I Became Famous After I Became a Parrot in the Movie Star's House - Chapter 23

This is a set of live broadcast equipment. When Bai Gaoxing sees the fill lights, he isn’t entirely sure, but the moment his eyes land on the microphone on the table, he is 80% certain.

—It’s possible for a movie star’s home to have a temporary studio, but with a microphone? It’s hard to imagine they set up a karaoke machine for home singing sessions, right?

Suppressing his excitement, Bai Gaoxing inspects the equipment closely. The set is obviously complete, all in matching colors and from the same brand. Maybe it’s endorsed by Li Pu himself, but Bai Gaoxing isn’t sure about the quality.

Should he try it out?

The large white parrot’s eyes gleam with a faint light as he walks gracefully to the table. Slowly, he carefully grasps the microphone handle with his claws.

In an instant, the cool sensation spreads from his claw to Bai Gaoxing’s entire body, sending a tingling chill up to his head. The smooth surface, the technological texture, the cold metal… Awesome!

The feathers on top of Bai Gaoxing’s head puff up, like a burst of leaves spreading wide, proudly displaying his joy.

After a brief pause, Bai Gaoxing plugs in the lamp, switches on the power, and turns on the light. Lacking flexible hands, even these simple actions require great effort. He can only be thankful that the study’s setup is nearly complete, save for the power supply. If the computer isn’t assembled or the lamp has no bulb, he would be helpless.

With the light on, Bai Gaoxing continues step by step, using his beak to press the power button. The computer screen lights up immediately, outpacing 99.99% of computers in the country.

As expected of the movie emperor’s equipment, the quality is top-notch.

But he doesn’t get far—the computer is stuck on the login page.

Against the dark blue background, the cursor blinks briskly in a rectangular white bar, about one finger’s width.

There is a password.

That isn’t surprising… Still, why does Li Pu’s personal laptop have no password, but this live broadcast computer, which clearly hasn’t been used for years, does?

Did he do this on purpose?

Suddenly, Bai Gaoxing feels discouraged.

The excitement of finding something fun fades, replaced by a sense of frustration. He can almost see the internet waving goodbye, taunting him that he’ll never access it again in this lifetime.

But should he really give up?

Bai Gaoxing raises his eyelids, glances at the keyboard light, and presses NUM LOCK. So far, he’s only gotten Li Pu’s phone password. What if Li Pu uses the same password for everything?

0211

The four digits are typed in one by one. Bai Gaoxing stares at the screen, his heartbeat quickening, his mind going blank—yes! He is in! He guesses right!

There isn’t much of interest on the default screen, aside from the chaotic jumble of software icons scattered across the desktop.

It’s not entirely fair to say it’s a mess. Besides the plugins, everything else is various types of live streaming software.

Really thorough, Li Pu.

At a glance, Bai Gaoxing spots the live streaming platform he saw on Li Pu’s phone, Xinghuo, sitting in the upper left corner.

The icons below are even more colorful: orange, cyan, purple… Bai Gaoxing moves the mouse and randomly clicks on one. The software has saved the password and logs in automatically.

Bai Gaoxing clicks on Xinghuo again, and sure enough, it is the same account from Li Pu’s phone, showing 35 million followers.

Switching to the second platform, it shows 20 million followers.

The third one has 12 million followers.

Bai Gaoxing raises his eyebrows—well, he can’t physically raise them, but he imagines the gesture.

So, are these live streaming platforms arranged by follower count? Next, he clicks on the last platform, called Firefly Live. This account has been created just a week ago and has only 10 followers.

Looking at the follower list, it consists of five random bot accounts and five users whose status as true fans is questionable. Even now, Bai Gaoxing stays calm and doesn’t get carried away with excitement. He thinks about registering his own account—but there’s no way he can do that. He needs a phone number, verification SMS, and ID card, none of which he has access to.

But this new account? He can use that!

Unable to hold back any longer, he accesses the account settings and begins updating the profile details.

Name: Dabai. 

Gender: Male.

Birthday: February 11.

Home address: It doesn’t matter; he randomly types “The Movie King’s Home”—no one would believe it anyway.

After completing the form, Bai Gaoxing feels a little tired, but his excitement keeps pushing him forward to the next step: changing the avatar.

Changing the avatar is easy. He just needs to turn on the camera, find good lighting, set a nice background, and choose a 10-second delay to get his pose right.

Satisfied, Bai Gaoxing admires the new profile picture: a big white parrot looking sharply at the camera, striking a handsome pose, with dark bookshelves and books behind him, perfectly highlighting his white feathers.

The next step is to open a live broadcast room.

Bai Gaoxing isn’t a complete stranger to live streaming. Two of his college roommates are part-time streamers to cover living expenses—one streams gaming content, while the other does cosplay. The gaming pro and the cosplay enthusiast make his short college life quite eventful; occasionally, they even invite him to join their streams.

Most importantly, he has done some amateur streaming himself. He remembers a time in high school when he prepared for an international competition. As part of his foreign language and real-time translation practice, his teacher assigns him to engage with strangers online. Unlike his classmates, who choose public spaces like parks or supermarkets—one senior even gets into trouble for it—he opts for a more convenient and effective way: interacting with strangers online.

That time isn’t entirely fruitless. He helps several kids with their summer English homework and assists a few college students with translation assignments from the same major through a limited-time lottery.

Back then, the goal of live streaming was to learn; this time, it’s purely to kill time. Just to relieve boredom, that’s all.

Bai Gaoxing creates a live broadcast room. After hesitating for a long time over the name, he types out six words: Buddhist Parrot Daily Life. “Buddhist” because he truly is laid-back like a Buddha; “Parrot” because, well, that’s his current identity; and “Daily” because he’s just broadcasting his everyday life, like sitting in a daze for two hours—if anyone even watches.

…But will anyone really watch it?

For some reason, Bai Gaoxing feels a little uneasy. He sets up this equipment mostly to communicate with people online, using the half-true, half-false veil of the internet. After all, who would believe that a parrot could chat fluently online? Most would assume it’s just the owner’s dubbing and clever promotion—that’s what a normal person would think.

This way, he can talk to his audience as much as he wants.

So… shouldn’t he make the live stream more interesting?

In the spirit of learning, Bai Gaoxing goes back to the homepage to check out other people’s live broadcasts.

There’s no shortage of games and cute pets on any platform. He randomly clicks on a stream featuring a hamster, and a voice booms: “Everything’s 20% off now! Friends, 20% off! Buy one and get a cage, buy two and get a discount. You can choose directly in the live broadcast room. Let me know when you’re done, and I’ll ship it once it’s in stock!”

Bai Gaoxing: “…”

He switches to another stream, this time about raising fish.

“Want to know how I raise this butterfly koi so well? It’s simple: change the water often and replace the fish frequently.” The middle-aged man with glasses and a gentle demeanor smiles as he speaks.

He wears casual clothes, big shorts, and flip-flops, looking like an experienced fish farmer. “We have a saying in fish farming: ‘one, three, five, seven.’ Feed the fish once a day, change the water every three days, clean the tank every five days, and swap out the fish every seven days. Ha, you’re wondering where the last butterfly carp went? My wife put it in the freezer, and now it’s frozen solid!”

He switches again, this time to a stream about reptiles.

A young girl, with a childish face and wearing a middle school uniform, carefully opens a small transparent box. Her slender, white fingers tremble slightly, and her face shows a hint of fear as she says quietly, “Hello everyone, this is a bird-eating spider. Its name is Feifei.”

The girl’s voice is soft and a bit shaky.

This stream seems more reliable. Bai Gaoxing tilts his head, noticing how scared the girl looks. If she is so afraid of reptiles, why does she keep them?

The girl tightly grips a mealworm with tweezers, closing her eyes to avoid watching it wriggle. She quickly tosses it into the box.

Whoosh! 

A giant spider appears.

The chat fills with comments like:

【Aaaahhh your spider jumped out!】

【Help, it’s crawling into the corner, catch it now!!!】

【Hahaha, I’m dying of laughter.】

Bai Gaoxing remains silent.

“Ahhh!!!” The girl screams, flailing her arms, knocking over the insect box onto the table, causing the bugs to scatter all over the floor. 

It is absolute chaos.

The next second, a hand grabs the streaming phone, the screen goes black, and a more mature female voice yells, “What are you doing?! Are you rebelling?!”

The girl whimpers, “Sis—I just wanted to feed Feifei… Ahhh, it’s over there!!!”

“Let go! I’ll catch it!” shouts the real owner of the spider.

A wave of chaos ensues.

Bai Gaoxing exits the livestream room. 

He begins to reflect.

Maybe, possibly, there is no need to be so nervous?

From Li Pu’s fan count alone, he can tell this livestream platform isn’t exactly overflowing with traffic. 

Besides, he is just a cute parrot.

Thinking of this, he adjusts the microphone volume and says “Hello” twice. His slightly robotic voice sounds even cuter with the effects from the sound card, and the speakers around him shake the table slightly.

The room is soundproof, so he doesn’t have to worry about the noise leaking out. The double-glazed windows are shut, ensuring no disturbance to the neighbors. The lighting is perfect, making him appear as a soft white in the camera, rather than overexposed like a glaring light bulb. Everything is in place.

After one final check of the setup, Bai Gaoxing confidently clicks into his live broadcast room.