A mortal who accidentally ate an Immortality Fruit gained eternal life, but was also sentenced to life imprisonment for stealing a treasure.
He thought this was how his life would be from then on: long, lonely, and with no end in sight.
Then society advanced and policies changed. The New Era's great amnesty hit Gu Xueqiao like a pie falling from the sky.
He was going to compete on a talent show!
Filled with endless curiosity about this world, Gu Xueqiao arrived at the training camp and made his way among humans and demons.
Everyone on this season's talent show was an amateur, every one of them gorgeous, and there was a new rule.
Among the one hundred trainees, fifty were "Black Hands." They were walking vote banks and lifelines at the elimination line. Find them accurately, and you could claim their votes for yourself.
Gu Xueqiao had come with a mission. As a human, he had to disguise himself as a demon and provoke others into reporting him.
But who said only humans could report people?
He would become the most obnoxious pest imaginable, picking on anyone he disliked and hunting like prey.
It's better for a friend to die than for me to die. Sorry, even though you're innocent, all you've lost is your dream. I'm the one who's really going to prison!
*
This season's talent show has a pretty, sickly-looking guy.
He looks like he won't live long, but somehow he hangs on with just one bar of battery until the end. And it seems... his battery is getting fuller?
Someone asked, "Why does Gu Xueqiao look like he's getting healthier and healthier?"
He gets onstage and acts like he's been injected with stimulants, his energy and vitality instantly surging.
Is this what they mean by a born idol?
And it's not just Gu Xueqiao. The audience watched in astonishment as the trainees on the show drank goji berry tea instead of ice water after dancing, put on instant face masks even during five-minute breaks, and each carried a bar of herbal shampoo soap. At such a young age, they were already committed to taking care of themselves.
The more alluring they are onstage, the more fiercely they drink their goji berry tea backstage.
Audience: Is it too late for me to start drinking it now?
Prison version:
When Gu Xueqiao was first locked up at Huaping Peak, he did everything he could to escape.
He jumped off cliffs, climbed trees, crossed rivers, and even dug tunnels.
But people who jumped off cliffs got stuck between the cliff face and the barrier, suffocating, their chests tight and unable to breathe, until they crawled back the way they came, their limbs covered in blood.
When he climbed a tree and swung outward from the treetop, he smacked flat against the barrier with a splat, nearly shattering his insides.
When he tried to cross the river, its usually calm surface grew boiling hot as he neared the barrier, bubbling away until he swam off with his skin and flesh badly scalded.
The shovel he used to dig a tunnel was a tree branch. Gu Xueqiao sharpened it flat, then drove it into the ground. Beneath the snow was soil, and beneath the soil seeped poisonous black water that burned a hole through his arm.
Eventually, Gu Xueqiao gave up. In that miserable period, even falling over in the snow meant hitting a rock. He stopped trying to do anything at all.
* An unconventional talent show
* Many original interpretations of the setting
* Beyond Huaping Peak, there is only open road ahead
Theme: Keep going forward. We'll hold back the wind for you.
