The night was destined to be sleepless for many people for various reasons.
The unrest gathered in front of the Arts Committee building was stopped by the security forces who arrived in time. Or rather, the people themselves chose to retreat.
But if possible, Cinnati would have preferred it to be the former.
At the same time.
The unrest that day spread rapidly across the world through the internet.
Fans and viewers everywhere, and even bystanders who had chosen to watch the drama unfold because of this incident, their discussions and emotions gave even greater significance to the yet-to-air fourth episode.
For the fans.
As an excellent, positive series that could provoke thought and reflection. For it to be banned naturally gave them a sense of shared indignation.
As for the spectators watching the drama unfold.
This incident was more like a minor event. The reputation of MiHoYo among ordinary people overseas had always been rather subtle.
The earliest change began with Penacony. In the eyes of most people, Penacony was a dazzling, extravagant, extraordinarily beautiful dream world.
But ever since Penacony came into existence, more than once, people had pointed out the strangely uncanny similarities between Penacony and the current entertainment industry.
Although it was wrapped in a philosophical concept of Harmony. Anyone with eyes could see it.
There were many interesting things hidden within. Entertainment to death, and the predicament of exploitation.
All these things seemed to have corresponding prototypes in reality.
Similar. Far too similar.
And perhaps the most interesting point was that this might be the first time some company had brought it up from a completely different perspective.
Outrageous!
How could the entertainment industry allow others to scrutinize it!
Yet shockingly, this scrutiny hidden within the story actually received unanimous praise around the world.
The people also felt that the story was incredibly well written and deeply immersive.
And so.
The big players in the entertainment industry began setting its sights on MiHoYo.
This was the source of the conflict between the two sides, and also the reason why it could not be reconciled.
A cultural war was different from a real war.
Its weapon was stories. The big shots would absolutely never allow someone to use stories to deconstruct the global image that they had built.
That was what later led to the confrontation between Olympus' and Amphoreus.
Now, Greece had banned Amphoreus. In the eyes of those merely watching the spectacle, this was simply proof that the war had entered its most heated stage.
For them, naturally, the bigger the spectacle, the better. They were looking forward to MiHoYo's next response.
...
On the second day after the incident involving the storming of the Arts Committee building.
The Greeks were still angry. But they no longer organized crowds to protest.
Because everyone discovered... This ban... didn't seem to be as strict as they had imagined....
A huge number of Blu-ray quality, high-definition links to the complete Honkai: Star Rail series suddenly appeared across the internet.
The websites hosting these links were all located overseas. Greece had neither the authority nor the ability to control these links.
As for Greece's domestic cybersecurity department?
Come on. These links were everywhere. Every day, dozens or even hundreds of links from different addresses appeared.
Their sources and characteristics were all different. Forget investigating them, even if they really tracked them down, what could they do?
The root servers and relevant infrastructure weren't even under their control. Their cybersecurity protocols had no real sovereignty to speak of.
When the Arts Committee anxiously submitted a report, hoping the cybersecurity department would take action. The people from the cybersecurity department gave up extremely decisively.
Their answer was straightforward: "There's nothing we can do."
It wasn't as if there was truly nothing they could do. For example, they could proactively disconnect the entirety of Greece from the internet, which naturally could block those links.
But that was something the Arts Committee could only think about.
Apart from that, with Thessaloniki as the center. The famous shipping family, the Marinakis family, began organizing an event called the "Art Route."
Its purpose was to establish tourism routes built around Greece's rich culture, thereby stimulating the economy along the route.
That was a good thing. The only problem was, this cultural route contained far too much Honkai: Star Rail-related content.
Not only the series itself. There were also watch meetings, fan gatherings, discussion forums, and various other activities.
The Marinakis family even funded an investment fund specifically to establish themed guesthouses, themed sightseeing routes, and other tourism facilities along the route.
And this route followed Greece's coastline. Practically every major city was connected to it.
And because of Greece's geography, traveling from the inland hinterlands to the coast wasn't particularly difficult either.
In other words, under this ban, the cultural influence of Honkai: Star Rail throughout Greece had not only failed to diminish, but had instead become even more prosperous.
It had even become more convenient than before for viewers to discuss it, watch it, and gather together!
Could the Arts Committee and Cinnati tolerate this? They couldn't control piracy, but surely they could control the Marinakis family that was openly provoking them right in their faces?
No matter how powerful or domineering you were. In the end, you were still openly refusing to comply with an order carrying the force of law.
Taken seriously, this could even be considered violating government orders!
When the Arts Committee brought investigators to the Marinakis family. The current family head, Elios, politely received all of them and hosted a banquet in their honor.
At the banquet, when the Arts Committee sought to hold him accountable and demanded that Elios provide all documents related to the new set-up, Elios readily agreed.
His attitude was so cooperative that the investigators who had come to investigate found it baffling.
Soon. A huge pile of documents and proposals was placed in front of the investigators.
Things went so smoothly that the investigators actually began to feel afraid.
After all, investigators going out to investigate something, only to mysteriously pass away along the way, such things had been countless throughout history.
Who could say that Elios's enthusiastic cooperation wasn't merely a desperate gamble?
This was the rising power of Thessaloniki, a Greek shipping giant. If he wanted these people dead, it would still be quite simple.
Yet just as they were trembling with fear.
They discovered, the other party's sincerity was genuine. There was none of what they had imagined.
Then what else was there to say?
Investigate.
After going through all the procedures and documents. The investigators' hearts sank into despair.
There was only one sentence that could describe how they felt at that moment. They would have been better off not investigating at all.
Every Honkai: Star Rail-related product that was supposed to be banned did not originate from Greece.
They came from France!
What exactly did the ban prohibit? Public distribution and media dissemination within Greece.
Elios had perfectly circumvented the entire ban.
First were the meetings. The organizer wasn't even the Marinakis family, but a cultural association registered in France.
Its name was weird.
It was called Blue Jellyfish. The content (previous episodes of Honkai: Star Rail) shown at the meetings came from legally licensed French streaming services.
As a member of the collective EU, Greece was required to abide by the Union's two major principles, the free movement of goods and services.
Any digital service provided in a member state of the Union, could not be completely blocked by another member state.
The Greek Ministry of Culture's ban could only regulate service providers within Greece.
It didn't have the authority to control another state. And Honkai: Star Rail wasn't banned in France.
That left Greece stuck from both ends.
More importantly, the Union explicitly prohibited any member from blocking cultural content legally provided by another member, in order to ensure the free circulation of culture.
As for enthusiast clubs, fan clubs, and the like... There were even more tricks they could pull.
The enthusiast club's official name was the "Greek Classical Drama and Contemporary Film and Television Adaptation Society."
It was simply an academic salon. The fan club was officially registered as the "Research Society for Character Costumes and Greek Traditional Clothing Culture."
As for why the enthusiast club was studying Honkai: Star Rail episodes from France? And why the fans attending the fan club were clearly dressed in outfits from Amphoreus?
Don't ask. Don't interfere.
Anyway, the goods came from France, Blu-ray, high-definition, even better quality than what they used to watch in Greece. And the clothes were outfits we'd designed ourselves. Personal preferences were none of your business.
Even more ridiculous was this, Amphoreus itself was based on Greece.
With Greek culture as their banner, they could do all these things, and there really wasn't anything the Arts Committee could do about it.
Because they really were studying Greek culture, weren't they? Unless the Arts Committee wanted to admit that this wasn't Greek culture, but rather the culture of Amphoreus from MiHoYo's Honkai: Star Rail storyline.
There were plenty of idiots on the Arts Committee, but they weren't insane enough to go that far.
As for the themed parks and themed guesthouses... The rooms were decorated in what they called an "Ancient Greek style," without a single engraving of Amphoreus or any related character.
Yet they contained many subtle elements. Even the music being played consisted entirely of various little tunes, without a single piece from Honkai: Star Rail's original soundtrack.
If the Arts Committee said that this was based on Honkai: Star Rail? What a joke!
There was absolutely no way any Honkai: Star Rail elements could appear within Greece! We were all upstanding, law-abiding Greek citizens. How could we possibly violate the ban?
Right? And legally speaking, they couldn't find any proof of infringement or violations either.
Besides, even if there was infringement, the rights being infringed belonged to MiHoYo, not Greece.
And so... After reading through all the information, the investigators felt nothing but endless frustration.
They suddenly discovered that, the only entity currently capable, legally, morally, and on every conceivable level, of legitimately putting a stop to all of this was MiHoYo!!
Unbelievable, right? First of all, there was the piracy, as well as these gatherings and cultural routes.
Because MiHoYo's works were banned in Greece, none of these were legal.
These Greeks were all engaging in piracy. If MiHoYo filed a copyright lawsuit, then the Arts Committee would finally have a legitimate excuse to shut all of these things down in the name of copyright infringement.
If something like that really happened, the Arts Committee would probably become the most copyright-respecting organization in the entire world.
They would investigate everything to the bitter end and tolerate absolutely nothing!
Unfortunately, this was nothing more than black humor! How could MiHoYo possibly sue them?!
The investigators, unable to describe what they were feeling, flipped through the documents with smiles uglier than crying.
Good news: We found the evidence.
Bad news: The evidence doesn't belong to Greece.
When these materials were sent back to Cinnati's desk...
According to his secretary's recollection, that day, not a single object in Cinnati's office remained intact.
Sure enough. That day, in front of the Arts Committee building, when Cinnati saw the crowd restraining their anger, his premonition had been correct.
The fact that they hadn't stormed the building on the spot meant that something even more terrifying was waiting afterward.
If this continued, the ban would become nothing more than a joke.
Left with no other choice, Cinnati lowered himself to an unprecedented degree, pulling strings and using connections in the hope of gaining support from within the Union.
He hoped to obtain their backing.
Although Cinnati and the Arts Committee could practically cover the sky with one hand within Greece itself, within the Union as a whole, Greece, and people like them, were nothing more than small fry.
Cinnati didn't have the channels or the connections to know the real big shots in the headquarters of the Union, who were responsible for cultural affairs.
So he could only work his way through layer after layer of connections. Those connections were provided by the famous reclusive club, the Fortress of Meropide.
That's why they say, the world is one big circle.
Go around and around, and eventually you'll end up right where you started.
The owner of the Fortress of Meropide was also someone Cinnati regarded as a powerful figure with extensive connections.
Our dear Wriothesley, with the mentality of someone watching a joke unfold, personally delivered Cinnati's words to Neuvillette.
What he received was an extremely official response from Neuvillette.
"We will seriously consider it." Everything remained unchanged.
On the eve of the fourth episode's broadcast, Cinnati received Neuvillette's reply, and his heart turned to ashes.
Anger, despair, and resentment filled him.
He couldn't believe that someone like Neuvillette would side with an entertainment company from another continent rather than people like them, his own side.
Seriously consider it? How long would they consider it?
Did Cinnati dare ask? Was he even qualified?
Did he deserve to ask? Back when he had wielded his authority to pressure the Okhema Theater and Aglaea, it had felt wonderful.
Now, he was experiencing that very same contempt and tyranny from a power even higher than his own.
Inside the office... Cinnati stared at the cultural products the investigators had collected and placed on his desk.
There were posters and discs, all physical products. And online, there were countless others of every imaginable variety.
But every single one bore the same conspicuous symbol.
A small, adorable blue jellyfish.
Yet now, in Cinnati's eyes, that jellyfish looked like a colossal beast from the depths of the sea, gradually devouring every last shred of his hope.
And that was indeed the truth. After the ban was issued, although Xia Wen repeatedly reassured Furina that everything would be fine, Furina was still extremely angry about it!
And so... a well-connected noblewoman, also an assistant director made a single phone call, reaching the mobile phone of Neuvillette, the most influential figure in France's Ministry.
Neuvillette, known by others as the Godfather and the Chief Justice, could only lower his voice and gently comfort the furious blue jellyfish, ahem, Furina on the other end of the phone.
In a sense, Cinnati's feeling was correct.
While countless scenes of black humor were playing out within the Arts Committee, and while the entire world's attention was focused on Greece, the broadcast time for the fourth episode of the Amphoreus Saga was finally drawing near.