Of course, even if he changed into the appearance of a young man, it still wasn’t his original form. William Green knew that the more concealed his identity, the better. After all, to this unknown world, he was a complete outsider, and he should act with caution in everything he did. Moreover, compared to his identity, there were things he was even more wary of—

William Green walked out of the alley and looked up toward the city above.

Through the vision of the Eye of Lingxi, countless beams of light shot up from within the city, standing like pillars that pierced the clouds. Their colors varied—some blue as ribbons, some red as the evening glow.

These were the wondrous sights forged by wishpower.

They made the city shine brilliantly; even without flashing neon lights, Glorious Fort was more dazzling than any big city he knew.

You see, on the other side of the rift, what William Green saw most was a dim gray, as if the whole world was surrounded by cold concrete.

Unfortunately... he couldn’t claim all this tempting wishpower for himself.

Because all these beams “belonged to someone.”

Chapter 5: Entrusting Wishes to Objects

William Green had tried to respond to these wishpowers, but as soon as he made a move, he felt a cold gaze from the other end—that was a mental invasion, overwhelmingly powerful. Even though he withdrew quickly, the whole process less than a second, his mind still suffered considerable trauma. For several minutes, he felt as if he had fallen into an icehouse, his body trembling uncontrollably, almost unable to think at all.

This made him realize even more deeply the difference between this place and his original world.

William Green now understood: when a beam of light reached straight to the sky, it meant the object of the wish was already determined. Only those faint, scattered lights that stopped halfway offered him a chance to slip in—for example, the squad captain of Glorious Fort’s city guard, John Bradley.

John Stone’s wish was simple: to save his sister, whether it be with money, medicine, or a healer... Probably because he was desperate, he hadn’t chosen a specific object for his wish. In other words, as long as someone could help him, he would accept anyone. It was this attitude that gave William Green the opportunity to take advantage.

This person’s soul wasn’t particularly strong, but for someone as starved as William Green, it was absolutely a sweet nectar.

“All right, time to tally up income and expenses...” William Green took out a notebook, jotting and sketching as he spoke to himself, “The wishpower gained from this contract is about seven hundred... Opening the boundary cost about a hundred, maintaining a body projection for half a day is about fifty, four of those makes two hundred... Oh, and there’s the cost of the boat and preparations...”

If there was any benefit to the near-starvation he’d experienced recently, it was that, in a time of extreme scarcity, William Green could clearly feel his own decline and was forced to learn how to split his power in half for use. This allowed him to precisely measure the amount of wishpower in his body and mark it with numbers.

For example, he set the amount needed to sustain life for one hour as one unit, and all other consumption could be calculated based on this baseline.

After subtracting all expenses, the final number left in the notebook was two hundred and twenty-one.

This meant the remaining wishpower would allow him to live at full strength for nine more days—less than he’d expected.

Seeing this result, most of the joy in William Green’s heart instantly vanished.

“Are you kidding me? This is a life-or-death contract, and I only get this little in return?” he couldn’t help but mutter. After all that work, he’d only bought himself nine more days—no wonder demons went extinct!

Generally, the amount of wishpower received depended on the strength of the wisher and the specifics of the contract. Once a contract was made, the responder would also be restricted; if he failed to fulfill it, he’d suffer contract backlash and lose several times the wishpower.

If this were a job, not even a dog would do it, but unfortunately, he couldn’t quit.

There was no choice but to keep looking for the next contract target—and he had to hurry.

William Green planned to take a stroll around the city and try his luck.

...

Glorious Fort was a coastal city, with vast tidal flats to the south and west, and an industrial district to the east, where thick black smoke billowed all day. Aside from this, William Green didn’t know much more than the game participants—after all, he’d only arrived a few days ago. Once he discovered this otherworldly lifeline, he immediately started planning the amusement park event, and simply hadn’t had time to learn about the city itself, let alone the areas beyond Glorious Fort.

So every time he walked the streets, it felt like a brand new experience.

Here, all the streets were paved with blue bricks, and on both sides you could see drainage channels hidden beneath the surface, showing that city planning had placed great importance on drainage. In some parts of the new district, steel rails were embedded in the streets for trams to run along.

It was clear these passenger vehicles were all steam-powered, leaving a long white cloud of mist every time they crossed the street. But strangely, they didn’t have huge steam engines at the front, and their stops and starts were quite nimble—very different from the steam trains in William Green’s memory.

However, the main means of transportation on the streets were still carriages and people.