Chapter 5: Because It's Free

"Change the question!"

Silly Girl gritted her teeth as she spoke. If, in the beginning, her annoyance was just for show to fit the program, now she was genuinely displeased with Jiang Yun.

Because he was actually messing with her!

Was a civil service exam question something a small-time streamer like her could comment on?

If she dared to say the question was nonsense, she’d get a warning from the platform in no time!

Hearing her protest, Jiang Yun spread his hands helplessly. "See? There you go again, getting all flustered. If you can’t answer, you just want to skip."

Despite his words, Jiang Yun still tossed out another question.

"When Nuwa was creating humans, she was molding people with one hand and laughing at the same time. Why do you think that was?"

Silly Girl frowned slightly. This was the first time she’d ever heard such a question.

She thought hard about it for a long time, but still couldn’t come up with an answer.

But she was worried it might be another civil service exam question, so she didn’t dare say anything reckless. She could only reply, "I don’t know."

Jiang Yun grinned widely. "Because, being a person, the most important thing is to be happy. So, are you happy?"

Even though Jiang Yun’s smile was bright and cheerful, the more Silly Girl looked at him, the more annoyed she felt.

This time, she was truly at her wit’s end. She shouted directly at Jiang Yun, "Happy, my foot!"

With that, she hung up the call without hesitation.

Watching the stream return to his lone frame, Jiang Yun blinked at the camera, feigning helplessness. "You see, big streamers have big tempers. Cursed me and ran off."

Jiang Yun played his part convincingly, but unfortunately, the viewers who’d witnessed the whole thing weren’t buying it.

"Oh, please. If I were that lady, I’d send my fans to cyberbully you right now!"

"Brother Yun, you really dare to make trouble, huh? You’re not afraid of her fans swarming you?"

"To be fair, Brother Yun’s antics are great. At least I’m really enjoying it."

"Why don’t you just switch to being a variety streamer? Hardly anyone watches your games anyway."

"Exactly! There are a million gaming streamers, but not many good variety ones!"

“...”

Seeing the barrage of comments, Jiang Yun waved his hand. "Enough, enough, some antics now and then are fine, but I’m not cut out to be a full-time variety streamer."

Saying this, Jiang Yun glanced at the time.

Unconsciously, half of his two-hour check-in task was already done. He just needed to coast through one more hour, and today’s check-in would be complete.

So he tried to connect with another streamer.

But he found out that the platform’s support feature only allowed one connection per day.

Since he’d already connected with Silly Girl, there was no way to connect with others today.

Seeing this, he addressed his viewers, "As you can see, I can’t connect with any more streamers today. How about we play some games? Just one hour, not too much. We can pass the time easily."

But the viewers weren’t having it.

"No way, Brother Yun! Your antics are way more fun. Don’t play games!"

"Yeah, I came here from the lady’s stream just to watch your antics. Don’t play games!"

"If you play games, I’m leaving. Do something fun!"

"Do more antics, or I’ll team up with the lady’s other fans to cyberbully you!"

A good number of the lady’s fans had come over after watching Jiang Yun’s shenanigans during the joint stream and had started following him.

Now they heard he was about to play games.

How could they agree? They were here specifically for the variety!

Jiang Yun noticed the influx.

His live viewership had already surpassed five thousand, and his follower count had shot up as well.

Clearly, his antics on Silly Girl’s stream had paid off.

Remembering the system’s earlier hint that the check-in reward was tied to viewership numbers, Jiang Yun decided to keep these new fans entertained.

"Alright then. Since I can’t connect with other streamers, how about I connect with some fans? If you’re interested, send me a request and we’ll chat together."

With that, Jiang Yun opened up the fan connection feature.

No sooner had he opened it than a dozen requests flooded in.

Jiang Yun picked one with a pleasing profile picture and accepted.

"Hello, can you hear me, Brother Yun?"

A female voice came through.

The viewers instantly perked up.

After all, Jiang Yun was mainly a gaming streamer, so his audience was mostly male.

And for male gamers, what’s the most attractive thing? Of course—a girl!

"No way, it’s a girl!"

"A girl! A real one! (slurp, slurp, slurp)"

"Brother Yun actually has female fans?"

"Oh wow, a female fan!"

“...”

"Yes, I can hear you." Jiang Yun replied, then pointed at the barrage of comments, making a scornful face: "Look at you lot in the chat—utterly indecent! Don’t go around telling people you’re my fans, you embarrass me."

Then Jiang Yun turned back to the girl on the call. "Is there something you’d like to talk about?"

"I have a relationship question. I was hoping you could give me a guy’s perspective."

"Oh? A relationship question?" Jiang Yun raised his eyebrows.

He smelled gossip.

So did the audience.

"Relationship issue? My advice: break up!"

"You know me, I always say break up, never patch things up."

"You know me, I just like drama, so I also say break up."

"You know me, I like married women, so I say stay together!"

"Every last one of you in this chat—line up for a ten-minute execution!"

“...”

The fan continued, "Here’s the thing. Not long ago, I started dating a younger boyfriend.

When we started, I felt like he just wanted to have fun, but I actually wanted something serious because I really like him.

We’ve been together for a while now, and I want to get married, but he doesn’t seem interested.

So I suggested breaking up, but then he begged me not to. He doesn’t want to break up.

I want to know what he’s really thinking. Why doesn’t he want to get married, but also doesn’t want to break up?"

After listening to her story, Jiang Yun silently opened a document and typed two big words:

Free ride.

"Do you understand now?"

The moment those words appeared, there was a brief lull in the chat, followed by a frenzy.

"??????"

"Wow, just ‘free ride’ left me speechless."

"Well… but… it does seem true."

"I’m a guy, and I think Brother Yun’s analysis is spot on."

"To be fair, Brother Yun’s right, even if I hate to admit it."

"Free ride—absolutely accurate!"

“...”