Chapter 1

Chapter 1

Me, the prettiest female ghost in the entire Wasteland.

I have a corpse-pale face, a pair of pitch-black eyes with no whites, trendy black-purple lips, gorgeous hair that falls past my knees, a one-of-a-kind long white dress, and no little feeties.

This face, this figure, this fashion sense.

I am simply the ghost of my own dreams.

Unfortunately, there are no other ghosts around to appreciate my beauty.

Ever since I became conscious, I had been wandering the Wasteland all by myself.

The Wasteland was barren, empty, and endless.

Ghosts are very light. With one hop, I could float three li. With the wind, add two li. Against the wind, subtract two li.

So I kept hopping and hopping, drifting around blindly, and somehow I actually found a place with signs of ghost habitation.

At the sight of my own kind, I pulled out the little mirror I carried with me and carefully checked my evil ghost styling. No problems. I was still an excellent ghost of anyone’s dreams.

Feeling a little nervous and shy, I planned to go up and greet them with a very ceremonial hop…

Whoops.

I overshot it.

My hair stretched out and wrapped around a wooden post I happened to pass, and only then did I finally manage to stop.

A place where ghosts lived really was nice. There were mountains, water, and even wooden posts. Unlike everywhere else, which was just barren land.

The other ghosts hadn’t noticed me drifting past and were still muttering among themselves.

I wasn’t far away, so I was forced to overhear a bit.

They were discussing how to go easy on this batch of newbie players.

Players.

Catching the keyword, I moved my head closer. Then I heard them reveal that this was a supernatural horror infinite-flow novel.

According to the setting, players were randomly taken from the real world into the game world. If they cleared enough instances, they could return to the real world and become filthy rich. If they failed, they would never go back and would remain as nourishment for the game world.

The Wasteland was the novice instance.

They were NPCs inside it.

Huh.

Then what was I?

I asked the question out loud.

Only when they heard my voice did the ghosts realize an evil ghost’s head had appeared among them.

“Aaaaaah! A ghost!”

After scurrying around in place for a while, they huddled tightly together and trembled.

My body followed after my head. I rubbed my neck and giggled. Since even ghosts could be scared by me, I was extremely pleased with myself. “I think so too. I look pretty ghost-scary.”

Once they saw what I actually looked like, they slowly recovered. Then they decided their behavior just now had been a bit embarrassing for ghosts, so they started glaring at me like nothing about me looked right.

Instance Mini Boss: “Where did a lonely wandering ghost like you come from?”

I answered honestly, “I just… floated here.”

“Floated from where?”

“Outside.”

“What does outside look like?”

“Desolate. Flat and wide-open.”

All the ghosts: “As if we’d believe that.”

Instance Mini Boss: “This is the instance boundary. No ghost can leave.”

Me: “Oh.”

I grabbed a lock of hair and twisted it around my fingers, then said quietly, “But I really did float in from outside.”

The ghosts didn’t believe me. They also gave me a quick lesson on the categories of NPC ghosts and monsters inside an instance. None of them could leave the instance boundary.

One category was native ghosts and monsters. They had intelligence and plotlines, were governed by the Instance Master, and were official, genuine NPCs.

Another category was derivative ghosts and monsters, formed from the resentment of dead players. They had no intelligence, no plotlines, and no one managed them. They didn’t even count as NPCs.

“Then I have intelligence but no plotline. What does that make me?”

The ghosts fell into deep thought.

One ghost shaped like a noodle was so conflicted he nearly tied himself into a knot.

In the end, they made up a brand-new term on the spot to define me. “You might be… a wandering wild NPC.”

“Then, then what’s the difference between me and you?”

Instance Mini Boss said smugly, “We have official positions and salaries. We’re formal NPCs.”

What was a salary?

Could you eat it?

Expectation gleamed in my pitch-black eyes. I rubbed my hands together excitedly, then asked with shy politeness, “Can I join you?”