Chapter 288 East Courtyard Bride

Chapter 288 The East Courtyard Bride

Though Su Bai was in a low mood, he wasn't so far gone as to torment innocent new players. Yet, when the bowl of "broth" was offered to him, he distinctly caught a whiff of a foul, decaying odor. Naturally, he couldn't bring himself to accept or drink the concoction.

"This broth is for the bride; we wouldn't dare drink it," the young girl immediately refused.

Su Bai didn't know much about the newcomers' earlier conversation, but he recognized that this particular girl was more mature than her peers, and even other players. However, listening to her now, he detected a clear reluctance in her tone, as if she already knew the bowl of broth in her hands was far from good.

Su Bai had no intention of making things difficult for the newcomers. Upon hearing her refusal, he simply nodded and softly said, "Then just leave it on the table for now."

Su Bai wasn't a benevolent person, but in the Nightmare World, he certainly wasn't evil either. Like most players, he only paid attention to people or non-human entities that interested him or with whom he had a past connection. However, when the four newcomers entered the courtyard, Su Bai recognized two familiar voices—they were unmistakably Lin Wenhua and Huang Qi, whom he had briefly encountered in an abandoned park in the real world not long ago.

Recognizing their voices sparked a new level of concern in Su Bai. This wasn't because he had met Lin Wenhua in his previous life, nor because Lin Wenhua was his mother Lin Wan's nephew by blood. If it were merely those two points, Lin Wenhua would truly be an inconsequential stranger to Su Bai.

Yet, this very stranger, in the future... in the post-apocalyptic Nightmare World, would save countless human players and become an indispensable pawn in the war between the black and white worlds.

So, Su Bai knew that Lin Wenhua and Huang Qi might eventually die someday, but absolutely not now, and certainly not in this small beginner's game.

Su Bai sat there in quiet contemplation. Having borrowed A Xi's power, he possessed some eerie qualities; though he had a heartbeat and breath, they were so faint as to be almost imperceptible. The room fell into an extreme silence, so profound that he could clearly hear the breathing of the four people before him.

All four were new to the Nightmare World, but their breathing was relatively steady, lacking the panicked, gasping breaths typical of ordinary newcomers. This made Su Bai feel that Lin Wenhua and Huang Qi had good fortune, encountering two rather reliable companions.

"Sister Bride, is there anything else you need us to do?" After a period of silence, the young girl spoke up again.

Before Su Bai could respond, the girl added, "Butler Zhao said he and Sister Bride are from the same village, and he asked us to keep you company and chat more."

As a special player who had intruded into a beginner's game, Su Bai was subject to unique restrictions imposed by his role. His behavior, speech, and area of activity had to differ from those of regular players. Thus, although he received similar initial information to the players, sitting in the room like this meant he would gather far less information than he would with a player's identity.

If Wen Wen hadn't mentioned it, Su Bai wouldn't have known that the butler, who made only a fleeting appearance in the story's background, was actually from the same village as the East Courtyard Bride. This implied that a face-to-face encounter with the butler would carry a high risk of his identity being exposed.

It's crucial to remember that Su Bai's mission required him to "not reveal his identity," not merely "not reveal his identity to players." Therefore, the old butler from the East Courtyard Bride's village could also lead to his mission failure.

However, Su Bai also possessed information unknown to the new players. For instance, his mission stipulated that he "not be identified as the murderer," implying that the three drowned brides themselves were also suspects. This was a detail that players, who mostly felt sympathy and pity for the brides, would find difficult to consider at the outset.

Even if it was just to gain a slight advantage on the future battlefield, Su Bai had to offer a subtle hint.

"Master Wang..." Su Bai lowered his head, his hands clutching the sleeves of his wedding dress as if both nervous and scared, his voice soft yet with a slight tremor. "Has that Master Wang returned?"

Su Bai wasn't a professional actor; he could only do his best to portray the poor girl forced to marry a strange man for the sake of her family's illness and livelihood.

"There should be more than just me as the bride entering this mansion. It would be good if Master Wang could step forward and say something now." The Master Wang Su Bai referred to was not the shadowy figure outside the door earlier, but the real Master Wang who had disappeared in the latter half of the game's background.

For the players, this was just a game, but for everything that transpired in this mansion, the catalyst was Master Wang—the man who, following a monk's advice, came to this remote place to build a mansion and insisted on marrying a beautiful sixteen-year-old girl.

But why would such a pivotal character disappear in the latter part of the story?

"...Does the Sister Bride want to stay in this mansion?"

When Wen Wen asked this question, two soft coughs came from behind her, as if the question she posed was not quite what they had discussed outside the door.

But this was precisely the question Su Bai wanted to answer.

"My family, and the villagers who sent me to this mansion, all hope I can stay in this cold, desolate place. What I think... doesn't seem to matter much," Su Bai's voice gradually faded.

"If the Sister Bride can't stay in the mansion, what will happen? Will Wen Wen never see the Sister Bride again?" The young girl seemed to realize these questions might be offensive to a bride she had just met, so she adopted a more childish tone.

The breathing of the others behind her became somewhat hurried.

"If I leave the mansion, without the bride price Master Wang promised, my family and the villagers would be very disappointed, perhaps even angry and resentful toward me. I probably couldn't go back to my old life..." Su Bai stopped there, making his point without overexplaining. "But life is long. Even if I can't go back, I can make my way elsewhere. I can find a job, work as a maid for a rich household in the city, earn money, return to treat my mother's illness, and send my younger brother to school. Everything will get better."

Su Bai needed to let the newcomers know that the bride also had a motive to harm the other brides, but at the same time, he needed to eliminate suspicion against himself, making the newcomers believe that he had no obsession with the position of "mistress of the house" or Master Wang's wealth.

"Sister Bride..." The young girl's voice was tinged with sadness.