Chapter 100 Royal City Banquet – Searching for the Princess.
The day passed peacefully, and night quickly arrived.
Halfway through the banquet, the entire banquet hall suddenly plunged into darkness, as if the power had been suddenly switched off; both the lights and candlelight disappeared.
A voice rang out in the darkness.
"The princess is getting married tomorrow."
"Tonight is the princes' final test—finding the princess."
I don't know if it's just my imagination, but the maid's voice sounded different than usual. Both her pronunciation and tone were stiff and mechanical.
"The princess has hidden herself. The princes must follow their hearts to find her. The first prince to find her before dawn will become her husband and stay in the capital to hold a grand wedding with her the next day. If no one finds the princess by dawn, she will choose her own husband."
"This is the princes' last chance. Good luck!"
After saying that, the maid disappeared.
The banquet hall was so dark that no one could see their own hand in front of their face. When the maid spoke, no one could see her or know where she was. When she left, there were no footsteps or the sound of fabric rustling; it was as if she had vanished into thin air.
Mo Rugui lit a prop candle, and Qin Ke quickly followed the candlelight to meet him, asking, "Where's Chen Su?"
This morning, they reached a cooperation agreement with Shen Su again. Based on the information provided by Shen Su, Mo Rugui had a feeling that something bad would happen tonight. They decided to act together. In order to avoid getting separated, the three of them stayed together before the lights went out. However, after the lights went out, Shen Su disappeared.
"I don't know." Mo Rugui shook his head, raised the candle and looked around, his brows slowly furrowing.
In the small space illuminated by candlelight, not only was Chen Su gone, but all the other NPCs were also gone, whether they were maids or princes. Only Qin Ke and Mo Rugui remained in the entire banquet hall.
Then they discovered that the banquet hall they were in was somewhat different from the one they had been in before.
Qin Ke also lit a candle, and the two of them looked around the banquet hall. The structure of the banquet hall had not changed, but the layout and decoration had changed from magnificent to somewhat simple. It was as if a tyrannical nouveau riche had suddenly become poor.
"Could we have been transported to another timeline?" Qin Ke muttered to himself as he searched. "If that's the case, and the princess isn't in this timeline, then we'll never be able to find her no matter what."
After speaking for a while without receiving a response, Qin Ke turned around and found Mo Rugui still standing there, her brows furrowed as if deep in thought. Qin Ke went back and asked, "Are you also worried that the princess is not on the same timeline as us?"
Mo Rugui seemed to only then come to her senses and asked, "Do you remember what Chen Su said this morning?"
Qin Ke was taken aback, somewhat puzzled as to why Mo Rugui asked that question, but he still nodded.
“I’m increasingly convinced that Shen Su was right.” Mo Rugui looked at the once-prosperous banquet hall. Before a royal city declines, there are many signs. One of the most obvious signs is that the national treasury is not full. And the lack of money in the national treasury will be reflected in all aspects. The fact that the once magnificent banquet hall has become simple is one of them.
"Was the decline of the royal city truly due to Suye, rather than simply following fate?"
Mo Rugui slowly repeated what Shen Su had said that morning.
"The Ska dynasty of today is not the Ska dynasty of the past, and His Majesty the King of today is not the King of the past," Mo Rugui continued, repeating what he had overheard from the two NPCs behind the veil the night before. "The Ska dynasty has long since declined; if it's not him, it will be someone else..."
Mo Rugui didn't say anything more, but Qin Ke understood.
They want to pass the game by changing history.
But the truth is that killing Suye doesn't change history, and the idea that "changing history can help you pass the game" is just their guess, and they're not sure if it will work.
After a long while, Mo Rugui sighed softly, and then regained his usual composure: "Let's find an exit first."
"Huh? Oh!"
Qin Ke was stunned for a moment before he suddenly realized what was going on.
This timeline is different from the original instance, so you naturally won't find the princess here.
They can only find an exit to leave this place, just like they did last night, and return to the original instance to search for the princess.
.
After the banquet hall was plunged into darkness, Shen Su had a bad feeling.
After the maid finished speaking and left, Shen Su lit a candle. The candlelight illuminated the empty surroundings, confirming his premonition.
This is still the banquet hall, but it's now a desolate mess. The floor is covered in thick dust, the walls are covered in cobwebs, and everything that can be smashed has been destroyed.
This timeline is clearly after the fall of the Ska dynasty.
The princess in this timeline is already dead, so he could never find her here.
Shen Su stood there for a while, then suddenly left the banquet hall, followed by the palace, and headed out of the city.
Immersed in the live broadcast room—
[Where is Chen Su going?]
[He wouldn't actually go and honestly go find the princess, would he? The timeline is wrong, there's no way he could find her!]
Qin Ke and Mo Rugui already knew they needed to leave before continuing their search for the princess. Didn't he think of that? Why is he running out of the city?
[Stop wandering around! Hurry up and find a way out, bro! I'm so worried!!!!]
At first, everyone in the live stream was worried for Chen Su, but as they got more anxious, they noticed something unusual—
Wait, what's that in front of us...?
[Princess's Tomb!!! This is a princess's tomb!!!]
[The maid said she wanted to find the princess! So, does that mean any princess, past or present, dead or alive, is acceptable?]
【Chen Su, you're such a clever little devil!】
.
The lights went out and then came back on, leaving only Shi Yu in the banquet hall. Then the king walked in.
The lights were still bright, and the banquet hall was still magnificent, just like before. The king in front of him was no different from the kings Shi Yu had seen before. This should still be the original instance.
He was not transported to other timelines.
So, other players were transported to other timelines.
"Time flies so fast. In the blink of an eye, my daughter has grown up so much. Your father's greatest wish was to see you get married, and now you are finally getting married..." The king stopped in front of Shi Yu, his gaze filled with fatherly love. As he spoke, his brown eyes gradually welled up with tears, and his voice became a little choked up, "Your father is a little reluctant to let you go."
"Father, I can't bear to part with you either," Shi Yu said tentatively. "I don't really want to get married. I want to stay by your side for the rest of my life."
The king wiped away his tears and said, "Silly child, whether you get married or not doesn't conflict with whether you stay by your father's side. You will inherit the Ska dynasty in the future, and your father is in good health now and has decades left to spend with you."
Shi Yu: "..."
Okay, he forgot, the princess was looking for a son-in-law to live with her, not to marry out.
“That’s good. I’m reluctant to leave Father,” Shi Yu paused, then said as if unintentionally, “Father, after spending this time together, I think Prince Moses is a very good person…”
As soon as Shi Yu finished saying "okay," she felt the chandelier above her head sway.
The tears in the king's eyes disappeared, replaced by confusion. He asked, "Moses? Haven't you been spending more time with Lucius these past few days? Why would you choose Moses?"
“It’s not that I chose Prince Moses,” Shi Yu said slowly and clearly. “I just think Prince Moses is very good. He’s witty and humorous, and I think I would be happy every day with him…” Shi Yu observed the king’s expression and felt the chandelier above his head swaying more and more violently. He changed his words: “Actually, I think Prince Ron is better!”
Crack.
Spiderweb-like cracks appeared on both glass windows.
The king's expression shifted from confusion to indifference, his eyes fixed on Shi Yu: "Ron? You like Ron?"
“I just felt that choosing Prince Ron would be more stable, but if I like him…” The swaying of the chandelier above paused for a moment, but after Shi Yu said the last sentence, the chandelier swayed even more violently, and the crystal light tubes made a crisp and sharp clanging sound, “I actually like Prince Su Ye.”
Crack.
The two panes of glass with the cracked spider silk shattered completely.
Crack, crack.
Cracks also appeared in the other glass panes, and then the entire hall began to shake as if it were an 8-magnitude earthquake.
Shi Yu quickly replied, "However, if there is a possibility, I would choose Prince Lucius."
Everything stopped shaking.
The shattered glass windows were restored to their original state, the chandelier overhead hung quietly, emitting a bright light, and the entire banquet hall returned to its former splendor. Everything that had just happened seemed like an illusion.
Shi Yu's Live Stream Room —
Good grief, is this some kind of game involving the king?
[Hahaha, I'm dying of laughter! The king's mood is like a rollercoaster, going up and down so much he almost had a heart attack.]
[It seems like Yu Yu wasn't deliberately teasing the King; perhaps he was testing something?]
...
Shi Yu was indeed verifying something.
Yesterday, when he passed by Shen Su, Shen Su slipped something into his hand.
It was a note with a sentence written on it—"The princess died at the age of 16."
This is undoubtedly a crucial clue.
The instance they were in was themed around "The Princess Choosing a Husband," which was supposed to happen when the princess turned 18. However, the information they received told them that the princess had died at the age of 16, meaning that the "Princess Choosing a Husband" event never actually happened in history.
Since this didn't happen.
So why does this instance exist?
Shi Yu recalled the first time he met the king as a princess. At that time, the king misunderstood that "the princess likes girls," which caused a strange event in the entire hall. After he explained it clearly, the strange event ended, and everything returned to normal.
Just like it is now.
All the strange occurrences ceased when he mentioned "Lucis," the person the king was satisfied with.
Shi Yu initially thought the anomaly in the main hall was due to a system mechanism.
It now appears that the anomaly in the main hall was not related to the system mechanism, but rather to the king's mood.
Could it be that this entire instance, including the "Princess Choosing a Husband" event within it, was all just a figment of the king's imagination?
In retrospect, this guess is very likely correct.
The king's greatest wish was to see his daughter get married, but the princess had already passed away. The king could not accept this fact, so he imagined the "princess choosing a husband" event, which led to the creation of the [Royal City Banquet] instance.
Shi Yu had seen on the forum that there was a way to ensure all players survive without clearing the dungeon: if the dungeon itself cannot be maintained due to reasons that the players have not violated the rules, the system will have no choice but to eject the players from the dungeon.
How can we make the instance unsustainable?
The answer is simple: break the king's illusion.
Since this is an illusion, once the illusion is broken, the instance will naturally collapse.
So how do we break free from the illusion?
Is it the desire to become the king of the nation? Or the desire to destroy him?
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