Outside.
Ji Yang had just turned on his streaming equipment when countless live stream comments flooded in.
“Boss, where did you go? Watching 248’s new instance had my heart in my throat, urgently need your commentary to calm me down.”
“Seven rules and then seven more rules, can a person even remember all that?”
“Xu Xi’s instance this time is so complicated, feels like the difficulty spiked again.”
“Isn’t the key that Hang Ze that unlucky guy is in it too! I got two stream notifications and realized these two are in the same instance, I’m shook.”
“Hey streamer, why are you in a car?”
Ji Yang adjusted his phone angle while apologetically saying, “Sorry to keep everyone waiting. I’m out right now, so I can only stream on my phone. Family, please understand.”
He scanned the rapidly scrolling comments.
“This instance is indeed tangled, you’ll need to switch between different players’ perspectives back and forth to watch it properly.”
As he spoke he slid his finger across another screen, cutting in several small windows.
“The starting information load is already substantial, it’s a classic rule-structure: seven-day funeral, multiple layers of taboos, and the core definitely ties back to Master Shen’s death.”
“These rules are interesting. If you analyze carefully you’ll find contradictions among them. I’ll explain the specifics later.”
He paused, and when he mentioned one name his tone subtly shifted: “As for Hang Ze… ahem, I didn’t expect him to be matched with 248.”
Of course Ji Yang was watching Hang Ze too.
He never imagined someone could be that unlucky.
He even suspected that if Hang Ze specifically went to pray at a temple, he might still end up worshiping some evil spirit or ghost.
He shook his head, pushed those thoughts down, and casually reassured the chat:
“But they’re players with similar ranks. Given God Hunt’s matching mechanism, it makes sense they’d be paired.”
“That makes sense, the higher you go the more similar players’ ranks become, they basically all know each other.”
“Right, it’s not unheard of for an entire instance to be full of acquaintances; it’s almost like forming a team.”
“More than that, sometimes they purposely time things to match together.”
“Woc, I didn’t notice either until you said it. No wonder some players always end up together.”
“Because there are fewer people up front, this trick works. Try rotating later players, there are hundreds with similar rank.”
Ji Yang smiled and switched the main screen to Xu Xi’s stream.
In the window, the young man was confronting a maid with a white flower in her hair.
He cleared his throat and began to give his take.
“Hang Ze is a bit unlucky, but he does have strength. Putting other rules aside, the Seventh Concubine’s rules alone number three, and they even contradict each other.”
“One funeral rule forbids red, purple, and gold, yet the mourning garments the Seventh Concubine prepared for the players are purple. Rule five says Seventh Concubine suffers from hysteria, so her words aren’t reliable, but she still manages the Rear Courtyard and can even deliver soup to players on vigil.”
“Unreliable doesn’t mean false, it could be selectively true. I’m certain she’s a key NPC in the instance; she must hold some important clue.”
Ji Yang pointed at the screen as he spoke.
“248 clearly thinks so too, but the Rear Courtyard is being blocked by that maid wearing the white flower, which means the Seventh Concubine route has a threshold. It might be related to identity, timing, or trust. Players like Shi Weiwei and Tang Shutong, who have the status of young ladies and can live in the Rear Courtyard, might have an advantage.”
“I noticed Xu Xi didn’t listen when Yu Hao and the others were discussing just now.”
“Yeah, and while everyone else left he stayed on the spot a while longer, like he was thinking about something.”
“Xu Xi usually doesn’t pipe up to remind others, but he did mention the time just now—did he notice something?”
“Don’t say that, this instance can’t be tricky enough to stump 248, right?”
Ji Yang happened to see that comment and slightly raised an eyebrow.
“Tricky?” He leaned back against the car seat, but his tone wasn’t serious. “I think ‘tricky’ often means interesting for Xu Xi.”
On screen, the young man showed no displeasure at being denied entry to the Rear Courtyard.
He didn’t even have any extra expression; he had clearly anticipated something.
“…Streamer, you’ve changed, you used to be different.”
“The streamer who used to sweat whenever a high-difficulty instance showed up—where did he go? Who are you, get off him now!”
“Sanshui has been led calmly by Xu Xi, of course I have too.”
Ji Yang read the comments and couldn’t help laughing. “Hey, you can’t say it like that. I still worry, I just—he’s 248, you know.”
That sounded odd, but the chat immediately understood.
Why trust so blindly? Because he had produced miracles before.
“Besides.” Ji Yang crossed his legs, “you can tell from 248’s reaction that he anticipated this restriction, or that his goal wasn’t to immediately meet the Seventh Concubine, but to test.”
“His actions look blocked, but they actually reveal valuable information: the Seventh Concubine route requires specific conditions or timing to access, but it’s not an absolute dead end or trap.”
“Okay then, the boss’s thinking isn’t something ordinary folks can grasp.”
“If the streamer says so, I’ll just sit back and wait for Xu Xi to clear it—confidence restored.jpg.”
“Wait, did you guys forget that unlucky Hang Ze?”
“…damn (confidence lost.jpg).”
Ji Yang fell silent.
He really had forgotten about that guy’s supernatural constitution.
He rubbed his forehead, thought for a moment, and comforted the chat: “Think positive—given 248’s clearing speed, maybe they’ll finish before the instance mutates?”
“Thanks, confidence restored.”
“Don’t say it, it’s actually possible. Don’t be fooled by early multi-player instance slow clears; Xu Xi often dabbles the whole time.”
“Exactly! Watching how fast the mixed-team competition boss cleared things, I think he’ll detect an abnormality the instant the instance mutates.”
“Maybe he’s already seen through Hang Ze’s constitution.”
“Yeah, don’t underestimate 248, unlucky my foot, just a little wear and tear.”
Ji Yang himself had been a bit hesitant, but the chat’s optimistic back-and-forth infected him.
After all, the other had created miracles before, more than once.
He had no awareness that Hang Ze’s past incidents—summoning hundreds of ghosts and breaking rules—were being brushed off as “a little wear and tear.”
While they discussed eagerly, the young man on screen made a new move.
“So, where’s Xu Xi headed next?”
Ji Yang glanced down at the paper on his thigh, a rough floor plan of the manor he’d sketched from the seven players’ perspectives. That’s why he’d been a bit late.
After comparing directions he confirmed, “To the Ancestral Temple.”
He unconsciously leaned forward and quickly cut to Xing Ge’s perspective for a glance.
In just two seconds he said, “Look, the paper figure’s position changed.” His tone was unusually certain.
…
Inside the instance.
The fleeting thought to go back to the Ancestral Temple flashed through and immediately grew stronger.
Xu Xi turned and left without hesitation.
Seeing the young man leave, the maid did not immediately withdraw into the Rear Courtyard.
She kept her head bowed, standing beneath the Moon Gate. The white flower pinned at her temple, under the faint glow, looked as if stained with fresh blood, gradually turning red.
Elsewhere.
The bluestone slabs by the Moon Gate reflected a damp, cold shine in the dim night. The covered walkway leading to the Ancestral Temple was as before.
Xu Xi stepped into the passage following the route in his memory, but soon a strange sense of dissonance arose.
He remembered that at the end of the covered walkway there would be two flickering lamps, but when he walked to the spot where those lamps should be, he found only a bare wall.
He took a few steps back and changed his angle.
…Still a wall.
He refused to accept it and tried several corridors that looked like shortcuts, attempting to judge by direction and distance, but every time he thought he was getting close, the scene in front of him gave a subtle sense of misalignment.
Xu Xi stopped moving.
He realized.
It wasn’t that he was lost; the manor itself was refusing to let him reach the Ancestral Temple.
…Bumped into a wall ×3.
