The backdrop can also be propped up.

Chapter 228 Exchanging Intelligence

"Alright, let's not talk about that now," Lu Renkui said. "What exactly is going on with this world?"

"These two sisters—to be precise, the eldest sister is the main driving force behind the creation of this instance world," the system WQBYRZM replied, "She created this instance world at a heavy price."

"What is her purpose?" Lu Renkui asked.

"It wasn't mentioned in the original text, but we can infer that it might be for her younger sister, the second young lady, Li Yue."

"What we know from the original text is that the eldest and second young ladies were twins, but for some unknown reason, the second young lady died."

"In order to revive her younger sister, the young lady somehow read some random things and ended up killing herself and everyone in the tea shop."

“No wonder the servants are the most resentful,” Lu Renkui said with a hint of helplessness, recalling the plot he read in the original text. “They were just living off that little bit of money. In the end, the young lady sacrificed them all to revive her sister. Although it sounds touching, it’s a bit too much.”

"So those dark figures outside the window were...?" Lu Renkui remembered the dark figures that had been peering at them from the window earlier. She prepared herself, but when she turned back to look, the dark figures were gone.

“Those shadowy figures must be former servants of the manor,” the system WQBYRZM explained. “They must have been plotting to possess the player and carry out their revenge against the eldest and second young ladies.”

“Both sides want the player dead—by the way, did the original text really not mention how to escape the teahouse?” Lu Renkui asked again.

"Hmm, no, because a large portion of the text is about how the protagonist (uke) falls in love with one of the male lead's (seme) fragments." System WQBYRZM glanced at the pile of invalid information in the original text and sighed.

"Sigh, never mind, let's keep looking." Lu Renkui felt a headache coming on again.

The next morning, Fang Cheng was woken up by the ringing of the clock. As a high school student, she resisted getting up early, but she managed to accept it fairly well. Besides, she still had to pick tea leaves.

While washing up, Fang Cheng mentally assigned tasks—today wasn't as urgent as yesterday, two hours should be enough to pick a basket of tea leaves.

After washing up, Fang Cheng grabbed a basket and ran to the tea garden. This time, she arrived at the tea garden ahead of time again. Looking at the white figures moving around in the tea garden, Fang Cheng quietly waited for the 5:00 bell to ring so that the white figures would be taken away.

The white figures stopped wandering aimlessly in the tea garden; they began to move, as if they were picking tea leaves.

"Dong—dong—dong—dong—dong—" As the bell rang, the white images gradually disappeared as if blown away by the wind, and the gate leading to the tea garden opened directly.

Fang Cheng went inside and, using yesterday's pace, finished picking a basket of tea leaves. Then, carrying the basket full of tea leaves, she walked towards the top of the terraced fields—she wanted to see if the tea garden had any boundaries.

As she walked, Fang Cheng felt that she should be reaching the top of the terraced fields—because there were only 7 terraces in total, and she had already climbed 7.

Unexpectedly, just as they reached the 7th floor, the ground suddenly began to shake violently. Fang Cheng lost his footing and fell to the ground, scattering a small pile of tea leaves.

Fang Cheng was a little anxious and quickly steadied the basket with her hands. Only when the ground stopped shaking did Fang Cheng dare to stand up, look up, and stare incredulously at the seven terraced fields that had just appeared out of thin air in front of her.

It seems we can't escape by crossing these mountains. Fang Cheng looked at the tea leaves scattered on the ground with some heartache. These tea leaves definitely don't count; we'll have to pick them again.

After picking the tea leaves, Fang Cheng arrived at the tea garden entrance right on time once again.

The gate slammed shut, and Fang Cheng turned around to see the white figures appear. This time, they weren't picking tea leaves, but slowly separated into several white clumps floating in the air, and they seemed to have grown larger.

Fang Cheng dared not look any longer—she was afraid those white shadows would rush over.

Fang Cheng ran to the kitchen and handed a basket of tea leaves to Bai Xingyi, who was working there.

Bai Xingyi handed the basket of tea leaves to another cook in the kitchen and began to cook.

After watching the cook prepare tea and deliver it to the young lady, Bai Xingyi stuffed another steamed bun into Fang Cheng's hand and pulled him to the players' gathering place.

As soon as the two girls entered the room, they saw Gu Huayang and the others who had arrived long ago, sitting in their seats with serious or worried expressions.

After returning to his seat, Gu Huayang reiterated the theme of the information they were going to exchange at this gathering: "Everyone sees the eldest and second young ladies differently from the rules. Fang Cheng and I discussed it last night. From her perspective, both the eldest and second young ladies are still alive, but from my perspective, the second young lady is already dead."

"So now we need to discuss how you all wrote the names of the eldest and second young ladies on your rule sheets."

Upon hearing this, Bai Xingyi raised his hand and said, "I have clearly stated here that the Second Miss is dead, but she will return in the form of a ghost."

"So I need to brew a pot of white tea for the Second Miss after I see her, and give it to her when I see her again. Otherwise, she will consider it disrespectful and kill me."

“It’s written here that the eldest young lady and the second young lady are one alive and one dead,” Li Hongying said with a frown and her head down. “But it says that if I see the second young lady, I need to report directly to the eldest young lady that someone is impersonating the second young lady and playing tricks.”

“Oh dear, me too.” Wang Jianhua rubbed his palms and said, “Tell me, the eldest young lady and the second young lady are one alive and one dead. The eldest young lady will come to inspect me. If you see the eldest young lady outside of her inspection time, then you need to report to her that someone is impersonating her.”

“I’m just a water carrier, so I don’t have that much information,” Chen Yi’an said, “but it did mention the eldest and second young ladies, one living and one dying.”

The group looked at Fu Qu, who nodded, indicating that he also knew about the deaths of the eldest and second young ladies. He then added a piece of news that no one except Fang Cheng had heard: "Last night, when I was grading homework, I met a man who said he was one of the people in charge of this tea house and asked me how I was doing here."

"Isn't this tea shop entirely under the control of that young lady?" Gu Huayang frowned, recalling the sentence on the rule sheet: "The young lady is the owner of the tea shop, please show her respect."

“That’s not quite right,” Fu Qu said. “I’ll go ask about it later.”

"It seems that only Fang Cheng is unaware of the lives and deaths of the eldest and second young ladies." Gu Huayang looked at Fang Cheng, who was already eating a steamed bun while shedding tears.

Sitting next to Fang Cheng, Li Hongying patted Fang Cheng and told her not to eat steamed buns while crying, as she might choke.

Seeing that Fang Cheng still couldn't stop crying, Bai Xingyi comforted him, "Calm down. Maybe your role is meant to be less concerned about the main family's affairs. So it's normal that your rule sheet doesn't mention the eldest and second young ladies' lives and deaths."

"How did you all know what the roles were?" Fang Cheng was almost in tears. "I didn't write anything on that piece of paper except the rules."

"Through interactions with the NPCs around you... didn't you see the part about the character in the rule sheet?" Wang Jianhua asked, somewhat surprised. "I've been picking things out from several people around me, and they can figure out what kind of character I'm playing in this world just from a few words. Weren't you working alone?"

“I only have myself.” Fang Cheng said this with a sob in his voice. “My rulebook has nothing on it except the rules.”