[The original owner was mentally ill]

Even though there was widespread online criticism about him opening too late and closing too early, Tong Yu still didn’t change his business hours.

Money needs to be made, but a life needs to be lived too, unless you’re not making money, ahem!

As usual, he ate breakfast, sunbathed, and completed his exercise routine. Only then did Tong Yu log into the virtual world. With yesterday’s experience, he logged in directly inside the shop today.

Yesterday, Tong Yu had sorted players by their reservation times. So today, there weren’t many players in the shop because they knew coming early wouldn’t get them a turn, and they might even block the boss from entering.

By the way, the incident of the escape room boss being blocked at the entrance by enthusiastic customers actually trended yesterday.

Tong Yu first arranged for the first batch of players to go in, then began the hiring process. He originally wanted to hire real people, but after thinking about it, the escape room game’s staff only needed to explain the plot, let people in, and escort them out. It wasn’t complicated, so hiring virtual NPCs was entirely sufficient. Plus, virtual characters had another advantage: their appearance could be changed according to his preferences.

Tong Yu even thought about assigning a special welcoming NPC to each escape room instance. For example, for the Ghost Bride instance, the assigned character would be the Ghost Bride’s husband, Young Master Li. He felt that having this character as the welcoming NPC might have an unexpected effect.

So, after the first batch of players finished, Tong Yu arranged for Young Master Li to greet the next group. The players who came today had all watched the live stream, so they recognized Young Master Li. Seeing Young Master Li leading them in, even though they knew he was a virtual NPC, they couldn’t help but chat with him.

“Young Master Li?”

“I am Li Chunsheng, from Jianglin, a scholar.”

“So you’re the one who tricked the Ghost Bride? Not only did you defraud her of money and affection, but you also killed her whole family. Are you even human?”

“I merely made a mistake that all men in the world are prone to making.”

“Can all men in the world punch you?”

“Shop rules: Punching an NPC costs 200 star coins per punch, and kicking costs 500 star coins per kick.”

“Holy crap, this must be the boss’s way of making money. That’s too shady.”

This was the friendly interaction between players and Young Master Li before entering.

Three hours later.

The eight players who had just entered stumbled out of the escape room, their legs trembling. Seeing Young Master Li again in his pale scholarly robe, their eyes immediately glowed red with fury.

Young Master Li considerately asked, “Esteemed guests, are you well?”

“I’ll well your mother!!”

“All the evil you did, did it all come back on us?!”

“You scumbag, how could you treat the Ghost Bride like that?”

“Bah! You still have the nerve to smile?”

Young Master Li maintained his smile: “Esteemed guests, please do not be impulsive. According to shop rules, punching an NPC costs 200 star coins per punch, and kicking costs 500 star coins per kick.”

“It’s just 500 star coins? Here, I’ll pay for 10,000 star coins worth of punches first!”

“And me, I’ll pay 10,000 too!”

Thus, just from the “getting beaten” service, Young Master Li earned tens of thousands of star coins in each session, which was something Tong Yu hadn’t expected at all. This further strengthened his resolve to hire virtual NPCs, since a virtual NPC could earn a month’s salary in one beating.

With virtual NPCs, Tong Yu was completely freed up. He spent an entire morning setting over a hundred different minor details in the Ghost Bride instance. For example, he designed ten different entry modes for the Ghost Bride. For the Soul-Locking Nails used to seal her, he added conditions for nailing them, such as having to nail them onto the coffin in a specific pattern. He created dozens of these patterns. Then, before each game started, he would randomly select a few of these new features to insert. Simply put, while the main plot remained unchanged, the sub-plots varied, adding small surprises to every game.

After finishing all this, Tong Yu felt much lighter. There was nothing left to do in the shop, and he primarily couldn’t bear to watch Young Master Li get beaten, even though he was the one who instructed Young Master Li to earn that “conscienceless” money.

In any case, the not-so-heartless Tong Yu went out for a stroll, bought a pile of virtual gourmet food, and returned to his small house. He planned to spend some time redecorating the house to resemble his own home back on Earth. If possible, he’d like to redecorate the house in the real world too, but considering it was Sheng Jing’s house, he didn’t feel right altering it. He planned to buy a new house and decorate it himself after the divorce.

He could actually start looking now. He wondered if property prices in the interstellar era were expensive.

‘No, buying it now would make it marital property, wouldn’t that benefit Sheng Jing?’

‘That’s not right either. As long as we’re not divorced, any money I earn is still marital property. So wouldn’t it still benefit Sheng Jing?

Never mind, I’ll just consider it repayment for saving my life.’

“Master, you have one unread message.” As soon as he entered the door, the Little Fatty robot rolled over.

“Who left the message?” Tong Yu sat on the sofa and began eating the “dark cuisine” he’d bought on the way.

With each bite, he frowned. The advantage part was watching his energy value plummet. He couldn’t help but suspect that interstellar food was so unappetizing not because of a cultural gap in cuisine, but simply to deplete energy.

“Mr. Li Zong.”

‘This person again.’ Ever since Tong Yu entered the virtual world, this Li Zong had called the original owner every day. Had he switched to leaving messages after discovering Tong Yu wasn’t answering calls?

Tong Yu avoided answering calls because he feared exposing himself if he encountered an acquaintance. With messages, he didn’t have to worry. He could even glean some information about the original owner without revealing himself.

“Play message,” Tong Yu instructed Little Fatty.

A moment later, a deep male voice filled the room: “Mr. Tong, you haven’t come for treatment for over half a month. I’m very concerned about your spiritual state. According to my previous spiritual evaluation of you, your spiritual state is on the verge of collapse. You must intensify treatment, otherwise, you will harm yourself and others. Please contact me when you see this message. I will not give up on you!”

Tong Yu was stunned for a long while after hearing the message.

‘This sounds like what a psychologist would say to a patient. Was the original owner seeing a psychologist?’

“Little Fatty, do you know who this Li Zong is?” Tong Yu finally remembered to ask.

“He’s a psychologist. Master used to consult Mr. Li Zong for psychological counseling every three days. Did you forget?”

‘It really is true.’

Tong Yu suddenly had an idea: this was the virtual world, and everything was recorded. Perhaps therapy sessions would be too?

“Little Fatty, do you have recordings of my previous psychology consultations?”

“Yes, would you like me to find them for you?”

“Yes!” This was the quickest and most direct way to understand the original owner.

Soon, Little Fatty retrieved a pile of videos, about fifty or more. If, as Little Fatty said, the original owner consulted every three days, that meant he had been seeing a psychologist for about six months.

Curious, Tong Yu clicked on the first video.

In the video, the original owner calmly described his situation: “I like my husband, but he doesn’t want to touch me, or even talk to me.”

Tong Yu inwardly cursed Sheng Jing, calling him a scumbag. ‘Why get married if you don’t like someone?’

Li Zong: “How did you handle that?”

Original owner: “I have to make him like me, so I told him that if he wanted me to help relieve his turbulent spiritual sea, he had to like me.”

Tong Yu: “!!”

As a psychologist, Li Zong was clearly more composed than Tong Yu. He continued to ask: “What was the result?”

Original owner, looking pitiful: “He disliked me even more.”

Tong Yu: ‘No kidding!’

After watching the first one, Tong Yu successively opened a few more. The first seven or eight videos had similar content. It wasn’t until the ninth that new details emerged.

Original owner: “Doctor, what should I do? He found out my secret.”

Li Zong: “What secret?”

Original owner: “When I married him, it wasn’t because I liked him. I just wanted to use this marriage to leave the small county town. I like big cities.”

Li Zong: “Since you don’t like him, why do you want him to touch you?”

Original owner: “Because he’s very outstanding. He’s handsome, intelligent, and a researcher at the scientific institute; he’s involved in the development of interstellar warships. He’s so excellent, I’m afraid someone else will snatch him away. Besides, he’s my husband, and sleeping with me is his obligation.”

Li Zong: “If you want him to like you, you shouldn’t threaten him. Instead, you should be kind to him, help him. Have you helped him?”

Original owner: “Of course! Less than two months after we got married, he actually demanded a spiritual cleansing. It hurt so, so much. I almost died for him.”

Li Zong: “Spiritual cleansing is an obligation of a contractor, isn’t it?”

Original owner: “But he almost killed me. He owes me for life!”

Li Zong: “Then have you considered terminating the contract?”

Original owner: “Terminate the contract? Then can I still stay in the city? But, if the spiritual contract is terminated, it won’t hurt anymore. But I can’t divorce, absolutely can’t divorce. I’ll go talk to him about this now.”

Tong Yu: ‘My goodness! You want all the benefits and none of the drawbacks. What nerve!’

He continued to watch the next video.

Li Zong: “You look very unwell today.”

Original owner: “I just slit my wrists to commit suicide. I knew he wouldn’t dare to let me die. To stop me from dying, he promised me everything, hehehe…”

‘What a psycho!’

Sure enough, the original owner discovered that as long as he self-harmed, Sheng Jing would yield. From then on, he escalated his behavior, repeating this tactic again and again. Sometimes he would act normal, crying and saying, “I don’t want to be like this, but why doesn’t he love me? If only he loved me, I wouldn’t be like this.”

Tong Yu clicked on the last video.

Li Zong: “Mr. Tong, your consistent engagement in psychological treatment proves that you’ve recognized your behavior as inappropriate. You care too much about your husband. How about we try a different approach? Leave your husband for a while and find yourself.”

Original owner: “No! Our contract is almost a year old. He just called to say he wants to terminate the contract and divorce me. I don’t want that, I don’t want that!”

Li Zong: “Mr. Tong, please calm down.”

Original owner: “Terminating the contract is fine, but not divorce, not divorce. What do I do, what do I do? I know! When he comes back, I’ll jump from the building in front of him, land at his feet. He’ll definitely compromise. Then I’ll make him sleep with me. Once we’ve slept together, he’ll have to take responsibility for me and won’t dare to divorce. I can also get my parents and his parents to condemn him. He’ll never be able to leave me. That’s it, that’s it…”

Li Zong: “Mr. Tong, your thoughts are very dangerous. Please calm down…”

Li Zong didn’t finish his sentence before the screen abruptly cut off.

Tong Yu finished watching all the videos, feeling drenched in sweat and a chill down his spine. “This plot could seriously make a psychological abuse-themed escape room.”

Without a doubt, the reason he transmigrated was that building jump, meant to force Sheng Jing into bed.

This reason for rebirth is a bit… undignified.

‘But no matter what, handsome Sheng Jing, I misunderstood you. I thought you were a huge scumbag before, but it turns out you’re a pure, unadulterated good guy. To not let a person with this kind of mental illness die, and even go as far as saving them and enduring them for a year—you’re truly an excessively kind person.’

—-

The excessively kind Sheng Jing was currently reading in his dorm, planning to procrastinate until tomorrow before going home.

Bai Sheng, the administrative head of the research institute, came to find him and handed him a card.

Sheng Jing was puzzled: “What is this?”

Bai Sheng: “A gift, for your contractor.”

Sheng Jing was bewildered.

Bai Sheng: “This is a perk from the research institute. The contractor with the highest energy consumption each month receives a virtual cabin developed by the institute. This month’s top performer is Tong Yu.”

Sheng Jing had never paid attention to this before, but he couldn’t help but feel a bit shocked now. Because only he knew that Tong Yu had only “worked” for a week, and in that week, he had surpassed the contractors of all other Awakened individuals in the research institute?

Bai Sheng patted his shoulder: “Go home early. He must be waiting for you to come back and keep him company.”

Sheng Jing didn’t want to go back, but he had indeed benefited from Tong Yu, and his work this week had been exceptionally smooth. After a moment of hesitation, Sheng Jing got into the levitating car heading home earlier than planned.