Chapter 31: Skyrocketing Fans

Wrapping up his review, Li Xiao glanced at his stream. All eighty-two red packets had been claimed. The viewer count, which had peaked at over 9,000, had now dropped to just over 2,000. Although nearly four-fifths of the audience had left, the remaining number still far exceeded his expectations. He originally thought retaining a thousand viewers would be a good result. To his surprise, there were still over 2,000 left. It seemed many people actually enjoyed his streaming style.

Checking the time, Li Xiao went down the list of the one hundred lucky viewers from yesterday, clicking into their profiles one by one.

"Cat-12", 308 likes.

"Dragon Slayer Warrior", 689 likes.

"Brother Xian", 1,078 likes.

...

He checked the videos of all one hundred lucky viewers right in front of his live audience. Ultimately, a viewer named "Alice in Wonderland" secured the highest count with 4,031 likes. Even though the quality of the video posted by this "Wonderland Alice" was mediocre at best, and there were barely any comments, it was blatantly obvious that they had asked friends and relatives for help, or perhaps even hired a click farm to inflate the numbers.

However, based on the rules Li Xiao had previously established with his audience, whoever got the most likes would win the 1,000-yuan red packet. Therefore, he did not fuss over how exactly these likes were acquired. He simply made a mental note of this oversight on his part. If he were to organize a similar event in the future, he absolutely could not rely on such a one-dimensional metric.

This "Wonderland Alice" had clearly been watching Li Xiao’s stream the whole time. Li Xiao merely sent an [Are you there?], and the other party replied instantly, without even a second’s delay.

[Brother Li, I’m here!]

[Great. Your video received 4,031 likes, which is the most among all the entries. As promised, I’ll send you the 1,000-yuan red packet.]

Without further ado, he directly transferred the 1,000 yuan in cash. "Wonderland Alice" accepted the red packet instantly.

[Thanks, Brother Li! Thank you so much! I’ll be your fan for life.]

[Alright, thank you for your support.]

Regardless of whether the person was being sincere or not, he closed the chat window. Next, Li Xiao sent out a mass message with a single click. The remaining ninety-nine lucky viewers from yesterday each received a small, 50-yuan red packet as a token of appreciation for participating.

In the stream’s chat, the audience buzzed with opinions.

"This Wonderland Alice’s video stats are obviously fake! Over 4,000 likes but only 30-something comments? It’s definitely botted!"

"Nothing we can do about it. The streamer set the rule based solely on likes, so they probably just exploited the loophole!"

"I’m crying! I mass-messaged my entire WeChat contact list and only got just over 200 likes in total!"

"Looks like I should go buy a lottery ticket today. I was drawn as a lucky viewer by Brother Li yesterday, and today I got a 58-yuan red packet. Thanks, Brother Li!"

"When are you doing another event, Brother Li? I want to join too!"

"Yesterday’s game was indeed a bit flawed; after all, I just came up with it on the fly," Li Xiao addressed his viewers.

"Don’t worry, everyone. Future events in the stream will be planned more carefully, and situations like today won’t happen again.

"As for new events, I don’t know exactly when they’ll be yet. But as long as you keep following my stream, you’ll definitely have a chance to participate.

"Thank you so much to all the viewers who supported me today. If you haven’t followed me yet, please hit that follow button, or you might miss out on my next red packet.

"Alright, I’m just about done with my meal, so today’s surprise inspection of the Celestial Treasure Restaurant concludes perfectly."

Seeing that the food on the table was mostly finished, he chatted with the audience for a few more minutes before ending the stream. He looked up at his three roommates.

"How is it? Are you guys full, or should we order a few more dishes? Don’t try to save me money."

The three of them waved their hands repeatedly.

"Are you kidding me, Brother Li?" Zhou Yu said. "We can barely finish these few clay pots as it is. It would be a huge waste if you ordered more!"

Zhang Jiawen also nodded. "I’ve been full for a while now. If I wasn’t afraid of wasting food, I would have put my chopsticks down ages ago."

Huang Zhiyuan frantically waved his hands as well. "What’s left on the table is already enough for a midnight snack. Ordering more would be purely wasteful."

Seeing their refusal, Li Xiao did not push the matter. The portions of the sizzling clay pots at this restaurant were indeed quite generous. Affordable, delicious, and authentic—no wonder their business was booming.

He took the menu to the checkout counter to pay the bill.

The cashier said, "The original price is 350, but the boss said to give you a ten percent discount, making it 315 in total."

Li Xiao waved his hand. "Let’s just make it 350. Keep the discount." With that, he directly scanned the QR code and transferred 350 yuan.

It was the first time the cashier had ever encountered a customer who outright refused a discount. Although she was a bit puzzled, she did not say much else. Since the customer was willing to pay more, it wasn’t her place as a cashier to force a refund.

After the four of them returned to their dorm, Li Xiao glanced at his phone. A few more streamers had finished filming their restaurant visits.

Carefully reviewing the videos, he soon noticed that one streamer, who had only just over 7,000 followers, used a script that was a bit too exaggerated. It wasn’t quite clear if this was simply the streamer’s personal style or if they had misunderstood his intentions. However, as the paying client, he could not be bothered to guess. He directly provided feedback for revisions and sent the video back for them to rework.

He then promptly settled the final payments for the other streamers. Only then did Li Xiao have the time to open his own Douyin backend.

Account: Brother Li Talks Food

Followers: 9,300

Likes: 22,700

Li Xiao nodded slightly. Throwing real money at it certainly made his follower count grow rapidly. He estimated that by tomorrow afternoon, his follower count would surpass the 10,000 mark.

He edited the footage from tonight’s stream. Considering the overall length, Li Xiao cut out the unnecessary bits. After tweaking the brightness and contrast, he successfully published the video.

Confirming the upload was successful, he did not hesitate to invest another 1,000 yuan in Dou+ promotion.

He was quite satisfied with his meal tonight. Although the sand ginger chicken and the shrimp and crab pot were slightly inferior to the others, they were still above average. After all, considering the price—58 yuan per pot—the cost-to-performance ratio was exceptionally high. Such a high-quality, inexpensive restaurant was well worth his own money to promote.

...

Late at night, inside the Celestial Treasure Restaurant.

The Boss of the Mediterranean was no longer holding that red megaphone, but today’s ledger.

"Feng, the numbers for today don’t seem quite right. Why are we up by a few dozen yuan? Did you accidentally overcharge someone when they were paying the bill?" the Boss of the Mediterranean asked.

"This isn’t good. If the customers find out, they’ll think we’re trying to scam them.

"Hurry and find out which bill was messed up.

"We need to refund them."

Feng, who was just about to clock out, jumped in surprise. Whether the daily reconciliation was over or under, it was always a hassle. She hastily set her bag down and asked nervously, "Boss, how much is the difference?"

The boss scratched his head again. "It’s not that much over, just 35 yuan, but we still have to get to the bottom of it. After all, this is definitely money we overcharged a customer."