Chapter 2

Chapter 2

The livestream chat instantly got even livelier.

“666. Now this is acting. No wonder so many livestream rooms get banned for promoting feudal superstition, but the host’s is still perfectly fine. This is what you call reverse product placement, huh? The host is awesome, and so is the operations team!”

“To the person above, I’ve been camping in this livestream room for a month. I don’t think the host is as smart as you make her out to be.”

“Agreed. I’ve always thought this host really knows Daoist arts. That paper crane just now? The fishing line on it got tangled into a knot, and people are still saying the line was making it fly? Please. It was clearly dragging the line along as it flew.”

“I’m dying. What era is this, and people still believe this stuff? A bunch of people getting fleeced by rich people and still thinking they’re so clever.”

The same classic daily flame war kicked off again. Some people said I was the real deal, while others said I was acting every day. They argued until the chat was a complete mess.

So noisy. I couldn’t help missing the days when I used to run a haunted house.

When I first came down the mountain, I opened a haunted house at an amusement park. All the ghosts inside had been personally caught by me, and that was also where I met Song Feifei.

Unfortunately, my ghost employees got a little too into their work and scared one customer so badly he had a heart attack and ended up in the hospital.

After paying out a chunk of compensation, I slunk away and shut down the haunted house. Then, following Song Feifei’s advice, I switched careers and started livestreaming.

The haunted house had been so peaceful. I could make money every day just watching customers get chased all over the place by ghosts.

Unlike this. Every day, I had to get yelled at by people left and right. It was exhausting.

To keep my popularity up, I also had to video call with fans every day and chat with them about this and that.

After finishing my usual daily science popularization segment, I turned on the video call and got down to business.

One thing the netizens were right about: my science popularization was mainly to keep my account from getting banned.

A certain platform was especially strict about this sort of thing. If you did astrology or tarot readings, no one cared. But the moment you dared mention traditional birth characters or anything like that in a video, it counted as promoting feudal superstition, and you could get banned at the drop of a hat.

Today’s caller was a young girl. The moment my audio connected, sobbing curses came through from the other side.

“You murderer! I’ve already called the police! They’re on their way to your house right now!”

Huh?

Song Feifei immediately perked up and squeezed herself down beside me.

“Friend, what are you talking about?”

Broken sobs came from the other end. She sounded like a very young girl.

“Waaah… I put on the Severing Bad-Karma Bond Talisman from your shop this morning, and my boyfriend died at noon!”

“He was crossing the road when a big truck hit him. He died on the spot. Give me back my boyfriend! You murderer!”

What the hell!

Something like that could happen?

Song Feifei and I looked at each other in shock. The livestream chat, meanwhile, completely exploded. Countless comments surged out one after another so fast there was no way to read them all.

“Is this a plant you hired? Isn’t this act a little too much?”

I looked at Song Feifei suspiciously.

A Severing Bad-Karma Bond Talisman usually only made someone trip, lose something, and so on. I would never dare casually sell anything that could take a life.

This person had to be someone Song Feifei found to stir up hype. She made it sound so real, too.

Song Feifei looked at me with an innocent expression.

“A plant, my ass. You think I have the free time to find plants for you? Selling one piece of talisman paper only earns me enough for one meal. You think I’d put on a whole act for the price of dinner? Keep dreaming!”