Took the high-speed train back to Binjiang!
Shen Miaomiao was in great spirits!
This felt amazing!
The game wasn’t even close to being ready, and she’d already thrown fifteen grand into it!
Honestly, she’d originally wanted to push the price even higher—like, just go ahead and drop a hundred grand.
But the moment that thought popped up, the system hit her with a warning.
Turns out, a hundred grand was way above the market price—borderline deliberate loss-making.
So, she had to settle for paying YiYou the market’s top rate.
Still, that was pretty good!
She waved grandly at the droopy Chu Qingzhou by her side.
“Chu-jie! Want a drink? My treat!”
Chu Qingzhou felt like she could die right then and there.
Fifteen grand!
A thing that could’ve been settled with seven grand, and this great-aunt just had to double it!
She really couldn’t wrap her head around it.
With a long sigh, Chu Qingzhou nodded, looking a little deflated.
“Sure... I’ll just have a Snow Mango.”
As she spoke, Chu Qingzhou started walking toward TeaJoy Drinks on the left side of the office entrance.
It was a trendy, high-end beverage shop that had just opened downstairs from their company.
Prices were on the steep side, but the drinks were top-notch. Chu Qingzhou bought from them all the time.
Right now, she desperately needed an ice-cold drink to cool down her inner fire.
But—
Before she could even turn, she saw Shen Miaomiao strutting off in the opposite direction, heading straight to Snow King.
Moments later, Shen Miaomiao walked out, holding two cups of lemon water. She handed one to Chu Qingzhou.
“Here! Lemon water! It’s good!”
Chu Qingzhou: ???
You… you’re willing to throw away an extra eight grand just like that…
But you buy me a cup of lemon water?
“...Miaomiao, is our friendship... worth just four bucks to you?”
As she spoke, Chu Qingzhou even raised the cup and gave it a little shake.
“You couldn’t even spring for a topping of coconut jelly?”
She shot Shen Miaomiao a heartbroken look.
Shen Miaomiao looked awkward as hell, pulling out her phone and showing Chu Qingzhou her bank balance.
502 yuan left.
“Our friendship is priceless, but my bank account isn’t,” Shen Miaomiao stuck out her tongue.
“I’ve only got five hundred bucks left for the month.”
Yep.
Ever since Shen Miaomiao had gone independent, Lao Shen had ‘cut ties’ with her.
Not just in terms of company investment—besides that initial 500k in startup capital, not a single cent more had come from the Shen family.
Even her previously worry-free lifestyle had come to a screeching halt.
Now, she had to get by on her own salary.
“But you didn’t have to burn through it all, did you?”
Chu Qingzhou saw through her act and exposed her without mercy.
“Your annual salary’s 500k! You’re making 40k a month!”
“Didn’t I cover the team’s celebration dinner the other day? That cost me six grand!”
Shen Miaomiao pouted.
“I also rented a place for myself—six and a half grand a month, pay three months upfront plus a deposit. Then there’s food, utilities, skincare, gas, car maintenance…”
Chu Qingzhou was speechless.
Yeah, Binjiang was right next to the provincial capital and the national capital—living expenses were definitely no joke.
Plus, Shen Miaomiao was a spoiled rich girl through and through—grew up with no concept of money, everything just handed to her.
Now that she had her own bank account, she spent without a care, always keeping a six-figure balance, plus a 500k credit limit on top.
Raised in that environment, even if she wasn’t super materialistic, there was no way she’d understand frugality like the average person.
And so... the awkward situation arose—
She was a rich broke kid.
Looking at the pitiful Shen Miaomiao, Chu Qingzhou couldn’t help but burst into laughter.
“Alright, alright, you poor little thing, I’ll treat you then!”
But Shen Miaomiao grabbed her arm and lifted the lemon water.
“Let’s just drink this today—no sense wasting it.”
Chu Qingzhou raised an eyebrow, a little surprised, then nodded.
“Old Shen’s parenting methods... very effective.”
Meanwhile, back at the company—
Gu Sheng and the others had just finished lunch and were chilling with a smoke.
As the saying goes: A post-meal cigarette is better than a godsend.
Smoke curling in the air, Lu Bian casually asked,
“Hey, Lao Gu, what did Little Nezha want you for this morning?”
“The motion-sensing pod,” Gu Sheng replied, sipping his tea.
“I told her about the idea. She seemed really interested. Grabbed Chu-dami and dashed off to Zhongjing—probably to negotiate with YiYou.”
“Huh?”
Da Jiang looked surprised.
“But didn’t you say before that our company couldn’t afford motion-sensing pod development right now?”
“Yeah,” Gu Sheng shrugged, a little helpless.
“But Little Nezha didn’t even give me a chance to explain. The moment she heard about the idea, she just greenlit it on the spot.”
Honestly, Gu Sheng was feeling a bit of a headache.
Like Da Jiang said, he was thinking about entering the motion-sensing pod market—but not now.
Their current financials just didn’t support it, and that was only part of the problem.
The bigger issue was—
His system’s emotional value reserve wasn’t enough to make a high-quality horror game.
In Gu Sheng’s plan, if they wanted to get a foothold in the motion-sensing pod market, their first release had to be a massive hit.
Something like Outlast, Resident Evil, The Evil Within, or Dead Space—
High quality, big scope, strong impact, rich story, maximum thrills.
But the problem was—he only had about 40,000 emotional points.
Even the smallest of those horror games—like Outlast—needed at least six figures.
That was a huge number for him.
With the three games he had now, it wasn’t going to happen in just ten days or two weeks.
After all, as time passed, player emotions would stabilize.
Even though his three games were still generating emotional points, the rate of growth had definitely slowed.
That’s why his original plan was to launch a new, low-cost, high-emotion-value mini-game—
Something like Getting Over It or I Wanna Be the Guy.
Those kinds of games could rake in emotional points like crazy.
Especially Getting Over It—back in the day, there were countless streamers rage-quitting over it. The content was gold.
Rake in a load of emotional points, then pivot into the motion-sensing pod market with Outlast—a perfect plan.
But...
Plans never keep up with changes.
The moment he mentioned an interest in the motion-sensing pod market, Little Nezha got all fired up and locked it in.
Now, he had no choice but to sift through the horror games in his system, working within his 50,000-point limit.
What should he make?
Leaning back in his chair, Gu Sheng closed his eyes, but his mind was running full speed.
Slendytubbies?
Nope. Too many jumpscares—players were already tired of that.
Poppy Playtime?
Nah. Gameplay was too basic—players would get bored quickly.
Five Nights at Freddy’s?
No. Too small in scale, low replay value.
Gu Sheng was stumped.
Something new, something fun, something with decent replayability...
This was hard.
Just as he was thinking, someone knocked on the office door.
Knock knock knock—
It was Chu Qingzhou.