CH 6

Even though the production team had reminded Wen Li that there would be a lot of viewers waiting in the live-streaming room, she was still startled by the flood of barrage when she just started the broadcast.

The other three pairs of guests had already completed their live broadcast tasks one after another a few days ago. They had made it to the hot search rankings and played with various memes.

Only Song Yan and Wen Li's live broadcast announcement had been postponed until today, citing the reason of "guests being busy".

The longer the delay, the higher the anticipation in the live-streaming room. The official Weibo account of the production team had been building up hype for several days. Despite the black screen with the large text "The host has not started the broadcast" in the center, the number of viewers in the top left corner remained around 700,000 to 800,000, and various white barrage messages flashed across the black screen.

「On the Nth day without Salt Grain's collab, missing them.」

「Are you still not starting the broadcast? If you don't start soon, I'll have to kneel and beg you.」

「I'm going to have to give up my phone tomorrow before going to school. Please start the broadcast, my child is too eager.」

「If you're not starting the broadcast, I'll pack up and return to Yangzhou!」

The barrage playfully brushed against the black screen, creating a joyful atmosphere. Suddenly, the official Weibo account of the production team made a post.

Official Weibo Account: 「[Salt Grain Live Room] will start at 20:00 tonight on time! @Song Yan 'Beauty' had to take temporary leave due to a schedule conflict, but our 'Sanli' @Wen Litchi will show you the most authentic daily life of a female artist. Remember to set your alarm for 20:00 tonight and meet us on Orange Juice TV!」

At exactly eight o'clock, when the broadcast started, the live-streaming room was truly only occupied by Wen Li alone.

The live camera used for the guests' broadcasts was a high-definition camera installed at their homes by the production team. However, since today's broadcast only featured Wen Li, the production team specifically had her use their phone for the live stream. They connected a high-definition camera directly above the phone so that the screen would display the barrage of messages, making it easier for her to interact with the viewers and prevent any awkwardness.

A flood of question marks scrolled across the screen.

「???」

「Hey, woman, don't suddenly come so close. You almost gave me a heart attack.」

「Why did you get so close? Don't you know you're beautiful?」

「This woman is using her face to shark people!」

"..."

Wen Li felt a bit embarrassed by the teasing comments from the fans and quickly retreated.

She received a message on her personal phone that was placed aside, so she grabbed it and saw that it was a WeChat message from her manager.

「Don't forget to thank the fans for the gifts.」

Only then did Wen Li shift her gaze back to the screen and began thanking the fans for their gifts.

"Thank you for the 'Sanli, you're Mommy's good baby' who sent 100 submarines," Wen Li didn't know how much a submarine cost, but she still said, "Thank you, Mommy, I have money to spend, don't worry about it."

She didn't feel like the fans were taking advantage of her. Lazily supporting her chin, she playfully tapped her fingertips on her cheek, bending her eyes as if she quite enjoyed this nickname.

「So cute, I'm dying.」

「Wuwuwu, Sanli Mommy loves you!!!」

「Don't want a dad, don't want a dad.」

Just as she finished thanking them, a fresh wave of gifts filled the screen once again.

"Thank you for the 'I'm done pretending, I'm Sanli's real husband' who sent 50 skyscrapers. Bigamy is illegal, meow."

「Thank you, thank you, I'm touched.」

「It's Salt Grain Sugar!!!!」

「Beauty: ??? Something seems to be turning green.」

「Beauty is confused seeing this guy claiming to be the real husband: Then what am I?」

「Hahahaha, exposing the truth online.」

Wen Li thanked several fans for their gifts again. The fans in the live-streaming room finally realized that if they wanted to catch Wen Li's attention, they first had to change their ordinary and unremarkable ID names.

Initially, the list of thanks mostly consisted of a few witty ones, but gradually, everyone started to become more unconventional.

Wen Li felt that reading the thank-you list was much better than sitting alone and not knowing what to say. When she encountered interesting IDs, she would join in the banter and chat with the fans in the live-streaming room. The atmosphere in the livestream was quite pleasant and relaxed.

She gradually relaxed and started conversing with the fans in the barrage.

Until a wealthy fan sent a big gift.

"Thank you..."

She stumbled halfway, and the fans started looking in the gift leaderboard to find out who had flooded the screen for a full two minutes.

「Hahahaha, that sister is too ruthless.」

「Hey, 'Sanli x Beauty, several times in one night', come out! Is this something you should know? Mind your own business!」

「Look, you've embarrassed Sanli! You! You're amazing!」

「Sanli, quickly thank the person! Someone has sent you 100 super yachts!」

Wen Li bit her lip and could only force herself to say, "Thank you for the 100 super yachts, %&￥#."

「Listen! Can't! Hear!」

「Why is an actress like you speaking so unclearly?」

「Disappointed, unfollowing. No sincerity towards the fans.」

「Unfollow +1.」

Then the screen was filled with declarations of "unfollow", which made Wen Li laugh in anger, "If my livestream gets banned, none of you is innocent."

「Wow, threatening fans. This is the woman I've been a fan of for three years.」

「Hey, you're acting so cool.」

「First, I'm not angry, I'm cool.」

「Second, my name is not Wen Li, it's 'Hey'.」

「Drop the attitude!」

「Take care of your wife, @Song Yan.」

Wen Li gritted her teeth and said, "No more thanking for the gifts. Stop sending them. Even if you bankrupt me, I won't say thanks."

She lowered her head and sent a message to her manager, knowing that she couldn't handle this situation. If necessary, she would add the gift money herself and donate it to charity. After all, she didn't lack that money. She couldn't let the fans climb over her head.

The fans were repeatedly jumping around on the protagonist's head, which was unacceptable.

In the end, Lu Dan replied to her: "It's fine. The effect is enough. You're on the trending list."

Wen Li was speechless.

"Did you buy the trend for me?"

"No, the fans pushed you up."

"?"

She couldn't care less about the chaos in the barrage. She directly logged onto Weibo and indeed found herself on the trending list.

One of the trending topics was #SaltGrainPlasticCoupleLove#.

She initially thought it was a topic that fans jokingly brought up, but when she clicked on it, she realized it wasn't. It was a literal mockery.

「#SaltGrainPlasticCoupleLove# Fans of Salt Grain are all just dog-like fans, so shameless to buy trending with Wen Li alone in the couple's livestream. The other three couples could easily overshadow Salt Grain. Even when Song Yan did not make it to the live-streaming, these fans still shamelessly boast about true love. It's just relying on a pretty face to exploit fans. Is this kind of plastic couple love marketing interesting?」

「+1. I've had enough of seeing multiple trending topics in one night.」

「I feel sorry for Ming-Zheng and Yan-Shun. Clearly, they are the sweetest couples in the livestream.」

It's you guys again.

Wen Li took a deep breath, put on a smile in front of the camera, and glanced at the real-time viewers' count in the top left corner of the livestream.

Alright, if Song Yan isn't coming back, then he isn't. She can bring in the liveliness of the livestream by herself. What five trending topics? Today, she'll make it ten!

——

Forty minutes into the livestream, at the Capital International Airport, the T flight from Shanghai to Yancheng arrived smoothly.

Just after getting off the plane, Song Yan turned on his phone. A series of pop-up notifications flooded his screen.

Among them, the notifications from Weibo were the most numerous. He had only turned off the notifications for messages from people he wasn't following, but Weibo still sent him notifications for daily hot topics.

Several of them were related to Wen Li.

It seemed that he wasn't suitable to go home now. It would disturb her interaction with the fans.

He looked through each trending topic, and his gaze finally stopped on the one with the least popularity.

Song Yan glanced at the content of the popular Weibo post and left a comment using his Weibo account with 70 million followers.

Song Yan: 「I'm already on my way home to receive criticism from Teacher Wen.」

This comment instantly received thousands of replies.

「?? Is this the real person?」

「It's our Beauty!!!」

「Ahhh, the Beauty is here.」

「@Wen Litchi, your husband is back!!!!」

The blogger replied:「Was it really him who posted the Weibo?」

「Are you blind?」

「Of course, it's our Beauty who posted it. Don't you know how to click on the profile and check the Weibo homepage?」

「An imitation account with 73.51 million followers, give me a break.」

「How does it feel for the anti-fans to be called out by the protagonist on the spot?」

「Wen Li's livestream has 37 million online viewers, while Ming-Zheng and Yan-Shun's combined popularity doesn't even reach half of that. Can you still criticize and pull her down?」

「Sisters, don't argue with this person. Ming-Zheng and Yan-Shun have a super topic with a level 12 fanbase. Just report and be done with it.」

Beside him, Song Yan's manager, Ke Bin, didn't know what he was doing with his phone at first. It wasn't until they got into the car and his phone kept buzzing nonstop in his pocket that he realized.

Ke Bin widened his eyes and looked at Song Yan, who was resting with his eyes closed, "What did you just post on Weibo?"

——

The livestream room was lively.

The fans stayed obediently in the livestream room and didn't leave. The chat was scrolling quickly, and the barrage from a few new viewers instantly got drowned in the flood of messages.

Wen Li was in the middle of removing her makeup. She had been going to the beauty salon frequently recently and had fewer schedules, allowing her to get sufficient sleep. Her skin condition was good. Earlier, someone in the chat mentioned wanting to see a female artist's nighttime skincare routine, and she happened to not know what else to do for the livestream, so she decided to showcase her skincare routine.

To prevent her phone from getting wet, Wen Li placed the phone she was using for the livestream on a small stand on the sink mirror.

She looked at herself in the mirror and earnestly explained her makeup removal steps to the fans, "Today, my eye makeup is a bit heavy, and it's not easy to remove. I have to apply a cotton pad soaked in makeup remover on my eyes for about thirty seconds. Otherwise, if I rub too hard, it might cause fine lines around the corners of my eyes."

「Welcome to Sanli's Beauty Classroom.」

「Sanli is afraid of getting wrinkles, I'm afraid of getting wrinkles too. So, let's just say I'm Sanli in a roundabout way.」

「Sisters upstairs, maybe you should take some cephalosporins.」

She squeezed some makeup remover onto a cotton pad and used it to cover her eyes. Both of her eyes were blocked from her line of sight. Wen Li felt a bit silly just standing in front of the camera like this, so she called out to the voice-controlled Bluetooth speaker in her home.

"Play an exciting song. We can't let the atmosphere in the livestream room cool down."

"Yes, master."

Then, the speaker automatically played a song.

"Suwei suwei suwei! Suwei! Suwei!"

As the DJ's heavy drum beats played, Wen Li was startled, causing her shoulders to tremble. She had watched a livestream of an internet celebrity in her free time and saw them dancing to this song. The melody was highly addictive, bringing joy in a silly way, and she ended up downloading the song.

Wen Li didn't know why, but she just followed the beat and started shaking her leg.

When people are bored, they tend to do confusing things, especially when they're removing makeup, covering their eyes, and standing in front of a sink without knowing what to do to pass the time.

Thinking about her cheap husband, who knows where he was having fun, and also recalling the mockery from the anti-fans on Weibo, she felt that she couldn't lose.

So what if there's no man at home? Even without a man at home, she can still have a great time.

"Suwei suwei suwei!"

「???」

「Please calculate the psychological shadow area of the cotton pad.」

「Sanli, do you still remember that you're a female celebrity?」

「Oh my, Sanli's music taste is just like that little kid next door to my grandma's house. Hahaha.」

「Gather at the village entrance, cement included!」

「Wow, no wonder I, the Wild King, fell for this woman.」

「I was secretly watching this during my evening self-study and couldn't help but laugh.」

「Brothers, let's spam the chat with 666 and get the party started.」

After suwei-ing for about half a minute, the barrage was still harmonious, with most of them laughing along or playing around. Then, suddenly, the barrage took a sharp turn.

「Wow, Beauty!!!」

「Wen Li, for fuck's sake, stop dancing, your husband is back!!!」

「Sanli, wake up, your husband is standing at the door, looking at you!!!」

「Forget it, she's covering her eyes with a cotton pad, she can't see.」

「I was spamming the chat half an hour ago, saying that Beauty is back, look at Weibo, but no one paid attention to me!! I got instantly drowned out! You can't escape the blame for Sanli's social death!」

「+1! Don't you guys check the hot topics!」

「What should we do? Sanli is still suwei-ing, and the beauty has been standing at the door smiling for half a minute, ahhhh!」

「...Let's contact the fan club and raise funds to buy a rocket for Sanli to immigrate to Mars.」

「Oh my god, it's trending! Someone recorded the screen and posted it on Weibo!」

「Damn it, I'm feeling so much second-hand embarrassment that my toes have reached the core of the earth.」

As the song ended, Wen Li took off the cotton pad and felt like her calories were burning throughout her body. She was sure she would lose another kilogram tomorrow.

"Ai Rui Ba Di, are you ready to party!"

However, the fans didn't respond at all.

「What kind of nonsense is this? You're dead to us!」

"..."

「What have I become a fan of?」

「The Associate Chief Physician of the Neurology Department at Yancheng Xiehe Research Hospital: Hello, how long has this situation been going on?」

Wen Li: "0v0?"