Cheng Che knew nothing about what was happening online.
Spring City No. 13 Middle School was strict. Senior-year students weren't allowed to bring phones into the classroom.
Guo Xin had secretly stashed away a basic phone, but all he could do on it was play Snake.
That way, he wouldn't be too heartbroken if it got confiscated.
As for the secretly filmed video that had been shared over a hundred thousand times on the short-video trending chart, few people in the entire senior year knew about it yet.
After the flag-raising ceremony, Cheng Che merely noticed that a lot more people were suddenly coming to him with questions.
How many more?
Enough that he wanted to move his desk next to the lectern and put up a sign: "Questions answered for a fee, one yuan each."
"Cheng Che, could you help me with this vector problem?"
"Brother Che, how do you break down this long English sentence?"
"Cheng Che, did you get the last fill-in-the-blank question on yesterday's math paper right? Could you explain it to me?"
Cheng Che turned no one away, explaining whenever he could.
When he couldn't, he honestly said, "I don't know how to do it either."
That only made them more excited. "You can't do it either? Great, I feel better now."
Cheng Che: "..."
Are you here to ask questions or make yourselves feel better?
This went on until the second class that afternoon.
In physics class, the teacher handed out a short quiz for them to finish during the lesson.
As usual, Cheng Che activated Total Concentration and bent over his paper.
The last major problem involved applying both electromagnetic induction and conservation of energy. He got stuck for a few minutes, ran through the model twice in his head, and suddenly grasped the key point. His pen swept across the page.
He finished and put down his pen.
He turned off Total Concentration and leaned back in his chair, ready to let Enduring Progress Without Fail slowly restore his energy.
Just then, a line of text suddenly appeared before his eyes.
[Charisma Trial · Stage two: Radiating Charisma. Objective: Earn the praise of 10,000 people. Completed!]
Cheng Che froze.
He blinked and read it again.
"Huh?"
Beside him, Guo Xin was scratching his head over the last problem. Hearing Cheng Che, he turned to look at him. "What, is the big problem hard?"
"No." Cheng Che shook his head, his expression complicated. "I'm surprised... I finished so quickly."
Guo Xin's mouth twitched. He looked at his own paper, where he had answered only two parts, then at the cap Cheng Che had already put back on his pen. He silently turned back and continued struggling painfully with the problem.
Cheng Che paid him no mind and returned his attention to the system panel.
[Congratulations! You have obtained the passive talent "Tolerance Makes Greatness."] [Congratulations! You have obtained the item "Perfect Hair Quality Shampoo."]
He looked at the talent first.
[Tolerance Makes Greatness (passive): For every 10,000 people who feel malice or disgust toward the host, the host's overall appeal to the general public increases by 1%. Current malice count: 0.]
Cheng Che: "?"
What the hell?
He stared at the line three times before he finally sorted it out.
In other words, if people trashed him, hated him, or couldn't stand the sight of him, he would become more likable to ordinary people instead?
This skill...
He rubbed his chin, and the more he thought about it, the stranger it seemed.
"Damn, am I really going to join the entertainment industry?"
What use did a high school boy have for "overall appeal to the general public"?
Other than becoming a star or a public figure, he really couldn't think of a second use.
But was this skill powerful? Yes, ridiculously so.
Because even if he really became some kind of Incubus king in the future, he couldn't possibly make everyone like him.
Sometimes, being too perfect was an original sin in itself.
There would always be people who thought he was fake, that he was putting on an act, and wondered what gave him the right to be so good.
And this skill transformed all that malice into public appeal for him.
The more people trashed him, the more ordinary people liked the sight of him.
What kind of perpetual-motion-machine logic is this?
Cheng Che couldn't help laughing.
He turned his attention to the item.
[Perfect Hair Quality Shampoo: With continued use, hair quality will gradually approach perfection. Note: For the host's use only. Affects hair only. Does not prevent hair loss.]
The words "does not prevent hair loss" made Cheng Che's smile freeze for a moment.
He touched the top of his head.
Not bad. His hair was still pretty thick.
Besides, his father Cheng Jianguo's thick head of hair was the best proof of his genes. His mother Jiang Xue was in her fifties, and her hair was still glossy and black.
He probably... wouldn't go bald, right?
"Old Xu's head..." He thought of his homeroom teacher's increasingly thinning hair and silently shuddered.
He had to start using this item.
It was best to guard against trouble before it happened.
Cheng Che gathered his thoughts and closed the panel, unconsciously twirling his pen between his fingers.
Ten thousand praises, completed in a single day.
That was far too fast.
He thought about it briefly and understood.
Someone at the flag-raising ceremony must have recorded a video and posted it online.
At the speed short videos spread, from morning to afternoon, not just ten thousand praises but even a hundred thousand were possible.
He did want to see exactly how people online were praising him.
But not now. His phone was still lying at home.
That evening, after Cheng Che ate dinner and took a shower, he returned to his room and fished his phone out of the cabinet.
As soon as he turned it on, he was bombarded by a screen full of missed calls and text messages.
Missed calls: 23.
Text messages: 17.
Unread WeChat messages: 99+.
Cheng Che opened WeChat first.
At the top were Xiao Zhou's messages.
[Xiao Zhou: Cheng Che! You've gone viral, did you know?! The video of your flag-raising speech made the trending chart!]
[Xiao Zhou: Sister Ruanning discussed it with the director. They're releasing the MV a few days early to strike while the iron's hot.]
[Xiao Zhou: If it does well, Sister Ruanning said she'll give you another red envelope.]
[Xiao Zhou: Oh, right, some people from entertainment companies might contact you soon. Don't rush to agree to anything. Stall them first. You're still young, so don't sign contracts or anything like that casually.]
Cheng Che felt a warmth in his heart as he read the last message.
Sister Xiao Zhou was usually carefree, but she was dependable when it mattered.
He went through the missed calls and text messages.
Sure enough, there were names like "Star Joy Media," "Heavenly Stars Culture," and "Brilliant Entertainment," every one of them sounding like a nightclub.
The messages were much the same, too: "We think you have a good image and would like to discuss signing you."
Cheng Che curled his lip and tossed his phone aside.
He wasn't opposed to entering the entertainment industry.
After all, as soon as the talent Boy of Many Styles appeared, he knew the system was paving the way in that direction.
But certainly not now.
He was only in his senior year, with the college entrance exam coming up and a pile of missions still unfinished.
Wouldn't rushing off to sign with some entertainment company at a time like this be tying himself down?
Besides, he'd heard that the entertainment industry was a mess, with all those dinner parties, social obligations, unspoken rules... He didn't want to be dragged to a drinking table to toast people at such a young age.
"Maybe later," he said to himself.
He picked up his phone again and opened the short-video app.
The first recommendation on the home page was him.
Cheng Che tapped on it.
The video had been filmed secretly. The picture quality was mediocre, and the camera shook a little.
But the white shirt, the beam of sunlight, and the boy speaking calmly and unhurriedly in front of the microphone were all there.
He stared at the screen for quite a while.
"So I'm this handsome?" he whispered.
It wasn't narcissism.
He was genuinely startled.
With the boost from Stars Surrounding the Moon, his bearing had been magnified several times over.
Sapiosexual Boy also gave him a focused, clean-cut appeal when he spoke seriously.
The person on camera and the one he usually saw in the mirror were like two completely different people.
As Cheng Che watched, an absurd thought even arose in his mind: If I were a girl, I think I'd fall for this guy too.
"No, no, no." He quickly shook his head and held the phone a little farther away. "I almost became Narcissus."
Narcissus was the person in ancient Greek mythology who fell in love with his own reflection on the surface of the water.
Oh, and he eventually loved himself to death.
Cheng Che opened the comments.
The top comment was fairly normal: "So this is someone else's kid? Good grades, handsome, and he has a nice voice too."
The second one started getting strange: "Little brother, big sister can wait for you to graduate."
The third went all out: "Isn't this my high school white moonlight I've never met?! If I'd had a classmate like this back then, couldn't I have taken my pick between Tsinghua University and Peking University?"
Cheng Che's face grew warm, and he kept scrolling.
Then he saw the snide comments.
"Looks like marketing to me. White moonlight, my ass. What's so good about looking at a fake person created by editing?"
"Even students have learned to buy trending spots these days? It's an act, right?"
"I've seen plenty of videos like this. In a couple of days he'll be selling products, and then he'll crash and burn. Don't ask me how I know."
"A guy who looks like that is still in high school? Why isn't he a trainee? What's he doing at school pretending to be a top student?"
Cheng Che stared at those comments, his expression calm.
If he'd seen them yesterday, he might have felt a little uncomfortable.
After all, he hadn't done anything, yet people were accusing him of "marketing," calling him a "fake person," and saying he was "pretending to be a top student."
But now...
He glanced at the description of Tolerance Makes Greatness on the system panel and suddenly let out a low laugh.
"Heh heh heh."
That's right, trash me. Do your best to trash me.
The harder you trash me, the greater my appeal to the general public will be.
The more Cheng Che thought about it, the more delighted he became. He clutched his phone and rolled halfway across the bed, then decided he was being too chuunibyou. He quickly sat up, cleared his throat, and restored his usual calm expression.
Then he turned off his phone, lay back on the bed, and stared at the ceiling.
The MV would be released in a few days.
When that happened, more people would know him.
He had to be ready.