Fake Person?

Shen Rui'an followed Su Tingbai away. Little Zhu immediately adjusted the angle, trying not to let Shen Rui'an appear on camera, so he aimed the lens at Su Tingbai's hands.

Su Tingbai was mixing fruit tea. He had long known how to make simple lemon tea, and it tasted exactly like what milk tea shops sold—perhaps even a little better.

Su Tingbai poured the finished fruit tea into a glass filled with ice. The pale brown tea submerged the cubes, whose shapes remained visible through the clear glass. He added a few lemon slices for decoration, then placed a sprig of mint on top, inserted a straw, and handed it to Shen Rui'an. "Here, try it. How does it compare to the Snow King drinks you usually have?"

Shen Rui'an accepted it with both hands and took a sip through the clear straw. The icy, sweet-and-sour flavor rushed into his mouth, chilling him to the core. It was as though the summer heat had been driven away by that mouthful of iced lemon tea.

"Delicious!"

Shen Rui'an spoke honestly. Compared with his favorite Snow King fragrant lemon black tea, it was no worse—in fact, it might have been even better.

Su Tingbai watched Shen Rui'an's satisfied expression, his eyes full of amusement. His gaze lingered on Shen Rui'an's face as he drank sip after sip. Su Tingbai took a small sip from his own cup as well, the corners of his lips lifting. "Drink slowly. There's no rush. Once the fried chicken is done, you can have it with this to cut the greasiness."

Hearing that, Shen Rui'an immediately began taking smaller sips. He was afraid that if he finished it now, he would have nothing to drink with the fried chicken later.

Su Tingbai chuckled. Shen Rui'an truly seemed like an angel lost in the human world—innocent and inexperienced, someone who could easily be tempted and exploited by evil people.

Angels could not remain in the human world forever. They would always return to heaven...

Su Tingbai tightened his grip on the cup. Thinking of Shen Rui'an's unexplained illness, it felt as though his heart had been pierced by countless needles, a dense ache spreading through him.

Were that old Taoist priest's words true or false?

Shen Rui'an would definitely be safe and well.

Su Tingbai pressed his lips together, his eyes full of resolve. He would ask Grandpa for that charlatan's contact information later.

Shen Rui'an was somewhat sensitive to other people's emotions. Just as he happily took another sip of his iced drink, he sensed that the man beside him seemed to be in low spirits. Tilting his head, he asked, "Su Tingbai, what's wrong?"

Meeting Shen Rui'an's concerned eyes, Su Tingbai shook his head with a smile. "Nothing. I just thought of something and plan to ask my grandpa about it."

"Is it urgent? Then go ask him. We can play games again after you're done." Shen Rui'an waved him off, walked straight to the beanbag chair, and plopped down. The chair bounced him slightly, but fortunately, he held the cup tightly and did not spill much.

Shen Rui'an cherishedly licked the fruit tea that had splashed onto his hand because of his carelessness. His little pink tongue lightly swept over the soft, pale skin between his thumb and forefinger.

Su Tingbai's gaze darkened, and his hand around the glass tightened. He suddenly felt terribly thirsty and could not help tipping his head back to gulp down a mouthful of lemon tea.

Little Zhu and the others fixed the livestream camera on the coffee table, then began moving around freely as well.

At that moment, the livestream chat was scrolling rapidly.

Meanwhile, the popularity of Xu Shasha's newly posted video continued to rise, and the comments beneath it surged as well.

[Whoa, I came here because of the buzz. Is this really that new guest, Shen An'an, from Su Tingbai's livestream who hasn't shown his face?]

[Holy crap, can a human being really grow up looking like that? Nuwa was showing off her skills with this one.]

[This is so fake. That screenshot was so blurry. Does the real person actually look like that?]

[The screenshot may be blurry, but you can still tell with the naked eye that he's definitely beautiful. As for whether he really looks like the painting, who knows? The screenshot looks about seventy percent similar to it.]

[Sand probably took some artistic liberties. You can tell from the screenshot that he looks pretty good, but it's too blurry. He feels more like someone who's attractive because of the atmosphere?]

[If Shen An'an really looked like the painting, he wouldn't be hiding his face, would he? I think it's exaggerated. Maybe he really is handsome, but not as handsome as in the painting.]

[Honestly, his facial features still hold up even in such a blurry image. If I were that blurry, my features would have melted together like cream. You can tell Shen An'an's features are genuinely excellent. But Sand also said the screenshot was enhanced with AI software, and AI-enhanced pictures usually aren't reliable. Still, if he looks even somewhat like this, he's no worse than those big beauty influencers on Douyin.]

There was both praise and skepticism. Everyone voiced their own opinions, and no one could convince anyone else. Yet without exception, no one said that the screenshot was unattractive.

The screenshot truly was beautiful. It did not show his entire face, and the reflection had blurred it, yet Shen Rui'an's exceptional features remained sharply defined. However, because the refrigerator door had a black background, the person reflected in it appeared grayish. Combined with the brightly colored fridge magnets covering most of his face, it gave the impression of a pipa still half-hidden behind a veil, creating an incomplete sort of beauty.

The screenshot had a distinct feeling of its own. As the video's popularity kept climbing, it had already reached hundreds of thousands of views in a short time, bringing Xu Shasha enormous traffic. Naturally, some people could not help feeling jealous.

Some sharp-eyed influencers had already begun copying the fridge-magnet photo trend. A #FridgePhoto# trending topic had even appeared.

As the buzz grew, more and more people entered Su Tingbai's livestream. Many had come purely to satisfy their curiosity, and the moment they arrived, they began asking questions.

[Where's the new guest?]

[Is the new guest really that good-looking?]

[If he really looks like that, I can understand why Su Tingbai treats Shen An'an so well.]

[Beautiful people always get special treatment.]

[Who says good looks can't put food on the table!]

[Could you let the new guest appear on camera? I'm really curious.]

[A friend of mine is terminally ill. Before dying, his only wish is to see Shen An'an show his face. Could you fulfill my friend's wish? Please!]

Some of the fans in Su Tingbai's livestream who had already disliked Shen An'an saw the comments constantly bringing him up, and their dissatisfaction reached its peak.

[This is Su Tingbai's livestream. Could you please mind the setting?]

[LMAO, are you really treating an artist's embellished drawing as Shen An'an himself?]

[What if the real person actually looked like that? Wouldn't that be uncanny valley? He'd just look fake.]

[Shen An'an has never shown his face. That screenshot only gives a rough idea of what he looks like. Who knows what he'd look like in high definition!]

[Who the hell can tell anything from something that blurry? You face-obsessed people should be reasonable. You're inserting Shen An'an into a blurry garbage screenshot and an artistically enhanced fake person?]

[Emmm... I didn't dare say it before, but I really think this is too much. Some cosplayers on Douyin could recreate Sand's painting now. Why are you all acting like Shen An'an actually looks like that?]

[Exactly. There are tons of influencers out there. Cosplayers like that could get the same effect with heavy editing. Get some better taste!]

[He doesn't even seem as good-looking as Xiao Xuan.]

[Xiao Xuan is incredibly quick with trends. He posted a fridge-magnet photo too, and it completely crushes that screenshot!]

[Come to think of it, isn't Xiao Xuan exactly Su Tingbai's type?]

The comments gradually spiraled out of control. Meng Meng and the others immediately sensed something was wrong and hurriedly kicked out the people bringing up other influencers. So they had come to siphon traffic.

Since Su Tingbai had said they would take a break for a while, Meng Meng had not been monitoring the comments in real time. That was why the discussion had escalated. Once she realized what was happening, she checked out Xu Shasha's new video based on what the viewers had said.

She was indeed startled for a moment when she first saw it, but when she looked up and met Shen Rui'an's face across from her, she immediately felt that the drawing was nothing special.