Chapter 229 - Parents
After cultivating in the real world for a couple of hours, Yuan stopped his cultivation and waited for Yu Rou to enter his room.
Suddenly, he could hear footsteps approaching his room. However, these graceful and quiet steps did not belong to Yu Rou.
A few moments later, the door opened, and Meixiu's voice resounded, "Good evening, Young Master. I will be attending you tonight because the Young Lady has been summoned by the Masters."
"Our parents? Do you know why?" Yuan asked her.
"I do not, Young Master."
"I understand. Thank you."
A few moments later, Meixiu began removing Yuan's clothes and wiping him down with a wet towel.
"Young Master, if you don't mind me asking, you'd participated in a musical competition in Cultivation Online, right? I heard about it from the Young Lady." Meixiu suddenly asked him.
"Yes, I did."
"What kind of instrument did you play?" she then asked.
"An instrument called the zither," Yuan casually said.
"Did you win? Knowing the Young Master, you most likely placed first again."
"I did."
"C-Congratulations, Young Master," Meixiu said in a somewhat surprised voice.
After wiping his body, Meixiu began feeding Yuan his three bowls of soup.
'Could the Young Master be Player Yuan who's currently dominating the game and causing a commotion around the world with his mysterious identity? Although it's hard to believe, their stories line up…' Meixiu thought to herself. While she doesn't particularly care about matters outside of the Yu Family, the countless talks about Player Yuan have also caught her interest recently.
Meanwhile, in a separate household a couple of miles away from Yuan's home, Yu Rou stood before two individuals— a handsome middle-aged man and a beautiful middle-aged woman.
"Yu Rou, do you know why we called you here today?" The middle-aged man asked her.
"I do not, father." Yu Rou responded in a calm voice.
Indeed, these two individuals were the sibling's parents, Yu Yong, the father, and Tang Lee, the mother.
After a moment of silence, Yu Yong spoke, "Do you know of the game 'Cultivation Online'?"
"Eh?"
Yu Rou's eyes widened at Yu Yong's unexpected question, as she never expected things that were not related to music would come out of their parent's mouth.
"I-I have… I even played it for a couple of days during my vacation," she responded after her initial surprise.
Tang Lee then said, "Well, the other families have been talking about it recently, or more specifically, they have been talking about an individual who goes by the name of 'Player Yuan'. Do you know of this person?"
"I do… He's all over the internet, after all." Yu Rou nodded in a somewhat dazed manner, silently wondering to herself why their parents were suddenly interested in Player Yuan who was their own son.
Yu Yong then said, "The children from the other families have recently participated in this musical competition related to the 'zither' within Cultivation Online, and they told their families that this Player Yuan was without a doubt a musical genius with strong beliefs that he belongs to a family with a music background."
And he continued, "I have heard of this Player Yuan before but never really paid attention to him, but if he's really a musical genius, I would like to meet him."
"Why do you want to meet him, father? He's just a gamer who's decent with the zither, right? Even if he's a genius with the zither, there's no guarantee that he could play the other instruments as well. Furthermore, nobody plays the zither anymore." Yu Rou asked him.
"It doesn't matter how many instruments he can play. Our company is always looking for talented people, and if this Player Yuan is as talented as they say, I want him to play for my company!" Yu Yong said.
Yu Rou shook her head and said, "I'm afraid that's impossible for now, father. Everybody has been looking for Player Yuan's real identity since the game started weeks ago, but nobody has been able to learn anything to date."
"I know— I have been researching about him as well. However, I don't believe that he'll be able to hide his identity forever. Sooner or later, his identity will be revealed, and when that happens, I will be the first one to greet him." Yu Yong said with a serious look on his face.
"Anyways, the reason I called you here today is to let you know that we will begin doing our tours in Cultivation Online instead of the real world, as that seems to be the trend nowadays."
"W-What? How does that work?" Yu Rou stared at them with a gawking look on her face.
"Simple. We will start doing concerts in the game to spread our company's reputation within the game. The other families have already been doing this and to great success. Therefore, we shall be doing the same as well."
"Y-You don't mean…" Yu Rou swallowed nervously after hearing this, as she could feel an ominous feeling looming in the atmosphere.
"I've heard from others that even people who cannot see or move in the real world can operate like they're perfectly healthy inside the game. If that's the case, then we can have Yu Tian play the game and start playing instruments again within the game. He has been useless for far too long, and it's about time he steps onto the stage again, albeit a virtual one."
Yu Rou silently gritted her teeth when she heard this, yet she didn't know what she could say at this moment.
"What… What if Brother Tian doesn't want to do it?" Yu Rou asked a moment later.
Tang Lee then spoke in a cold voice, "He doesn't have a choice in this. If he doesn't want to do it, then we will simply disown him and kick him out of the house, as we have no use for someone who does nothing but eat up our money and resources. It's not cheap maintaining someone in his condition even for us, after all."