Several days had passed since Himeko's livestream, yet the gaming community was still buzzing about Honkai Impact 3rd's new story chapter.
Meanwhile, Eden's album releases were rolling out one after another, completely dominating Weibo's trending charts.
As for Honkai 3? It only stayed on trending for a single day after the update before being pushed aside.
Penguin's new version fared even worse—it didn't even get a sniff of the trending tab.
The only time Girls' Odyssey came up was when people on Douyin made videos about Honkai 3, dragging Penguin's game out for another round of mockery.
After all, that sudden character-death stunt had left too foul a taste in players' mouths.
But gradually, a strange trend began to appear.
Under many Honkai 3 videos, random comments started popping up, accusing miHoYo of being a greedy cash-grabber—
saying that without Herrschers, the game was unplayable, and that all those grindable characters were useless bait.
Most players were baffled.
After all, Honkai 3 didn't even have PvP.
The only competitive ranking—the Abyss—barely handed out a few hundred crystals difference between ranks.
It existed just to give whales a tougher challenge mode.
Girls' Odyssey, on the other hand, had added a PvP mode on top of copying Honkai.
And when a game has PvP, that's when free-to-play players truly can't compete without spending.
So when people saw "Honkai 3 is pay-to-win" comments, they just treated it as a bad joke.
But soon, the accusations multiplied.
And when someone left a comment under Yu Weiwei's Weibo asking if she'd ever played Honkai 3,
her reply turned the whole thing into a wildfire.
[Honkai 3? I've played it. Honestly, if you don't pull Herrschers you can't even play. They dangle all these grindable characters, but they're useless. It's a scam.]
Yu Weiwei might only have been a second-tier celebrity, but she was still a celebrity.
Her words carried weight.
The moment she accused Honkai 3 of being a scam, hordes of her diehard fans parroted her blindly.
In response, countless Honkai 3 fans flooded her comments, furiously cursing her out—
calling her a clown who would throw away even her dignity to hype up her endorsement deal.
Anyone with eyes could see the truth:
It was Girls' Odyssey's PvP mode that forced spending.
And the rewards for it were insanely generous.
Climbing the weekly PvP leaderboard? First place got you a seven-day limited-time "ultimate armor"—
not only stunningly designed, but ridiculously overpowered.
Of course players would spend heavily to secure it.
Yet Yu Weiwei didn't say a word about Girls' Odyssey's blatant money-grabs, and instead called Honkai 3 a scam?
Naturally, players were livid.
As her Weibo filled with angry comments, Yu Weiwei's face grew uglier by the minute.
Even with her fans defending her, they were badly outnumbered.
And this was on her home turf.
In frustration, she set her Weibo to allow only fans to comment.
Only then did her supporters gain the upper hand.
But then something unexpected happened—her follower count started skyrocketing.
Before this fiasco, she had around 12 million followers (inflated with some bots).
Within half a day, she'd jumped to 15 million.
Yu Weiwei was surprised—but delighted.
Not only had she pocketed Penguin's fat paycheck, she'd also gained a tidal wave of attention.
This was a jackpot.
"They might be haters, but… haters are still fans~"
She quickly called her agent to plan a future "redemption arc."
After all, she was only endorsing a Penguin game, not committing a crime.
Once the storm blew over, she could apologize, act pitiful, and—
those haters would turn into fans.
Her agent was also pleasantly shocked.
"To think a game scandal might actually push you closer to the A-list…"
"So, what's our move now?"
The agent thought for a moment, then chuckled.
"Let's wait and see. The controversy is already rolling. miHoYo won't sit back and do nothing."
…
Meanwhile, at miHoYo HQ.
Rita rushed in to report the situation to Mo Li.
Sure, anyone with half a brain could see Penguin was behind the smear campaign.
And sure, the reasoning was laughably flimsy.
But ignoring it wasn't an option.
Left unchecked, rumors had a way of morphing into "truth."
Too many younger players—or simply lazy ones—would be misled.
The girls were understandably anxious.
Mo Li skimmed through Penguin's smear.
"Heh. So this is the angle they're taking? Pathetic."
Originally, he hadn't wanted to tangle too hard with Penguin.
Going toe-to-toe with a giant internet conglomerate wasn't exactly rational.
But now that they couldn't win on merit, they'd resorted to this filth.
"Since you're so eager to lose, I'll grant your wish."
He turned to Rita with a reassuring smile.
"Don't worry about this. I'll post a single video and settle it."
"As for you—go gather evidence of Penguin's plagiarism. We'll sue them directly."
Rita's eyes widened.
"Boss… are you sure? Penguin's fought dozens of plagiarism suits and never lost…"
Her voice grew grave. "If we lose, it could hurt Honkai 3's reputation badly."
Mo Li only smiled.
"Relax. Our game code is watermarked all over with our studio's logo."
"And by some miraculous coincidence… Girls' Odyssey's code has the same logos."
Rita froze. They actually copied the code wholesale?
If that was true, then the evidence was ironclad. This time, Penguin couldn't possibly escape.
She curved her lips into a sly smile.
"Understood, Boss. I'll start preparing right away."
Once Rita left, Mo Li booted up his computer, logged into his account, and recorded a Memory Arena showcase.
"Heh… useless grindable characters? Clearly, you've never seen the Immortal crush skulls with inch-force."
Right now, Herrscher of the Void was the queen of physical DPS.
And for lightning damage? The grindable Fu Hua: Shadow Knight: Shadow—reigning supreme.
How dare they claim grindable characters were worthless?
The moment Mo Li uploaded the video, a flood of players swarmed in to watch.
At first, many assumed it was an official announcement.
Instead, it was a Memory Arena clear video.
[Grindable Character White Night Executor—7 Health Bars in 1 Second]
[Witness the Vanishing HP Bar—Kallen 31,180 Points]
The video opened with pounding electro beats.
First came the lineup showcase: White Night Executor + Stygian Nymph + Knight Moonbeam.
Among them, Stygian was the trickiest to obtain.
But White Night? Any long-term player had her at SSS by now, or at least SS thanks to recent events.
The battle began.
Moonbeam flashed in, triggered Time Fracture with a weapon skill.
Switch to Stygian, pop another weapon skill.
Then White Night entered, hammering Kallen to build SP.
As Time Fracture was about to end, she dashed again—triggering another fracture.
The cycle repeated—switch, dash, fracture—slowing the timer to a crawl.
Until finally, both Stygian and White Night had full SP.
Kallen's stance bar broke.
The music hit its crescendo.
Stygian unleashed her ultimate and weapon skill—debuffing enemies and buffing allies.
Moonbeam swapped in, dashing to fracture again, then slamming her weapon debuff.
Finally, White Night appeared.
Her ultimate blazed forth.
A storm of blows rained down in dizzying flurries.
Under White Night Immortal's overwhelming inch-power, Kallen's HP bar plummeted at a horrifying pace.
The chat exploded.
[Holy sh*t!!]
[???]
[What the hell did I just watch?!]
[Kallen: ??? Where's my HP bar??]
[Kallen: So this is the pressure of a 50,000-year-old granny!]
[Immortal Fu Hua, absolute legend!!]
[Confirmed: Red Feather Immortal was the one playing this run!]
[Penguin, get your ass out here! What do you mean grindable characters are useless?!]
[I thought the Queen was already unmatched—but Immortal Fu Hua's even scarier! Whose lieutenant is she?!]
On the victory screen, the camera lingered on Fu Hua.
She spoke humbly:
"This performance… was less than perfect."
The barrage went nuclear.
[Humble god-tier carry…]
[Redefining "perfect" itself.]
[Sis, look under your feet—Kallen's corpse says otherwise!]
[Ahhhh!! Immortal's too damn cool!!]
[Time to copy this setup! I've got those stigmas and chars gathering dust—turns out they're monsters!]
[Copy this homework? Forget it, I don't have the hands for it!]
[Honestly, even with 3S Herrscher I couldn't delete Kallen this fast…]
[Penguin, drag Yu Weiwei over here! Let her see what "useless" looks like!!]
[In the right fights, grindables demolish paid characters… insane! miHoYo, aren't you scared no one will pull your limiteds after this?]
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