Chapter 7: Work of a Master
Chapter 7: Work of a Master
Late at night, at Xingcheng Media Institute.
Inside the boys’ dorm room, Shao Haoyu sat at his desk, wearing headphones and playing a video game with intense focus.
His roommates had all gone home for summer vacation long ago, so he didn’t worry about the sounds of keyboard tapping or team commands disturbing anyone’s rest, playing with complete freedom.
Beep beep beep!
The alert sound in his headphones didn’t distract Shao Haoyu, because he was in the middle of a dungeon crawl with his buddies.
It was a critical moment as they fought the Boss.
“You’re all dead!”
The heavily wounded Boss let out an ear-splitting roar. Suddenly, it unleashed a massive Area of Effect skill. Flames and lava instantly filled the screen, and the entire team’s HP bars plummeted all at once.
“The healer’s down!”
A panicked shout rang out in the team channel.
Hao Yu, who was tanking at the front, felt his head go buzz, like it was about to explode.
Damn!
He’d spent so much time and effort getting through this dungeon. He’d even paid a high price for outside help.
Just as the Boss was about to fall, the healer actually died!
It felt like lightning struck.
Shao Haoyu didn’t even have the strength to ask why the best-protected priest died first. His team crumbled under the Boss’s fierce counterattack, members dropping dead one after another.
In the blink of an eye, the whole team got wiped out.
Failure!
Sulking, Shao Haoyu tugged off his headphones and slammed them onto the desk.
He rubbed his stiff face, preparing to turn off the computer and go to sleep.
That’s when Shao Haoyu noticed a flashing avatar icon in the bottom right corner of the screen, signaling an incoming message.
Shao Haoyu clicked on it casually.
It turned out the message was from his senior.
He immediately felt a little nervous.
Because Shao Haoyu was going out for an internship in the second half of the year, and it was at the same company where his senior worked.
This senior, who had graduated years ago, was his connection there.
Shao Haoyu quickly read the message.
Luckily, it wasn’t about his internship. The senior brother had actually sent a link to a Bilibili video.
Followed by a short, simple sentence: Check out this video.
Shao Haoyu opened the link.
3-Year Animation Graduation Project?
The video’s title made him chuckle silently — an old joke.
Artwork under such headlines were often exaggerated or bizarre, going for stupid, funny, wild content to provoke viewers and get them spamming comments while boosting click counts.
But with so many similar videos out there, people got bored and stopped paying much attention.
As a third-year student majoring in Film and Animation at Xingcheng Media Institute, and a Level 6 member on Bilibili, Haoyu Shao curled his lip contemptuously.
But since it was sent over by his senior, he clicked play anyway.
The video was extremely short, just one minute long.
Shao Haoyu finished watching it quickly.
He felt puzzled.
Couldn’t believe it.
Selected replay!
This time, Shao Haoyu dropped his casual attitude, watching with extra care and concentration.
The scene jumped straight in. The camera pushed forward and paused in front of a long, thick vine.
A big-bellied beetle with a round head and horns sat perched on the vine, happily munching on a bright green leaf.
A beam of sunlight shone right onto its body. Spots shimmered on its dark-gold shell, radiating hazy light.
It looked beautiful.
But this Golden Beetle, eating heartily, didn’t notice a Fierce-armed Mantis slowly creeping closer.
The mantis hid itself using the surrounding leaves as cover. Its shell constantly changed color and texture to match the environment, camouflaging itself perfectly.
Only its pair of razor-sharp front limbs gleamed with a cold, metal-like light.
Once it reached a suitable distance, the Fierce-armed Mantis attacked the unaware Golden Beetle!
In a flash of fierce light, the thick shell of the Golden Beetle instantly shattered, splitting apart and falling off, revealing its snow-white flesh inside.
In the next moment, its head tumbled down.
The cut was smooth and clean!
(At this point, a string of “666” spam filled the bullet chat.)
The successful ambusher extended its sharp claw, expertly hooking the insect meat from the broken shell.
It turned its head. Three cold, unfeeling eyes on its triangular head stared straight into the camera.
It spread its wings and jumped down from the vine.
(Video ends)
After watching it a second time, Shao Haoyu frowned tightly. He watched it a third time, a fourth time…
Only after watching it over ten times did he send his senior a message: “Mind-blown! Mind-blown.jpg”
This was no ‘3-Year Animation’ level tech. The best CG out of Hollywood couldn’t be better than this!
Even without voiceover or background music, this mere 60-second silent fight scene was heart-stopping. The lighting effects, animations, and details reached an unbelievable level.
It felt so real.
Especially at the end when the mantis turned to stare straight ahead — Shao Haoyu actually felt like he was the prey being watched.
He shuddered; felt fear!
If he had to criticize anything, it would be that the video picture wasn’t perfectly clear.
But that actually added to the sense of realism.
After a moment’s thought, he added another line: “Was it re-posted from elsewhere?”
His senior replied instantly: “I searched online already, didn’t find anything similar. It’s probably original.”
“Showed some friends in American, they said they’d never seen it before.”
“They agreed it’s top-tier work.”
“A masterpiece!”
Shao Haoyu was stunned.
This senior of his had studied at an art institute in “American” for three years. He was now a top-flight animation and special effects artist within his nation, with deep expertise in the CG Domain.
If elder brother said he was a great god, then he truly was a great god!
Shao Haoyu, snapping out of his daze, gave the video on BiliBili a triple action.
Like, coin, and save.
Then he shared it on his Moments!
Of course, he didn’t forget to follow the uploader either.
Then Shao Haoyu noticed that this uploader, with the ID “G93,” had only posted this one video so far.
The follower count barely passed a hundred.
Way fewer than his own.
But that didn’t lessen Shao Haoyu’s admiration and respect for “G93”!
Gao Jing woke up from his sleep.
He grabbed his phone and found it was already past nine in the morning.
He’d slept deep last night.
Getting up, he felt energetic. Even his gloomy little room looked pleasant to him. His state was very good.
Gao Jing touched the necklace hanging around his neck.
He gripped the Bronze Anchor, feeling something strange.
The Bronze Anchor seemed to be absorbing something, like a pond dried out for years touched by raindrops. Though tiny, it nourished the soil a little.
It showed a trace of life and energy.
Gao Jing didn’t understand why, and he didn’t dwell on it.
This Bronze Anchor was too amazing. Its powers couldn’t be explained by science, hiding who knows how many secrets.
Gao Jing needed to uncover them slowly.
He got up, washed in the bathroom, then went out for breakfast, coming back with a huge bag of snacks and drinks.
After changing into his dried windbreaker and shouldering his backpack with a crossbow, Gao Jing tightly gripped his Machete.
“Off we go!”
He teleported back into the Great World.
In the forest, the air filled with a familiar rotten smell. The huge spider’s body lay ahead.
Its wound gurgled out sticky fluid.
Clearly, time in this world froze when Gao Jing left and restarted when he returned.
Gao Jing wasn’t surprised.
He pulled out the Bronze Anchor for a close look.
His heart sank a little.
One of the Silver Scales was gone.
Now there were eight left.
His earlier guess was proven right!
Gao Jing looked up at the sky and stepped forward.
Before, he’d just headed one way searching without a goal. Now he brought a drone. Once he checked the nearby land layout, he wouldn’t flit about blindly like a lost fly.
But the treetops here were too tall and thick. He needed to find a more open spot with sparse woods.
After over an hour’s hike, Gao Jing finally found the perfect place.
The ground was flat here. When he glanced up, he saw a wide patch of clear blue sky.
Gao Jing quickly took out the Mavic2 and matching screen controller from his pack. After a quick setup, he sent it flying.
With a buzzing rotor noise, the drone climbed straight upward.
One hundred, two hundred, three hundred meters…
The Mavic2 moved swiftly. In short time, it shot past the hundreds-of-meters-tall treetops.
Gao Jing stared hard at the controller.
The Mavic2’s video feed was strong. Clear images showed up on the LCD screen right away, letting him see the rough spots nearby.
But what Gao Jing didn’t expect was: the moment the Mavic2 hovered and circled in place under his control, a dark shadow suddenly flashed across the lens.
The screen went pitch-black.
All signal data vanished!
Gosh!
Gao Jing almost spat out blood.
The drone he just spent 10,000 yuan on—gone like that?
Was that a bird just now?
Did it gulp the Mavic2 down like a bug?!