Forecasting Natural Disasters for Novel Natives - Chapter 7
After the acid rain, the streets were bleak and dilapidated, with mottled walls on buildings lining both sides.
Billboards had crashed down, roadside trees were reduced to bare trunks, and cars and electric vehicles along the curb were rusted and corroded—some stripped down to skeletal frames.
Most shops had closed their doors, with very few still operating.
Jiang Ying led Shi Feizhai through two streets before finding an open restaurant. “This is the nearest place around here that’s still open. All the other shops are closed. Is this okay?”
Shi Feizhai’s mind was entirely focused on Jiang Ying, so he couldn’t care less about restaurants. He nodded eagerly. “Yes, it’s perfect!”
“System, is that ‘devoted love’ skill still in effect? She’s smiling so beautifully at me.”
Pickup System: “The devoted love skill only lasts one day, so it’s definitely expired by now.”
“Then she must be captivated by my personal charm. I told you—there are still people with sunshine in this world.”
The Pickup System looked at his appearance and remained silent, quietly observing this female security officer.
After observing for a while, it found no flaws. Perhaps beautiful women just have such peculiar taste?
Realizing time was running short, it immediately assigned Shi Feizhai a task.
「Newbie Mission: Hold the target’s hand, gaze deeply into her eyes, and say, “You look beautiful today,’ and receive acknowledgment and praise from her. Reward: Newbie Gift Pack.」
Shi Feizhai immediately became nervous.
He straightened up, gripping his chopsticks and scraping them back and forth on his plate, his eyes darting about evasively as he kept swallowing.
Jiang Ying watched him warily and asked gently, “What’s wrong?”
Shi Feizhai took a deep breath and reached out to grasp Jiang Ying’s hand on the table. “You look beautiful today.”
Jiang Ying: !!!
Every hair on her body stood on end. The plump, sweaty hand resting on hers was clammy with perspiration. She used all her willpower not to fling it away immediately.
She smiled awkwardly, withdrew her hand with restraint, and took a sip of water. “Um, thank you.”
Shi Feizhai grew anxious—why wasn’t she praising him? Come on, praise him!
Jiang Ying couldn’t understand what he meant and could only smile awkwardly.
Her phone on the table had a flashy case with a tiny camera hidden inside, emitting a faint glow.
Outside the restaurant, in an unremarkable small van, Peng Lan watched Shi Feizhai on the screen, constantly fidgeting with an urgent expression. “Jiang Ying, keep the conversation going. Don’t let it stall.”
Jiang Ying had an invisible earpiece in her ear. Hearing Peng Lan’s words, she thought hard, then said with half-shyness, “I usually don’t dress like this—I always wear my uniform. Does this really look good?”
Shi Feizhai hurriedly said, “Yes, it really does look good.” He asked stammering, “So what do you think of me?”
Jiang Ying struggled internally. She couldn’t speak the truth, and she hadn’t thought of how to fabricate a lie yet.
Peng Lan: “Praise him.”
Jiang Ying had no choice but to lie with a straight face, making her tone as sincere as possible. “You also, um… have great character. You can tell you’re someone with real ideas.”
Shi Feizhai immediately said to the system, “Look, look! She praised me! Is the mission complete?”
Pickup System: …
Pickup System: This is hard to judge.
It sensed no genuine affection from Jiang Ying, and the praise was rather vague. But… it technically counted as praise, right?
Fine, let’s give the host a little sweetness first.
Pickup System: 「Newbie Mission completed. Newbie Gift Pack has been delivered.」
Shi Feizhai was immediately overjoyed, grinning from ear to ear.
Jiang Ying: … Help! He believed it! He actually believed it!
Those wrinkled clothes from three days in detention, greasy hair, face full of acne scars and marks, and those unwashed yellow teeth—I said he had a good character and he actually believed it!
Jiang Ying felt that if there were a competition for delusional confidence, this guy could take the top three.
Jiang Ying rubbed her forehead with her hand, concealing her overly fake smile.
Shi Feizhai couldn’t wait to see his newbie gift pack. He looked around frantically, then stood up. “Um, I need to use the restroom.”
In the van, Peng Lan ordered, “Men’s restroom team, stand by!”
This restaurant was surrounded by their people inside and out. Because they couldn’t figure out what secret Shi Feizhai was hiding, they didn’t dare install too many cameras, but they had stationed people at every place Shi Feizhai might go.
The men’s restroom was naturally a key location.
Shi Feizhai entered the restroom with quick steps, nearly flying, though he was still smart enough to find a stall to enter.
In the restroom, one man was adjusting his collar in front of the mirror, and another was pretending to use the toilet in a stall.
There were only three stalls total. He was in the middle one, with the door not even properly closed, scrolling through short videos with the sound on.
The two men exchanged glances through the gap in the door—conventional methods wouldn’t show them anything.
So the one adjusting his collar took out his wallet, didn’t grip it properly, and coins scattered all over the floor with a clatter.
“Oh no!” He hurried to pick up the coins.
One coin rolled to the feet of the man in the stall, and he bent down to pick it up.
The man in the stall shouted, “What the hell, you pervert! Are you peeping at me?”
The coin-picker got angry. “Who’s peeping at you! What’s there to see about you?”
“You’re not peeping at me? You deliberately threw money over here!”
“It rolled over by itself, what can I do about it? You’re the pervert, taking a dump with the door open and playing videos on speaker. Do you think the restroom is your home?”
“I’ll dump however I want. Is that any of your business?”
As they argued, they bumped against the partitions, “accidentally” dropping coins, glasses, and a phone into Shi Feizhai’s stall.
Through specially treated reflective surfaces, they observed Shi Feizhai’s actions inside.
Shi Feizhai was delightedly taking out the gift package from the system. Looking at the large red box that appeared before his eyes, he was so shocked his mouth hung open, then the argument started next door.
He held the gift package, not daring to move.
But the quarrel outside seemed to provide cover rather than draw attention.
Cautiously, he proceeded to open the box.
With a pop, the gift box disappeared and transformed into a protective suit.
Hat, clothing, gloves, boots, breathing mask…
Piece by piece, they floated in front of Shi Feizhai like game items.
He reached out to grab the hat, which suddenly enlarged. He put it on his head—a perfect fit.
System: “This is acid rain protection gear. Even if the sky rained aqua regia, wearing this would keep you completely safe.”
Shi Feizhai almost laughed out loud but quickly covered his mouth.
“So I won’t have to worry about acid rain anymore?”
System: “This is just a small reward. Your goal is to build an acid-resistant city and become the city lord. Complete tasks to get construction materials.”
Shi Feizhai immediately felt heroic: “City lord! City lord! Hahaha, here I come!”
「Next Mission: Steal a kiss from the beauty. Task reward: 100 acid-resistant building bricks.」
“Only 100 pieces?”
“Simple tasks have small rewards. Later there will be acid-resistant coating, acid-resistant glass, primary pastures, water treatment plants, super city acid-proof domes, and other rewards.”
Shi Feizhai’s breathing grew heavy as he listened, storing the protective suit back in the system.
Personal equipment was nothing—this was just the beginning.
His eyes burned with intense ambition as he strutted out confidently.
Passing by the mirror, the system said: “Your acne scars have faded, and your belly has shrunk a size. This is also part of the reward.”
Shi Feizhai looked at himself in the mirror. His acne scars had faded several shades, and the belly that stretched his shirt had gone back in.
He looked several times more presentable.
Shi Feizhai touched his chin and struck a sleazy pose: “My handsomeness is finally going to show!”
System: … I give up. Overconfident average man.
After he left, the coin-picker and the stall-user also stopped.
“Did you see that just now?”
“I’m not blind.”
“He actually conjured things out of thin air! This world is getting more and more fantastical.”
“I got it on video. Quick, send it to Team Leader Peng!”
Sitting at the restaurant table, Jiang Ying noticed that when Shi Feizhai came out, he seemed like a completely different person. What was with this confidence and sleaziness radiating from his entire being? Did he win the lottery in the restroom?
In the van, Peng Lan received the video shot from below at an upward angle, and his pupils contracted.
He had Jiang Ying keep Shi Feizhai stable while he urgently returned for a meeting.
“We can now confirm that Shi Feizhai can materialize objects, specifically acid rain protective gear. He eagerly retrieved it after receiving Jiang Ying’s praise, implying he didn’t possess it beforehand.”
Only a few people attended the meeting—those currently capable of giving orders in A City.
Peng Lan continued, “Besides this, he also talks to himself, seemingly conversing with something we can’t see. I suspect Shi Feizhai has something that gives him rewards when he performs certain actions toward women and meets certain conditions.”
“For example, this protective suit was the reward he received after holding Jiang Ying’s hand and getting her praise. The future acid-resistant city is probably accumulated bit by bit through this method.”
One attendee nodded in agreement. “Shi Feizhai not only received material rewards—his face and figure also improved. The more rewards he gets, the better his appearance probably becomes. This explains why the statues in the acid-resistant city become thinner and taller.”
Others agreed. “So that’s how it works. No wonder the Sky Screen was so disdainful of him. When such a person suddenly rises to power, it’s like a poor man who suddenly gets rich, or a petty person who gains authority. The acid-resistant city in his hands probably won’t have any good governance. The Sky Screen said it would become a new hell—the final situation must be terrible.”
“Despicable! What did this person do to deserve such a good thing!”
Peng Lan looked at A City’s current highest leader. “Please give instructions, leader. What should our next step be?”
Everyone looked at the highest leader.
The leader pondered. “Since the Sky Screen clearly stated that this acid-resistant city is that ray of hope, for the people, for the country, for the future, we must have this thing in our hands. Peng Lan, do you think it can be done?”
Peng Lan thought for a moment. “Now we can confirm that Shi Feizhai himself has no particular strengths. If we just hide behind the scenes and let him develop on his own while we pick up the pieces, the best result would be building one or two acid-resistant cities, but everything the Sky Screen showed would still unfold.”
This meant that the vast majority of people would still die.
This was obviously unacceptable to everyone.
Peng Lan: “To maximize benefits, first, we need to figure out what that thing is and how it operates. Second, we need absolute control.”
Not through Shi Feizhai as an intermediary, but direct communication with that thing.
The leader nodded. “Good. Peng Lan, you organize this. You can mobilize all the city’s human and material resources. Go do it.”
After the meeting ended, Peng Lan immediately inquired about the restaurant situation.
“That Shi Feizhai is disgusting as hell, always trying to grope Jiang Ying, and hinting that she should go to his place.”
All men could see what Shi Feizhai was planning.
The question was whether this was Shi Feizhai’s idea or the idea of the thing behind him.
Peng Lan’s eyes behind his glasses were ice-cold. Behind that acid-resistant city, who knew how many innocent women’s humiliation and sacrifice lay hidden.
For a moment, he even wondered—was such a place full of sin and exploitation, such a twisted thing, really necessary to exist?
If the world needed to be saved through such means, how distorted would the future become?
He looked up at the sky. The Sky Screen supported them taking that thing—perhaps the situation wasn’t so bad.
If they could communicate with the Sky Screen, they might learn more about the situation.
*
Wei Yuexin lay on the hospital bed reading the novel, pinching her nose as she continued.
She wanted to see if there was anything else in this acid rain apocalypse novel that could be made into video content.
The result was all that pickup and conquest stuff.
Kiss a cheek, get acid-resistant bricks. Hug, get acid-resistant coating. Peek at bathing, get acid-proof glass. Cohabitation, get air purification machines.
The deeper the intimacy, the greater the scale, the better the woman’s conditions and higher her status, the more rewards.
The protagonist seduced every woman he encountered, enjoying himself while reaping benefits—utterly shameless.
Wei Yuexin discovered that if she put herself in the fat otaku male protagonist’s shoes, it was actually quite satisfying. This kind of effortless multiple benefits made her want to be a man.
In the end, the harem he opened—every moderately attractive woman in the acid-resistant city had been conquered by the male lead. The entire acid-resistant city was essentially supported by these women.
But the Pickup System got stuck at the final step, unable to upgrade. The male lead also finally got tired of being a petty tyrant. One person and one system entered sage mode, then had an epiphany—
Physical relationships are ultimately shallow and temporary. Only true love is eternal, and only heartfelt deep love can upgrade the system and make the male lead transcend physical limitations to become truly strong.
So these two jerks started returning to fundamentals, pursuing true love.
Then they discovered that all the women they had conquered before submitted to the male lead because of material factors, survival, appearance, etc. Not one person loved the male lead’s beautiful soul.
The male lead felt disappointed, sad, and sighed that no one truly understood his inner self. After searching for a long time, he finally found a pure and beautiful girl who gave him pure, sincere love.
The novel’s ending was this: the girl died saving the male lead, the male lead proved himself through love, successfully transcended physical limitations and became a saint. The system upgraded and took the male lead away from this world to conquer new horizons.
After reading the entire novel, Wei Yuexin felt uncomfortably stuffed.
No useful material whatsoever, just a bellyful of frustration.
What ridiculous garbage!
She got up to get water and check the data for her second video.
Views: 4.55M+!
Likes: 670K+!
Dislikes: 880K+!
Flowers: 360K+!
Pff!
She almost spat out her water.
Views and dislikes dropped a little, but likes and flowers increased a lot!
Looking at the backend, this video could bring her over 5,000 in income!
“Sh*t!”
In the dim light, Wei Yuexin excitedly pumped her fist, her eyes sparkling.
Alright, she would never curse that crappy book again. This was her money tree!
[Dear Weizi, hello. Your video has been loved by audiences. Your backend has been upgraded and you can now receive and reply to private messages from viewers (who have liked and sent flowers to all your videos).]
Wei Yuexin received this backend message and found it strange. Did the DouDou platform have such rules? Requiring likes and flowers on all videos to send private messages to video creators?
On second thought, wasn’t this a rule from the reality show game side?
Looking at her private messages, no one had sent her any yet, so she didn’t worry about it.
Just as she was thinking this, a private message suddenly came in.
「Who exactly are you?」