Song Mo did not know about the “moral bias” hypothesis deduced by the authorities.
The Instance's selection of people was indeed random.
Just as there were fools among good people, there were also clever individuals among the wicked.
Thus, even if a bias truly existed, it would not lead to a completely one-sided situation.
Of course, even if she knew, she likely would not have much of an emotional reaction. At most, she would just utter an “Oh,” and then continue scribbling changes on her scripts.
After having died and come back to life, it was difficult for her emotions to experience any major fluctuations.
It was as if something—or some existence—was stripping away her human emotions bit by bit.
From the first living corpse to the current 《Campus Ghost Stories》.
—Seeing Zhao Weilai's brilliant performance, she would clap and cheer.
—Seeing Zhou Shengsheng betray his friend to survive, she would also frown.
But she would not give special treatment to any individual players because of their identities.
Unless, of course, they possessed something that caught Song Mo's interest.
After all, she was still very happy when she saw Screenwriter Points and her remaining lifespan.
...
Xingkong Media was located on the 23rd floor of a CBD building on Jiefang Road in Jiangcheng. The entire floor did not have a single window that opened to the outside.
Late at night, it was still bustling with activity.
Cool white LED light strips ran along the ceiling, brightly illuminating the space of over three hundred square meters.
Thirty-six glass livestreaming booths were arranged in two rows, looking like cells in a beehive.
Each booth was only two square meters, containing nothing but an adjustable desk, a gaming chair, and a background wall equipped with fill lights.
The glass was one-way.
“Hello, hello! I'm your gaming streamer, Adeka. Today, we're going to cast—”
“Welcome to the livestream, Captain! You're here so early today, Captain baby!”
“Come on, brothers! I'm going to show you guys how to eat a whole pig in three bites!”
“What song does everyone want to hear? Feel free to make requests.”
“Relationship livestream. If you're brave enough to go on the mic, come on up! No glass hearts allowed when we rate your looks.”
“Come, come! I highly recommend the babies in the livestream check out this eye cream. I won't even mention what wrinkles it can remove or how it whitens, because you can see all these effects for yourselves...”
On camera, what the streamers presented to the audience was always exquisite makeup, high energy, and a perpetual smile.
Off camera, there were stacked takeout boxes and half-finished cups of iced Americanos tossed aside.
The open office area sat between the two rows of booths, with over a hundred computers lit up simultaneously.
The rapid clicking of keyboards was as dense as heavy rain pounding on a tin roof. Three screens stood in front of each operations manager.
The numbers refreshed every second. The moment the metrics dropped by even 0.1 percent, the supervisor's voice would immediately blare through their headsets:
“Retention in Room 3 has dropped! Tell the streamer to hand out lucky bags to keep people!”
“Room 7's conversion rate is terrible! Pin the promotional item to the top!”
“The streamer in Room 12 is in a bad state. Remind him to smile! How is he supposed to milk money from the older sisters with a face like he's at a funeral!”
This place did not tolerate idle people, nor did it tolerate emotions.
The media company was like a high-precision juicer, squeezing the youth's time, appearance, and vibrant desire for expression into data.
Then, it converted them into straightforward commissions and revenue flow.
Song Mo floated near the ceiling's ventilation vent, looking down at the screens below.
In places invisible to ordinary people, countless wandering shadows floated numbly.
The dense, low-grade Materials resembled a school of sardines in the deep sea.
A'yan floated by her side. She poked the glass booth with her fingertip and said sympathetically,
“Master, their faces are stiff from smiling. The master of this place is far too tyrannical. Are they also performers raised by wealthy families?”
The ghost in red had never seen such a spectacle. She floated in front of the camera with great curiosity, only to be frightened by the dense barrage of comments the next second. She quickly flew back to hide beside Song Mo.
“How lively. They're singing and dancing.”
“No, this is their job. If you like watching it, I'll buy you a phone tomorrow. Let's go.”
Song Mo patted the female ghost's head, transformed into a cloud of black mist, and headed straight for her destination through the ventilation duct.
...
Late night was the peak period for livestream metrics.
In a booth with pretty good metrics, a gold-embossed ID was pasted on the glass door: Big Eater Manman.
Chen Man's late-night livestream had already been running for three hours.
The warm yellow ring light made her face look rosy and plump, hiding her dark circles and the acne on her face.
On the folding table in front of her, food packaging boxes were stacked high like a small hill:
Three large bowls of mixed thin noodles, drizzled with bright red chili oil.
Two boxes of garlic fried chicken, their skin golden and crispy.
Five packets of cooked fire noodles were tossed into a towering pile, sprinkled with a few flakes of seaweed and covered in a thick layer of cheese.
Beside them sat high-sugar, high-calorie milk tea, along with exquisite cakes and pastries.
“Babies, today we are challenging a twenty-pound extra-spicy set!”
Chen Man smiled at the camera, her eyes curving into crescents.
“Type '1' if you think Manman can finish it all, and '2' if you think she can't! Those who lose, please give me a free follow~”
The comments flew past rapidly, densely covering half the screen.
【Oh my god, that's way too much... I get stuffed from just one bowl of noodles a meal.】
【Is Manman's stomach made of rubber? Last time, she just wolfed down ten pounds of fried chicken like it was nothing.】
【I'm guilty of scrolling onto this late at night. I've already opened my food delivery app.】
【Streamer, can you eat a bit slower? Don't burst your stomach.】
【This is at least enough food for five people for two days. Big eaters are terrifying.】
Chen Man looked at the comments, smiled, picked up her chopsticks, and twirled some fire noodles to stuff into her mouth:
“This fire noodle sauce is really fragrant. The spiciness is just right, not that dead-spicy industrial chili flavor. The link is in the yellow shopping cart under Item 1. Babies who love spicy food can go ahead and grab it. The price in the livestream today is a real bargain.”
In her earpiece, the operations manager kept reminding her from the backend:
“Retention is up by two points. Keep up the pace, mention the link three more times. A user is asking if you can eat garlic. Have some garlic to boost interaction.”
Chen Man nodded imperceptibly, picked up a clove of garlic, and took a bite. “Noodles without garlic lose half their flavor! Are there any babies who love eating garlic as much as I do? Type 'garlic' so I can see~”
The comment section was instantly flooded with “garlic garlic garlic.”
No one knew that this was already her second eating livestream of the day.
She ate five meals a day and threw up five times.
Her voice had long gone hoarse, and she relied entirely on throat lozenges to keep speaking.
Her teeth had turned yellow from stomach acid corrosion, and three of her back molars had already been filled.
The backs of her hands were covered in bruises from forcing herself to throw up.
But Chen Man could not stop.
Eating livestreams made money fast. A single commercial deal could equal a regular white-collar worker's monthly salary.
Her parents needed retirement support, and she wanted to buy a house and get married—all of which depended on this income.
So what if she threw up? It was better than being poor.
While she was streaming, the assistant hosts from the snack livestream room next door gathered near the snack shelves to slack off.
Their voices faintly drifted into her booth:
“Items are missing from the shelves again. Two boxes of imported freeze-dried strawberries, a few packets of fire noodles, and even the fruit gift box was opened.”
“I don't know who took them. They've got sticky fingers.”
“Stealing samples? Have they never eaten food before?”
“No idea. It's been happening for almost a week. Things get stolen every single day. Maybe we should just install a security camera.”
“Oh, come on. These things aren't worth much anyway. It's probably just someone who got hungry in the middle of the night and grabbed them. Haven't you had enough of being on camera?”
...
The comments in Chen Man's livestream continued to fly past rapidly:
【Here it comes, here it comes! Manman's late-night food temptation time is here!】
【Just finished working overtime, just waiting to watch your stream to help me eat.】
【Help, the more I watch, the hungrier I get. I've already ordered barbecue.】
The number of online viewers quickly surged to thirty thousand, and the figure was still slowly climbing.
Chen Man smiled as she tore open a bag of potato chips. Just as she was about to speak, the comment section was suddenly spammed by a string of garbled code.
【///???!!!...@@@###$$$】
There was no profile picture, and the ID was a meaningless string of numbers: User 73849266.
Sending it once wasn't enough; it was immediately followed by another long string of garbled code.
Huge chunks of garbled code densely occupied half the screen, looking exceptionally jarring.
“Moderator, kick this person sending the garbled code.”
Chen Man frowned.
Accounts sending garbled code in the middle of the night were either glitching or causing trouble on purpose. Keeping them ruined the viewing experience.
“Don't, Sister Man!” The moderator replied with a hint of excitement in his voice. “That's Garbled-Code Bro, an old internet celebrity! He shows up in plenty of late-night streams. This guy spams garbled code every night, bringing his own traffic! Look at the comments, everyone is greeting him!”
Chen Man took a closer look. Sure enough, the comment section instantly became several times more lively.
【Holy crap, Garbled-Code Bro!】
【Garbled-Code Bro is here again! What new breed of code are you spamming today?】
【Garbled-Code Bro's late-night food tasting session, hahahaha.】
【He really is the most persistent person I've ever seen. No donations, no chatting, just pure garbled code harassment.】
【Garbled-Code Bro: I don't understand, but I am deeply shocked.】
The regular viewers all knew this “Garbled-Code Bro.”
A guest account with no profile picture, no level, and no donation record.
It was almost like some late-night urban legend, only appearing in late-night food streams.
Once he entered, he would spam a bunch of messy symbols, and kicking him did no good.
Over time, many viewers had gotten used to it.
Chen Man's on-the-spot response was quick. She smiled and teased:
“So it's Garbled-Code Bro! Welcome, welcome~ Is Garbled-Code Bro here to join us for a late-night snack today too?”
The comment section was boisterous, with everyone joking around with Garbled-Code Bro, but that account remained quiet.
After about half a minute, a full screen of red exclamation marks suddenly spammed the screen.
【!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!】
【S...O...S!】
The dense exclamation marks filled the entire comment area, making people's heads spin.
The viewers in the livestream were momentarily stunned.
【??? What's wrong with Garbled-Code Bro?】
【Why is he typing a distress signal?】
【Did he get excited? Did he see something delicious?】
【Was his account hacked? Or did he just sit on his keyboard?】
Chen Man was also taken aback. Just as she was about to smooth things over, she saw that user's ID turn gray.
The profile picture went dark, indicating a sudden offline status.
In short, he had come out of nowhere and left just as mysteriously.
The comment section resumed its liveliness. No one dwelled on an alt account anymore.
...
What no one knew was that three seconds ago, in the warehouse on the second basement floor, an old Android phone with a cracked screen went black with a soft click.
“A'yan, look what we found...”
Song Mo held a fat rat that was easily the size of a kitten by the scruff of its neck. She looked at the phone on the ground, finding it somewhat amusing:
“A... little fat rat that knows how to use a phone, watch livestreams, and even post comments?”
Staring at the protruding belly of this fatty, she really couldn't bring herself to say the word “little” with a clear conscience.
Rate on N.U.
