Investment Cashback, Billionaire God [Quick Transmigration] - Chapter 29: Thank You, President Ruan, for the 300 Million

Chapter 29: Thank You, President Ruan, for the 300 Million

“Hello everyone in the livestream, I’m Yu Yu. We’re currently over three million points behind the previous contestant. Is there any baby in the audience who can help me climb higher? I really want to see you all.”

Yu Yu solemnly held the microphone as all the stage lights focused solely on him.

The bright white lights made his eyes glisten with moisture, as if he were about to burst into tears at any moment.

“Thank you [Little Fish Loves Midnight Snacks] for the Carnival! Thank you [Want to Be a Sister-in-Law] for the SoundHope No.1, and special thanks to boss [Han’s Dictionary Has No ‘Lose’].”

With only ten seconds left in the two-minute voting period, Ruan Zihan had just poured over four million into Yu Yu’s votes this round, barely pushing him past Momo who was currently in eleventh place.

“Ten, nine, eight…” The director passionately counted down the final seconds.

However, Ruan Zihan’s relief was short-lived. Within mere seconds, Momo’s activity points suddenly began skyrocketing, threatening to overtake Yu Yu once more.

His heart immediately clenched again.

If they couldn’t beat Momo this round, all his efforts from the past week would be wasted.

Ruan Zihan began frantically operating his Light Brain, his fingers moving faster than ever before. He didn’t even bother carefully calculating the vote difference, just anxiously selecting quantities and clicking to send gifts.

Perhaps to enhance audience immersion, the final competition stage featured exaggerated gift effects, with spectacular live visuals for every major gift donation.

A dozen Carnivals sent out transformed the green-themed venue into a shower of silver fireworks.

Gasps filled the entire stadium while the director’s grateful announcements grew increasingly hoarse.

Ruan Zihan felt indescribable emotions – relief mixed with his heart feeling suspended in midair.

He had pushed Yu Yu to ninth place this round and thought he could rest briefly, but during Momo’s two-minute voting period, all the other contestants’ votes were rapidly increasing.

As Momo’s segment neared its end, Yu Yu had fallen back to eleventh place, facing another imminent voting session.

While monitoring the real-time rankings and calculating activity points, Ruan Zihan swiftly operated to supplement votes, desperately trying to keep Yu Yu within the top ten.

As the three lowest-ranked male hosts were successively eliminated, the remaining audiences began voting like mad, quickly pushing the qualification threshold higher and higher.

With only nine contestants remaining, every fanbase was mobilizing desperately. To prevent Yu Yu from falling to last place, Ruan Zihan could almost hear his own heartbeat as he mechanically repeated the process of exchanging gifts and selecting recipients.

[Insufficient user balance. Would you like to recharge?]

Just after pushing Yu Yu to eighth place, his Light Brain suddenly displayed a gray-red popup. Ruan Zihan froze, suspecting a system error.

Hadn’t he had over ten million in his account before entering? How could he be running out of funds when the elimination round wasn’t even halfway through?

As he scrolled through the gift exchange records from the past twenty minutes, his heart gradually sank.

He never imagined he could unconsciously spend over ten million in such a short time – and that such an enormous amount would only be enough to push Yu Yu into the top eight.

Now only two spots remained for the top six. As long as he could scrape together another sum of money quickly, there was still a chance to turn things around.

Stock sale proceeds took at least three hours to clear, and formal bank loans required visiting a counter to organize and submit documents. With time so tight, he could only download various small loan apps one after another.

He couldn’t afford to hesitate now. Ruan Zihan quickly removed his mask and sunglasses, opened a loan app, and verified his face through the terminal’s camera.

The girl beside him glanced over and realized she was sitting next to a major celebrity. She was thrilled to discover that the boss of Starry Galaxy also enjoyed watching Group Broadcasts. Just as she was about to greet him and ask for a photo, she noticed his bloodshot eyes, his muttered words, and a fanatical, obsessive look on his face.

The girl silently lowered her raised hand and observed his actions for a moment. Her gaze inadvertently fell on the small loan app visible on his Light Brain screen, and she couldn’t help but feel startled.

She quietly shifted further away while discreetly activating her terminal’s camera function.

On stage, a girl in a dark blue beaded gown was passionately rallying for votes. Having climbed from eleventh place on the real-time rankings to successfully break into the top nine, Momo had already outlasted three male streamers during tonight’s voting sessions.

Her team’s strategy was well-planned: they typically remained in second-to-last place without making moves while others were rallying votes, then surged forward in the final ten seconds when it seemed someone was about to overtake them, directly pushing the last-place streamer into elimination.

As Momo staged another comeback to defend her ranking, the entire stadium erupted in deafening screams.

This storyline of an obscure, low-tier streamer rising against the odds perfectly hit many viewers’ satisfaction points. Even many casual viewers who hadn’t gifted Momo in previous rounds contributed scattered votes for her.

The stadium ceiling twinkled with starlightsomeone had gifted Momo a high-value present worth one hundred thousand.

While everyone around was looking up in astonishment at the ceiling, Ruan Zihan had no mind to appreciate those flashy effects. He had frantically withdrawn over two million from small loan platforms and poured all the money into designated gifts for Yu Yu.

Soon, another streamer was eliminated. Yu Yu was now in eighth place, only a few hundred thousand away from Momo in seventh.

One hour into the broadcast, Yu Yu returned to the voting stage. His voice choked with emotion:

“Brothers and sisters who like me, can you help me out? Could you give me a few more votes? I really want to make it into the top six…”

The gap between Yu Yu and Momo was narrowing. Just as Ruan Zihan began to feel relieved, he saw the minimum voting requirement for this round’s rally displayed on the right side of the screen.

The rules for the final performance round were too complicatedhe had forgotten that each elimination increased the voting requirement by fifty thousand activity points. The starting requirement was five hundred thousand, and with four people already eliminated, this round required at least seven hundred thousand to pass the microphone.

The money he’d withdrawn from the loan apps had all been gifted before Yu Yu took the stage, so it didn’t count toward the rally session. That meant he now needed to come up with another six to seven hundred thousand.

Ruan Zihan’s fingers frantically tapped on his Light Brain as he messaged everyone he was close with:

[Bro, I’m in trouble. Can you lend me five hundred thousand? I’ll pay you back tonight.]

Chi Yingying replied the fastest: [??? What’s going on with you? You can’t even come up with five hundred thousand?]

Realizing something, she sent a series of smiling emojis:

[You’re not still dreaming about getting that streamer into the top six, are you? Do I need to find someone to piss on you to wake you up?]

Chi Yingying’s words stung him, but Ruan Zihan had no time to retort.

Only fifty seconds remained in the two-minute vote-pulling period. On stage, Yu Yu not only had a tearful voice but had started tremblingly wiping tears with his fingers, his handsome face crumpled with grievance as he kept casting expectant glances toward Ruan Zihan’s seat.

He had already invested over thirty million in totalhow could he fail when success was just within reach?

Just a little more, just two spots away from getting Yu Yu into the top six.

If he could obtain accurate information about Mega-Entertainment’s new short drama, he could replicate a similar version before they did.

Then not only would he instantly recoup hundreds of millions, but he could also nail Mega-Entertainment to the pillar of plagiarism shame, ensuring that man would never recover.

[Didn’t you borrow over five million from me at the casino last month? Can you pay me back some now? I’m really desperate]

Perhaps because she saw him frantically sending seven or eight messages in a row, Chi Yingying reluctantly transferred 415,000:

[You know I can never save moneythis is all I have. I even sent you what I won just this morning.]

[Yingying, could you take out a fifty-thousand loan from a micro-lending app for me? I’ll sell my stocks tonight and repay you in full.]

Chi Yingying: [Do you hear what you’re saying? Have you lost your mind???]

[I haven’t gambled my brains away, stop treating me like a fool.]

Her scolding messages kept popping up in the chat interface, but with only about ten seconds left in the vote-pulling session, he urgently needed to send the money he just received to Yu Yu.

If only the casual fans would vote a little more, Yu Yu wouldn’t be eliminated…

In the final two seconds, Ruan Zihan’s eyes bloodshot, he looked up at the stadium’s large screen

Yu Yu’s total activity points for this round finally settled at 690,200.

Eight thousand shortjust eight thousand away from advancing.

Eight thousand was merely the cost of a meal under normal circumstances, yet now he was stuck right here.

Ruan Zihan couldn’t hear Yu Yu’s farewell speech; all sounds in the venue seemed stretched infinitely far away, his brain feeling numb as if soaked in ice.

How could he fail at eighth place when he was so close…

The people on the vote-pulling stage had changed twice already. Ruan Zihan didn’t know how long he had been in this state, but when he finally snapped out of it, his clothes were drenched in cold sweat.

The girl next to him wore a meaningful expression, waving her luxury-brand bracelet in front of him:

“Are you okay?” Do you need me to call for help?”

Ruan Zihan didn’t say a word.

His Light Brain bluntly showed 10:00 PMhe had gone over three hours without Hallucinogen, yet he hardly felt any craving, only the urgency to send votes.

Now, his thirty million had completely gone down the drain.

He faintly felt he had been played, but Mega-Entertainment’s Group Broadcast publicly displayed all vote details for each round, and he found no traces of manual intervention.

He wanted to find an outlet for his frustration, only to realize he couldn’t blame anyone but himselffor not preparing enough cash in advance, for failing to remember the competition rules clearly, and for not borrowing more money from others before Yu Yu took the stage for the final vote appeal.

It felt as if an invisible hand had twisted his internal organs into knots. Every setback today ultimately traced back to his own oversights…

In a daze, Ruan Zihan opened his message interface and found that only two or three people had responded to his loan requests sent half an hour earlier, most with polite refusals. His assistant’s message only added salt to the wound:

[President Ruan, if possible, please bring back the souvenir gifts and streamer materials prepared by Mega-Entertainment]

[They’re being resold at high prices on secondhand platforms now. I can help list them on our company’s anonymous disposal account tonight]

On stage, the final vote appeal for the top six to five was underway, with Momo and Duan Jiancen engaged in a fierce back-and-forth. Ruan Zihan felt completely drained of energy. Carrying a large bag of souvenir gifts, he silently left the stadium ahead of time.

In the nine years since his rebirth, every investment he made had capitalized on industry trends. No matter what he invested in, success had always come easily.

It had been too long since he’d experienced such pure defeat.

It was the rainy season on Primary Star, and torrential rain was lashing the area outside the Federal Central Stadium. To maintain his anonymity, he had no choice but to take the public Cloud Rail home. With a gloomy expression, Ruan Zihan opened an umbrella and stepped into the rain.

“He left later than I expected,” Fang Zhuo remarked while watching the surveillance footage from outside the venue on his Light Brain. On another large screen in the background, real-time data from the competition livestream was displayed.

Jiang Yu added, “He stayed in his seat for over half an hour after Yu Yu got eliminated before leaving.”

Fang Zhuo gave a soft hum of acknowledgment. “That makes sense. Probably couldn’t move due to Hallucinogen withdrawal.”

Tonight, [Han’s Dictionary Has No Word for Defeat] had invested over fifteen million in the livestream. Combined with previous amounts, this brought total system rebates to more than three hundred million.

Fang Zhuo genuinely hadn’t manipulated the vote counts. He had even prepared contingency plans with Deng Jiaqiang in case Ruan Zihan managed to push Yu Yu into the top six.

But he never expected Ruan Zihan to fall short by just ten thousand votes from making the top seven. One could say the man either lacked money or brainsor perhaps both.

Fang Zhuo’s gaze shifted to the main screen where the competition was reaching its climax, now focused on the battle for the top two positions.

Tao Mi, who had placed second in the previous round, was now neck and neck with Jian Yujing. The two had already exchanged vote appeal rounds five or six times.

Momo, who had staged a remarkable comeback throughout the competition, ultimately finished sixth. Fifth place went to Xiao Xiao, who had an existing fanbase. Duan Jiancen, from Zhou Zongyun’s team, secured fourth place, while the host recruited from the red carpet event successfully claimed third.

Inside the stadium, various gift effects erupted continuouslysometimes silver fireworks filling the sky, other times golden rain pouring down. The live comments were unusually frenzied:

[So this is the first time it’s being streamed on Bear Live, right? Their audience spending power is insanethey actually pushed Tao Mi to compete head-to-head with Jian Yujing]

[Respect. Momo was also entirely supported by their platform… Who remembers she almost got eliminated in the first round? Our legendary comeback queen Momo!]

[Can that sunshower effect be used for other singers’ concerts next time? It’s seriously so gorgeous ahhhh]

[…Well, they might not be able to afford it. These special effects require extra payment, and you can tell these were specifically designed by an art team]

[Feeling like our Jing is about to beautifully take first place! Brother Fang, promise me you won’t discount the first prize reward okay? QAQ]

[The lounge and assistant should be fine, but getting a full month of screen time at Federation Central Plaza is probably impossible. That place is insanely expensive – even top celebrity fans don’t dare book it that long, and the schedule is super tight. Getting a full week would already be impressive…

Not that I doubt Brother Fang’s management capabilities, but we still have to respect objective reality]

[Jing fans are already bragging about imaginary achievements again. Tao Mi’s voting segment isn’t even over yet and you’re acting like you’ve won first place. Do you need us to photoshop a trophy for you?]

[AHHHH live viewer count broke 900,000! Screenshotting this!!]

The Star Federation consists of thousands of major and minor planets, with a population more than ten times that of the Blue Star era. Particularly in the highly developed entertainment industry, it wasn’t rare for top streamers or celebrities to attract over 200,000 live viewers, but throughout the entire year, few livestreams could break the 500,000 concurrent viewer threshold.

Mega-Entertainment’s Group Broadcast had invested nearly ten times more in advertising than other similar livestreams, becoming the only platform in nearly three years to peak at over 900,000 concurrent viewers across all platforms.

As Tao Mi regretfully exited the competition in the final round with a gap of over 100,000 votes, red envelopes began raining down across the venue.

The amount in each red envelope wasn’t large enough to cause stampedes, but they covered the entire venue. The audience’s relatively restrained cheers soon turned into surprised exclamations of delight.

Jian Yujing changed into the winner’s black and red cape, holding up the pure gold trophy while gripping the microphone.

As the livestream ended, the system began popping up various achievement notifications

[Congratulations Host! Achievement Unlocked: ‘Related Discussions About Signed Artist Exceed 10 Million’]

[Congratulations Host! Obtained Ultra-Rare Title ‘Shield-Breaking Spear’]

[You are the sharpest spear, you are the most perceptive merchant. This title is obtained when receiving over 300 million in rebates directly from competitors]

[Total Unlocked Achievements and Titles This Time: *2. Rewarding 2 Unnamed Series Mystery Boxes, already placed in system backpack]

[Mystery Box Description: When mystery box quantity reaches nine, Ten-Draw will be unlocked. Detecting environmental density exceeding 10 people within 100 meters of host. Does not meet automatic mystery box opening conditions. Recommend host proceed to unpopulated area for mystery box selection]

This mystery box system is quite intelligent. Fang Zhuo immediately checked his remaining lifespan interface.

Including the earnings from tonight’s final Group Broadcast, his account balance had now reached 5.4 billion. The survival interface showed he only had two days left before the system would apply the basic disease buff.

This time, he spent 600 million at once to exchange for two months of lifespan. The system instantly popped up a notification.

[Host’s Current Remaining Survival Days: 102]

[Exceeds system-defined healthy survival period of 40 days. Random disease conditions no longer apply]

He still had three months of remaining survival time. This finally sounded like it provided some margin for error, rather than constantly teetering on the edge of receiving system debuffs.

The live stream finally ended, and almost everyone backstage went wild. The faces of the several streamers eliminated tonight showed no trace of sadnessnot only had they earned unexpectedly huge profits tonight, but they would also receive corresponding tier resources afterward.

The staff had prepared various exquisite snacks and drinks backstage, and everyone chatted loudly while eating.

The only person crying backstage was Momo, and it was out of excitement for climbing so many ranks.

Fang Zhuo gestured for Jiang Yu to come over: “Later, take everyone to Central City for a group meal. Pick a nice restaurant.”

Jiang Yu nodded. He understood exactly what “nice” meantin other words, max out the budget.

Fang Zhuo didn’t linger backstage and planned to leave the stadium through the main passage, aiming to return to the hotel early to open the mystery box.

It was already half past one in the morning. Most of the audience outside the venue had already left, and the corridor connecting the backstage to the main passage was almost completely empty.

Just as he was about to cross the corridor, four or five burly men suddenly appeared from around the corner at the far end. They carried iron rods and stun guns, with crude tattoos on their shoulders.

“Director Fang, please hold up.”

Even if they hadn’t spoken, Fang Zhuo would have stopped immediately.

He stood about ten meters away from the group, turned his head slightly, and let out a soft laugh.

With their appearance and skill level, they were clearly the cheapest kind even among local thugs.

Perfect. He had been thinking that the small Superpower he bought for forty Points earlier would become useless once he opened the Bodyguard Employee Card tonight.

Unexpectedly, Ruan Zihan was so consideratehe had specially sent him an opportunity to test the effects of the system’s Superpower.