Chapter 30. Rave Reviews
By the time they returned to the hotel, the sky was already completely dark.
The three of them—Ken Sugisaki and the others—didn't even say hello before heading to their rooms and practically collapsing straight into bed.
They couldn't help it, because they were truly exhausted today, and that afternoon they finally understood what Xander meant yesterday.
Out of nowhere, the game's popularity suddenly exploded, and the crowd gathered in front of the booth almost clogged the entire venue.
Because there were too many people, their closing time was extended by more than an hour.
The nerves of being watched by a huge crowd and the nonstop work completely drained the three of them, leaving them without even the strength to speak.
They ate a simple dinner in silence, then fell onto their beds, unable to move an inch.
Naturally, Xander cared about his cattle and horses… no, his brothers.
He quietly set their alarms for the next morning to keep them from oversleeping and being late, and only then, satisfied, returned to his own room.
He was also quite worn out today and planned to turn in early.
On the other side, after seeing today's ranking and popularity score, Bronya fell silent, just like Kaguya.
Then, with Seele's reminder, she checked the trending searches for the day.
"To the Moon + Miss Pink Elf + Eden Studio."
Her vision went dark again at once, her fair little fists clenched tight, and her face filled with deep unwillingness.
Bastard, you have no martial virtue!!
With that indignation, she pulled along Seele, Kiana, and Mei—who had taken time to return to the villa to cook for everyone—and the group sat down together to play the game Xander had brought to the exhibition.
The result was four girls crying their hearts out late at night.
Kiana in particular smeared snot and tears all over Mei, leaving Mei not knowing whether to cry along or get angry.
Although it was Seele's second viewing, precisely because it was the second time, her feelings were even deeper.
When she saw the platypus and those paper rabbits, she already wanted to cry.
The next day, just after Xander dragged his would-be late-sleeping workhorses to the venue, he saw three pairs of somewhat reddened eyes.
"What's going on?"
He asked, puzzled.
Why did they look so listless, as if they'd been crying?
Seele pouted.
This time she didn't come over for headpats; instead, she hid behind Sister Bronya and said to Xander in displeasure, "It's all Brother's fault."
"That's right, that's right, it's all your fault, Xander!" Kiana echoed angrily.
"Hmph!" Bronya gave a light snort, and without another word, led the two away.
This left Xander utterly confused, unable to make heads or tails of it.
He gave up trying to figure it out and decided it was better to get back to his own booth first.
But when he found the three and went back together, he stared at the empty ground in bewilderment.
"Wait, where's my booth?
Where did such a big booth go?"
The place that had been packed shoulder to shoulder yesterday was abruptly empty now.
The booths to the left and right were squeezed tightly together, but only here a strange gap had been left.
Xander quickly called the person in charge, and only after hearing the news did he breathe a sigh of relief.
It hadn't been torn down.
It had been moved.
The organizers hadn't expected a little indie game to blow up this much.
If they kept Xander's booth inside the hall, one, it wouldn't be safe, and two, it would be unfair to the other exhibitors sharing that hall.
So, after weighing various factors, the organizers decided to clear out Stadium No. 2 overnight and use it exclusively for his booth.
They had actually called and texted him last night, but because he went to bed early, he hadn't seen any of it.
Looking at the missed calls and unread messages on his phone, Xander apologized to the organizers, then hurried with his three workhorses to Stadium No. 2.
Opening time was right around the corner, so they had to hurry.
After a day of fermenting, even more people came today.
Curious gamers and fans of Elysia and Eden alike swarmed in, and the crowd nearly stuffed Stadium No. 2 to the brim.
Even so, many people were still squeezed outside and couldn't get in.
This wasn't actually good.
Even if they squeezed in, those farther back couldn't see what was happening up front, and because the game was a continuous, story-driven experience, a lot of people watched out of sequence, which led to an outcry online.
So Xander approached the organizers, and together they came up with a plan.
They gathered manpower overnight and turned Stadium No. 2 into something like a movie theater.
Rows of chairs were set beneath a giant projection screen, they even decorated the walls with game-related art, and entry was changed to a reservation system.
The game runs a little over three hours, just right for one session in the morning and one in the afternoon.
This way, although some players might miss the exhibition if they were too slow to reserve, at least order could be maintained.
This also produced a very interesting phenomenon.
Students at St. Freya near Stadium No. 2 could see large groups of people going in with smiles, then coming out in tears a few hours later, day after day.
Some curious students made reservations themselves, and they too came out crying, much to everyone's fascination.
The online buzz only grew hotter.
Thanks to Eden's huge name, even "Eden Studio" alone was enough to feed Xander a big wave of traffic.
And with such an excellent story, aside from a handful of attention-seeking clowns, the praise was almost unanimous, with hardly any negative comments to be seen.
It was, in a word, a resounding success.
However, the trend in livestreams took on a different flavor.
It all began with Sirin.
After losing face once by bawling on stream, she shrewdly recommended "To the Moon" to several of her streamer friends, smiling as she said it was a wonderful pure-love game and suggesting they stream it.
Then she displayed the stats from her previous playthrough stream, and the others were all tempted at once and couldn't wait to go live with it.
So, when she saw one after another crying on stream, Sirin immediately felt balanced.
If everyone cries together, then Sirin won't lose face, right?
This maneuver suddenly made the viewers see the light.
They turned into co-conspirators, slipped into their favorite streamers' channels, and began to egg them on.
[Streamer, streamer, hurry up and play To the Moon.
The story is super sweet~]
[Streamer, streamer, a new game called To the Moon just dropped.
Everyone's playing it—if you don't, you'll fall behind~]
[Streamer, play To the Moon or I unfollow!]
[...]
Thus, a crooked trend was born.
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