Six months later, the program was canceled.
First, the appearance of celebrities ruined the original intention of the program; second, Ye Chen and Ling Yi could no longer fool the audience.
The second season of the show opens with a conspiracy; everyone on set is an actor, including the "ordinary person" being "acted out"—each with their own script.
What's the point of acting? Are they just playing the audience?
With the behind-the-scenes manipulation exposed, it's no wonder the show is doomed.
" The Final Master, are you really leaving?" Ye Chen was very reluctant to see Ling Yi go.
"It's not like we're parting ways forever. We'll meet again. A woman named Yin Wanqing will come looking for you. Just go with her then."
" Yin Wanqing? Is she my teacher's wife?"
Ling Yi couldn't help but recall the steamy scene when he barged into Yin Wanqing's bathroom before, and chuckled twice, saying, "Not yet."
" The Final Master, your smile is a bit lewd," Ye Chen said.
"Enough with the nonsense, let's go!"
After Ling Yi finished speaking, his figure disappeared. There was no need to leave Clone in this world. Those who understand, understand!
This is yet another modern world.
Ling Yi's identity has changed to that of a host, and the program he hosts is called " Ancient Nature," a program that is about to be canceled.
Similarly, the identity Ling Yi has taken on is also that of the Protagonist of this world.
The chances of randomly getting the Protagonist are not high.
The Protagonist's cheat code is the Shock Value System. By shocking others, he can gain Shock Value Shock Value, which can then be exchanged for various cutting-edge technologies.
A very formulaic cheat code.
" Ling Yi, I'm sorry, the ratings for your show are too low. If they don't improve by next week, we'll have to cancel it."
In the office, the station director sighed helplessly.
"It's very difficult to maintain the ratings for the technology channel now. It's not just you; even the Humans in Nature program might be canceled in a while. Old Zhao is getting old, and once he retires, the ratings for this program, which has been around for over thirty years, will probably plummet."
"Besides, we live in the internet age now, and fewer and fewer young people are watching TV."
Ling Yi didn't speak, but instead studied the Protagonist's cheat ability.
The beginner's equipment is the Time Retrospection Glasses, and Ling Yi is researching how to use these glasses to gain Shock Value. As for whether the show will be a flop, Ling Yi doesn't care; at worst, he can quit his job and do live streaming.
Coincidentally, on the station director's desk was a fossilized bone from an unknown animal.
However, when Ling Yi looked through the Retrospection Glasses, he saw a wild wolf.
These wolves are incredibly lifelike and vivid, depicting scenes of them Keep Running, hunting, and Combat for the position of Wolf King.
"Is this the Wolf King's shinbone?" Ling Yi suddenly asked.
The station director was taken aback, then laughed and said, "You know a lot about this? This was a gift from someone, supposedly a fossil of a Wolf King. I don't know if it's real or not, I've just kept it here as a decoration. How did you figure it out?"
"I've done some research, Director. I have an idea for the program ' Ancient Nature ' that I'd like to give a try."
"Tell me what you think!" The station director knew that Ling Yi was unwilling to have the program canceled. If Ling Yi's idea was really good, he didn't mind giving this young man a chance.
Ling Yi thought for a moment and said, "I want to change the program to a live broadcast format. Also, I need the station manager to help me prepare some things..."
As Ling Yi left the station director's office, he couldn't help but let out a long sigh of relief.
This station director is a very good person; if it were someone else, they probably wouldn't have agreed to Ling Yi's request.
But the station manager only gave him one chance; whether he can keep the show depends on the quality of tonight's program.
The time slot for " Ancient Nature " is between 11 PM and midnight.
An hour is not a short time.
Previous episodes mainly focused on the natural environment and biological structure of ancient times.
The most frequently mentioned topics are dinosaurs, and other plants and animals that lived during the same period as dinosaurs.
"Tonight's content is likely to overturn people's understanding of dinosaurs," Ling Yi said with a smile.
There are three hours left until the show starts.
Ling Yi went to the cafeteria to eat something first, where he ran into a few familiar colleagues and chatted for a while.
There were no ridiculous scenarios like Taunt by competitors or some young master putting on airs to your face.
At 10:30 p. m., Ling Yi arrived at the studio.
The assistant's name is Guan Xiaoxiao. She is a girl who wears glasses, has a spiky hairstyle, a small round face, and big glasses. She looks very cute, but she is a bit short, less than 1.6 meters tall, and gives the impression of being a junior high school student.
But her actual age is already twenty-six.
"Are you crazy? Are you really going to do a live stream? And what are you doing bringing all these bones here?"
" Xiaoxiao, you should know what it means if this show is canceled, right?"
"So, you're prepared to No More Bets?"
Ling Yi scanned the fossils, looking at the images reflected in his Retrospection Glasses, and nodded in satisfaction, saying, "It's not exactly No More Bets; I'm still confident."
"Just these animal bones?" Guan Xiaoxiao asked.
"Yes, just based on these bones!"
"Forget it, you've already made up your mind, there's no point in saying anything more. I'll go check the equipment one more time."
The show was going to be canceled anyway, so no matter what Ling Yi did, in her view it was just a matter of a few days sooner or later.
At 11 o'clock sharp, Ling Yi appeared in front of the camera holding several cards.
At the same time, many mobile phones with the Great Central App installed simultaneously received a notification that the " Ancient Nature " program was starting a live broadcast.
Great Central App still has a high download rate, after all, it's a national broadcaster, and many people still maintain the habit of watching the news.
This was a publicity campaign initiated by the station director using his authority to promote Ling Yi.
Ling Yi's idea was good, and the station director also thought highly of this young man. At least it was a good attempt. Even if it failed, the program would simply be canceled and Ling Yi would be temporarily suspended for a while.
To reiterate, this show was always going to be canceled.
"Today's program theme is still dinosaurs," Ling Yi said with a smile to the camera.
Guan Xiaoxiao simultaneously projected the live stream comments onto a large screen in front of Ling Yi, making it convenient for Ling Yi to check the live stream's dynamics at any time.
"Is this what you think of dinosaurs?" Ling Yi asked, turning to the side and pointing to the screen behind him.
At this moment, images of familiar ancient dinosaurs began to switch on the screen.
Tyrannosaurus Rex, Plesiosaurus, Pterodactyl...
"But what if I told you that dinosaurs didn't look like this at all, but rather... like this!"
The scene on the screen suddenly changed, becoming Phoenix engulfed in flames, Black Dragon spewing Lightning, a Tyrannosaurus Rex releasing beams of light... These images were mostly taken from the game and looked a bit far-fetched.
"You're probably thinking, 'That's impossible! This isn't a dinosaur, it's a creature from the Myth!'"
Ling Yi smiled slightly and said, "But how can you be so sure that dinosaurs looked exactly like what we see now? Who told you that? Those experts?"
"What I'm trying to say is that even those experts can't definitively tell you what dinosaurs really looked like."
"To this day, many experts are still debating whether dinosaurs had feathers and whether they were Coldblood."
"So, what would Dragon Capital had thick fur?"
Ling Yi's words plunged the few viewers in the live stream into deep thought. What would a hairy dinosaur look like? That was hard to imagine.
"It's important to understand that our depictions of dinosaurs are all based on fossils. Biologists can only reconstruct what dinosaurs looked like based on their understanding of the structures of existing organisms."
"Let's do a simple test."
Ling Yi pointed to a small animal fossil on the table and asked, "Can anyone guess what kind of animal this fossil is?"
The comments on the screen were all over the place, with some saying it was a bird-like dinosaur, others a pterosaur, and still others a scaly-jawed dinosaur...
"Actually, it's just a fossil of a Rabbit."
Ling Yi posted a picture of a Rabbit.
"Suppose we turn back time ten thousand years, and Rabbit have already Miejue by then, and people in the future have never seen Rabbit. What would this Rabbit ultimately look like to them?"
"Let's look at the second fossil!"
The second fossil is larger; it is the skull of a large animal. The forehead of the skull is concave, the frontal bone is slightly wide, and there are two teeth protruding outwards below. Most importantly, there is a notch in the middle of the forehead of the skull, which looks like it has a third eye.
The viewers in the live stream were in an uproar because the skull didn't look like that of an Earth creature at all, especially the "third eye" in the middle. There are no animals on Earth with three eyes.
"I saw many people in the live chat guessing it's Alien, is that what it looks like?"
A picture of a Three-Eyed Tribe Alien appeared on the screen, which immediately won the approval of the live stream viewers.
But Ling Yi changed the subject and said with a smile, "Actually, this is just the fossilized skull of a juvenile elephant."
The comments section exploded. Someone searched online and found that, sure enough, an elephant's skull does look like that.
"So, continuing with the previous assumption, ten thousand years from now, when future humans discover an elephant skull, will they reconstruct it into the appearance of a terrifying Alien? And then they might speculate that at that time, we may have interacted with Alien, or even fought a war with them?"
The viewers in the live stream had no argument; Ling Yi's words were reasonable and well-founded, and importantly, this was a possibility that could actually happen.
"Now, let's look at the third and last group of fossils."
This set of fossilized bones is quite long, but many people recognize it at a glance as a fish fossil.
After all, the fish head is a bit too obvious.
"That's right, it's easy to identify; it's a fish fossil. But, let's guess what kind of fish it is."
Most viewers guessed it was ribbonfish or eel.
"This is the fossilized skeleton of an electric eel."
"Everyone knows about electric eels, but who could tell from fossils alone that it was a fish that could generate electricity?"
"Let's imagine this: since electric eels can generate electricity, why couldn't ancient creatures breathe fire or release Shockwave? After all, a creature's various abilities only exist in its muscle tissue; skeletal fossils don't tell us anything about them."
Ling Yi turned to face the camera and slowly said, "In the Great Wilderness dwells a strange serpent, its color pitch black, as thick as a child's arm. It dwells in the Blackwater and wields Lightning. Ordinary people will retreat upon encountering it, and touching it will surely lead to death!"
"This is a description of electric eels from the Classic of Classic of Mountains and Seas. If electric eels had Miejue in ancient times, wouldn't we think this passage is nonsense?"
"Could we speculate that most of the creatures in the Classic of Mountains and Seas and Seas actually existed?"
"There is a bird that resembles a chicken, with five-colored plumage, named Phoenix. The plumage on its head is called Virtue, on its wings Righteousness, on its back Propriety, on its breast Benevolence, and on its belly Trustworthiness. This bird eats and drinks naturally, sings and dances by itself, and its appearance signifies peace and tranquility throughout the world."
"This is a description of the Phoenix from the Classic of Mountains and Seas of Mountains and Seas. Let's look at pterosaur fossils. Suppose we fill a pterosaur with fiery red feathers, and its muscles have Fire Setting tissue like an electric eel. Could this be the Legend Phoenix?"
If the audience initially raised objections, now the objections are significantly less vocal.
"In ancient times, humans may not have needed to rub wood together to make fire; they could simply snap their the Snap to create Huoyan."
"Was the Combat between ancient behemoths back then like those depicted in the Myth, where they could control Magnetic Field, causing Tilling, or control temperatures, Freeze thousands of miles with a single breath?"
In the station director's office, watching Ling Yi speak eloquently on the live broadcast, even he couldn't help but be captivated by what Ling Yi was saying.
"This kid's got some skills." The station manager couldn't help but laugh out loud. He knew very well that if even he was attracted to the show, it was bound to be a hit.
"However, this episode's content clearly went off-topic, so it might be difficult for the next episode."
The station manager has seen far too many shows that become wildly popular for a short time, but it's impossible for a show to maintain its success in the long run by relying solely on such unconventional methods.
Before we knew it, an hour had passed quickly.
As the program was about to end, Ling Yi laughed and said, "Ancient creatures have left behind countless fossils. We can only prove their existence through these fossils, but they have left us with even more mysteries."
"The only thing we lack right now is a Time Machine."
"In the next episode, I will take everyone on Time Machine back to ancient times to see real prehistoric dinosaurs and witness the powerful and mysterious dinosaur civilization."
That concludes this episode. See you next time!
As Ling Yi finished speaking, the live stream went black.
" Ling Yi, are you crazy? Where are you going to get a Time Machine? How are you going to handle this in the next episode?" Guan Xiaoxiao said.
"Don't worry, since I said it, I can definitely cover it up. I have a secret weapon, you know," Ling Yi said with a smile.
"Real?"
Seeing Ling Yi nod affirmatively, Guan Xiaoxiao breathed a sigh of relief and said, "I'll edit it and then upload the replay."
Just then, Ling Yi's phone rang; the caller was the station director.
" Ling Yi, come to my office." The station manager hung up the phone after saying that.
Ling Yi checked the Shock Value in the system and couldn't help but smile.
"We don't have a real Time Machine, but setting up a Time Projector is no problem. How magnificent would the Myth creatures of ancient times be? I'm really looking forward to it."