Chapter 34: Is this something you can watch for free?

Boom!

Explosive flames erupted on his wife's body, but the flames seemed to encounter cold water and instantly extinguished, leaving his wife unharmed.

"What?!" Shen Lingxue's eyes widened in disbelief. "She's completely unharmed? Run!"

She realized that the strange phenomenon before her was beyond her ability to handle and turned to flee, but at that moment.

Her wife's pale white hand flickered through the air.

The air seemed to be stirred by something, and as Shen Lingxue and the other person were about to flee, their heads slid off their necks, the severed ends smooth as mirrors.

Whoosh!

Fang Xiu didn't hesitate for a moment, diving straight toward the two corpses and beginning to search them swiftly.

"Husband, what are you looking for?"

His wife's gentle voice rang in Fang Xiu's ears.

Fang Xiu ignored her and continued searching for any useful information.

The next moment, a sharp pain struck him, and his vision went dark as his consciousness began to fade....

...

Night, dotted with stars.

Fang Xiu stood at his own doorstep. The current time node was just after escaping from Qing Shan Mental Hospital and returning home.

"Oh? Has the death reset point remained unchanged? It seems that escaping from Qing Shan Mental Hospital was an event point. When I returned home and tested my wife with a scalpel, it marked the entry into the next event point. The point should not change until a new bizarre event occurs.

Therefore, the Investigation Bureau will arrive at 8:40 AM tomorrow. It is time for my precognitive ability to be revealed to the world."

Fang Xiu planned to begin his scheme. Now that he knew the Investigation Bureau existed, there was no reason not to utilize it.

After all, it was nearly impossible for him alone to make the entire world's strange phenomena suffer; he had to rely on external forces.

Bang!

He opened the door and returned home, ignoring his wife as he walked into the bedroom and turned on the computer to check the Global Strange Phenomena Forum.

This was given to him by Shen Lingxue and Li Wenhao last time. Though the two hadn't appeared yet, Fang Xiu had already memorized the URL.

Opening the URL, a skull nearly filling the entire screen appeared. As the skull slowly faded away, a dark red interface was revealed.

It was divided into many sections: Europe and America, Asia, Japan and South Korea, Domestic...

Each section had numerous subcategories: Strange, Spirit Masters, Strange Artifacts, Bounties...

Fang Xiu quickly scanned the titles of various posts, his interest piqued. This might hold the truth about this world—the strange truth.

Though it might not be complete, it would at least be faster than exploring on his own.

However, when he randomly clicked on a post about the origins of the supernatural, a prompt popped up stating, "Insufficient balance, please recharge."

Fang Xiu's gaze shifted to the bottom of the post, where a string of zeros caught his eye.

He roughly calculated that viewing this post would cost approximately one million.

This left him momentarily speechless, as his bank account held only a few hundred dollars.

He then glanced at other posts, all of which followed the same pattern: cheaper ones cost a few thousand dollars, while those involving classified information easily reached millions, and some even exceeded ten million.

"Is this the world of Spirit Masters (the wealthy)?" Fang Xiu murmured.

After realizing his poverty, Fang Xiu became even more determined to pretend he could predict the future. He wanted to use this ability to gain the greatest possible benefit; otherwise, he wouldn't even be able to afford to browse the forum.

Unfortunately, Fang Xiu could only open the basic section of the domestic forum. The posts here were mostly worthless common knowledge, along with many unverified rumors, and even some people bragging.

He looked at the top-ranked hot post, titled "I've awakened the ability to manipulate time."

"Manipulate time?" Seeing this post, Fang Xiu's heart sank slightly. If even time manipulators had appeared, the value of his ability to foresee the future would be greatly diminished.

He clicked on it and saw the post read: "It was a dark and stormy night. Suddenly, there was lightning and thunder, a fierce wind blew, and a blood moon rose in the east..."

After reading a thousand words of description, the post concluded: "And so, I awoke to the ability to control time. Unlike the time-stopping or time-rewinding abilities seen in films, I named my ability—Wasting Time!

For example, by reading this post, you've just wasted five minutes of your time."

Countless comments followed below the post.

"Damn it..."

"You bastard..."

"I can't be the only one fooled—this post must be bumped up!"

Click!

Fang Xiu silently closed the post.

He looked at the poster: Cosmic Invincible Pretty Soldier.

Hmm, he silently noted down the name.

"Is this what you can see without spending money?"

After calming down for a moment, he continued browsing. After spending an hour, he finally found a few posts released by the official Investigation Bureau organization. Since they were officially certified, the information on them was mostly useful.

There were simple explanations of the origins of the strange phenomena, basic knowledge about spirit masters, and introductions to strange artifacts.

Fang Xiu randomly clicked on one and immersed himself in it.

He spent the entire night reading.

He gained a basic understanding of the mysterious phenomena and the basics of spirit masters.

It wasn't that there was much information, but there were too many spam posts and some clickbait titles with unclear authenticity, which wasted a lot of Fang Xiu's time.

After a night, he shut down the computer, with a preliminary framework already forming in his mind.

The grades of strange phenomena are divided into five levels based on their level of harm, from highest to lowest: S, A, B, C, and D.

Some strange phenomena have low individual power but cause significant harm, so their ratings are correspondingly higher.

For example, there is an anomaly known as the Plague in a foreign country. Its power is weak, and as long as its core is located and proper preventive measures are taken, even a first-tier spirit master can kill it. However, despite its weakness, this anomaly can spread plagues on a large scale, causing millions of deaths, hence its A-level rating.

If left unchecked, an A-level strange entity has the ability to wipe out the population of a large city in a short period of time.

S-level strange entities are on a national scale, capable of destroying an entire country in a short period of time.

Generally, the higher the level of danger, the stronger the strange entity. Strange entities like "Plague" are rare.

The origin of anomalies is unknown, with vague legends dating back to ancient times. Some speculate that the extraordinary individuals of the past were likely spirit masters.

Later, for unknown reasons, these extraordinary individuals and anomaly legends faded into obscurity for a period. It wasn't until modern times that anomaly legends resurfaced, with a nearly 200-year gap in between—the cause remains unknown.

At least, there are no answers in the free sections.

All strange phenomena appear out of nowhere, without warning or pattern.

At first, there were few strange phenomena, and they were not widespread globally. However, as time went on, the frequency of their appearance increased.