Chapter 29

Chapter 29

The Eldest Miss was strolling through her family’s garden, accompanied by her maid.

Despite the seemingly calm scene, Jian Fan received a prompt to make a choice.

Deliberately throw a small stone to make the Eldest Miss trip and fall for a “hero saves the beauty” moment, or do nothing at all.

Jian Fan frowned and chose the latter without hesitation.

Based on this choice, Jian Fan could guess a few things. His identity was likely meant to deliberately approach the Eldest Miss to establish a connection and build a deep relationship. Looking at the Script’s development, the “hero saves the beauty” option was undoubtedly the better choice, but Jian Fan’s personality made him dislike doing such things.

Since it was his own choice, he would follow his own whims.

Once the selection was made, the scene before him began to change. Jian Fan returned to his room, and the subsequent plot points were presented before his eyes in text form.

His choice had directly influenced his first meeting with the Eldest Miss.

The Doctor met the Eldest Miss later during a physical examination.

The Eldest Miss’s health wasn’t particularly poor, but strangely, the deceased had required the Doctor to check on her every seven days. Even the slightest ailment drew the deceased’s extreme concern. Although Lin Junruo had mentioned that her character was very pampered, this level of attention still struck Jian Fan as odd.

While the concept of regular wellness checks existed in ancient times, they shouldn’t be this frequent. Furthermore, no one else in the household-not even the deceased-received such treatment.

Though he was called a resident doctor, after reading the subsequent content, Jian Fan felt that this Doctor seemed more like someone hired specifically for the Eldest Miss.

It was precisely because of this that the Doctor and the Eldest Miss had frequent contact. The Eldest Miss had been raised somewhat naively by the deceased; after spending time with the Doctor, she found him to be gentle, considerate, and knowledgeable, and she gradually began to develop feelings for him.

Later, the Eldest Miss began to proactively show her affection. The Doctor initially refused and even intended to resign, but in the end, he seemed moved by her sincerity. Not only did he stay, but the Eldest Miss’s one-sided crush seemingly turned into a mutual romance.

The textual explanation ended there. As the words vanished, Jian Fan’s time reversal also came to an end.

Jian Fan now had a rough understanding of the relationship between the Doctor and the Eldest Miss.

The Doctor had come with a purpose, and he had chosen the Eldest Miss as his point of entry. The choice Jian Fan had been given earlier was likely to determine the dynamic of their relationship: whether the Doctor would be the pursuer or if he would let the Eldest Miss take the lead.

Because of Jian Fan’s choice, the Doctor had opted for a safer, more passive approach-the “boiling a frog in lukewarm water” method. He first piqued the Eldest Miss’s interest through their daily interactions, then played hard to get, even staging a drama about leaving. Only after forcing the Eldest Miss to take action did he put on a moved facade, ostensibly accepting her feelings.

The Doctor’s goal in approaching the Eldest Miss was most likely the deceased. However, Jian Fan frowned. Wasn’t this process a bit too slow? He had spent too much time on the Eldest Miss, only to use her as a stepping stone to get close to the deceased later…

If the target was the Eldest Miss herself, what could be the reason?

Jian Fan couldn’t figure that out for the time being. Aside from this, he had obtained another piece of information from this time reversal.

The Toy Dagger, the Taoist priest, and… Jian Fan looked up and pulled a copy of the Book of Changes from the shelf in his room.

The reason he had spoken so quickly upon seeing the Taiji Diagram on the deceased’s body was that he had caught a glimpse of the Book of Changes on the bookshelf while inspecting his room earlier. At the time, Jian Fan hadn’t paid much attention to the book’s presence; even when he flipped through it later, it was just a book with nothing else unusual about it.

But now, connecting it to the mention of a Taoist priest, certain links began to faintly surface.
Was this Script really just the melodramatic family feud they thought it was?

This point was worth investigating further.

Jian Fan didn’t have enough information to deduce anything more, but his doubts were soon answered in the afternoon.

After their midday break, an NPC arrived to inform them that they could return to the main hall to continue their investigation. Before Jian Fan could even reach the hall, he was pulled into a corner by a hurried Qin Nan.

“Did you find something?” Seeing Qin Nan’s behavior, Jian Fan quickly guessed his intent.

Qin Nan looked at Jian Fan with a complex expression. “I discovered something massive.” He paused, looking at Jian Fan suspiciously. “Wait, you don’t already know, do you?”

Jian Fan shook his head. “I’ve gathered some information, but nothing quite so shocking has developed yet.”

Shocking.

Qin Nan felt that was a very apt word.

“Go on,” Jian Fan prompted. “We don’t have much time, so keep it brief.”

“I’ll try.” Thinking back on what he had experienced, Qin Nan had a stomach full of grievances, but their time was indeed limited. He forced himself to extract the most important details. “There’s a secret room in the deceased’s bedroom. It contains the corpse of the Eldest Miss’s biological mother. The deceased intended to use his own daughter or granddaughter-I’m not sure what method-to resurrect the mother inside the Eldest Miss’s body!”

Jian Fan looked up.

So that was it.

That explained why his character had to contact the Eldest Miss and establish such a close relationship with her. The Eldest Miss was the key to everything! No matter what the deceased did, he ultimately needed her present. Therefore, by getting close to the Eldest Miss, it would be easier to achieve his purpose for being here.

“It’s too twisted, using his own descendants to resurrect a dead person,” Qin Nan lamented. He added, “And who exactly was the deceased? How did he even know how to do something like resurrecting the dead? Was he scammed, or can it actually be done in this setting?”

“I’m not sure if it can actually be done, but he likely wasn’t scammed,” Jian Fan said.

Qin Nan was surprised. “Do you have clues on your end?”

“I didn’t understand before, but after what you said, I have a general idea,” Jian Fan replied. Uncharacteristically, he didn’t wait for Qin Nan to ask and offered an explanation: “Remember that Toy Dagger? A Taoist priest gave it to me, and I deliberately approached the Eldest Miss.”

A Taoist priest, the Eldest Miss, and the deceased wanting to use the Eldest Miss’s body as a vessel…

Qin Nan’s mouth hung open. He forced himself to swallow a curse, settling for a simple, “Holy crap.”

“Oh, right. I think the Third Young Master and the Third Young Lady probably realized what the deceased was planning. That’s why they deliberately fell out and didn’t dare to have children. If that’s the case, the Third Young Master’s motive for murder is even stronger. Combined with our previous deductions, the killer should be him,” Qin Nan said.

Although the game required them to make choices, those choices only seemed simple and not directly related to the murder case. The subsequent developments would still follow the character backgrounds within the Script.

In other words, if the Third Young Master had gone to the deceased’s courtyard that day, then based on his character profile, the probability of him killing the man was nine out of ten.

Jian Fan agreed with this speculation.

“Let’s go. We’ll talk more over there,” Jian Fan said.

The two stepped out from the corner and headed toward the main hall. Just as they were about to arrive, Mu Xin suddenly rushed out from the side and blocked their path.

“The Third Young Master is dead,” Mu Xin said.

Dead?

Both Jian Fan and Qin Nan were stunned.