The Folklore Bureau — A Hong Kong Folklore Mystery Otome Roleplay (The 1978 Returned-Soul Case)
Final Product: The Folklore Bureau
Cover
The 16:9 key art: Shen Mo on the rain-soaked Hong Kong waterfront at night, the 1978 case file under his arm, harbour lights and red lanterns bleeding across the wet stone — and in the puddle beside him, the translucent figure of the woman who came back long enough to name her killer. Painted in the world's own refined semi-realistic painterly direction.
Gameplay
Actual gameplay: the route opens three days after the professor's funeral. Shen Mo's portrait holds the left pane while the narration sets out the returned-soul file, the name written on the third page and the message warning you away from the old home site. Continue and the free-text action box wait below.
Gameplay
Actual gameplay with the controls hidden for a clean read: the whole opening turn laid out end to end — the case, Shen Mo going still over your name, the unknown number, and Detective Lau's call about the director who died the night before. The conversation is the interface, not a menu.
Gameplay
Actual gameplay with the session menu open: Save, Load, Restart and Roleplay Settings. The case remembers where you left it, and you can replay the opening to take a different thread — the file, the home, or the man who has been chasing this monster his whole life.
The Folklore Bureau is a playable Hong Kong folklore-mystery otome roleplay — a returned-soul cold case about a woman who came back from the dead long enough to name her killer, a professor who died before he could close the file, and the consultant who believes the old stories the way other men believe in gravity.
Three days after your folklore professor's funeral, his final case arrives: a folder from 1978, still open, still unsolved. A woman died, returned long enough to write a name, and vanished. On the third page, in the victim's file, in ink that has been there forty years, is your name — three decades before you were born.
Shen Mo is the consultant assigned to close it: late twenties, rectangular glasses, a worn jade pendant, a scholar who consults for the police on cases that smell of the old stories. He does not ask whether it is a coincidence. He asks whether someone has been keeping you alive. Around you turn Detective Lau, who distrusts his methods; the Jade Lantern Home, a children's home that closed in 1980 with its records never archived; the returned woman herself; and a killer who is still alive, still respectable, and has just learned the file has resurfaced. Compare the official record to the field notes. Find the retired officer who closed the case. Decide what you owe the dead — and what you are willing to do to the living. Play The Folklore Bureau →
Game Features
- Live LLM Narrative Direction — nothing here is a fixed script. A deepseek-v4-flash agent reads the action you type, keeps Shen Mo in the register of a scholar who says the precise thing and then goes very still, and writes the next beat, the subtext and the silence after it as you play. The same agent planned the premise, the 1978 opening, three investigable threads and four locations from a one-line world prompt.
- A Consultant Who Treats Ghost Stories as Evidence — Shen Mo does not explain the supernatural away, and he does not perform belief either. He reads a returned woman the way a detective reads a witness: what she chose to say, what she left out, and why she wrote a name thirty years early. His first line sets the whole route: "Either this case is a hoax, or someone has been keeping you alive for thirty years without telling you. I need to know which."
- Answer In Your Own Words — the free-text action box is the whole interface. Ask Shen Mo to walk you through the 1978 file. Find the retired officer who closed it. Push him about the photograph turned face-down in his office. Say nothing and let the rain do the work. Every typed beat lands differently, and the case remembers which silences you chose to break.
- Three Investigable Threads — Who was the woman who came back? (the main thread: a photograph with your eyes, a name and a date that match your birthday, a case closed as "unsubstantiated" by an officer who retired the next year), What is the Jade Lantern Home? (a register listing more children than the building could hold, transfer records pointing to a demolished hospital, a director honoured the year the home closed), and Why does Shen Mo believe so completely? (a photograph turned face-down, a jade pendant he refuses to explain, a three-year gap in his published work). Each carries clues, actions, discoveries, a reveal and consequences that change the ending.
- A Case That Rewrites Itself — the returned woman was your great-aunt, murdered for trying to expose what the home really was. Join Shen Mo and the 1978 case collides with the syndicate's present; confront the institution and its respectable fronts begin to fall; pursue the woman's truth and your whole family story reframes; walk away and the network closes in, because the file has already resurfaced. Refusal, exposure and trust are written as real outcomes, not failure states.
- Two Cut-Out Portraits, Three Painted Scenes, Zero Install — Shen Mo's bust and close-up portraits were segmented into true transparent PNGs with isnet-general-use, so he composites cleanly over three painted settings — the Folklore Department archive, the Jade Lantern site at dusk and his own lamplit office. The whole case is a mobile-first page: free to start, nothing to download.
Character Sprites
Sprite
Shen Mo — folklore scholar, police consultant, late twenties. Rectangular glasses, dark coat over a rumpled shirt, the worn jade pendant his grandmother gave him, and the level stare of a man who has learned the hard way which old stories are true. Cut out into a true transparent PNG so he stands over any painted scene.
Sprite
Shen Mo in close-up — rain in his hair, the jade pendant catching the lamp, the expression of a man doing arithmetic on a case that should not be possible. This is the face he wears when he reads your name in a 1978 file and decides, before he says anything, that he will not let you out of his sight.
Production Process Breakdown
Stage 1: World & Genre Groundingdeepseek-v4-flash
The world "Handsome Men in the Galaxy" set the house art direction — refined semi-realistic painterly, value-defined contours, organized shadow planes, warm translucent midtones, small controlled speculars, idol semi-3D painterly. For this route the AI narrowed it into Hong Kong noir: rain on wet stone, red lanterns and teal neon, jade green, amber desk lamps, and the hush of an archive after midnight.
The world "Handsome Men in the Galaxy" set the house art direction — refined semi-realistic painterly, value-defined contours, organized shadow planes, warm translucent midtones, small controlled speculars, idol semi-3D painterly. For this route the AI narrowed it into Hong Kong noir: rain on wet stone, red lanterns and teal neon, jade green, amber desk lamps, and the hush of an archive after midnight.
Stage 2: Case Constructiondeepseek-v4-flash
From the premise — a professor's last case with your name written in it thirty years early — the agent built the playable spine: a four-link relationship graph (Player, Shen Mo, Detective Lau, the returned woman), three investigable threads with clues, actions, discoveries, reveals and consequences, four locations, four story directions and the default opening on the day the file arrives.
From the premise — a professor's last case with your name written in it thirty years early — the agent built the playable spine: a four-link relationship graph (Player, Shen Mo, Detective Lau, the returned woman), three investigable threads with clues, actions, discoveries, reveals and consequences, four locations, four story directions and the default opening on the day the file arrives.
Stage 3: Key Art & Cast Portraitsgpt-image-2.5-sunburst
The 16:9 key art was painted as a single staged scene — Shen Mo on the rain-soaked waterfront with the 1978 file, the ghost of the returned woman reflected in the puddle — so the cover is literally the first image of the route. The official 3:4 key art was reframed from the world's own Shen Mo card, preserving the same face, coat, glasses and jade pendant.
The 16:9 key art was painted as a single staged scene — Shen Mo on the rain-soaked waterfront with the 1978 file, the ghost of the returned woman reflected in the puddle — so the cover is literally the first image of the route. The official 3:4 key art was reframed from the world's own Shen Mo card, preserving the same face, coat, glasses and jade pendant.
Stage 4: Scene Paintinggpt-image-2.5-sunburst
Three 16:9 backgrounds were painted at 1536×864 to stage the investigation: the Folklore Department archive with its 1978 boxes and green banker's lamp, the abandoned Jade Lantern children's home at dusk with one red lantern still burning at the gate, and Shen Mo's office with its corkboard of photographs, jade pendant and rain-streaked neon window. Each keeps the lower third calm and uncluttered so dialogue and portraits can sit over it without fighting the art.
Three 16:9 backgrounds were painted at 1536×864 to stage the investigation: the Folklore Department archive with its 1978 boxes and green banker's lamp, the abandoned Jade Lantern children's home at dusk with one red lantern still burning at the gate, and Shen Mo's office with its corkboard of photographs, jade pendant and rain-streaked neon window. Each keeps the lower third calm and uncluttered so dialogue and portraits can sit over it without fighting the art.
Stage 5: Transparent Cut-Outisnet-general-use
Both Shen Mo portraits were segmented into true transparent PNGs, so he composites cleanly over any painted scene — no grey box, no matte edge — and can be swapped mid-scene without re-lighting the background.
Both Shen Mo portraits were segmented into true transparent PNGs, so he composites cleanly over any painted scene — no grey box, no matte edge — and can be swapped mid-scene without re-lighting the background.
Stage 6: Visual QA & One-Click Publishneta-studio
The build was checked in-browser at 1280×800 — portrait scale, text contrast in dark and light, the immersive reading view, the session menu and the free-text turn flow — then published in one click to a shareable play link, with the world's portraits, scenes and prompts left reusable by any fork.
The build was checked in-browser at 1280×800 — portrait scale, text contrast in dark and light, the immersive reading view, the session menu and the free-text turn flow — then published in one click to a shareable play link, with the world's portraits, scenes and prompts left reusable by any fork.
Scene Backgrounds
BG
The Folklore Department archive at night: towering shelves of hand-bound case files and field notes, a long oak table under a green-shaded lamp, cardboard boxes marked 1978, a rotary fan and rain streaking the tall windows. This is where the file waits — and where the official record and the field notes first disagree.
BG
The Jade Lantern Site at dusk: a crumbling 1970s children's home on a Hong Kong hillside, rusted playground frame, boarded windows, faded lantern murals, weeds through cracked tiles — and one red paper lantern still hanging at the gate. Below it, the city skyline glows in blue haze, close enough to have forgotten what happened up here.
BG
Shen Mo's office above a Hong Kong shopfront: a desk buried in case files, a green banker's lamp, a corkboard pinned with photographs and red string, a jade pendant laid out on worn silk, one photograph turned face-down in its frame, and teal neon bleeding through the rain-blinded glass. This is where his sister's file is kept — and where he finally tells you why he believes.
Asset Prompts
16:9 Key Art Promptgpt-image-2.5-sunburst
"Cinematic 16:9 otome mystery game cover key art for 'The Folklore Bureau', a Hong Kong folklore-investigation romance in the Handsome Men in the Galaxy world. Shen Mo, a sharp rumpled folklore scholar in his late twenties with rectangular glasses and a worn jade pendant, dark coat over a rumpled shirt, stands in a rainy neon-lit Hong Kong street at night holding an old 1978 case file; warm amber lantern light and teal neon reflections on wet asphalt; behind him in the puddle, the translucent silhouette of a woman who came back from the dead. Refined semi-realistic painterly, value-defined contours, organized shadow planes, warm translucent midtones, small controlled speculars, idol semi-3D painterly. Dramatic cinematic composition with negative space at the top, no text, no watermark, no logo, no border."
"Cinematic 16:9 otome mystery game cover key art for 'The Folklore Bureau', a Hong Kong folklore-investigation romance in the Handsome Men in the Galaxy world. Shen Mo, a sharp rumpled folklore scholar in his late twenties with rectangular glasses and a worn jade pendant, dark coat over a rumpled shirt, stands in a rainy neon-lit Hong Kong street at night holding an old 1978 case file; warm amber lantern light and teal neon reflections on wet asphalt; behind him in the puddle, the translucent silhouette of a woman who came back from the dead. Refined semi-realistic painterly, value-defined contours, organized shadow planes, warm translucent midtones, small controlled speculars, idol semi-3D painterly. Dramatic cinematic composition with negative space at the top, no text, no watermark, no logo, no border."
Shen Mo Portrait Promptgpt-image-2.5-sunburst
"Shen Mo, a sharp rumpled folklore scholar in his late twenties with rectangular glasses and a worn jade pendant, wearing a dark coat over a rumpled shirt, standing in a rainy neon-lit Hong Kong street at night, portrait. No text, no labels, no letters, no signage anywhere." — the character prompt stored with this route, used for the cast portrait and the key-art reframe.
"Shen Mo, a sharp rumpled folklore scholar in his late twenties with rectangular glasses and a worn jade pendant, wearing a dark coat over a rumpled shirt, standing in a rainy neon-lit Hong Kong street at night, portrait. No text, no labels, no letters, no signage anywhere." — the character prompt stored with this route, used for the cast portrait and the key-art reframe.
3:4 Key Art Reframe Promptgpt-image-2.5-sunburst
"Recreate the reference image as a 3:4 vertical portrait. Fully preserve the reference content: identical character, same face, hair, expression, outfit, pose, background, props, lighting, color grading and art style. Only change the canvas to a 3:4 aspect ratio, extending the scene naturally upward/downward to fill the taller frame. No text, no watermark, no border, no logo."
"Recreate the reference image as a 3:4 vertical portrait. Fully preserve the reference content: identical character, same face, hair, expression, outfit, pose, background, props, lighting, color grading and art style. Only change the canvas to a 3:4 aspect ratio, extending the scene naturally upward/downward to fill the taller frame. No text, no watermark, no border, no logo."
Scene Background Prompt — The Archivegpt-image-2.5-sunburst
"The Folklore Department Archive at night — a cramped academic archive inside an old Hong Kong university building: towering wooden shelves of hand-bound case files and folklore field notes, a long oak table under a green-shaded banker's lamp, cardboard boxes labelled 1978, a rotary fan, rain streaking the tall windows, warm amber pools of light and deep teal shadow. Refined semi-realistic painterly, value-defined contours, organized shadow planes, warm translucent midtones, small controlled speculars, idol semi-3D painterly. 16:9 widescreen visual-novel background, no text, no watermark, no people, no UI, lower third calm and uncluttered."
"The Folklore Department Archive at night — a cramped academic archive inside an old Hong Kong university building: towering wooden shelves of hand-bound case files and folklore field notes, a long oak table under a green-shaded banker's lamp, cardboard boxes labelled 1978, a rotary fan, rain streaking the tall windows, warm amber pools of light and deep teal shadow. Refined semi-realistic painterly, value-defined contours, organized shadow planes, warm translucent midtones, small controlled speculars, idol semi-3D painterly. 16:9 widescreen visual-novel background, no text, no watermark, no people, no UI, lower third calm and uncluttered."
Scene Background Prompt — The Jade Lantern Sitegpt-image-2.5-sunburst
"The Jade Lantern Site at dusk — an abandoned 1970s children's home on a Hong Kong hillside, crumbling cream-and-green concrete, rusted playground frame, boarded windows, faded painted murals of lanterns, weeds pushing through cracked tiles, a single red paper lantern still hanging at the gate, humid mist and deep green overgrowth, the city skyline far below in blue haze. Refined semi-realistic painterly, value-defined contours, organized shadow planes, warm translucent midtones, small controlled speculars, idol semi-3D painterly. 16:9 widescreen visual-novel background, no text, no watermark, no people, no UI, lower third calm and uncluttered."
"The Jade Lantern Site at dusk — an abandoned 1970s children's home on a Hong Kong hillside, crumbling cream-and-green concrete, rusted playground frame, boarded windows, faded painted murals of lanterns, weeds pushing through cracked tiles, a single red paper lantern still hanging at the gate, humid mist and deep green overgrowth, the city skyline far below in blue haze. Refined semi-realistic painterly, value-defined contours, organized shadow planes, warm translucent midtones, small controlled speculars, idol semi-3D painterly. 16:9 widescreen visual-novel background, no text, no watermark, no people, no UI, lower third calm and uncluttered."
Transparent Cut-Outisnet-general-use
Both Shen Mo portraits were run through a single-image segmentation model at full resolution and saved as true RGBA PNGs, then checked on a light and a dark backdrop for hair edges, glasses frames and the jade pendant cord before being placed over the painted scenes.
Both Shen Mo portraits were run through a single-image segmentation model at full resolution and saved as true RGBA PNGs, then checked on a light and a dark backdrop for hair edges, glasses frames and the jade pendant cord before being placed over the painted scenes.
Why Choose Neta Studio
Professional — a cloud harness runs the whole production from world building to case design to publishing, with no local setup. Stable access to the latest models: GPT Image 2.5 · deepseek-v4-flash · isnet-general-use.
One-click generation — officially tuned skills drive every step: world building, roleplay drafting, key art and scene painting, transparent cut-outs, in-browser visual QA and one-click publishing, with world fork and resource sharing built in — so every portrait, scene and prompt in this case is reusable in your own world.
Community-first — users build unlimited worlds, and every public world can be forked, remixed and reimagined. Start from this rain-soaked waterfront, or begin fresh from any idea — a one-line prompt is enough.
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The Folklore Bureau was generated by Neta Studio AI from a single world prompt — the world took minutes, the case and the artwork took minutes. You can do it too — adapt this world or start fresh from any idea. No coding required, free to start.
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