Building a Gaming Empire From Scratch

Since this was their first time, Cloud Dream’s staff had no experience and was organizing it as in reality concert.

In this process, they thought about all the advantages of a virtual concert: no fatigue, accommodation for millions of audiences, low-cost top-level equipment effects, one-time recording for lifelong preservation, etc.

All these good things.

Especially considering that this was an event hosted by Cloud Dream Official and with Alex’s influence in the domestic market, who would think that someone would dare to make trouble in the face of these two forces?

But some people wanted to provoke the tiger and poke its rear.

Particularly after the Dinosaur Island battle, it proved that the “Prohibition of firearms and attacks” rule was flexible.

As long as you use your brain, you can always find a breakthrough.

After all, causing “fatal damage” was never a mandatory option when making trouble at a concert.

For example, the simplest: at the critical moment of the concert, unplug the power supply or simply cut off the power line, what would happen?

This shows that you can use minimal effort to make the biggest impact.

However, of course, these people’s plan wasn’t that simple and crude.

These people had two goals-

One: Change the signal reception source of the audio equipment, sing a song by themselves, and let tens of millions of audiences enjoy it.

Two: Go backstage to see the Queen of Heaven, Alex, and it would be even better if they could take a photo with her!

They thought this wouldn’t be a big deal and that Cloud Dream wouldn’t put up a big fight.

– After all, it’s allowed by your game mechanism!

Of course, to prevent being caught by millions of players and being killed repeatedly or being searched in reality by excited fans and engaging in real-life PK,

it’s still safer to wear masks, change their nicknames, and pretend to be bandits.

So, did Cloud Dream have security measures?

Of course, they did.

But the NPC security prepared by everyone was not to prevent conflict but out of habit-

If there was security to maintain order in reality, why not equip it in the game?

Otherwise, something always seemed missing.

Expecting these NPC security guards to play any role was basically wishful thinking.

After all, these players had taken down ten-meter-long dinosaurs, so the deterrent power of a mere 1.7-meter or 1.8-meter tall human was very limited.

As the craze and undercurrents intertwined,18:18 finally arrived.

The first virtual concert in history, and the one with the most personal concert audiences ever, began.

Innumerable rays of flowing light flickered in the circular concert hall, and the sparsely distributed players were randomly sorted by the system and transformed into light and thrown onto various seats in the hall.

Players who were lucky enough to be drawn into the front row and second-floor VIP seats were naturally ecstatic.

Those who were thrown into the corners couldn’t help but sigh and wail.

At the next moment, all the lights in the circular concert hall went out, leaving only the dusk light of Night City streaming through the carefully designed window, outlining a few gentle contours for the hall.

A melodious tune began to echo in the hall.

The originally noisy players quickly quieted down, casting their eyes to the center of the stage.

There, a beam of dusk light slowly washed over.

Wrapped in the warm light, Alex approached slowly.

Although Cloud Dream had a dedicated technical team to cooperate with them, creating all kinds of unimaginable, dazzling special effects,

Alex rejected them, choosing only a simple opening.

Not just the opening, except for the end, Alex barely used any overly exaggerated fantasy-style special effects throughout the concert.

Only using some very simple effects, just enough to blend into the stage performance without overshadowing it.

In this extremely simple but effective light, Alex, wearing a carefully designed performance costume, raised her microphone and sang the first opening song-

“The setting sun is long, footsteps are slow, the air is warm and soft/

You say life is short, why not enjoy the moment…”

“Setting Sun” was not Alex’s most classic piece.

Choosing it as the opening might be due to the coincidence of time, as it was indeed the time for dusk to arrive and the setting sun to slowly descend.

Plus, it’s a more upbeat song that can quickly stir up the emotions of fans and bring them into the festive atmosphere of the concert.

As for the effect-

It was explosive!

Alex sang only the first sentence quietly, and the second sentence was drowned out almost by the chorus of all the audiences in the venue.

Seeing this situation, Alex couldn’t help but laugh, continuing to sing along with everyone with a face full of smiles-

“Let’s love and be joyful together/

Spring breeze and drizzle, moonlight and gentle kisses/

She made it look effortless and graceful.

This was Lincoln’s direct feeling.

How high is the artistic achievement and humanistic value of the song?

Lincoln didn’t feel it, and even felt that it was catchy, just a standard pop song.

And that’s to be expected—if a song can touch a national audience, it definitely won’t set a difficulty threshold for being “understandable.”

But he was still deeply shocked.

The reason is simple, not only are nearly 10,000 people in the audience singing along with Alex right now.

But also tens of millions of people in 1,237 mirrors!

All are easily mobilized emotionally by Alex and end up joining this great chorus selflessly.

Even many people haven’t sung a few lines, and they don’t know what emotions will be triggered, as a cheerful song, they sing with tears in their eyes.

How can one not be shocked by the ease with which such a feat is accomplished?

At the same time, through different channels, the audience who watched the concert on the Cloud Dream Live Broadcast Platform at the same time has already reached a terrifying 78 million people!

If it weren’t for the annual Chinese New Year’s Eve Gala, this number could easily top the domestic highest simultaneous viewership!

But now, sorry, it’s not even in the top ten.

Regardless of the top ten or top twenty, it’s all the same show…

At the moment, the concert’s live broadcast room has entered a time of song-friends communication, and all previous chat content has disappeared:

“Setting Sun! My favorite!”

“The atmosphere is so great! I already regret not being there.”

“Sister Alex is still as beautiful as ever!”

“I thought of my ex-boyfriend, we used to take walks in the sunset, share the same pair of headphones, hum this song, but now… sigh! Maybe those who love more are destined to be more hurt.”

“Today the clouds look so beautiful, I want to take a picture to show you, but I realized we haven’t been in touch for a long time, and suddenly it feels like the clouds don’t look as good.”

It’s not even 12 o’clock at night yet, is it going straight to the emo rhythm?”

The barrage of comments in the live broadcast room can’t affect the scene.

After fully mobilizing emotions, Alex immediately started singing classic songs one after another without a break.

And the audience didn’t show weakness, singing one after another as well.

After all, no one would get tired, even if their vocal cords were torn, it would only take one song to recover completely, so what’s the fear?!

Sing!

Just sing!

There are quite a few inspiring songs during the war, most of which are passionate and powerful.

As a result, the atmosphere on site became even more heated, and the enthusiastic fans followed the hot rhythm, almost shouting lyrics line by line.

Shuihua in the front row, who asked for leave to return home early, and Nishino Chizuru next to her, waved their cheering sticks vigorously, with red cheeks in excitement.

—Shuihua came with Lance, but during the random seating at the beginning, Shuihua was luckily in the front row, while Lance was thrown to some corner by the random system…

Fortunately, Shuihua met Nishino Chizuru, whom she had met before, and under the passionate atmosphere, Shuihua quickly forgot about Lance and started chatting with Queenie.

In the VIP seats on the second floor, Lincoln temporarily left his seat, bid farewell to the excited Mavis, and went backstage on his own.

After singing these enthusiastic songs, Mavis would chat with the audience and share some of the things that happened during her two-year absence from the public eye.

When the audience had calmed down a bit, she would pull Camille Victoria up for a duet.

Then Mavis would leave the stage for a while, change her outfit, and let Camille Victoria sing a song on her own.

—Although one-click changing is more convenient, Mavis thinks it will affect the audience’s experience, so she chooses to go offstage and change her outfit.

Although it is still a one-click change, as long as the audience doesn’t see it directly.

Lincoln walked toward backstage, going to see how Camille Victoria’s nerves were easing.

He walked through a section of the not-so-spacious passage, came to the door of the backstage resting room, and was about to knock on the door when he suddenly heard a heavy thud and a faint “uh-uh” sound.

It felt like the sound someone would make when their mouth was covered and they were struggling with all their might.

Thankfully, the sound came from behind him, not from inside the resting room.

Lincoln put down his hand that was going to knock on the door and turned to look behind him.

At the end of the hallway, six bandits wearing bulletproof suits and mahjong masks walked around the corner and entered the passage.

At the next moment, their eyes met.

The six blunt-weapon-wielding bandits suddenly froze.

Both sides fell silent without agreement.

A few seconds later,[One Cake] suddenly exclaimed in shock, “Damn! Lincoln!”

The other five people also panicked:

“Damn! Why is Lincoln here?”

“Why isn’t he listening to the song?”

“Is that what’s important now? Figure out what to do!”

Then…

[San Tiao], holding a heavy iron crutch in hand, glanced at Lincoln with empty hands and alone, looked back at his five teammates, and finally said…

“Shall we… get him?”