Chapter 2: Bone Ashes Rice
In her previous life, Lin Huai had also been pulled into this game by accident, along with her pushcart and the coffin. They called it a survival game for everyone, but there was no choice involved—no “willing or unwilling”—only forced teleportation. To survive, people fought with everything they had, stooping to any dirty trick necessary.
Lin Huai was an orphan. When she was only three months old, she had been left under a large locust tree outside the Lin Coffin Shop. Old Lin found her and took her in.
Old Lin was an old bachelor. He lived alone and rarely spoke, but his coffin-making skills were the best in the region. He had an excellent reputation, making his living by selling coffins and working part-time as a funeral director.
From the time she was a little girl, Lin Huai helped Old Lin build coffins. She learned wood carving, local funeral customs, ancient taboos, and the proper ways to care for the dead.
Everything changed on the day she got engaged to her fiancé. Old Lin was walking from the coffin shop to the hotel when he saw someone fall into the river. Without a second thought, he jumped into the water to save them. The person survived, but Old Lin was swept away by the fierce current.
Right before the survival game began, Lin Huai had been pushing this very cart, carrying the coffin with Old Lin’s body, preparing to bury him with her own hands. But before she could lay him to rest in the earth, she was suddenly teleported into the game.
Once she arrived, everything disappeared except for her personal belongings—and Old Lin’s body was gone from inside the box.
Still, this red willow wood coffin was the final resting place Old Lin had built for himself years ago. Lin Huai could not bear to leave it behind. So, she kept pushing the cart, carrying the heavy coffin forward along the road.
Later, she met Chen Feng—her fiancé. After Old Lin died, Chen Feng had promised to stay by her side through her grief, even insisting on delaying their wedding for three years to honor her mourning period.
Because of that promise, Lin Huai felt deeply indebted to him. When they ran into each other on the road, his vehicle had already been destroyed, and other players were hunting him down. He looked completely defeated, yet Lin Huai protected him without hesitation. Together, they agreed to reach the end of the road and escape the game side by side.
She never imagined that in such a brutal world, their deep love would not even survive three months.
Chen Feng hated being without a vehicle. Using sweet words and false promises, he talked her into letting him “borrow” her coffin.
Not long after, he found a new lover named Su Wan. Seeing that Su Wan had rich resources and rare items, Chen Feng turned on Lin Huai at once, trying to kill her where she stood.
Lin Huai barely escaped with her life. Hunted by Chen Feng and Su Wan together, she struggled bravely to survive for another six months.
During that half-year of misery, she watched helplessly as Chen Feng and Su Wan used her coffin to climb into the top fifty of the server rankings. The other players called them the enviable Ghost King and Queen of the Mystic Coffin.
Meanwhile, Lin Huai lived like a rat in a sewer, hiding in disguise. Every coin she earned went toward buying zone transfer cards so she could flee in panic from one district to another.
In the end, the gap in power between them was simply too wide. After six months of running, Chen Feng caught up to her.
The deepest, most agonizing betrayal was that Chen Feng used Old Lin’s coffin to strike the final blow himself. Afterward, he tossed her broken body into the Evil Ghost Path of the Abyss.
Down in that abyss, it felt like true hell. Her flesh and soul were torn to shreds and chewed on by countless hungry ghosts. Every second was a slow, unbearable torture that burned straight to the bone.
Trapped in that endless torment, pure hatred burned inside Lin Huai’s soul.
Just as her last bit of consciousness began to drown in the darkness, she heard a voice. It came from somewhere far away, cold, quiet, and echoing strangely:
“If you were given a chance to start over, what would you do?”
Gathering the very last drop of her strength, Lin Huai gave her answer. Then, total darkness swallowed her whole.
When she opened her eyes again, she had truly been reborn.
Lin Huai pushed the cart, taking steady steps forward on her own two feet.
As she walked, she looked at the light screen floating in front of her to check her details.
In her past life, she had chosen the nickname “May All Go Well”—a cute, innocent screen name. She had started in District 88, Sector 888, which everyone considered a lucky number. Because of those digits, the players there thought they were chosen by destiny, and everyone acted proud and powerful.
Because of that atmosphere, the moment Lin Huai showed up with a pushcart and a coffin, she was seen as an unlucky stain on Sector 888. A cute name could not save her.
Chen Feng used that hatred to his advantage. He turned the entire sector against her, telling everyone that her work with the dead was ruining the good luck of Sector 888. The other players agreed with him, joining Chen Feng and Su Wan to hunt her down like a monster. If she had not found a zone transfer card at her lowest point, she would have died back then.
Lin Huai looked at the prompt on the screen: Please enter nickname.
Her eyes turned cold. Without hesitation, she typed in a new name: Bone Ashes Mixed with Rice.
Player: Lin Huai
ID: 4444420520729
Nickname: Bone Ashes Mixed with Rice
Vehicle: Two-wheeled handcart with coffin
Stamina: 100/100
Spiritual Power: 100/100
Fatigue: 0/99
Combat Power: 25
Resources: French soft bread x3, Mineral water x3, Copper coins x2, Cinnabar x1
Lin Huai blinked at the numbers. District 44, Sector 444? Four was the number of death. This number suited her perfectly.
Even more surprising was her vehicle information. Lin Huai stopped in the middle of the road, opened the vehicle status screen, and read through it carefully:
Vehicle Name: Two-wheeled handcart with coffin (Level 1)
Max Speed: 5 km/h
Attack Value: 1
Defense Value: 24
Immunity Value: 5
Shield Range: 10-meter radius
Status: Crude but intact
In her previous life, the system had treated the coffin as a special item, separate from the cart. That was why Chen Feng had been able to trick her into handing it over. Her wooden cart alone had zero defense.
Now, the panel showed a vehicle defense of 24! For a starting vehicle, that was remarkably high. That durability belonged to the coffin itself, but now the cart and coffin were linked as one.
The immunity value of 5 came from the coffin as well.
The black mist drifting over the road would slowly get thicker over time. It was made of cold, dark Yin energy. As it spread, it would slowly eat away at the players’ vehicles. Later in the game, players had to spend valuable resources, like Yang energy crystals, to coat their rides with protective layers to resist the rot.
Basic starter vehicles never came with an immunity shield. But her coffin was different.
Back then, the coffin had an immunity value because of its special nature. Now, the system treated the coffin and the cart as a single vehicle. That meant she started with a huge defense bonus—and she never had to worry about someone stealing the coffin out of her hands ever again!
Realizing this, Lin Huai burst into a wide, happy grin. Old Hei was a hundred times better than that stiff assistant named Desolate!
Old Hei, completely unaware of what Lin Huai was thinking, began to bark insults across the channel again:
“I forgot to mention: survival on this road comes with a daily travel goal. Today, every player must cover twenty kilometers. Anyone who fails will drop dead on the spot!”
“Some players have already run three kilometers! You rookies sitting on your butts—what are you waiting for? Are you waiting for your dead grandpa to crawl out of his grave and drag you forward?”
Lin Huai had a strong feeling that Old Hei was taking a jab directly at her.
Still in high spirits, she grabbed the handles and pressed on. The pushcart’s two small wheels groaned and creaked under the weight as they rolled over the road.
Old Hei might be bad-tempered, and he certainly loved to curse, but he knew how to get things done!
