Chapter 1

In the Tang Kingdom, Jiangnan Province, the capital city is Xihu City.

In the western suburbs, at Xihu University of Arts, in the third cafeteria.

He Yanfeng sat at a long table, listlessly poking at the rice in his tray.

Watching the vibrant figures of students coming and going, He Yanfeng's eyes were vacant and lifeless.

Clearly, his mind was not on the things in front of him.

At that moment, with a clatter, a tray was placed down.

A figure suddenly sat opposite He Yanfeng.

Sun Pengxiang extended his right hand, holding chopsticks, and waved them in front of He Yanfeng's eyes: "What's wrong, are you out of your body? Be careful not to eat the rice into your nostrils."

Interrupted by Sun Pengxiang, He Yanfeng immediately came to his senses and casually poked at the already somewhat cold food: "Why did you come so late?"

Sun Pengxiang picked up a piece of braised pork, put it in his mouth, and chewed: "I, Teacher Sun, am charming and have excellent teaching skills. Even after class, students still pull me aside to ask questions."

Seeing Sun Pengxiang's self-satisfied look, He Yanfeng couldn't help but roll his eyes and mercilessly expose him: "Pull you aside to ask questions? Are today's college students so eager to learn? I think, most likely, they're asking you to highlight the key points for the final exam!"

After saying this, the corners of He Yanfeng's mouth curled up into a faint smile, revealing a look of clear understanding.

Hearing this, Sun Pengxiang's face immediately fell: "Don't be so harsh! Can't you just agree with me once? Do you have to argue with me?"

He Yanfeng helplessly pursed his lips: "Alright, Teacher Sun, you've worked hard, you've exhausted yourself for the future of our Tang Kingdom! Here, this chicken leg is a reward for you."

Saying this, He Yanfeng picked up the chicken leg from his tray and placed it on Sun Pengxiang's tray.

Although he knew the words were fake and He Yanfeng was clearly just humoring him, Sun Pengxiang chose to pretend not to know and happily accepted it: "That's more like it."

Enjoying a bite of the chicken leg He Yanfeng "rewarded" him, Sun Pengxiang continued: "It's been a month since the breakup, and you still look like you're licking your wounds?"

He Yanfeng remained silent, continuing to poke at his rice.

Sun Pengxiang continued: "If you ask me, it's not worth being sad and upset over Li Xuemei! In the past three years, how much effort and money have you spent on her so-called art dreams and star dreams! Even the expenses for her to participate in the 'Prosperous Tang Sound' competition were all paid by you. And what was the result! As soon as she made it to the top ten and had a bit of a chance to become famous, she immediately broke up with you! To put it bluntly, it's even more ruthless than 'when the birds are gone, the bow is put away, and when the rabbits are dead, the dogs are cooked'!"

Feeling indignant, Sun Pengxiang shook his head repeatedly, seemingly feeling sorry for He Yanfeng.

What a bad match!

He Yanfeng took a sip of winter melon and pork rib soup, his tone somewhat dejected: "It's all in the past, no need to bring it up again."

Sun Pengxiang picked up the conversation: "Right, it's all in the past, you need to look forward. As the saying goes, 'Why pine for one flower when there are so many fragrant grasses in the world?' The best way to forget a relationship is to start a new one."

As he spoke, Sun Pengxiang handed over his phone.

Not knowing what Sun Pengxiang was up to, He Yanfeng casually glanced at the content on the screen.

"['Heart Fluttering'... 60-day love reality show... all amateurs... embark on a mysterious journey in the 'Romantic House']" He Yanfeng read out, skipping some parts.

After reading, he looked at Sun Pengxiang with a puzzled expression: "What do you mean?"

Sun Pengxiang's face showed a mysterious smile: "What else, participate!"

"Participate?" He Yanfeng couldn't help but suppress a laugh: "Are you out of your mind? Do you really believe in this stuff?"

Sun Pengxiang was unconcerned: "Why not give it a try? After all, this is a reality show produced by Jiangnan TV, the filming location is in Xihu City, and it won't affect your work."

He Yanfeng laughed and shook his head: "You try it, I'm not interested."

"It's not me who's heartbroken, why should I try! Besides, if I participate in such a show, and Shen Jiayan finds out, the ceiling might collapse," Sun Pengxiang said with a grin. "Oh, and I forgot to tell you, I've already signed you up."

He Yanfeng was speechless: "Uh..."

What a sneaky move.

After regaining his composure, He Yanfeng was quite puzzled: "When did you do that?"

Sun Pengxiang smiled mysteriously: "The day before yesterday, didn't I borrow your ID to check something..."

He Yanfeng suddenly understood.

So that's when he remembered his ID number.

He Yanfeng helplessly shook his head and then said with a faint smile: "Sneaky boy!"

Sun Pengxiang retorted: "Don't be ungrateful!"

Feeling he had eaten enough, He Yanfeng got up and walked to the tray return area: "Do what you want, shows like this are mostly filled with people with connections, and with so many applicants, there's no way I'll be selected."

Saying this, he poured out the remaining food from his tray, stacked it in the return bin, and walked to the nearby sink.

Sun Pengxiang followed closely behind: "It's like buying a lottery ticket, what if you get lucky?"

After washing his hands, He Yanfeng asked Sun Pengxiang: "How about a few rounds of 'Ultimate Gun God' tonight?"

As for the application for the 'Heart Fluttering' reality show, he didn't give it a second thought.

Sun Pengxiang shook his head like a rattle drum: "No time, 'Eternal Love' is showing tonight, I have to take Shen Jiayan to the movies."

He Yanfeng gave Sun Pengxiang a playful kick: "Get lost, don't show off your love in front of me."

Ten minutes later, in the teacher's dormitory area of Xihu University of Arts, Room 502, Building 13.

This was a one-bedroom, one-living room apartment.

Provided free of charge by the school for young teachers to live in.

He Yanfeng lay on the sofa in the living room, his eyes full of confusion as he stared at the empty space in front of him.

Following He Yanfeng's thoughts, a semi-transparent screen suddenly appeared in front of him.

The screen was a perfect square, with six medium-sized Chinese characters in the upper left corner—[Earth Entertainment Mall], and a small line of text in the lower right corner—[Dog Food Points: 0 points]. In the middle rectangular block, a small area was lit up, showing a musical note icon, with a line of text below it—[Song: 'Encounter'].

There was a small arrow on the screen, similar to a mouse cursor.

He Yanfeng had already tested that he could control this small cursor with his thoughts and click on the icons on the screen.

The function was very similar to a mouse.

'Would you like to spend 100 Dog Food Points to purchase the song 'Encounter'?' When He Yanfeng controlled the cursor to click on the musical note icon again, the text that had appeared at least ten times before reappeared on the screen.

'Dog Food Points insufficient, cannot purchase.' When He Yanfeng mentally clicked 'Confirm,' as expected, he got the same result as before.

This result made He Yanfeng both helpless and somewhat reflective, and he couldn't help but recall the situation when the [Earth Entertainment Mall] first appeared.

It was a month ago...

That day, his girlfriend of five years, Li Xuemei, had proposed a breakup to He Yanfeng.

He Yanfeng was very sad, feeling that his life had collapsed, and the world had lost its color.

Truly heartbroken and heart-wrenched.

He Yanfeng wanted to fight for it, wanted to retain her, even though he had already seen through it, Li Xuemei's feelings for him were not genuine.

He Yanfeng was not stupid; some things had already shown signs and hints, but he had been deceiving himself, hoping that through his efforts, he could change something.

However, when the music ended and the people dispersed, he finally realized that everything was just his one-sided wish.

That night, He Yanfeng drank a lot of alcohol, got completely drunk, and passed out, and Sun Pengxiang eventually brought him back to the school.

The next day, when he woke up, in a daze, He Yanfeng discovered this mysterious screen.

At first, He Yanfeng thought it might be a hallucination caused by the aftereffects of drinking.

However, after a simple wash, he found that the screen still existed, and he immediately became restless.

After ruling out various possibilities, He Yanfeng even suspected that he had encountered something supernatural.

Fortunately, he was an adult and had read many strange stories, so after a while, once he realized that the mysterious screen was harmless to him, he gradually calmed down.

Perhaps, like some plots in novels, he had encountered a strange event.

Although such a thing sounded absurd, it had happened so abruptly that it couldn't be explained by any scientific principles.

After a month of exploration and experimentation, He Yanfeng gradually discovered some characteristics and information about the mysterious screen called [Earth Entertainment Mall].

First, as its name suggests, this thing was a mall, similar to an online mall, though it was a bit crude, perfunctory, and sloppy...

Second, the items sold in this [Earth Entertainment Mall] were not ordinary things. Currently, there was only one song called [Encounter], and whether it was a known song or not, He Yanfeng didn't know, as he hadn't heard it, but he had guessed that it was probably not, and might be a song from another world.

After all, since such absurd things had already happened to him, what else was impossible?

Third, regarding the Dog Food Points required for purchases, He Yanfeng had made some guesses after several experiments.

To this end, he had specifically gone to several pet stores and bought several bags of dog food, but ultimately proved that Dog Food Points had nothing to do with real-world dog food.

Then, He Yanfeng visited several of the university's dating hotspots.

The willow forest by Ming Lake, the Pipa Slope on the back mountain, the Bright Moon Coffee House in the first cafeteria, the Mandarin Duck Internet Cafe at the east gate... He saw many seagulls and egrets, and ate a lot of dog food, but still didn't gain any Dog Food Points.

After eliminating these possibilities, the most likely scenario was that he needed to show off his love and make others eat dog food to gain Dog Food Points.

When he reached this possible conclusion, He Yanfeng felt the screen's full malice towards him.

To ask someone who had just experienced a breakup to show off their love was like rubbing salt in the wound.

Of course, this was just a guess.

He Yanfeng had thought about hiring a temporary girlfriend to try, but when he saw the balance in his bank card, he immediately gave up the idea.

Wasn't a month of cafeteria fast food good enough?

Why do such a luxurious thing?

Finally, He Yanfeng discovered that this mysterious screen called [Earth Entertainment Mall] could be shown or hidden by his thoughts, and only he could see it.

This was confirmed on the second day the screen appeared, using Sun Pengxiang as a guinea pig.

After putting away the screen, he read a book for a while, then took a shower, and went to bed.

Tomorrow would definitely be a good day, because it was Saturday, a day off.

The next week would also be good, because the next week was payday.

It seemed he could try some luxurious things.

With this thought, He Yanfeng slowly drifted into sleep.

Ding dong ding dong...

Just as He Yanfeng was sleeping soundly, the doorbell suddenly rang urgently.

"Who is it?" He Yanfeng woke up groggily, turned on the light, and shouted towards the door.

After getting up, he looked at the wall clock, which read 12:30 AM.

He Yanfeng was puzzled: 'So late, who could it be?'

Before He Yanfeng could reach the door, a familiar voice came from outside: "Teacher He, good news, good news!"

He Yanfeng helplessly rubbed his forehead and opened the door: "Teacher Sun, so late, what good news? Did you forget your keys again and plan to cross over from my balcony?"

He Yanfeng couldn't help but suspect, because this guy was a repeat offender, often forgetting his keys and, since they lived next door, crossing over the balcony was a common occurrence.

Fortunately, this was an old apartment building built over twenty years ago, with balconies close to each other and no security windows.

Ignoring He Yanfeng's complaints, Sun Pengxiang directly waved his phone in front of He Yanfeng's face, excitedly saying: "Quick, look, the 'Heart Fluttering' show's email, you made it!"

He Yanfeng stood there in shock, speechless.

This was really a stroke of luck!