Ke Meng returned to his room and recorded the day's findings in his little notebook.
"Resisting negative effects can increase resistance."
There was also the news brought by the Black Ghost, along with the information he had uncovered himself.
"Summoning different gods requires different rituals."
"The game keeps running even when all the players log off. Don't their servers need to go offline for maintenance?"
"There appears to be a barrier around the outskirts of R'lyeh City."
After finishing his notes, Ke Meng checked the view counts on his videos.
The cat review had climbed to 100,000 views, while the glove review had reached four thousand.
Downstairs, the spraying sounds of disinfectant came again.
Ke Meng went to the window. Mrs. Chen was disinfecting the area as usual.
Ke Meng turned around, cut his test footage down to ten seconds, then logged into QQ and sent Chen Momo a message.
"You there?"
"Yep. Want breakfast?" Momo replied.
"Yes, and I'd like you to watch a video while you're at it," Ke Meng typed.
Momo replied that it was no problem. Two minutes later, a rhythmic knock sounded at his door.
Ke Meng first shut the Big Fur Dog in his room, then opened the door to accept the breakfast she had brought.
"Where's the video?"
Chen Momo tilted her head from side to side, looking behind him, but she didn't see the little fluffy dog.
"I sent it to your account," Ke Meng said.
The girl nodded, took out her phone, and played the video Ke Meng had sent right there.
The video was very short, just ten seconds long. It opened with Ke Meng dipping a toothbrush into a dark brown liquid and soaking it for two seconds.
When he took it out, the toothbrush had been stained dark brown.
By the time the dark brown color faded on its own, the video had reached the five-second mark.
For the remaining five seconds, Ke Meng showed the toothbrush's body and bristles to the camera from every angle.
"So, what did you think after watching it?"
Since he had thrown the edit together casually, Ke Meng hadn't added any background music. The video felt a little dry and wasn't particularly entertaining.
But Chen Momo didn't find it boring. Her gaze seemed glued to the phone screen, and she didn't snap out of it until the video ended.
"I feel like... the bristles on this toothbrush are made of stone. What a strange feeling," Chen Momo murmured.
Ke Meng pretended not to know anything and said, "Then take it back and show your mom. Ask her what she thinks. I'm planning to cover this in my next video, so I'll fine-tune the presentation based on your feedback."
"OK, I'll ask her for you." Chen Momo headed downstairs with a puzzled expression.
Ke Meng returned to his bedroom, eating breakfast while waiting for Chen Momo's latest update.
The Big Fur Dog crouched beside him, bright eyes fixed on the savory pancake wrap in Ke Meng's hand, and whined for a bite.
"Look how well-behaved the Big-Faced Cat is. Never begs for dried fish." Ke Meng patted the Big Fur Dog on the head.
Big Fur froze, not wanting to say anything.
The convenience store on the first floor.
Chen Momo returned to the shop. Her mother sat behind the checkout counter in a daze.
"Mom, let me show you a video."
As she spoke, Chen Momo placed her phone screen in front of her mother on the counter.
Hearing her daughter's voice, Mrs. Chen's eyes regained their spark, and she looked at the phone screen.
The video opened with a mysterious dark brown liquid. A white toothbrush was dipped into it and held still for two seconds.
Then the toothbrush was pulled out, its white bristles coated in dark brown liquid.
The ten-second video was brief. Mrs. Chen stared at the screen without blinking until it ended, then dragged the progress bar back to watch it again from the beginning.
After watching it four times, Mrs. Chen frowned and asked, "Where did this video come from?"
"It's Brother A-Meng's new video. He hasn't finished it yet, though. He's still gathering material."
Chen Momo sat in a chair and raised both arms high, stretching her slender, fair legs straight beneath the table as she let out a long, languid sound.
"The bristles on this toothbrush look like they're made of stone," Mrs. Chen murmured. As though something had occurred to her, she immediately stood up and went over to a shelf.
Before long, she returned with a white-bristled toothbrush in her hand.
Chen Momo let out a surprised sound. The toothbrush in her mother's hand was identical to the one Ke Meng had used in the video, both in brand and design.
Yet the toothbrush her mother held gave a completely different impression from the one in the video. One was an everyday product of modern chemical manufacturing, while the other was a baffling blend of stone and manufactured materials. It was utterly strange.
"Great Cthulhu's video is really something this time." Mrs. Chen sat down and held the toothbrush in front of the phone screen, comparing the two closely.
No matter how she looked at them, the two toothbrushes looked identical, yet the one in her hand gave her a deeply puzzling feeling.
Chen Momo sent her mother's observations to Ke Meng, who explained, "I used psychological techniques in this video. Everything from the lighting and shadows to the objects used as cues was carefully designed. That creates a cognitive illusion, making you mistake it for something made of stone. Don't worry, it's only an illusion..."
Reading Brother A-Meng's reply, Chen Momo thought it sounded very sophisticated.
"Mom, see? Brother A-Meng designed it all carefully. He used psychological suggestion." Chen Momo showed her mother Ke Meng's reply.
Mrs. Chen gave a murmur of acknowledgment, paying little attention to Ke Meng's reply. Her eyes remained fixed on the video.
Outside the window, the sun broke through the clouds, and daylight flooded the little shop, illuminating the convenience store's interior.
Their shadows quietly lengthened across the floor, like new plants unfurling their branches and leaves, growing wild.
Ke Meng's room on the second floor.
After receiving their feedback, Ke Meng could be certain of one thing.
The Honey Juice's effects could reach viewers through video footage. If he used the Honey Juice as the subject of his next review, the video would definitely have a stronger effect than the Mighty Gloves review.
Perhaps once viewers saw it, they would share it more widely, driving the view count even higher.
But that raised another problem: the effect was too powerful.
The Mighty Gloves and the strange cat could both be replicated with video effects, but the mysterious effect of the "Honey Juice" was difficult to explain that way. Its uncanny sense of déjà vu broke through the confines of the footage and struck directly at the viewer's mind.
Ke Meng sat in his chair at home, considering whether to use the Honey Juice as the subject of his next review.
He wrote and sketched on a sheet of paper, sorting through the risks and opportunities a "Honey Juice" video would bring.
Risks and opportunities went hand in hand.
In Ke Meng's view, the system's quest reward, the "Shadow-Grasping Hand," probably wasn't some randomly chosen skill. It might genuinely come in useful.
If he really did need it, then Blue Star, the world he lived on, wasn't safe either. Beneath its peaceful surface, hidden currents stirred. The danger came from enemies lurking in the shadows, who might be criminals or nonhuman creatures.
If dangerous creatures existed, the government probably had special departments to deal with them.
Releasing a "Honey Juice" video might well draw the attention of those special departments, if they existed. Working with the government would be an opportunity, too.
Of course, there was also the risk of being placed under restrictions. Ke Meng needed to think it through carefully rather than impulsively releasing the video.
The plan is probably for him to cooperate with the government. This book uses a fictional map, not Earth's actual geography. I'll draw a map of Blue Star when I have time.
Before you continue