37 A Strange Idea
322 0 6
X
Reading Options
Font Size
A- 15px A+
Width
Reset
X
Table of Contents
Loading... please wait.

Ao Jing went with Liangqiu Huang to visit the family of his brother’s fiancee. He was a bit worried about what his husband was doing though. Shangguan Yu should still be imprisoned in the dungeon and was probably be bored to death right now. To make sure that he was alright Ao Jing finally sent over a chat message, making use of the fact that he was following behind Liangqiu Huang.

Just a moment later, Shangguan Yu send back a crying face. [How could I be alright? I am imprisoned in the dungeon. There’s nothing I can do. If it was outside, I could at least go and refine some items. But here, there’s nothing to be done. It’s difficult enough to write this message with my hands tied up like this. It’s maddening!]

Ao Jing couldn’t help but sigh when he heard that. The dungeon in the game was really like this: If you had the bad luck to be thrown in there, then you wouldn’t be able to do anything until you got out again. As for how to get out … Well, there were a few ways.

For one, you could break out by yourself but if you got caught while doing this, the consequences would be even worse. Thus, it really wasn’t a good idea to do so when you were already in trouble.

The same was true for the second method which was to get somebody to help break you out. In fact, trying this was even worse because if you got spotted, not only would you land yourself in trouble but the other person would get a penalty as well. And getting caught was incredibly easy.

Who knew what the game developers had taken the day they came up with this system but while breaking in and out of prison, the chance of dropping something from your bag was heightened.

That was not only annoying since you lost something but could — in the worst case — even lead back to you. Thus, it was sometimes the person helping you that was thrown back into jail while you might somehow manage to get away without future consequences.

Needless to say, most players weren’t enthusiastic about breaking somebody out. Instead, they’d just tell the person to stay put there for the few hours that it lasted, and then, they would get out anyway. That way, only one person was inconvenienced.

The only people who actually went to the trouble of doing something like this were those who knew each other outside of the game or had gotten very close while playing just like Ao Jing and Shangguan Yu. If it was a normal occurrence, Ao Jing definitely would have rushed over to save his husband.

Unfortunately, right now, none of those would be an option. Shangguan Yu would have to stay in there or Liangqiu Huang would become suspicious of him again even after clearing his doubts with the investigation. After all, it would seem as if he had fled the dungeon and fleeing would likely equate to admitting his guilt. They couldn’t let that happen.

[I’m sorry. I was just trying to save the task since you seemed excited about it.]

[I know.] Shangguan Yu was a bit miffed but he could understand his husband’s decision. All tasks in this game were optional. Unfortunately, those devs had made that fact their excuse for another shitty excuse: If you died in one of these tasks, then it was game over and you couldn’t finish it.

The quest would be marked as failed, you didn’t get a reward and you were blocked from ever participating in it again. Even if a friend took up the same task and you tried to go with them, you wouldn’t be able to be an official part of it and could at most give some advice from the side. It was as if this was a real world and you were just a ghost spectating from the side that couldn’t be seen by the common people.

Players had complained about it without end on the forums when they found out in the beginning but the only result that had had was that the team behind the game included a short note about this fact in the tutorial you went through when starting out. It had truly made people speculate a lot just why somebody would be so intent to ruin the fun for others. Anyway, they hadn’t found an answer and there were merely lots of rumors circulating.

Ao Jing gave a wry smile at Shangguan Yu’s attitude. [I promise I’ll hurry up. We’re already on our way to the family of Liangqiu Min’s fiancee. When we get there, some concerns should come up already so you’d be out of danger. After that, it’s only a question of time until his brother finds the real culprit. In the worst case, I’ll just go and call Liangqiu Min himself over. That way, it’ll be obvious that there wasn’t any murder and he’ll have to let you go.]

Shangguan Yu pursed his lips when he read that message. [Unless his brother wants to even the score because I tried to kill him.]

With his hands tied, Shangguan Yu took some time to type the message. Thus, it only reached Ao Jing when they had already arrived at the house. He winced at those words. They weren’t completely made up out of thin air. There definitely was a certain chance that Liangqiu Min was still carrying a grudge. After all, even though they were trying to help him with solving this case, it didn’t change that Shangguan Yu had tried to kill him previously and even almost succeeded.

Right now, they could only hope that Liangqiu Min considered himself a gentleman who wouldn’t harm somebody after they had helped him with something even if there had been a previous grudge. Well, in the worst case, he’d have to try to persuade him to let go of any thoughts of revenge just like he had done with his brother. He only hoped that he would be able to do so.

6