NOVPUBAs a reasonably intelligent human being, Ye Ping'an had always believed in a certain saying:
Every gift from fate comes with a price tag secretly attached.
Could there truly be such a thing as an unearned stroke of luck in this world?
Perhaps, but he didn’t believe it would ever land on him.
Knowledge was something he had crammed into his own brain. The university he attended was the result of relentless studying. The house he lived in was left behind by his parents after they passed.
Even if he scratched a lottery ticket and won a hundred bucks, hadn’t he still spent twenty to buy it in the first place?
So, when the "Interstellar Live Stream" system bound itself to him last year, Ye Ping'an didn’t consider it a blessing. Instead, he prepared for the worst.
From the very beginning, Ye Ping'an half-heartedly went through the motions.
All he had to do was meet a fixed monthly streaming quota, and the audience’s tips could be converted into Xia Country Currency—earning him an income comparable to top-tier streamers on platforms like Douyin. On the surface, it seemed like a dream.
But Ye Ping'an simply didn’t like it.
He didn’t like having some inexplicable thing latched onto him.
He didn’t enjoy wandering around with his phone every day, searching for places to broadcast.
Even coding assignments in his dorm room felt infinitely more interesting than streaming.
Yet now, he found himself trapped by this "Interstellar Live Stream."
This was something Ye Ping'an gradually realized.
The system didn’t impose strict demands—just meeting the minimum streaming hours was enough, with no surprise missions or tasks.
But humans weren’t mechanical tools.
Ye Ping'an noticed that he was slowly being influenced by the interstellar viewers in his stream.
It’s hard not to care about outside opinions.
Though Ye Ping'an streamed with minimal effort—mostly around Bin University and nearby areas—over time, some regular viewers grew bored.
So, on weekends, he’d venture out to other scenic spots or streets, just to watch the audience’s reactions: their shock, their awe, their comments about how the "retro Earth-themed set designs" were getting more elaborate.
Admittedly, there was a secret thrill in knowing something they didn’t. Every time he saw their astonished remarks, Ye Ping'an would laugh inwardly. 𝓷ℴ𝓿𝓅𝓊𝒷.𝓬𝓸𝓂
[Host’s opening yet another new scene!]
[Wonder what the next retro attraction will be—when’s the grand opening?]
[This is next-level! So many pure-blood Earthlings… Host must be backed by some major Earth family.]
[I bet this is a whole retro-themed planet built by Earthlings. Host’s just teasing us—but when’s the official launch? How much are they spending on all these actor NPCs anyway?]
Comments like these gave him a private kind of joy—or maybe just smug satisfaction. It was the reason he’d go out of his way to stream in new places, even when he only needed to hit the bare minimum.
Sometimes, he’d even pick locations just to see how far the viewers’ wild theories and exaggerations could go—whether it was a famous landmark or the bustling crowds of International Street.
Even during holidays, he’d make trips to famous mountains and rivers just to broadcast them.
Ye Ping'an had to admit: deep down, he felt a quiet superiority. Thoughts like "Interstellar folks are so clueless," "They’ve never seen this before," or "Let me educate you today" had crossed his mind.
But he always stuck to the minimum streaming hours—mostly out of laziness.
Yet here he was, a self-proclaimed slacker, willingly traveling far and wide just for the sake of audience reactions.
Then one day, Ye Ping'an woke up, and when his roommate Yuan Ye asked what he was doing that day, his first thought was: Go out and stream.
He didn’t answer. The realization stunned him.
Why would I go out to stream?
To meet the minimum hours.
But I’ve already hit this month’s quota.
The internal dialogue played out in his head.
For the money? No—I’ve barely touched the converted tips and earnings. There’s more than I could spend.
The fact that his first instinct was "stream" meant two things: he’d formed a habit, and the stream had become a source of validation.
As he climbed down from his bunk, Boss Chu casually remarked, "You’re up late today. No need to go stream, huh?"
That ordinary sentence hit Ye Ping'an like a lightning strike.
Just how often had he been streaming for his roommates to take it for granted?
That day, Ye Ping'an wandered the campus alone, lost in thought.
It was spring in Bin City, but he hadn’t truly appreciated the scenery in so long. Every time he stepped outside, it was with a selfie stick in hand, eyes glued to the flying barrage of comments—completely oblivious to the world around him.
Somewhere along the way, his life had started revolving around the stream.
He was still a student, but between classes, after dinner, during free periods—his mind was always preoccupied with where to stream next, what new spectacle he could show the audience to amaze them.
That day, for the first time, Ye Ping'an walked through campus with real awareness. He’d streamed here countless times, but he’d never noticed the blooming flowers, the lush grass, the birds singing.
And so, from that moment on, Ye Ping'an made a decision: he would cut ties with the Interstellar Live Stream.
He wanted his life back—one centered on his own will, not dictated by some external system.
The stream had brought him benefits and joy: money that lasted ages with minimal withdrawals, the information gap between him and viewers thousands of years in the future, the emotional highs from their engagement.
He weighed it carefully. His parents were gone, leaving him only an old house. Without the stream’s income, his savings barely scraped six figures.
Letting go meant giving up endless wealth.
But Ye Ping'an was determined to walk away.
He was a top student in computer science. The senior girls in his dorm had even hired him to write programs before.
Ye Ping'an wasn’t short on work. Work meant income.
Maybe he was just being stubborn—turning down easy money from streaming, preferring the satisfaction of coding line by line.
More than that, though, the stream’s unknown origins unsettled him. It felt like a ticking time bomb.
Early on, he’d worried about becoming an unwitting "Earth traitor"—what if streaming revealed Earth’s coordinates to the universe? Even now, the fear lingered.
The unknown breeds fear. Ye Ping'an had always harbored doubts. If it kills me, fine—but what if it endangers the entire planet?
That’s why he never dared to force-remove the stream by drastic means.
Not that he had the means to begin with.
From spring onward, Ye Ping'an began testing the limits of the stream’s assistant.
He gradually reduced his hours—from just half the quota, to a third, then a fifth. By July, he hadn’t streamed at all for an entire month.
The assistant nagged, but Ye Ping'an kept insisting: I’m a student. I’m busy. I don’t have time.
He did not receive the imagined "severe punishment."
The little assistant assigned to him could only nag or suspend his "livestream withdrawals" as penalties.
Ye Ping'an had failed to meet the required livestreaming hours for four consecutive months, causing his host rank to drop repeatedly. All earnings from those four months were frozen, but he didn’t care.
Gradually, he figured it out—the livestream assistant bound to him was truly just an AI tool for support. Its functions were limited to assisting with broadcasts, and even the penalties for his downgraded permissions followed preset rules.
Originally, Ye Ping'an had hoped that passive resistance—slacking off and refusing to cooperate—might force this interstellar livestream system to "uninstall" itself.
But so far, the livestream showed no signs of disappearing.
A suspicion grew in his mind: Could this thing be bound to me for life? Did it expend all its energy on me, making it impossible to transfer now?
He wasn’t discouraged. If passive resistance and failing to meet quotas could lock certain permissions, what about other actions?
Though this was an interstellar livestream, it shared similarities with modern platforms.
The livestream was a platform—one that pushed content, promoted new hosts, and directed traffic. When Ye Ping'an first started streaming, a flood of viewers arrived. He guessed there had to be some algorithmic promotion at play.
Even across different eras, livestreaming must have universal principles.
For example, certain topics, terms, or outright violations of public order would trigger bans.
Ye Ping'an tested this several times. He openly stated in his streams, "I’m on Earth—this is a thousand years in the past."
Not once was he banned. Instead, the audience mocked him.
[Alright, alright, we know you’re on ancient Earth.]
[Sure, sure, you’re totally in the past. Whatever you say.]
This approach clearly didn’t work. He had to think of something else.
Previously, viewers had mentioned that interstellar livestreams had content ratings—some species could even broadcast explicit acts openly. This crushed Ye Ping'an’s idea of testing boundaries with risqué content.
Violence and gore? He had no way to stage that either!
And because of the "couple’s" special status, Ye Ping'an feared they might notice his experiments. He’d moved off-campus to avoid them.
But… none of his attempts to unbind or get banned had succeeded. This made him wonder:
Given Yan and Zhu Jue’s connection to the interstellar era—and their possible identities—could it be that my livestream requires their approval?
After all, his livestream assistant was utterly useless. It either dodged questions with "Due to current temporal discrepancies, this information is unavailable" or locked permissions, leaving Ye Ping'an fuming.
After much deliberation, he had one last resort—an option he’d never use unless absolutely desperate.
If my body is damaged, my life threatened, or nearing its end… surely the livestream would unbind then?
But for now, valuing his life, he hadn’t fully considered this plan.
The interstellar livestream bound to him posed no obvious threat to his survival. Was it worth risking everything?
Ye Ping'an hadn’t decided.
He resolved to come clean to his two friends.
If anyone in this world understood "interstellar livestreaming" better than him, it had to be the couple from the stars.
About Yan and Zhu Jue’s true identities, Ye Ping'an had only pieced together clues through speculation.
If they really were what he guessed—interstellar-era archaeological observers, his livestream supervisors—they should have the "authority" to interact with his bound system.
At the very least, if they could use a spacetime portal to send snacks from the interstellar era, they must hold some status there. And as interstellar citizens, they’d know how to delete a host account, right?
So, after avoiding his roommates for a month, Ye Ping'an steeled himself and sent a message.
[Ye Ping'an]: Jue, you free these next couple days? Need to ask you and Yan for help with something.
When Zhu Jue received the message, he and Yan had just left a summer blockbuster at the mall.
"Wonder what’s up with Ping'an," Zhu Jue mused.
"He’s been gone from the dorm for a month. Maybe it’s relationship trouble—he is asking us for advice!" Yan said, chin lifted smugly.
With the short semester over, they had no classes left. They hadn’t decided whether to visit their families in Ning City before summer break ended, but their parents were already swamped with work.
Zhu Jue replied quickly—they were free anytime.
On the other end, Ye Ping'an thought: No time like the present. If he delayed, he might waver. Better to act fast.
That afternoon, Yan and Zhu Jue met a visibly tense and fidgety Ye Ping'an.
They’d chosen a teahouse near Bin University. After the server left, Ye Ping'an checked the door, locked it, and cleared his throat.
"Ping'an, what’s this about? So secretive?" Yan’s eyes sparkled with gossipy delight.
"Did something happen off-campus?" Zhu Jue asked, concerned.
Ye Ping'an took a deep breath. From their reactions, they hadn’t noticed his recent antics. But he was past caring.
"You know I do livestreams, right?" he said.
Yan and Zhu Jue nodded in unison. "Of course."
It wasn’t just them—their whole dorm knew Ye Ping'an streamed. It was public, though no one knew his channel name.
"Am I… your friend?" The abrupt question nearly stunned them.
"Of course," Yan said.
"You’re our future best man," Zhu Jue added.
Good. Even as interstellar beings, they still consider me a friend. Ye Ping'an bolstered his resolve.
"What if I don’t want to stream anymore? How do I quit?" he asked bluntly, gaze intense and unwavering.
"I know you two can help."
This was still a teahouse. Ye Ping'an wasn’t sure about surveillance or bugs, so he avoided naming the interstellar livestream outright. But he trusted they’d understand.
He must mean that interstellar livestream bound to him. Did it start affecting him negatively?
But Yan had no clue! And why did Ping'an think they had a solution?
Yan spoke somewhat blankly, "First... first try disconnecting the network?"
"Deactivate the account?" Zhu Jue hesitated.
Ye Ping'an froze in that moment.
Suddenly, he heard the live-streaming assistant's prompt in his ear.
[Host alert, host alert! Current spacetime intersection disrupted. Signal lost, signal lost! Possibility of signal interception cannot be ruled out!]
[Relay signal lost. Cross-spatial link cannot be established.]
[Call failed, call failed, call failed!]
[Live stream cannot establish a valid energy-providing link. Activating signal protection protocol—deleting locally stored data and entering hibernation mode.]
The voice of the interstellar live-streaming assistant cut off abruptly. Even when Ye Ping'an mentally called for the live stream, no prompts appeared. Silence followed.
He stared dumbfounded at the young couple sitting across from him.
Ye Ping'an had assumed they had some level of authority and thought they could just open a backdoor for him. But instead, they went for such a direct and brutally simple solution!
Holy crap!
Did they just unplug his interstellar internet cable for him?!
