Shift! The Side-Character Heroine

 Live streaming while the Chu Luoxun card is activated

Night had fallen, and Zhao Youyue finally kicked off her live stream.

At that moment, Su Li tuned into “Ah Yu’s Live Stream.” After Su Li had found out that “Ah Yu” was actually Lady Zhao, she had developed a new interest in watching live streams, even though she was not even interested by the slightest bit before this. As a loyal follower of Lady Zhao, she had unknowingly been mesmerized by Lady Zhao and is now a hopeless Zhao Youyue addict…

Before Zhao Youyue departed for the capital city to record Yu Shengfan’s lines, she made sure to bring Su Li out for a big treat. That unlucky girl is once again taking the blame for Chu Luoxun’s death in “Beautiful April.”

At the dining table, Su Li had exclaimed that her current situation could perfectly be described with the words “Death is like the wind always by my side”[1]. No matter which well-known female protagonist she draws, they would all end up with great misfortune. No one else is capable of doing such a thing but her!

Zhao Youyue had of course been very kind and was very patient in comforting Su Li and calming her down. Su Li was extremely touched, and felt that Zhao Youyue was the one and only perfect reader of “Beautiful April” in the world. Zhao Youyue had always been there for Su Li, at her best and worst. Even when Su Li truly started doubting herself, and genuinely believed that she had a cursed hand, Zhao Youyue had assuaged her fears and affirmed that she would definitely win this battle!

Uh, no, actually, Zhao Youyue’s so-called reassurance was more of a request for Su Li to stay focused on her goal.

Then you might ask, what is Su Li’s goal?

Of course, her goal is to be able to unleash all of her potentials through the drawing of mangas. Su Li is neither an overambitious person nor did she expect much. All she wanted was for her various work to gain more recognition and garner a high sales volume, so that she is prepared for the day when she decides not to draw ever again. When that day comes, she hopes that she can just sit and wait for the cash to roll in, while being able to live a comfortable life.

A money-minded artist like Su Li is actually a big threat to Zhao Youyue and her attempts to collect iconic character cards. It just so happens that Su Li is the closest artist friend that Zhao Youyue has. Life is really unpredictable sometimes.

However, money is not the only important thing to Su Li right now. Lady Zhao had completely stolen a portion of her heart. Su Li was now a devout follower of Lady Zhao, and she was determined to do whatever it would take to make Lady Zhao happy. She went so far as to make sure that whenever she finds Lady Zhao liking a particular book, she would take the initiative to get on Lady Zhao’s good side, by drawing an illustration of her favorite character for her…

Considering the fact that Lady Zhao was not even a tiny bit furious after Su Li drew Chu Luoxun to death, Lady Zhao had to be an astute person, who was capable of rational thought. Lady Zhao must have realized that the one to blame is, in fact, the author of the novel, Leng Zi, not Su Li.

Anyway, since Su Li is so good at drawing, she could easily finish everything that is assigned to her in the blink of an eye. Sometimes, she would have so much time to spare that she would even draft out a few sketches and keep them for future use. If not for this, why would Su Li even be free to meet up with Zhao Youyue on weekends?

As a result of her overflowing spare time, Su Li had recently got to know more about the King of Glory, and had been addicted to it ever since. Of course, even in the King of Glory, she is a loyal follower of Lady Zhao, who was extremely good at the game and could easily carry her team. Su Li could lay back and still win the game if she teams up with Lady Zhao. Obviously, victory came easy, considering how Lady Zhao would play her favorite champions like Luna, or Li Bai with extreme familiarity and skill! What a professional!

If someone were to say that Zhao Youyue is the best King of Glory player in the country, would anyone even dare to object it?

Su Li had also suggested that Zhao Youyue should stream King of Glory instead of League of Legends, so that Su Li could learn more about the game. For a non-gamer like Su Li, the controls and mechanics of League of Legends are way too challenging. She preferred King of Glory, as it was much easier to play, compared to League of Legends. It is no wonder that all the elementary school kids preferred King of Glory!

After hearing Su Li’s suggestion, Zhao Youyue thought that it was quite a good idea and that she might really consider doing it. Recently, the masses have been more inclined to playing mindless games that provided little challenge. An example is King of Glory, which had been getting a lot of attention lately. Every Tom Dick and Harry is playing and getting addicted to the game, ranging from people as young as elementary school kids to old aunties and the like, to the point where the media has been forced to give out advice on how to prevent gaming addiction. Without sufficient warning, everyone might just keep playing game after game after game…

This is why everyone says that King of Glory is dangerous!

Since King of Glory is the center of attention now, and a prevailing hot topic, the amount of live streams revolving around the game had naturally increased. This is why Zhao Youyue agreed that live streaming King of Glory might be a good idea.

Su Li was currently in the midst of watching Zhao Youyue’s live stream. Her favorite part of the live stream is when Zhao Youyue speaks to the viewers or does some little performances in between her games. Clearly, if anyone were to take a look at the bullet curtain, they would realize that Su Li is not the only one who lived for the moments between Zhao Youyue’s games —- —-

“Since your game is finally over, please play a song on the violin!”

“Ah Yu, didn’t you sing “Parallel Galaxies” the last time you streamed? Sing it one more time…”

“Listening to Ah Yu speak to her viewers is way more meaningful than watching her play!”

“When will Ah Yu turn her camera on, just listening to her voice is boring!”

“It is impossible for a female live streamer to become famous without turning her camera on!”

“There are no ugly girls in this modern age. There are only girls who do not care about how they look and do not use makeup. Ah Yu what are you waiting for, there is nothing to worry about, just turn your camera on!”

…

This was just another normal day in Zhao Youyue’s live stream. Viewers requesting for her to turn on her camera have become a daily occurrence, as they believed that the moment Ah Yu turns her camera on, the live stream will go insane!

If Ah Yu continues to be mysterious, all the rich viewers who donate heavily would surely stop watching her live streams. Even though “Boss Hao” had donated a big amount of money last time, nobody else fought with him to be the top in the donation list. If she would just turn her camera on and let everyone have a look at her face, she might be able to attract more affluent viewers. In an attempt to top the donation list and get Ah Yu’s attention, the rich viewers might just engage in a fight to see who donates the most amount of money to Ah Yu.

Of course, the viewers also knew that when rich viewers start to compete, more people would join the live stream to see what is going on, and naturally, Ah Yu’s popularity will also soar…

Zhao Youyue usually ignores the viewers on her bullet curtain who request for her to turn on her camera. It does not matter anyway. Even if she turns her camera on, she can be a “headless being,” – asking Su Li to draw a cartoon portrait of her face so she can use it as her head. In a parallel universe, there is a live streamer called “Xiao Yuan” that does this during her live streams. She even has a “Yuan’s classic emoji pack” that contains her various cartoon portraits with different emotions. She is also good at singing and is widely known as a 2D live streamer. Unfortunately, in Zhao Youyue’s world, there was no one like that yet.

At that moment, Zhao Youyue activated the “Chu Luoxun card,” as she confidently spoke to her viewers, “Now, I will be singing “Sweet,” I hope that all of you will like it!”

The viewers were suddenly hyped up —- —-

“Oh oh, is Ah Yu finally going to sing? I can’t wait!”

“Can anyone tell me who is the original singer of “Sweet”?”

“Correct me if I am wrong, but I think “Sweet” is an entirely fictional song from a certain juvenile novel. Is there also such a song in the real world?”

“I’ve just looked it up on Baidu[2], and there seems to be no such song. In fact, it is a song from “Beautiful April,” written by Chu Luoxun as a gift to the male and female protagonists!”

“Wow, Ah Yu would become the original writer of “Sweet” in this world then, is she trying to cosplay as Goddess Chu now?”

“Just do it, start singing already, it doesn’t matter what you sing, I would still like it anyway!”

“Ah Yu is just way too talented. If I remember correctly, the lyrics of “Sweet” are not even completed in the novel, let alone the melody.”

“If Ah Yu can do so much as to complete “Parallel Galaxies,” she would definitely be able to complete “Sweet” as well, melody or not!”

…

The bullet curtain is instantly filled with comments by excited viewers, for Zhao Youyue had not sung for them for quite a while. Moreover, this time, as she will be singing a song that has only ever appeared in a novel, the anticipation threatened to kill them!

While listening to Zhao Youyue sing, Su Li’s admiration for her has once again increased. If Su Li could be said to be slightly talented in drawing, then Zhao Youyue’s talent in music is definitely out of this world!

There is just one thing that Su Li could not wrap her head around she simply could not figure out why Lady Zhao preferred to do covers of songs from novels that do not exist in the real world. Why would she go so far as to purposely write the melody of the songs herself, when she can just conveniently sing a song that already exists.

Translation note :

[1] “Death is like the wind – always by my side” is a quote from a League of Legends champion, Yasuo. Yasuo says that line when he is picked during champion selection.

[2] Baidu is the first Chinese search engine to receive such a license. It provides users a query-based searchable community to share knowledge and experience.