Lin Yi’s backend had frozen.
Yes, frozen, because there were too many likes, comments, and private messages.
This wristband, salvaged from a garbage dump and on the verge of scrapping, clearly couldn’t handle such a massive amount of data. The screen flickered a few times in struggle and finally crashed.
Lin Yi stared blankly at the dark screen for a long moment, not sure whether what he had glimpsed was even real.
The sheer number of red notification dots had startled him so much that he stumbled and nearly fell.
Not daring to multitask while walking anymore, Lin Yi suppressed his churning emotions and hurried back to the house. After taking a deep breath to calm himself, he opened the wristband again.
This time, it didn’t crash. He waited for the backend to load at a snail’s pace, then checked it several times over before confirming that his eyes hadn’t deceived him, his inbox was indeed flooded with private messages.
Under his account, there were nearly a thousand new likes and comments. He casually scrolled through a few:
“Checking in for the super handsome guy!”
“Secret code: handsome guy kills mutant beast with bare hands”
“Haha, everyone came here from that video, right?”
“This hidden gem of a handsome guy, go viral!”
A video? What video?
Completely baffled, Lin Yi scrolled through the comments, feeling certain that something had happened without his knowledge.
After searching for a while, he finally pieced it together. A fan had clipped his live stream and uploaded it to a video platform, and it had gone viral.
He searched for the video title mentioned in the comments, and sure enough, a clipped video appeared.
Next to the video title was a prominent flame icon.
That… seemed to mean it was trending… right?
Holding onto a last shred of hope, Lin Yi opened the video. The moment he clicked on it, he saw a small line of text at the bottom:
“Trending Rank #32”
Lin Yi’s vision went dark.
Heaven knew, as a former researcher who had always kept a low profile, this was the first time he had ever received so much attention. Lin Yi felt as though his long-dormant social anxiety was about to flare up.
Taking a deep breath, he ignored the embarrassingly effusive praise beneath the video and seriously clicked to watch it.
It was no wonder the video had gone viral. From the title to the editing rhythm, everything was excellent, worlds apart from Lin Yi’s own hastily put-together live streams.
Of course, good production alone wouldn’t have been enough. What truly mattered was the person in the video.
When he was streaming, Lin Yi couldn’t see what the camera was capturing, so he hadn’t felt anything particular. But now, watching the edited clip, even with his untrained eye, he could see that the figure in the video was indeed striking.
An unintentional willow casts a shade. That chance glance back had inadvertently become the most powerful moment of the entire video.
The video had been posted the night before last. Almost immediately after its release, its popularity had climbed steadily, peaking during the daytime of the following day, landing at #32 on the trending chart, as Lin Yi had seen.
By now, the video’s buzz had already dropped quite a bit, but tens of thousands of people were still watching it in real time.
Lin Yi let out a long, complicated sigh. While it was true that he had intended to use live streaming to increase his influence, the sudden surge in attention had come too abruptly, catching him completely off guard.
He knew he should make good use of this opportunity, but the problem was—
Lin Yi stared blankly at his wristband. As an apocalypse survivor who had woken up after thousands of years, this was the first time he truly felt he had hit a blind spot in his knowledge.
Ah Yun, on the other hand, came over curiously to see what her big brother was doing with the wristband. But she clearly had little interest in such things. After a few glances, she quickly lost interest and shifted her attention elsewhere. “Big brother, Ah Yun is really hungry… When are we eating?”
Lin Yi: …
He looked at her with slight exasperation, wondering how the clever, well-behaved little girl he had picked up had turned into such a foodie under his care.
Clearly, Ah Yun wasn’t going to be of any help. Then, almost as if guided by some invisible force, his thoughts turned to another person—
…
“Trending?” A hand with distinct knuckles and a thin layer of calluses took the wristband.
Lu Jinghan lowered his gaze, his fingertips gently gliding across the screen as he quickly browsed through the information, simultaneously listening to Lin Yi explain the current situation.
What was a difficult problem for Lin Yi was hardly anything in Lu Jinghan’s eyes.
After all, having been deeply entrenched in the political maelstrom of the capital planet, he had dealt with public opinion storms far more complicated than this.
But—
Lu Jinghan’s originally nonchalant expression subtly paused. His fingertip lingered on the screen for a moment, landing precisely on an image.
It was the very photo that had made Lin Yi famous across the internet, the one countless fans had called handsome, the picture of him looking back.
In the photo, the young man’s figure was long and agile like a leopard’s, his brows and eyes filled with wild, murderous intent. The heavy blood on his body and the twisted, tangled mutated plants around him only added more layers to the striking image.
The Lin Yi in the photo had a touch of youthful, unrestrained vitality, a stark contrast to the gentle young man Lu Jinghan had come to know over the past few days.
Very… striking. Even someone as discerning as Lu Jinghan had to admit that.
And so, when he looked at the comments below, they stirred a subtle feeling he couldn’t quite name.
His pause lasted only a moment. Quickly, he composed himself, hiding any trace of his thoughts.
Lu Jinghan naturally swiped the photo away and gave a slight, almost imperceptible cough to cover it. “I’ve roughly understood the situation now.”
“The most important thing right now is not how to act, but not to let this attention affect you. If you plan to continue streaming, then the attention of fans, even criticism and abuse, may become your norm in the future.”
Lu Jinghan handed the wristband back to Lin Yi, his voice steady—
“Don’t take the trending status too seriously. Just do what you need to do.”
As he said this, Lu Jinghan was almost solemnly earnest, yet his tone was calm, and his expression showed no fluctuation.
It was as if, just as he had said, the trending status was a matter of little importance.
Seeing him like this, Lin Yi inexplicably felt a weight lift from his chest, and his previously unsettled heart steadied.
Observing Lin Yi’s thoughtful expression, Lu Jinghan continued, “Have you made up your mind? If so, then think about the most important thing right now, what do you want?”
“What do you hope to gain from this popularity? What is the purpose of your live streams? That will directly determine your next move.”
“In fact, there are many paths you could choose. For example, if you’re willing to take on ads and endorsements, you could earn a large number of star coins in a short time. Alternatively, you could use this opportunity to leave Blue Star. Many entertainment companies would value your potential and be willing to sign you, allowing you to go to the capital planet and continue developing…”
“What do you think? Which path should I choose?” Lin Yi didn’t answer directly but turned the question back on him.
Lu Jinghan opened his mouth as if to say something, but in the end, it turned into a sigh. “That’s not for me to decide. It’s your choice.”
There was one more thing Lu Jinghan didn’t say out loud. He had seen too many people lose themselves in fame and fortune on the capital planet. He had tried, but he couldn’t bring them back.
Among those people was even his own adjutant, who had once lived and died by his side…
Gloomy memories surged up, but he forcibly suppressed them. Looking at the young man before him, whose expression was firm and certain, Lu Jinghan’s heart stirred slightly. “Besides… I suspect you’ve already made up your mind, haven’t you?”
Sure enough, Lin Yi said resolutely, “I’ve decided. I’m not leaving Blue Star.”