Let me take a swing at this: the chip itself has two GPIO. The dev board the chip is soldered to already uses up one of them for the reset system, allowing the chip to programmatically reset the whole board. You’re basically undoing that so you can use it. I’m guessing the consequence is you can no-longer have the software reset the whole device anymore.
And now if this is wrong, hopefully I’ll be corrected and we’ll learn more. :)
So yeah, turns out it's nothing to do with the 8266's board, and everything to do with the chosen relay module. Since it has nothing to do with driving the relay, it doesn't need to be connected. But if it were connected, whenever it is high, the relay board connects it to the reset, so the chip gets reset.
So you are bending it simply to ensure that pin can't be plugged in to the relay
And now if this is wrong, hopefully I’ll be corrected and we’ll learn more. :)