, passing right through Lynas.
Lynas's face instantly turned pale and stiffened. Expressionless and with his body ramrod straight, he walked out of the lighthouse's beams.
A series of chaotic footsteps and screeching sounds echoed in the darkness.
The vermilion paper palanquin followed the faint path of light extending from the lighthouse, drifting towards the distant cluster of subsidiary towers, resembling candles.
"Idiot! Hahaha..."
From the crowd, a huge crow's head cawed with laughter.
It was perched on the left shoulder of a burly man with unwavering eyes, a cold expression, and muscular physique, standing with his elbows crossed.
"Young man, you don't know the immensity of the world…"
"He think the safety mentioned in the manual includes the Master of Tower, does he?"
"The manual certainly doesn't include the Master of Tower, but the Master of Tower will have to pay some survival points this time…"
A group of people discussed animatedly.
"Brother…buddy, who's that big shot in the sedan chair?"
Benjamin took a dozen steps forward, then asked the man wearing a gorilla mask.
"This is the newly promoted Tower Master of Paper Doll from the previous dungeon month. However, only new tower masters would come to the main square."
The gorilla man, seeing this was his customer, casually explained.
"As expected of Tower Master of Paper Doll, exuding domineering aura, terrifyingly powerful, possessing the aura of the strongest!"
Benjamin exclaimed, then thought for a moment and asked the gorilla man, "Buddy, do you have any information about the Master of Tower?"
"Don't talk nonsense, I don't."
The gorilla man looked around cautiously, then said carefully.
And quickly moved away from Benjamin.
Seeing his panicked expression, Benjamin didn't say any more and decided to go back to check the information about the lighthouse first.
"Back to reality."
Benjamin's mind raced, and he returned to his room.
He glanced out the window and compared the information in the two Lighthouse records.
All the records here are just some information about the strength levels of the first two stages. The supposedly thousand entries were mostly filler, even including a rule against spitting on the ground.
Only a few entries were truly useful. One of them was that people could communicate with the Lighthouse and spend 500 survival points to apply for a personal room.
The personal room included a strength testing room and an appraisal function.
Once the strength test reached Tier 1, one could know the name of the next scenario world in advance and could spend survival points to refresh the current scenario world.
The first refresh cost 500 survival points, the second 1000, then 2000, 4000... the cost increasing exponentially.
Benjamin flipped through the gifted intelligence again, then put it down and sighed,
"Brother Lynas, your death was not unjust!"
The two intelligence reports stated,
"The Mountain Village Corpse" has a lake near the protagonist, consuming it can resist possession by monsters."
"Regarding the supernatural beings in "The First Commandment", grabbing the neck of the possessed person can imprison the supernatural beings."
"Phantom Murder Room 1408" states that one can escape the monster by climbing through the window to room 1407."
The first report contained two points, the second only one.
However, anyone who believed this intelligence and followed its instructions in these worlds would likely die without even understanding how they died.
Benjamin didn't understand why the Masters of Tower who compiled these Lighthouse manuals would deliberately release such obviously misleading information.
These manuals made no mention of the Masters of Tower themselves.
But one thing was certain, he couldn't carelessly reveal the memories of those story worlds he knew, or he might be targeted by these Masters of Tower.
Benjamin entered the Lighthouse again, his thoughts triggering the Lighthouse Mark.
"Unlock personal space."
[Spend 500 survival points to unlock personal space?]
"Yes."
[Survival points deducted successfully. Personal Lighthouse space unlocked.]
'7697 survival points remaining.'
A tomb rose from the ground before Benjamin. The tomb opened, revealing a hole as obscured as ripples in water.
He walked through the hole. Inside were only four simple walls.
With a thought, Benjamin styled the room to resemble Dean's villa.
He sat on the familiar sofa and triggered the Lighthouse Mark.
"Enter the testing room."
The surrounding environment instantly changed, transforming into a desolate, endless plain of yellow earth, utterly silent and desolate.
[Entered the testing room. 100 survival points deducted per minute.]
Benjamin dusted himself off and stood up. The space had changed abruptly, without any warning.
He already knew from the manual how to test strength—whether it was healing, combat skills, firearms, recovery ability, digestion, mental strength, or even one-time destructive methods like nuclear weapons—the Lighthouse could comprehensively determine his strength level.
However, a false strength level was not only useless, but could actually backfire. And the manual didn't explain why.