After Chen Jincheng finished his song and was about to step down, the MC announced, "Ancestral Master, that song truly expressed all the sorrow in our hearts! And Young Master Guo from V8 sent you flowers worth ten thousand to show his support!"
Chen Jincheng paused, taken aback.
'Did the song get him that hyped up?'
He knew, of course, that the MC was telling him this for a reason.
When he was livestreaming, he had to thank his "bros" for every gift they sent. In a situation like this, where someone had spent ten thousand in cold, hard cash, it was only right and proper to go over and offer a toast.
So, he walked straight toward V8. He remembered them, of course; they were the young men who had sent the "1314" gifts earlier.
Guo Feng saw Chen Jincheng approaching and, to his own surprise, felt a pang of nervousness.
It was the classic fan mentality.
After watching the Ancestral Master's streams for so long, he was finally meeting him in the flesh.
Chen Li from marketing saw Chen Jincheng arrive and immediately made the introduction. "Boss, this is Young Master Guo!"
Chen Jincheng nodded and immediately grabbed a shot glass to pour a drink. But before he could offer a toast, Guo Feng beat him to it, saying enthusiastically, "Cheng, I'm a huge fan! I was just telling everyone in the stream that you were right here in front of me, but those bastards didn't believe me. They even cussed me out!"
As he spoke, he even pulled out his phone to prove he was in the chat room.
Seeing that he was a genuine fan, Chen Jincheng didn't hesitate. He had Wang Yuan bring over the phone he was using for the livestream, then, looking delighted, he pulled Guo Feng in front of the camera. "I'm so happy today. On my very first day running the bar, I ran into a fan and brother who supported me with a ten-thousand-yuan gift."
He then turned to Guo Feng. "Bro, say hi to all the other bros in the stream!"
Guo Feng couldn't wait to address the stream. "See? I told you Cheng was right here with me, and you all didn't believe me. Do you believe me now?"
Instantly, the viewers in the chat remembered the earlier argument, and the fans who had doubted him began to apologize.
"666, my bad, I was being shallow."
"So he's a big shot! I admit I was out of line earlier!"
"Ten thousand yuan! Boss, please send out a red envelope! I want to send Cheng a gift!"
"Boss, red envelope please!"
"Boss, red envelope please!"
"…"
Seeing this, Guo Feng didn't hesitate for a second, immediately sending out a red envelope worth 20,000 Tiao Coins.
He actually quite enjoyed this feeling.
Just then, Chen Jincheng took out a pack of cigarettes and a lighter. "I've said it before: if I ever meet one of my fan bros in real life, I'll personally light a cigarette for him. To avoid getting flagged by the platform, we'll turn the camera away for a second."
Wang Yuan was quick to cooperate, covering the camera lens.
Chen Jincheng then sincerely offered a cigarette to Guo Feng. "Bro, have a smoke."
Guo Feng hadn't expected Cheng to be serious. After he took the cigarette, Cheng actually bent down to light it for him, and a wave of emotion washed over him.
'Cheng really is just like he is on stream,' he thought. 'He treats his fans like real brothers. He truly loves his bros.'
He was hyped up all over again. He grabbed his phone and fired off a bullet comment: "HOLY SHIT, CHENG ACTUALLY BENT DOWN TO LIGHT A CIGARETTE FOR ME! EVEN MY BEST FRIEND HAS NEVER DONE THAT!"
The moment the comment went out, he sent a Carnival to the livestream.
Seeing this, Chen Jincheng naturally thanked him at once and downed two consecutive drinks with him.
Once, a fan in his stream had asked him whether he loved his bros or loved gold more. He had answered without the slightest hesitation that he loved his bros.
And he had always acted that way. After all, only by loving his bros could he get his bros to send him gifts, and only by receiving gifts would he have the money to buy gold.
"Bro, you enjoy yourself. I've still got a lot of bros in the stream to look after," Chen Jincheng said to Guo Feng after another drink.
"Cheng, I get it. Go on, get busy!" Guo Feng immediately replied.
Chen Jincheng made a quick exit and returned to his office. Thanks to his performance of "Trajectory," the number of concurrent viewers on his stream had once again surpassed ten thousand.
His follower count had even broken 1.5 million.
Seeing this, he decided to keep the stream running a while longer.
「Time passed.」
The late-night rush at Extreme Bar soon came to an end. Since the bar had only reached 30% capacity, and many of the patrons were walk-ins from the earlier evening hours, there was no one who stayed until three or four in the morning, let alone all night. By a little after 2 a.m., all the customers had dispersed.
Chen Jincheng saw Elephant and the party girls off safely downstairs before returning to the bar.
The moment Wang Yuan saw him, he said excitedly, "Boss, not only did we hit 30% capacity today, but because of your song, a lot of customers got hyped and started buying more drinks. Our revenue reached 40,000!"
This revenue figure didn't include the money from the flower gifts.
However, for a bar with fifteen private rooms and fifty-nine booths, making only 40,000 was a sign that business was dead in the water.
The silver lining was that the average spending per table wasn't low, reaching over 2,000. At full capacity, that would translate to a daily revenue of 150,000.
If they could make the bar a hit, to the point where they could implement a minimum charge for the entire venue, then a daily revenue of several hundred thousand could be possible.
Everyone knows how profitable bars can be. That would be countless times more than what he was currently earning from livestreaming.
Chen Jincheng's first order to Wang Yuan was, "Tomorrow, go to the building management. I want to rent the ad space on the roof and the exterior walls. Get a bigger sign put up."
Since the Extreme Bar's sign had a +100% customer attraction effect, he had to take full advantage of that attribute. By putting signs on the building's roof and exterior walls, everyone in the vicinity would see them, which would surely attract a lot more customers.
"Boss, I'll get on it first thing tomorrow," Wang Yuan nodded.
Chen Jincheng continued with his instructions. "Also, post some recruitment ads. You can handle the escort hostesses yourself, but I want you to help me recruit more GOGO dancers, DJs, and resident singers. Show me their résumés when you have them."
'Since I'm bound to this game-like system, I can't let the resource pool of nightclub girls go to waste.' He wouldn't consider the hostesses who were already committed to being drinking companions, but GOGO dancers, DJs, and resident singers were all good targets. What if he found another future internet celebrity like Jiang Xiaobai, someone who had been famous in his past life? He could sign them on the spot.
Even if he didn't, he could just follow the template of the long-legged influencers from his past life. Surely some of them would catch on.
"Okay," Wang Yuan nodded, then added, "Boss, you should also come to the meeting tomorrow afternoon to formally introduce yourself to the staff."
Chen Jincheng nodded. He then walked over to Jiang Xiaobai, who was standing off to the side with a bag slung over her shoulder and the signed contract in her hand. "Let's go," he said.
As he headed for the exit, Jiang Xiaobai immediately fell in step behind him.
When they reached his BMW 5 Series, Chen Jincheng called for a designated driver, then sat in the back with Jiang Xiaobai.
"Where to?" Chen Jincheng asked.
"Huh??" Jiang Xiaobai was clearly taken aback.
'He's asking me?'
"What do you mean, 'huh'?" Chen Jincheng said immediately. "I'll drop you off first, then I'm going home to sleep. I'm dead tired."
"Xilin District. I rent a place there," Jiang Xiaobai said at once, a flush of embarrassment creeping onto her face.
She had thought…
"Driver, Xilin District first," Chen Jincheng immediately told the man behind the wheel.
Once the car was moving, Chen Jincheng said to her, "When I get back, I'm going to carefully review the videos you've made. I'll pick you up tomorrow, and we'll try shooting a new one to see how it goes."
"Okay!" Jiang Xiaobai nodded at once.
She had only ever filmed for fun before, never putting much thought into it. Now that he was making good on his promise to promote her, she was naturally thrilled.
"Oh, right. Don't get any tattoos," Chen Jincheng warned her seriously.
The Jiang Xiaobai from the other world had several million fans across various platforms, but her large sleeve tattoo held her back quite a bit. She often had to wear concealer patches to cover it up.
Her innocent image was great on its own, but the concealer patches were jarring and just looked off.
"I wasn't planning on getting a tattoo," Jiang Xiaobai said quickly.
"Good," Chen Jincheng nodded.
'The Jiang Xiaobai from the other world must have spent too much time in the nightclub scene,' he mused. 'She got influenced by that corrupting environment, got the tattoo, and by the time she got famous, it was too late to regret it.'
He then tried to recall what that past-life Jiang Xiaobai's most popular video had been.
It seemed to be a video of her DJing while wearing a "pure but sultry" thin-strapped lace outfit, as well as one in black lingerie with garters. The display of her 175cm-long legs, the now-you-see-it-now-you-don't allure, combined with the provocative way she moved her waist and hips while DJing—the impact was definitely pushing the censors' limits, with one foot already over the line.
All these factors combined caused both videos to get over 1.5 million likes each.
Jiang Xiaobai's market value naturally skyrocketed. She went from being a female DJ earning ten to twenty thousand a month to a nightclub goddess commanding an appearance fee of 30,000 an hour. At her peak, she was making 50,000 an hour.
Although both videos were later taken down for "unforeseeable reasons," any viewer who had seen them would surely remember them vividly.
Now that he had used the Internet Celebrity Debut Card on her, if he could recreate those two videos from her past life, she could achieve that same level of fame. That would be enough to let her easily break one million followers.