Translator: Nyoi-Bo Studio
Editor: Nyoi-Bo Studio
Lin Yao returned to her room, turned on the computer, and logged onto the Hang City Forum.
Perhaps it was because the opening night of the Hang Citynight masquerade party was coming up, but the Hang City Forum had been particularly lively lately.
Jiang Mingshu seemed to have successfully rid herself of the stalking colleague who drove a sports car. In the past few days, she had been active on the singles subsection.
Unlike Jiang Mingshu, Lin Yao didn’t just stay in the singles subsection, nor did she lurk around or irrigate like other netizens. In fact, nowadays she hardly did any irrigation.
Lin Yao’s Peaches Aren’t Naughty posted stuff in several major subsections. Every day she would go to her own post and update it.
In this period, Lin Yun had successively taken Lin Yao to several well-known restaurants in Hangzhou, including a private restaurant hidden in the depths of the Beishan Road residential house by the West Lake, a Southeast Asian restaurant with singing and dancing performances, and a Turkish restaurant in Hangzhou…
Under the ID Peaches Aren’t Naughty, Lin Yao made foodie posts in the Events subsection, and the title was: Foodie in Hangzhou.
Of course, the posts were all experiences of the delicious food Lin Yun took her to eat.
“I met my true love—Curry Crab at LEAF restaurant, a very Southeast Asian style restaurant by the West Lake… as upbeat music played, I, who was supposed to be solemnly eating curry crab, was dragged by the waiter onto the stage to awkwardly dance together. All because I got distracted for 0.01 seconds.
I’ve never learned their cultural dance so I didn’t dance well. I moved a bit like a penguin. I was kind of absent-minded, but in short, it was pathetic.
This wasn’t the point!
The point was, when I finally got rid of the overly friendly and attached LEAF restaurant waiter, and returned to my seat, only a bunch of shells were left of my beloved curry crab!
My friend told me, “This curry crab should be eaten while it’s still hot. If I hadn’t finished it, it would have gotten cold…blah blah”
Therefore, I advise everyone who plans on going to the LEAF restaurant to not get distracted by anything other than food. Even if the waiter is handsome, you must stand your ground, or else the consequences will be very severe. For example, the curry crab… would get cold.”
Although such posts weren’t very literary in nature, other netizens found it very easy to resonate with, and everyone else joined in on the roasting as well.
Under the influence of Lin Yun, a connoisseur, and after Lin Yao searched up and identified strategies of foodie posts shared by everyone in the Events section, now she could also be regarded as an amateur connoisseur, and she could loquaciously discuss food-related topics with netizens.
“Foodie in Hangzhou” soon became the most popular post in the world of the food section of the Events forum.
Peaches Aren’t Naughty’s post in the Love Life forum section was: New day, new pain.
From the title, one could tell that the post was about roasting, but her style of roasting was different from other people’s. Her posts were always written in a humorous and scathing tone as she wittily described the occurrences, trivial matters, and helpless matters in her daily life.
For example, when she had given up her seat on the bus once, she felt smug about her good deed, but when she looked down, she discovered that her protruding belly had stretched out her clothes and unbuttoned them.
Or, once when she encountered an acquaintance who she hadn’t seen for a long time, the other person asked her dramatic tone how she had become so attractively, and asked whether or not she got plastic surgery blah blah blah, and finally, she told the truth, “Uh, I just washed my hair before going out.”
This post quickly became one of the most popular posts in the Love Life section of the forum.
Peaches Aren’t Naughty also made a post in the singles section, titled: The Adventures of the Naughty Peach.
This post carefully relayed the anecdotes she had experienced during her participation in the singles forum section’s events, and from the perspective of the forum newbie Peaches Aren’t Naughty, she described the FB scene with singles forum section’s netizens.
Although her writing style was mediocre, her posts were appealing because of how down to earth, relatable, and authentic she sounded. This post also began to attract more and more attention from netizens.
Unlike other netizens, Peaches Aren’t Naughty didn’t post or reply randomly without any apparent purpose. She always carefully constructed her posts and was in the habit of replying in the morning and evening, without interruption and without omissions.
She was also very concerned with the posts from other netizens in the forum. Most of the time she only played the role of a listener, and occasionally gave some insightful small pieces of advice, which were usually inspiring.
Not only that, but many of her inspiring words of advice left on the Hang City Forum, as well as her quippy comments, and even some of her witty remarks became sought after by people.
For example, someone once posted a question and asked: What is fate?
After Lin Yao saw it, as Peaches Aren’t Naughty, she replied, “Fate is the poop of the gibbon.”
An off-hand comment like this, despite not making any sense at all, was quoted by many people in the span of just a few minutes, followed by a dozen pages, with 20 articles per page, which meant that it was quoted hundreds of times.
Moreover, since then, the hype didn’t die down even after a long time. Netizens continued to quote and follow the post.
Lin Yao was a girl with a sweet and gentle temperament, and her inner qualities became more emphasized through Peaches Aren’t Naughty.
Lin Yao was also a person who had experienced some downturns in life, so even if Peach Aren’t Naught encountered awkward situations on the Internet, she wouldn’t take it personally and would calmly try to remedy the situation.
Peaches Aren’t Naughty became a peacemaker with the ability to dissolve hostile situations and break up imminent arguments.
Goodwill is often mutual, so now no matter which forum section Peach Aren’t Naughty popped up on, there would always be familiar IDs coming up to greet her.
One month later, “The Adventures of the Naughty Peach” became the most popular post in the singles subforum, as well as the entire Hang City Forum.
For Lin Yao, she didn’t have any marketing ambitions for Peaches Aren’t Naughty, and all of this was simply a fun pastime for her during her spare time after she got off work. She never anticipated all the unexpected benefits.
*******
It was already late at night, and only Qin Rongze and his personal assistant Liang Kaiwen were left on the 49th floor of the Orlando Building.
Qin Rongze was initially focused on approving various documents, but he could hear Liang Kaiwen dramatically burst out laughing every few minutes.
“Wah Kaka Kaka, this is too hilarious! Ah ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha… wah ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha…”
Qin Rongze was a typical workaholic. Work was the only thing he had on his mind, but, right now Liang Kaiwen was making too much noise for him to continue.
Qin Rongze went over to check and discovered that Liang Kaiwen’s computer screen displayed a page of a section on the Hang City Forum, and he was rocking back and forth laughing at the computer screen.
Of course, Qin Rongze couldn’t understand why he was behaving so foolishly. He raised his finger and tapped on the table twice, and asked, nonchalantly, “Do you remember what you were supposed to be doing?”
“Ahem, chairman.” Liang Kaiwen was mortified. He didn’t have time to wipe the tears from the corners of his eyes. He hurriedly got up and explained, “I remember, I’m helping you investigate Peaches Aren’t Naughty, whose true identity is Lin Yao. You’re looking for that young girl.”
Qin Rongze’s fingertips moved slightly. “And, have you found anything rewarding?” His deep voice made it impossible to tell his mood.
Of course, Liang Kaiwen had found something rewarding—he had saved a bunch of Peaches Aren’t Naughty’s hilariously witty posts.
“Ha, it’s been somewhat rewarding, but I think I need to register an ID with her…”
Liang Kaiwen saw the CEO gazing at him with an ambivalent expression, and for some inexplicable reason, he felt a little faint-hearted inside. “Ahem, I mean, I want to register an ID for you, but I don’t know what you think about it?”
Only now did Liang Kaiwen realize how fascinating Lin Yao was, so it was no wonder the chairman couldn’t get her off his mind. Wait no, the chairman probably hadn’t even seen these yet…
He had a bold idea: print out these funny posts and place them on the CEO’s desk.
He wondered how the CEO would react after he saw them, perhaps he would burst out into laughter despite himself?
Of course, this kind of thing was something Liang Kaiwen only dared to think about, never do.
Qin Rongze looked up and stared at him without giving a clear answer.