Floor 17 Evening Breeze Doesn't Ask About Return: Honestly, seeing so many people obsessing over whether the family curse was lifted or not, I really want to say there's no need.
You'll understand once you compare. The family curse is only there for some players to farm high scores and get high-quality items.
It's like adding flowers to brocade—but you need the brocade first before the flowers can look good.
Floor 18 Arisu: To be fair, while the person above is right about it being flowers on brocade, that brocade isn't easy to get.
At the start of this instance, powerful items are directly locked, and special abilities are banned. More than half of a player's capabilities are instantly rendered useless.
Even if you notice something is off in the early stage, you simply don't have the power to fight the forces behind the scenes.
Floor 19 Half-Immortal Hu's Online Fortune-Telling: I feel that so much. I was that pure sucker whose skills got banned.
I spent the whole time keeping an eye on everything that was wrong with the matchmaking agency, gathering clues bit by bit, only to end up helplessly watching the evil god descend.
Floor 20 Half-Immortal Hu's Online Fortune-Telling: Sure, they unbanned them for me later, but what's the point of nursing a baby after it's already dead?
My skills have a very long cast time, and I even have to set up formations to go with them. The evil god had already descended by the time they remembered to lift my ban. What could I even do at that point?
Floor 21 Square Inch of Mountains and Seas: Stupid! If you can't beat them, why didn't you borrow strength? Aren't there Bureau of Investigation NPCs in the instance?
As long as you gather enough clues about the cult and their occult rituals, you can just go straight to the Bureau of Investigation to report it. The official NPCs will take over and handle the rest. You don't have to face them head-on at all.
It's a waste not to use such powerful NPCs. Trying to carry it all by yourself is just a thankless task.
Floor 22 Pastafarian: So staying in the city had that kind of epic showdown? I missed it completely. What a shame.
I headed straight for my grandmother's hometown right from the start and stayed in Baijiacun the entire time, researching how to lift the family curse.
Floor 23 Orange Cat Doesn't Like Fish: Out of curiosity, how did the person above know where their grandmother's hometown was?
I pestered the NPC mom for information at the start, but her lips were sealed tight. She wouldn't reveal a single clue. In the end, I had no choice but to obediently go on the blind dates and follow the process.
Floor 24 Pastafarian's Reply: Hehe, it was just an exclusive skill for a rare class.
This class is great for curing low blood pressure, and this skill is about the only decent thing about it.
...
Floor 30 Orange Cat Loves Eating Fish: Has anyone looked at the thread for the Yuexian Shrine instance that opened at the same time?
I just came across it and took a look. I realized these two might be linked instances.
Floor 31 Finding Rivers in the Mist: Linked? How so?
Floor 32 Orange Cat Loves Eating Fish: I was one of those who treated lifting the family curse as the main quest, so I used some methods to go back to Baijiacun, the origin of the curse.
Anyone who has been back to Baijiacun like me should know that there's a spirit medium in the village named Sangu.
Floor 33 Pastafarian: There is indeed such a spirit medium. And?
Her professional skills weren't very good, and she couldn't lift the curse, so I ignored that NPC after that.
Floor 34 Orange Cat Loves Eating Fish: Sangu's courtyard has a whole bunch of statues enshrined in it, and one of the main deities is Lady Yuexian.
According to Sangu, Lady Yuexian is in charge of human marriage and karmic relationships, and the place specifically dedicated to her is called Yuexian Shrine.
Floor 35 Restless Wind: Holy crap! It matches up!
Floor 36 Restless Wind: I just read a thread about Yuexian Shrine, and the big shot Er Xiang in that thread was still wondering about something.
Why, after stalling for enough time, the incarnation of Lady Yuexian would suddenly explode and perish on the spot for no apparent reason, with absolutely no trigger mechanism to be found.
If they are linked instances, then this inexplicable anomaly makes perfect sense.
Floor 37 I Still Love Her: Holy crap! This is a wild theory!
Could it be that someone in this instance caused trouble, preemptively cutting off and heavily injuring the about-to-descend evil god, which then triggered a chain reaction affecting the Yuexian Shrine side?
Floor 38 Under the Bridge in Front of the Door: The evil god and Lady Yuexian aren't the same thing, right?
I feel like maybe some big shot took Lady Yuexian to go head-to-head with the evil god?
Lady Yuexian got heavily injured in the fight with the evil god, which consequently caused her incarnation in the Yuexian Shrine instance to explode.
...
The discussion below continued, with all kinds of guesses, wild theories, and breakdowns popping up one after another.
But Bai Ci no longer had any interest in scrolling down further.
A flash of inspiration crossed her mind, and she caught it just in time.
She seemed to understand what the settlement screen's comment, "Inadvertently provided assistance to other players," actually meant now.
If Yuanxin Matchmaking Agency and Yuexian Shrine were linked instances, then the Lady Yuexian in both places was the exact same entity.
Combined with the broken peach wood pen and incense after Sangu invited the deity to possess her, what else was there to not understand?
She was the player who had caused Lady Yuexian's injury.
At the same time, Bai Ci also got the answer to another mystery that had puzzled her.
Why was her [What is Love] curse left with only a sliver of health?
The six dead blind date partners had only played a minor role; after all, they were just ordinary humans. The bulk of the work had been done by that single glance from Lady Yuexian.
When the two forces clashed, Lady Yuexian was injured, and the curse was worn down until it almost completely vanished.
It really was a stroke of pure luck. The system's evaluation wasn't wrong at all.
...
Her break quickly came to an end. After some thought, Bai Ci ultimately decided to allocate her newly acquired attribute point to Spirit.
Upon entering the new instance, Bai Ci's consciousness was still hazy. Before she could even open her eyes, she heard the bustling sounds of a crowd all around her.
Gongs and drums clashed loudly, firecrackers crackled and popped, the noises rising and falling in waves, interspersed with the tender yet excited shouts of children.
“The bride has arrived!”
“The bride has arrived!”
The children chanted.
Bai Ci finally overcame the weight of her eyelids and opened her eyes. What met her gaze was a dark, heavy red, her vision completely blocked by fine, exquisite red silk.
Instead of rashly pulling it off, she lowered her head slightly to create some distance between the red silk and her face, using the gap to make a judgment.
This was a red bridal veil.
She then scanned her own body.
Unsurprisingly, she was dressed in a bright red wedding gown.
The fabric of the wedding gown was smooth and delicate, embroidered with a complex and exquisite pattern of harmonious phoenixes, detailed with fine stitches and outlined in gold thread.
Even if Bai Ci couldn't identify the material, she knew from the texture and embroidery alone that this garment was definitely not cheap.
Yet this luxurious wedding gown felt incredibly out of place on her current body.
Her frame beneath the gown was thin and frail, completely unable to fill out such grand bridal attire.
Looking at her hands, which were the most telling indicator of her situation, Bai Ci rubbed them together. From fingertips to palms, the rough texture was exceptionally pronounced.
Her palms and fingertips were covered in thick calluses, their rough lines clearly the result of years of working the fields and performing heavy labor.
A woman who clearly did hard manual labor all year round, yet dressed in an incredibly expensive and exquisite bridal gown—no matter how one thought about it, it was bizarre.
Vigilance rose in Bai Ci's heart. Before she could explore her surroundings, the slight swaying beneath her suddenly ceased. The bridal sedan chair touched down smoothly and came to a complete halt.
The noisy voices outside subsided slightly, and a middle-aged woman's voice drifted in clearly through the sedan curtain.
“The auspicious hour has arrived—”
“Bride, please step out of the sedan.”
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