Chapter 3

When the first ray of morning light shone upon the slender currents of Qinglan River and reflected in glittering ripples, the beautiful, poor, miserable River God, who had been picking up trash, saw the first wave of humans arriving at the riverbank.

Author's note:

What was the most painful thing in the world?

He Qinglan: Max level, no mana, turned ugly. Fake smile.jpg.

Black Carp: My deity has become beautiful, poor, and miserable! Sob sob sob!!

Shui Wuyuan: Mocking his wife for being miserable, perhaps he'll keep mocking him and then end up slapping his own face.

Chasing his wife—

—like this...

Chapter 3

They were called the "first wave" of humans because more than one person had come.

Four people approached the riverbank from different directions.

The first to appear was an elderly woman at eleven o'clock. She wore tattered, excessively old clothes and clutched a torn sack tightly in her hands, gazing expectantly at the trash by the river. She was probably a scavenger.

But she moved far more slowly than the three young people approaching from the eight o'clock direction.

The three consisted of two men and a woman, all carefully dressed. The man and woman walking in front even held long tongs similar to He Qinglan's and wore gloves. They looked like environmentally conscious young people enthusiastically coming to pick up trash. But the tall, sturdy young man behind them held a phone mounted on a tripod. That made them seem less like people who had come solely to collect trash.

The three had originally been chatting and laughing as they walked over, but the moment they saw He Qinglan picking up trash atop the small dirt slope, all three of their expressions changed.

In that instant, He Qinglan sensed a trace of malice and fixed his gaze upon them.

Although He Qinglan was watching them, the distance between them meant the three did not restrain their conversation. They merely lowered their voices somewhat. Yet the River God could still hear their exchange clearly.

"Damn! What's with that guy? Why is he picking up trash too? Is he a junk collector?" The tallest and burliest young man frowned deeply.

"How could he be a junk collector?! Even though he isn't dressed that well, look at his face, then look at his bearing. A gorgeous guy like that could start a livestream, do absolutely nothing, and still get donations from face addicts, okay? I think he might be in the same business as us." After getting a clear look at He Qinglan's face, the girl among the three cried "holy shit" three times before speaking excitedly. "Boss Water is insanely popular right now. We definitely aren't the only ones trying to ride his traffic."

"But is he a new streamer? I'd never forget a beauty like that after seeing him once, but why don't I remember him?"

The girl's reaction darkened the face of the other young man beside her, who was slightly shorter but fairly good-looking. The way he looked at He Qinglan carried a thread of jealousy and mockery. "If you haven't seen him, that just means he's freshly done, right? These days, so many people are desperate to get famous that they'll go under the knife at any cost. He's probably been waiting for this opportunity for ages, or he wouldn't have come so early."

This male streamer absolutely refused to believe anyone could naturally look like that. The young man wore nothing but a dusty gray T-shirt and long pants, yet somehow made them look like the attire of a poor young nobleman. Meanwhile, even the authentic luxury brands on his own body had been made to look ugly and tacky by comparison.

"Enough, ignore him. Let's hurry up and film our video. No matter what, we have to be the first to ride Boss Water's Weibo hype! There'll definitely be plenty of people following the trend and coming here to pick up trash later. Once there are too many copycats, it'll look fake!"

The shorter young man ground his teeth again at He Qinglan's excessively handsome face, then quickly dragged his two companions to the nearby trash area to film their video.

He Qinglan listened to everything while picking up trash. Though he did not quite understand terms such as "livestream," "video," "face addict," "donations," and "Weibo," after connecting them with the trio's actions of speaking into their phone camera while picking up trash, he more or less grasped what they meant.

These three truly had not come to pick up trash seriously. They had come to... attract attention?

But what use was attracting attention? After several thousand years, human behavior had truly grown stranger and stranger.

The River God merely glanced at them once before quietly continuing to pick up trash. Though the three were only putting on an act, they were at least genuinely collecting garbage, so there was no need to bother with them.

At that moment, Black Carp fiercely flicked his tail inside the fruit-canning jar and blew a bubble. "Sob sob sob!"

River God! Black Carp knows what they're doing! Black Carp will explain it to you!

And so, the River God, who had only just awakened and entered the human world, received a crash course from an enlightened fish about all sorts of new-era knowledge, including "phones," "Weibo," "short videos," and "streamers."

He also came to understand why those three humans had come to pick up trash—

It turned out it was for a living.

The River God compared their behavior to that of ancient humans. It was probably like stages and street acrobatic troupes no longer being limited by location, able to broadcast directly through those phone videos or livestreams and receive donations afterward.

The River God looked toward the man and woman over there, who were seriously picking up trash and had even sorted and arranged it by category, and thought that was not bad.

Whether they were putting on a show or making a living, as long as they genuinely picked up trash, there was nothing wrong with earning their food that way.

He even felt that if this kind of "performance" could draw more people into caring for the environment and living creatures, and bring more people to pick up trash, it would count as somewhat beneficial.

Thus, for the first half hour, He Qinglan was in a fairly good mood.

He even helped the elderly scavenger collect several dozen more plastic bottles. From her, He Qinglan learned that some trash could be exchanged for money. But the River God had no need for money at all, so he gave those several dozen plastic bottles to her.

After the elderly woman had collected all the plastic bottles in this area, the three people filming their video over there also seemed to have finished their work and prepared to leave.

There had originally been nothing wrong with that.

However, when He Qinglan looked up, he saw the young man who had just been carrying a huge bag of trash and telling the phone camera, "I hope everyone protects the environment and safeguards our own home," raise his hand and fling that huge bag of trash away.