Carry the Bridal Sedan, Escort the Bride

A handsome young man sat slumped on the bathroom floor, his face deathly pale.

A deep gash cut across his neck, blood steadily welling out of it.

The blood had soaked through his collar and run onto the wall and floor.

Yet he let it pool around him without even trying to press a hand over the wound to stop the bleeding.

Because Li Xian couldn't, and didn't want to.

He couldn't because he had already lost too much blood to lift his arms, and he didn't want to because-

"Clatter."

The fruit knife slipped from Li Xian's fingertips and struck the bathroom tiles with a sharp clang.

This was the last thing I could think to try.

Li Xian silently repeated the thought to himself.

His vision swam, and he collapsed onto the floor.

"Carry the bridal sedan, escort the bride..."

"In red robes and red rouge, to her groom's side..."

Li Xian's closed eyelids twitched. His dim consciousness stirred, but not enough for him to fully open his eyes.

Li Xian vaguely realized this was a bridal procession folk song, recited quietly by several men whose rough voices overlapped in a muddy chorus.

"First, escort her past the Stone River shore..."

"Second, escort her to the bridal chamber door..."

The folk song grew louder and louder in Li Xian's ears, but the atmosphere of the recitation felt nothing like a wedding procession. Instead, it sounded as though they were sending off a dead person's soul.

Then the final two lines were recited beside Li Xian's ears-

"Third, may we never meet again in this life..."

"Gather the corpse and bones in the mourning hall."

A sudden jolt finally woke Li Xian. He hurriedly steadied himself before he could slide off his seat, then heard a man swearing.

"Why the hell did you suddenly let go? Are you trying to get someone killed? You nearly tipped the sedan over!"

"Tch, would I have let go if you hadn't lost your grip just now? And now you're blaming me!"

The nearby argument grew more heated. Li Xian opened his eyes, but all he could see was red.

He was puzzled for a moment, then raised a hand to feel in front of his face and discovered a piece of red cloth draped over his head.

Li Xian's heartbeat quickened slightly, and he reached for his neck.

Completely intact.

He reached up to pull the cloth off his head, but a sudden mechanical voice interrupted him.

[The system has completed role assignment. Welcome, player Li Xian, to the game instance!]

[Instance name: Stone River Village]

[Instance type: Puzzle-solving - Roleplay]

[Instance difficulty: F]

[Number of players: 7]

[Generating role information...]

[Player's assigned role: Li Xiaojuan]

[You are a woman living in Stone River Village. Today is your wedding day. You have no family in the village, yet this wedding is exceptionally grand. You are currently wearing bridal robes and sitting in the bridal sedan.]

[First-time instance entry detected. Additional hint: If the villagers notice the bride behaving out of character, your life may be in danger. Therefore, you must not let the villagers discover that the bride is a man.]

[Personal task: Enter the bridal chamber and drink the prepared wedding wine. Time limit: 10 minutes (open the task panel to check your progress)]

[Warning: Players who fail their tasks will be eliminated. Please make every effort to clear the instance.]

Li Xian took a little time to digest the information the system had given him and calm himself down.

The information I worked so hard to track down was true. That means...

My parents didn't die in some bullshit car accident like my relatives claimed. They died because of this "game instance."

Somewhere beyond Li Xian's sight, a floating screen in a hall faithfully displayed the scene of him sitting in the sedan.

A few people stopped amid the passing crowd. One man looked at the red-robed bride in the middle of the screen and said, sounding puzzled:

"Did the system bug out? Why is it broadcasting an NPC's perspective?"

A nearby passerby overheard him and grew curious. "Isn't this a roleplay instance? Isn't the one in red a player?"

The man shook his head. "Stone River Village is technically a roleplay instance, but since it's in the beginner zone, players have always been tourists visiting the village. They use their real names, too. There's no actual roleplaying involved."

"Hmm..." The passerby propped a hand beneath his chin thoughtfully. "Couldn't someone have been unlucky and randomly gotten that role? The odds might be low, but people do draw rare role cards."

But the man answered with certainty, "Even if that's true, the bride's role could never be assigned to a player."

"Huh? Why not?"

"Because the bride of Stone River Village always dies."

The argument outside the sedan gradually died down. Li Xian felt the seat beneath him sway as the sedan was lifted off the ground again.

The sedan bearers began reciting the eerie bridal procession song once more.

Li Xian secretly lifted his bridal veil, exposing one eye to inspect the sedan's interior.

There wasn't much room inside. When Li Xian straightened his back, his head nearly touched the wooden panel overhead. Light filtered through the red cloth covering the sedan, staining the entire interior a dark red and lending the already cramped space an inexplicable air of menace.

Li Xian felt a strange, cold dampness seep from the bridal robes he wore. He reached down to touch them, but the fabric beneath his hand was smooth and dry.

His gaze followed the fabric, and he noticed the long hair hanging beside his temples.

He wound a strand around his fingertip and felt it. Its texture was different from his own hair, confirming that he was wearing a wig.

Li Xian wanted to check a few other things, but the sedan was set down again, and an impatient voice urged him from outside:

"We're here! Hurry up and get out!"

A bearer pulled aside the curtain next to him. Li Xian quickly lowered the hand holding up his veil, then carefully stepped out of the sedan, his skirt trailing along the ground, and was led into a room.

The moment his trailing foot crossed the threshold, the door slammed shut behind him.

He was about to take off his veil, but stopped when a voice suddenly sounded inside his head.

[Character panel generated!]

[Name: Li Xian]

[Gender: Male]

[Stamina: 75]

[Health: 25]

[Sanity: 100]

[Points: 0]

[Items: None]

[Current zone: Beginner zone]

[Instances cleared: 0]

Health: 25?

Li Xian moved his arms and discovered that although his body appeared unharmed, even the slightest movement brought on a distinct feeling of weakness.

It was probably because his method of entering this place had been a little... violent.

Li Xian didn't dwell on his low health. Once the mechanical voice stopped, he reached up to pull off the veil that had been blocking his sight.

Just as he was about to move, he suddenly heard faint footsteps ahead of him.

The hand Li Xian had been about to raise remained frozen at his side. His whole body seemed restrained by some inexplicable force, leaving him unable to move.

The footsteps drew closer and closer, finally stopping right in front of him.