Chapter 17: Side Hustle
After a moment of hesitation, Chen Beiwu decided to pretend as if he knew nothing, and just like usual, stood up and headed to the second floor after finishing dinner.
âArenât you going to tell Beiwu?â Chen Dong muttered.
âThereâs no need. Telling him will only add to his worries.â Huang Xiaoling shook her head. âBesides, this is a critical period in Chen Beiwuâs cultivationâhe must not be disturbed.â
As she spoke, she looked at Chen Dong and couldnât help but say, âCanât you take my advice just once and quit your job burning bricks at the factory?â
Upon hearing this, Chen Dongâs brow furrowed instinctively, and he said in a heavy tone, âYou say we must avoid taking the Immortal Loan or itâll implicate Beiwu. Fine, I wonât borrow. But now youâre trying to stop me from earning money through my job? Are you saying I should just stand by and watch you die?â
Huang Xiaoling fell silent.
After a long pause, she replied, âAlright, say no more. You just keep being stubborn for now. When the day comes that both of us are gone, Iâll have Beiwu bury us close together. That way, we can sleep side by side, and Iâll come for your offerings in the middle of the night.â
Chen Dong: ââŠâŠâ
Elsewhere, Chen Beiwu changed his original plan and went out immediately after grabbing his filming equipment.
Pan River, also known as Pearl River, was named for passing through Pearl Island.
Unlike the tributaries of Still Abyss West Lake, fishing was allowed in the Pearl River. It was a perfect fishing spot for locals in YuanâKong County, no need to dodge patrols. Chen Beiwu usually streamed his fishing here.
After preparing, Chen Beiwu directly started his livestream.
ăDamn, I waited three days for this streamer to go live. Can you be a bit more diligent!ă
ăYouâre asking too much. Heâs a student. Itâs already great he streams at all.ă
ăDaily check-in. Keep it up, streamer.ă
Looking at the barrage of messages floating across the screen, Chen Beiwu was already used to it.
Making moneyâthereâs nothing shameful about it.
Nowadays, self-media was very profitable. Even though his popularity wasnât high, with only a bit over ten thousand followers in his stream, the spirit stones he earned monthly were still far more than what heâd get from reporting illegal fishing.
Relying on livestreaming, the amount of spirit stones Chen Beiwu earned in a year could not only pay the tuition for Shouhe No.2 High School but also cover his momâs annual medical expenses.
âGood evening, fellow cultivators. This is Tiansource Fishing Fortune. Tonight, Iâll try hand-rod fishing and see if I can fill the fish bucket.â As usual, he opened with his intro and pointed the camera toward the ink-black Pearl River under the moonlight.
ăFill the fish bucket? Iâd say youâre lucky if you donât reel in a corpse. Streamer must still be half asleep.ă
ăI bet a bag of spicy sticks he wonât catch a single fish tonight.ă
ăI bet two bags.ă
ăAll in, I bet ten bags of spicy sticks.ă
Chen Beiwu remained indifferent to the viewers' reactions.
Not catching fish was the point!
So far, Chen Beiwu had livestreamed over a hundred fishing sessions. Other than fish, heâd reeled in almost everything imaginable.
For example: exotic tools, pills, corpses, jade slips, iron boxes, pocket watches, stones, shoes, weeds, condoms, river mussels, snakes, and more.
At first, failing to catch fish was a fluke. But once he realized this kind of livestream attracted traffic and made money, Chen Beiwu deliberately began fishing up all sorts of random itemsâanything but fish.
Over time, the viewers started calling him âFish Runner.â
As the name implied, even the fish would flee upon seeing him.
ăIâm the future censor of the Law Enforcement Bureauâsending the streamer a membership card *1âfollowedă
As this message with a gift appeared, the streamâs popularity skyrocketed.
ăDamn, streamerâs been noticed by the Law Enforcement Bureau!ă
ăWhoa, is it the real deal?ă
ăGuys, trust me. Maybe other streams are suspicious, but in Tiansourceâs stream, the Bureau showing up is totally normal.ă
ăYou gotta believe in metaphysics. This guy can fish up anything except actual fishâeven reeled in three corpses, scared me half to death.ă
ăTurns out the streamer is a corpse-fisher. No wonder the Bureau is watching him.ă
ăNah, heâs a treasure-fisher. Heâs fished up at least five discarded magical tools.ă
Seeing all this, Chen Beiwu felt helpless.
What a mess!
It wasnât like he was trying to be dramatic or seek attention. The truth was that the evil cultivators in Fallen Dragon Manor had no sense of decency or professionalism. They didnât even know how to destroy corpses properlyâafter killing and looting, they just dumped the bodies in the Pan River, and he just happened to fish them up.
âAhem. Iâm a professional fishing streamer. Please, viewers, donât say such things,â Chen Beiwu said as he cast the baited hook while trying to calm the chat.
ă???ă
ăLOL, not even one fish in a year and you dare call yourself a professional?ă
ăStreamer, can you share your secret fishing spot so we can avoid it?ă
After posting a comment, Xu Ziqing lay back on her soft chaise woven from cloud silkworm thread, then tapped the screen with her bare toe to enlarge it, watching her classmateâs antics with curiosity.
Ten minutes passed.
Other than some weeds, Chen Beiwu hadnât caught anything.
âThis is ridiculous. How can this blockhead not even catch one fish?â Xu Ziqing couldnât help but laugh.
Staring idly at the lotus-shaped ceiling, Xu Lingling speculated, âDo you think itâs all part of Chen Beiwuâs script?â
âItâs not a script.â Xu Ziqing shook her head. âIf that blockhead hadnât found the corpses, the culprits wouldnât have been caught.â
Just then, as if she had noticed something, she suddenly sat upright, startling Xu Lingling.
âWhatâs wrong?â
âShh! Donât talk. Watch carefully.â
Xu Ziqing shook her index finger, eyes locked onto the hook catching an iron box on screen.
The box was rusted all over, with a jagged little leaf protruding from its edge, sporting some red fuzzy hairs.
ăDamn, streamer, somethingâs up!ă
ăWhatâs up? Itâs just a rusty iron box, right?ă
ăThe boxâs worthlessâthe valuable part is the Bloodface Vine!ă
ăHuh? You mean the streamer reeled in a second-tier spiritual herb?!ă
In an instant, a swarm of question marks flooded half the screen.
âWhat Bloodface Vine? Thatâs obviously just some riverbed red algae.â Chen Beiwu deliberately shut the box to keep the herb from being exposed any further.
ă??? Streamer, Iâll pay 500 spirit stones. Sell me that 'algae' of yours.ă
ăStreamer, sell it to me! Iâll pay 800 spirit stones!ă
ăStreamer, Iâll pay 2,000 spirit stones. If you sell it, then forget I said anything (comical tone)ă
Some viewers believed Chen Beiwu had fished up the second-tier Bloodface Vine, but others thought someone was just playing along and stirring the pot.
âLingling, did you get a good look?â Xu Ziqing asked without turning her head.
âI did. It should be the Bloodface Vine,â Xu Lingling said hesitantly.
Though it was just a fleeting glance through the screen, as a middle-grade first-tier alchemist, recognizing herbs from the Ten Thousand Grasses was a basic skill. One look was enough for her to see that what lay in the box wasnât red algaeâit was indeed a branch of the Bloodface Vine.
No jokeâhow could ordinary algae possess such a dense spiritual glow? Just looking at it screamed ârare find.â
âGrandpa was right. Chen Beiwu really does have a bit of fortune on his side,â Xu Ziqing thought to herself.