The Rise of Otaku
chapter-37

Lu Yuan’s conjecture was completely wrong. The owner who lived here was actually a young man who seemed to be in his twenties. He also didn’t look like a teacher. More importantly, why was he staying in the village? It did not even look like those who wanted to establish farming businesses in villages. His skin was so pale that he did not look like a person who could do any labor work.

After all, they were not from the same village. Even if she had doubts, it was not easy for her to ask. In the end, she just opened the snack bag and got herself ready to enjoy the childhood memories of an outdoor cinema. However, this kind of expectation was instantly dropped after she saw the title. Because on the screen, it was written with two words – “Calabash Brothers”.

‘What years is this, how could someone still play this kind of movies that only children would like? Uh... I forget the main audiences are children. That vintage projector also looked like an antique. I guess it is normal to have this kind of grandpa-level animations. Welp, it seems like I really needed to watch some childhood animation movies...’

With this thought, Lu Yuan began to watch the movie. However, the quality of this movie called “Calabash Brothers” was unbelievable.

The opening of the movie showed a small mountain village. But this small mountain village was more than enough to shock the audience. The scenery of the mountain village, the flowers, and the plants were like top-quality photos. With birds singing, insects chirping and melodious background music, it made the entire village looked like a paradise, it was absurdly beautiful.

Lu Yuan, who was drinking coke, almost spat out the coke, ‘this is the domestic animation!?’

In the university, Lu Yuan was a member of an animation club. Although she usually participated in some activities like COSPLAY, her knowledge of animation was far better than the other people here. Such beautiful pictures were not supposed to exist in the domestic animations.

It was a pity, that no one except she felt that this was very strange. Looking at the calm expressions of everyone in the yard, it made her feel as if she was overreacting.

‘No way, how can the animation movie played in an outdoor cinema in a large yard in a village is better than the animated movies played in the cinemas in big cities!’

Lu Yuan quickly took out the mobile phone, took a short clip, and then sent it to those friends of the animation club.

“Believe it or not, I saw a domestic animation blockbuster in a village!”

Although the clip was only a dozen of seconds long, and it was taken using a mobile phone in the dimly lit condition, the superb quality of the animation still made the friends of Lu Yuan confused.

“Holy shit, when was this movie released? Why I have never heard of it!”

“This is not the Calabash Brothers I know, my Calabash Brothers cannot be this beautiful!”

“Can’t find any information online, Yuan Zi are you sure that you saw this in a village?”

Her group was suddenly bustling with noise. After Lu Yuan took some more clips and sent them to them, no one doubted this anymore. Instead, they all began to search for this strange Calabash Brothers crazily.

How come they have never heard of any news about such high-quality domestically produced blockbuster? This was unbelievable. Normally, there should’ve been all kinds of news before the animation even began its production. However, it had already been shown in the village, but they still had not heard anything.

Every time when Lu Yuan sent them a short clip, it would make them go crazy. All of them almost wanted to fly over to that village to see the movie personally.

“Holy shit, the fifth calabash is actually a girl!”

“NO, no, no... I can’t handle this surpassingly beautiful scene anymore. Next time, I will use this costume instead.”

The scene they talked about was the birth of the fifth calabash. The dress she had was filled with the ancient charm of Han Dynasty and with various beautiful adornment, it embellished the beauty of the fifth calabash to the extreme. The iconic calabash was not on top of her head anymore. Instead, it appeared as a tattoo on the fifth calabash’s forehead. It was like the flame pattern that ancient girls used to like.

Not only the appearance of the fifth calabash was completely different, but the rest of her brothers also no longer had the same look. Each person’s appearance, personality, and ability were different, and they were displayed in great detail in the movie. The brand new characters were filled with modern flavors. And having all those elements together, it gave people a strange and inexplicable excited feeling whenever they were doing the poses together.

“Yuan Zi, can you ask the owner of the cinema that if he is going to play the movie tomorrow as well. If yes, I will buy a ticket and go to your village tomorrow!”

Some people were not satisfied with some short clips to keep them hanging. So some of them decided to go to Lu Yuan’s house. Not only would they be able to enjoy the movie, but the meals and accommodations were also provided by Lu Yuan anyway, it could not be greater. Apart from a few people that were still on the sightseeing tour in other places, two people already decided to come over. This time, Lu Yuan’s holiday would be a lot of fun...

The last battle between the righteousness side and the evil side was so exciting that it even made the audience cheer constantly. The fire ability of the fourth calabash was like ‘Fire Release: Great Fireball Technique’, while the fifth calabash was like ‘Water Release: Water Dragon Bullet Technique’. It almost made people think that they were watching Naruto movie. When all the calabash were combined together into one invincible calabash, its overwhelming power and charming smile even made Lu Yuan’s heart beat rapidly.

After seeing the candid clips of the last battle, all Lu Yuan’s friends completely were totally impressed by the company that made the movie, although they still did not know which company made it. The strange thing was that no matter how they searched it, the results were always the old versions of the calabash brothers. None of them could find the version that was in their group chat.

This was truly strange. It was already shown in a village. Why there was no information online?

With all kinds of questions. Lu Yuan’s friends arrived at Hong Shan village.

Before Lu Yuan’s friends arrived, she also did some homework as well.

The owner of the outdoor cinema called Zhou Yu. He was a strange young man. It was said that he did not leave his house for a year. This did not surprise Lu Yuan. It was just an otaku. There were many of them in the city. She just did not expect that there would be an otaku in a village. Those otakus were truly something else. As long as they had a computer and internet access, they could stay anywhere.

Only until recently did Zhou Yu’s lifestyle started to change. At first, he made some military weapon models, it even shocked the people in the news station, then he had an art show in a primary school. After that, he began to open an outdoor cinema. It made many kids want to go to his house every day. But the strange thing was that he did not want money. No one knows why he was doing it.

With all the rumors she had gathered, it really gave people a feeling that he was an eccentric person.

When it got to the afternoon, Xiao Lele once again urged her to bring her to Zhou Yu’s house. But this time, she did not need to worry, because apart from Lu Yuan, there were three other girls going to the outdoor cinema with her as well. With a group of people heading toward Zhou Yu’s house, it was rather impressive. However, since there were more than two people, they could not ride electric motorbike anymore. Fortunately, Luhua village wasn’t far. It was only less than half an hour journey by walking. They just treated it as an after meal exercise.

Upon entering Luhua village, one of Lu Yuan’s friends Zhang Mengmeng suddenly noticed something. She found a spot that was higher than other places, stood on top of it and then looked around at the afternoon scenery of Luhua village.

“This... this is Luhua village?!”

Lu Yuan felt very strange, she had never mentioned the village name before. How did Mengmeng know the village’s name?

“That is Luhua primary school, over there is the ruined temple... that place is the house of the old village chief, don’t tell the house you talked about is that house with a big yard over there...”

As if Zhang Mengmeng was born in this village, she was calling out some places’ names one by one. However, Lu Yuan knew that Zhang Mengmeng was not from this village, she was not even from this city. But why was she so familiar with this village?

“Mengmeng, why are you so familiar with Luhua village? You even know some places that I don’t. Don’t tell me that in your previous life, you are a villager in this village?”

“Don’t be silly, it is the game I like also called Luhua village, it is exactly the same as this village. ”

So it was the player of the myth of Luhua village.