Chapter 57: Look at You, Getting All Impatient Again

After listening to the middle-aged man, Cao Yu fell into deep thought.

Praying to the God of Fortune at least three times during the day;
Dining at the public canteen during meal times;
Going to sleep by ten o'clock at night;
And, players must separate and stay at the homes of the town's residents, with only one person per household.

Cao Yu sensed that something was amiss.

The first three were fine; he could just assume they were genuine local customs.
As for the fourth, it clearly meant to separate the players... Should he obey it?

Temporarily pushing down his suspicions, Cao Yu tentatively asked a rather bold question:
"What happens if we don't follow these four customs?"

"If you don't follow them, you don't. Whether to follow local customs depends on personal preference. However..." The middle-aged man smiled and said, "Young man, if you truly intend to stay, I advise you to follow them. People nowadays are becoming increasingly restless and impatient. The customs of our town can be considered a way to cultivate healthy habits. If you want to live a happy and leisurely life, you have to start with the details."

"Will I run into danger if I don't follow them?" Cao Yu probed further.

Forcing a probe like this was actually quite a risky move.
However... he was somewhat confident in his own strength, and coupled with the fact that night was approaching, this might be his only opportunity to test the waters.

Unfortunately, the middle-aged man maintained his gentle attitude:
"If you don't want to move here, you can just leave. Why are you dragging danger into this? Sigh, you players always love to say baffling things."

"Just asking out of curiosity," Cao Yu smiled and said, "By the way, has anyone in town gotten married recently?"

He recalled the "item-type node" he had seen before entering the instance—a framed wedding photograph hanging on the wall.

"Married? I haven't heard of anything like that," the middle-aged man replied. "Our town is small; if there were any joyous occasions, it certainly wouldn't escape my notice. I can assure you that no one has gotten married recently."

"No one... Then were there many outsiders visiting here yesterday?" Cao Yu described, "About twenty or thirty people."

"Ah, yes," the middle-aged man said. "I remember they were all accommodated on the east side of the town. But I didn't bother to find out the exact number."

"Right," Cao Yu asked, "Are you an indigenous resident of this town, or did you move here?"

"I moved here. Let me calculate... it must be close to twenty years now." The middle-aged man wore a reminiscent look.

Afterward, Cao Yu brought up a few other topics to chat with him. Finding nothing suspicious, he took his leave.

He soon knocked on the door of a second town resident.
Before long, an elderly woman with a kind face opened the door and came out. Looking at Cao Yu, she smiled and asked, "Is there something you need?"

Cao Yu smiled back and said, "Granny, I'd like to ask you a few ques—"
"Young man, you must be a player, right?" the old woman interrupted.

Cao Yu: "..."

The old woman smiled and said, "Players often come here, and they always ask about the rules. Actually, what rules are there? There are merely four customs..."

...

After a brief conversation, Cao Yu bid farewell to the old woman and knocked on the door of a third town resident.
The information provided by the old woman was identical to what the middle-aged man had said earlier, yet Cao Yu did not stop his visits just for that.

A sample size of only two households seemed a bit too hasty no matter how he looked at it.

Soon, the third household opened its door, and a young man of about thirty walked out.
Upon seeing Cao Yu, the young man smiled and said, "You must be a player, right?"

"Yes." Cao Yu no longer felt any surprise; he went straight through the motions. "I'd like to ask about the rules here."

Come to think of it... why did the residents of this town all wear such smiling expressions?
Was the happiness index of life here really this high?
If players frequently arrived to ask about the situation, according to common sense, the townspeople... should feel annoyed, shouldn't they?

Yet, the young man showed no trace of annoyance. He smiled and said:
"There are actually no rules here. There are only three customs, and whether you choose to follow them depends entirely on your personal will."

"Um... huh?" Cao Yu's gaze narrowed. "How many customs?"

"Three," the young man replied. "The first is prayer..."

After a thorough explanation, the young man informed Cao Yu of the customs regarding prayer, dining, and sleeping.

Once he finished listening, Cao Yu asked directly:
"Are you certain there is no fourth custom? For example, that outsiders must separate and stay in the homes of the townspeople?"

"Where did you hear of such a custom?" The young man shook his head. "I've never heard of it."

"I just asked a family over there, and they told me there is a fourth custom," Cao Yu said, pointing directly at a house not far away.

This behavior could be considered quite bold.
Directly pointing out a conflict in the townspeople's common knowledge... Cao Yu had already prepared himself to deal with a crisis.
Had he not been so confident in his current strength, he would never have attempted such a somewhat suicidal stunt.

As a result... the young man merely replied with a calm demeanor:
"Oh, they probably remembered it wrong."

Cao Yu: "..."

...

At 6:20 PM.
Cao Yu reunited with Zhou Fan and the other two to exchange intelligence.
The four of them had spent a little over ten minutes consecutively visiting twenty households, barely completing a round of "sample surveying."

After compiling and comparing the intelligence, they discovered... the problem was rather serious.

Praying at least three times during the day, eating meals at the public canteen, and going to sleep by ten o'clock at night—regarding these three customs, the information provided by every single town resident matched completely, with no differences whatsoever.

Only the fourth custom, which was the point that outsiders must separate to stay overnight, did not match.
Some townspeople said it existed.
Others said it did not, claiming there were only three customs in the town and no such rule about staying separately.

This was quite thought-provoking.
Song Qiao's younger brother, Song He, even had the impulse to drag both types of town residents out to confront each other.
However, there was no time.

Mealtime was approaching, and the townspeople had already left their homes, heading toward the public canteen situated in the center of the town.

Furthermore... dragging townspeople out for a confrontation seemed a bit like courting death, didn't it?

Song He, Song Qiao, and Zhou Fan all felt a headache coming on.
Now, it wasn't just a matter of two contradictory instance prompts anymore.
The rules stated by the town residents actually differed... And there were less than ten minutes left until the 6:30 mealtime.

So, should they follow the rules and head to the public canteen first, or not?

Zhou Fan looked at Cao Yu and asked, "Brother Cao, how do you think we should choose?"

"We still have two key points that haven't been investigated," Cao Yu said thoughtfully as he spoke.
"First, on the west side of this town, there are previous players living there... Logically speaking, the idea of players remaining to live inside an instance sounds a bit like fantasy. Therefore, I'm more inclined to believe they are players who failed past clearance attempts and are living in the instance through some bizarre method."

Without immediately delving into that issue, he continued:
"The second key point is the twenty-four missing Federal residents. We haven't encountered a single one of them yet. According to the townspeople, they are currently living on the east side of the town.
After coming into this instance, these people ought to have panicked and caused a huge uproar.
Yet... based on the intelligence we've gathered so far, not a single disturbance has occurred in this town, which is very strange."

"I've noticed these two points as well," Song Qiao acknowledged.
"However, the previous players are on the west side, and the Federal residents are on the east side. With less than ten minutes left before mealtime... we don't have time to go around asking one by one. We have to make a choice right now."

She turned to Cao Yu and asked, "So, should we follow the rules and go to the canteen for dinner right now?"

"Look at you, always in a rush," Cao Yu smiled and said. "I haven't finished speaking yet."

Without keeping them in suspense any further, he said directly:
"Have you noticed that the residents of this town... all love to smile?"

"Now that Brother Cao mentions it..." Zhou Fan recalled, "The people I visited really did smile the entire time they talked to me, and they all seemed very gentle."

"This place is called Happiness Town, the living atmosphere is leisurely, and everyone loves to smile... Does that seem to make sense?" Song Qiao's younger brother, Song He, asked, "Could there be something wrong with their smiles?"

" Viewed on their own, there's nothing wrong with them, at most indicating that the happiness index of life here is very high. But when combined with those two bizarre details—'players remaining to live here' and 'Federal residents causing no trouble'—it becomes a bit problematic."

Cao Yu warned:
"In the background lore of the instance, there is a sentence mentioned—this town can make people forget many troubles.
I'm starting to suspect that this sentence is not a description of the living atmosphere. Rather, this town can truly, in a physical sense, make people forget many troubles.
Forget so much that once they step inside, they only want to stay and live here, unwilling to leave, and unwilling to cause any chaos..."

At this point, Cao Yu suddenly paused and looked at Song He—specifically, he looked at Song He's right wrist.

He saw that Song He's right wrist was fractured at some unknown moment, displaying a distorted shape.

Only then did Song He react, as a wave of intense pain assaulted his brain.

"Ugh...! My hand is broken!?"