Mu Chen's method was actually quite simple.

He simply pretended to have captured the three brides. Lu Xiaoyao and the others weren't bound this time, thanks to Mu Chen's "guarantee" that he had crippled them, making restraints unnecessary. This spared them the fate of being forcibly made up after being tied up and gagged.

However, even without being bound, they were still forced into bridal gowns. And because of the time constraint, several paper-effigy old women came to the room to apply makeup to all three of them at once.

Lu Xiaoyao and the others sat before the dressing table, once again startled by their reflections.

They were truly hideous!

"Rumble!"

Outside, the sky darkened, followed by a clap of thunder and a downpour that arrived right on schedule.

"It's raining..."

Lu Xiaoyao looked out at the rain. The window in front of the dressing table was open, and raindrops drifted in, hitting their faces. Soon, Lu Xiaoyao felt a shiver run down her spine.

"Oh right, this game seems to have rain..."

As soon as she entered the game, Lu Xiaoyao was chased by all sorts of monsters. After being captured, they struggled to escape, and were finally coerced into returning here, completely forgetting that it rained in this game.

"So what if it's raining? Do you think if we run now, they won't be able to catch us because of the rain, and everything will be fine?"

Wang Wenfei didn't even care about the paper-effigy old women standing beside her, openly talking about escaping. Anyway, all they did was talk.

Talking about escaping wasn't against the law, right?

Just like she was just talking, these paper-effigy old women didn't even blink, staring straight ahead as they focused on applying makeup to the three of them.

Anyway, you can't escape, so they don't bother worrying.

"We don't have the ability to run anyway..."

Lu Xiaoyao sighed. She recalled the moment when a wisp of black energy suddenly appeared before her eyes, shot from the boss's fingertip and entered her brow, sending a chill through her body. She really thought she was dead!

But the boss said that if they didn't listen to him, this black energy would drill into their hearts, causing a sudden myocardial infarction and death, and then they would have to work for him.

H-how could they dare to disobey? _(:3」∠)_

Especially since they discovered that they could hear the boss's direct orders to them, which others couldn't hear.

No wonder he was the big boss!

Even with his power weakened, he was still so awesome!

They could only obediently listen!

Instead of a bunch of NPC minions taking orders, now they were directing players to be minions. What was the point of this game experience?

...

Mingmei and the others had just stepped out when the sudden downpour caught them off guard. By the time they found shelter, they had made a new discovery.

"There's really no one on the street. Just the three of us and these little guys running around trying to dodge the rain."

They ducked into a tavern on a street corner. It was empty. Qi Hai Kui cautiously closed the doors and windows, hiding in a blind spot by the window and peeking outside. But she really didn't see anything.

"The Zhang family has a happy occasion. Everyone in the town must have been invited, right?"

Mingmei remembered the scene in the newbie village when the rain stopped at night and a group of paper figurines swarmed toward the Zhang family. So she voiced her guess.

"T-then doesn't that mean the Zhang family not only has the Zhang family's servants..."

Zhen Hu was using a dry towel from the shop to wipe the heads and faces of a group of little ghosts. Hearing Mingmei's words, he suddenly glanced at the forty little ghosts summoned by him and Qi Hai Kui. He whispered, "Did we summon too few?"

"If everyone in the town is really over there, then even if the two of us summoned two hundred, it would still be too few."

As she said that, Qi Hai Kui's gaze fell on Mingmei, making Mingmei's hair stand on end.

Then she saw Qi Hai Kui ponder for a moment and make up her mind. "When we see people later, please directly ask them to buy at least five boxed lunches to start."

Mingmei: ??

You little rascal!

Mingmei's eyes lit up, and she looked at Qi Hai Kui, her gaze seeming to say, "I didn't expect you to be that kind of Qi Hai Kui!"

Mingmei initially thought that Qi Hai Kui would be the earliest to buy and spend the most points in the entire game. But if he did as he said, if he succeeded, he would actually be the one who spent the least points in the entire game!

You're a genius!

A competitive player among the well-adjusted!

Relying on his own strength to lead everyone to spend a lot of points together?

"I've seen the walkthrough for this game before. The worst ending in the original version should be the feng shui master failing to save people and dying, the teacher character betraying the players and turning into an evil spirit, and all three female players being sacrificed and devoured by the boss... I don't know what will happen in this game? Whether the boss has been enhanced or something else..."

Just then, Zhen Hu sat on a bench next to them, listening to the sound of the rain pattering outside, and began to ramble with a vacant look.

He said, "So far, I haven't found any trace of the zerg. Didn't they say that the system would determine which game was tampered with by the zerg and then put us in it?

"So far, other than all the NPCs going crazy in advance, I really don't know what the zerg have done. Could it be that they just tampered with these NPCs?"

"Instead of wasting effort on tampering with these NPCs, why didn't they tamper with the boss?"

Hearing Zhen Hu's rambling, Qi Hai Kui suddenly realized something else—it seemed like many characters in this game had gone crazy early, but the boss was nowhere to be seen!

"You were at the Zhang family before, did you see the boss?" Qi Hai Kui said, looking at Zhen Hu and asking, "Just now you said you were caught at the Zhang family, you escaped... Did you see the boss during the whole process?"

"No." Zhen Hu also shook his head, thought for a long time, and confirmed, "We saw Master Zhang more times than we saw the young master of the Zhang family."

"How was Master Zhang's health when you saw him?"

"Pretty good, he was even taking a walk in the mansion."

"That's not right!"

Qi Hai Kui remembered that Master Zhang's health in the original game was very poor, one could even say he was terminally ill.

How could he still be taking walks?

When Miss Bai of the Bai family came to the Zhang family to break off the engagement in the original plot, she was still worried about the old man's health and didn't dare to say it directly!

"So that means Master Zhang's character was also tampered with?" Zhen Hu didn't understand Qi Hai Kui's surprise. "Didn't you say before that the other NPCs were tampered with? Isn't it normal for Master Zhang to be tampered with?"

"What about the boss? They tampered with so many NPCs, there's no reason not to tamper with the boss, right? But once they tampered with the boss, why didn't the boss attack you?

"Just think about the boss in the newbie village. Don't underestimate it just because it's in the newbie village and its weaknesses are obvious. But back then, there were piles of players who died at the hands of the newbie village boss!

"Plus, according to the degree of deterioration of the game when we came in, I don't think we could have withstood the boss going crazy early and attacking us. Unless—the boss is different from the others!"

Qi Hai Kui's analysis made Mingmei exclaim, "Awesome!"

She learned through Lu Xiaoyao's perspective that the boss's power had been weakened. While a group of NPCs were holding the crazy script, only Mu Chen silently took out the sickly script...