Chapter 3

Chapter 3

Looking at the various skills in the system mall and thinking about the dangers he might face in the future, Shen Dongqing decided to become a streamer to rack up Fame Points.

That said, Shen Dongqing had no clue how to actually be a streamer.

Luckily, the internet had everything you could think of. Shen Dongqing searched around and picked a streamer tutorial video with the most views to watch. Pairing that with the comment section, he quickly got the gist of the equipment and software needed for streaming.

Streaming didn't take much gear—just a camera and a mic.

After checking camera prices, Shen Dongqing figured he'd just stream on his phone for now—his savings weren't gonna cover a real camera.

For the mic, he scoped out the latest deals and grabbed the one with the best bang for the buck.

The promo even threw in a free phone stand. Sure, the stand looked cheap, but hey—free is free, and Shen Dongqing wasn't about to complain.

Once he'd bought his gear, Shen Dongqing went looking for reviews of different streaming platforms, but the opinions were all over the map. As an outsider, he couldn't tell what was legit and what was BS.

Then it hit him—he actually knew someone in the biz he could ask.

Zhang Feiyu was caught off guard when he got Shen Dongqing's text. He never figured Shen Dongqing would wanna become a streamer after getting laid off, but between Shen Dongqing's face and the chatter about him in his own comments, he figured the guy was a natural fit for this gig.

With a mug like Shen Dongqing's, he could at least scrape together some cash streaming—way better than sitting at home jobless.

But then...

"You wanna be an outdoor streamer?" Zhang Feiyu blurted out, stunned.

"Don't do anything crazy. With a face like yours, going the looks-streamer route—even if you don't blow up—you'd easily pull in enough to cover rent and food every month. And your day-to-day would just be chatting with fans, singing, playing games. Low-effort streaming, honestly." Zhang Feiyu advised earnestly.

"Don't look at me doing outdoor streaming and think I'm raking it in. It's a grind, seriously. Forget the gear you gotta haul around—you're also on your feet all day, gotta know how to put on a show, keep the content interesting, and outdoor streaming doesn't even care much about looks. Wasting your best asset on that would be a total shame!"

Zhang Feiyu was genuinely looking out for Shen Dongqing. In his book, Shen Dongqing's face was the kind that got people talking—perfect for the looks-streamer lane.

Of course, the real reason Zhang Feiyu was pushing so hard was that he figured Shen Dongqing might've gotten the idea from watching him—and he didn't want the guy going down the wrong path because of that.

Zhang Feiyu had a point. If Shen Dongqing were just in it for the money, he'd have taken the advice. But the thing was, he needed to get his name out there.

As an outdoor streamer, with the Criminal Attraction Aura in play, he had a way better shot at going viral and getting people to know who he was. But as a looks streamer, his odds of blowing up were way slimmer—he might not even be able to tap into the Criminal Attraction Aura's power at all.

Seeing Shen Dongqing wasn't budging, Zhang Feiyu dropped it and just recommended Tianfeng Live.

Compared to other platforms, Tianfeng Live had huge traffic, tons of different stream categories, and—most importantly—it was pretty welcoming to outdoor streamers.

"Just be ready—the competition's brutal." Zhang Feiyu warned. He wasn't on Tianfeng himself, but he had buddies who'd tried it, and the outdoor-streaming scene there was cutthroat. If you didn't have some kind of gimmick, you couldn't hold onto viewers.

"Go watch some of the big streamers, steal their best moves, and don't just jump into streaming blind. New streamers get a traffic boost—don't blow that." From there, Zhang Feiyu walked him through all the rookie traps to dodge and dropped a bunch of tips.

Shen Dongqing listened closely. He'd come across this stuff online before, but it was always all over the place—a mess to sort through—nothing as thorough as what Zhang Feiyu was laying out.

Sure, with the Criminal Attraction Aura, as long as it kept doing its thing like before, his stream wasn't gonna flatline.

But with Zhang Feiyu's playbook, he could dodge a ton of early pitfalls and get his streaming career off to a smoother start.

As confident as he was, Shen Dongqing still mulled over the what-ifs and mapped out a backup plan—becoming a cop.

For a regular person, running into a criminal meant danger. But as a cop, running into one was an opportunity—and nabbing them was a feather in your cap.

Plus, as a regular civilian, you'd have no backup when you ran into a crook. But as a cop, as long as he wasn't solo, he'd have backup nearby. Then it wouldn't be him scared of the criminals—it'd be them scared of him.

Still, Shen Dongqing was hoping the streaming route would pan out, because even if he became a cop, that was just a band-aid. To fix the root of the problem, only the Fame Points system could do the trick.

...

Over the next couple of days, Shen Dongqing didn't step outside, holed up in his room binge-watching outdoor streams and clips, soaking up every trick of the trade.

These two days at home also doubled as a little experiment.

He wanted to see if staying put would make the Criminal Attraction Aura useless, or if it'd still keep dragging criminals to his door.

So far, the results had Shen Dongqing breathing easy—he hadn't had to call the cops in two days.

But Shen Dongqing didn't dare get complacent. The Criminal Attraction Aura was sitting right there on his status panel. Who's to say this quiet stretch wasn't just the calm before the storm?

Honestly, Shen Dongqing wasn't thrilled about running this experiment, but he needed to get a better read on how the Criminal Attraction Aura worked.

After all, going by the original story, the danger only ramped up the further along he got. If he didn't test things out now, he might not live long enough to test them later.

But Shen Dongqing was still on the fence about whether to keep the experiment going.

The crooks he'd run into before had all been o