Chapter 55: The Veterans Had A Bad Feeling
Even Bingbing saw the short video Jiang Xun posted and said, “Boss, your video sped up and cut out a lot of swallowing actions. It’s very easy for the netizens to misunderstand that you are faking it.”
Jiang Xun did not mind. “It’s fine. At most, we can just start a livestream to clarify things.”
Tailai: “Why does this feel a little familiar?”
Zhenghui: “Boss, it’s like you’re fishing for publicity.”
Bingbing thought, ‘Aren’t you guys awfully familiar with these kinds of practices? Have you all been scammed in the same way before?’
Zhao Dejia: “…In the beginning, the boss only provoked the three of us, but now she’s aiming for an entire sea of people!”
Jiang Xun remained silent.
They didn’t have to word it in such an ugly way.
Indeed, the moment the video was posted, it riled up the netizens successfully, especially the ones who had previously been forced to apologize. This time, they felt as if they’d caught Jiang Xun in the act of doing something wrong and immediately leapt at the opportunity to criticize her.
“You doubled the speed of the video! Are you afraid that we will find out that you’re faking your video?”
“Are you tryna make yourself look like one of those pretty girls with big appetites?”
“Big appetites aren’t attractive, and besides, the country opposes wasting food. And you call yourself a top student at Beijing University.”
“This kind of video should be banned. Clout chasers should be banned!”
“Wow you’re really good at clickbait. In your last video, you had a stone slab smashed on your chest, but apparently you can’t even hold yourself back for a few days before making another gross video.”
“Absolutely no standards for the sake of clout. How disgusting!”
“I thought I misunderstood you, so I followed you for a while, but I’ve unsubscribed again.”
There were also netizens who downloaded Jiang Xun’s video and slowed it down again, checking it frame by frame.
“The part where she faked eating and vomited must have been cut out, otherwise how can she explain not even needing to swallow?”
“It’s too fake. Even if she did swallow, she could have faked it. To think that she’s still a student of Beijing University?”
“Don’t give her any ideas.”
“@beijing university, can you manage your own student and stop her from trying to please the public? It’s also embarrassing for your school.”
With her previous experience, Instructor Yang didn’t blame Jiang Xun immediately. Instead, she contacted the people in the cafeteria.
After learning that Jiang Xun’s daily appetite was this big, she was speechless. She couldn’t possibly let a student go hungry!
After the video of her having a rock crushed on her chest, Jiang Xun now had more than 370,000 fans. As a result, more people saw her eating and broadcasting videos, and the number of comments that scolded her, disapproved of her, and doubted her were also much higher than last time.
There were 3,115 likes, but there were 7,809 comments, and half of them were negative comments.
However, this didn’t necessarily mean that half the people who watched the video had left negative comments; instead, it seemed that there were some people who were spamming the comments and replying to many people.
As usual, Jiang Xun recorded these usernames down. She even recognized some of them from the time when she crushed the big rock on her chest. Many of them had questioned her and even directly messaged her back then.
“Huh. These people have some guts to pull the same stunt and not even change their usernames,” she sneered. This time, after they apologized, she wouldn’t delete their names off the list; she had a feeling that they would be there again the next time.
After that, she recorded another short video. “I’m Jiang Xun. In the previous eating video, many people suspected that I was faking it and said that I was wasting food.”
“Ha! My appetite is so big, so I have to eat so much for every meal. It’s already the 21st century, and I’m still not allowed to have a full meal? There is no way that I, of all people, can be wasting food. Moreover, to everyone watching the video, I guarantee that no one knows how to cherish food more than me!”
“I, Jiang Xun, would never waste food!” she declared arrogantly, raising her chin.
“This Saturday, at 12 o’clock sharp, I will livestream myself eating lunch at Xijing Restaurant.” Jiang Xun also added the restaurant’s name and location to the video description. “As usual, everyone is welcome to come watch. If you catch me eating fake food, I will compensate you with 10,000 yuan. There is no limit to the number of people. If I prove that I am eating real food, then you have to apologize to me.”
“I have already recorded your usernames. If you don’t apologize, I will post your usernames every day.” Jiang Xun kindly reminded them, “Isn’t it nice that newcomers to this experience can mingle with old veterans who have gone through the same thing?”
With an earnest smile, she said, “Don’t go astray, now.”
The newcomers ended up leaving the video utterly confused. Why did they still need to exchange experiences with the veterans?
The veterans in question, however, had a bad feeling about this.
Mom, Jiang Xun didn’t actually eat all that, right?
They didn’t want to be recorded again!
On Friday, Jiang Xun called Xijing Restaurant in advance and booked a small table for two and a large table for eight in the lobby.
Jiang Xun would be the only one sitting at the small table for two. She would definitely order a lot of dishes and fill the whole table.
If Bingbing and the others sat with her, those netizens who came to supervise her could find an excuse to say that someone was helping her finish the food, which was why she booked an eight-person booth for Bingbing and the others. She also instructed Xijing’s people to arrange the two tables adjacent to each other.
On Saturday, Jiang Xun called her roommates, Bingbing, and the school bully trio to Xijing Restaurant for a meal.
They arrived 15 minutes early, after which Jiang Xun set her phone in place and adjusted it to a suitable angle, then ordered her dishes in advance and instructed the waiter to serve the dishes at 12 o’clock.
Not long after Jiang Xun sat down, many customers came to the restaurant one after another, quickly filling it up.There was even a long line outside the restaurant.
A waiter whispered to his colleague, “What’s going on today? Although our restaurant is usually full, we don’t have a long line at the entrance.”
“Yeah.” His colleague was also puzzled. “We are famous for our quality, not some internet celebrity.”
“Also, there are a lot of reservations for this afternoon,” the colleague said. “Usually, there are reservations, but most of our customers come here directly.”
Those who had made reservations were all enthusiastic netizens who had come to watch Jiang Xun’s livestream. Having been afraid that there wouldn’t be any seats left, they’d made early reservations.
“Good thing that we made a reservation, or we’d have to queue up outside,” one customer said, wiping the non-existent sweat from his forehead.
“I really didn’t expect Jiang Xun’s appeal to be so high.”
“What appeal? They’re all here to supervise her.”
The customers who were waiting in line at the entrance of the restaurant craned their necks to look into the restaurant.
It didn’t matter if they couldn’t have lunch as long as they could watch Jiang Xun’s livestream.
One of the waiters even thoughtfully brought out plastic benches so that the customers outside could sit down.
As soon as it was 12 o’clock, Jiang Xun started broadcasting on time.
The waiter saw that the people waiting in line at the door were not in a hurry at all. They all took out their phones to watch the livestream.
How in sync everyone was!