Chapter 1145: Returning to the Phoenix Pool

Thanks to Luo Quan, the reputation of "The Little Mermaid" in the United States plummeted.

Originally, the ratings on major platforms were only hovering around passing, but by the next day, they dived to 4.0.

For this kind of politically correct movie, everyone understands what is going on.

You film yours, I won't watch it or evaluate it, anyway, it's not us who are disgusted.

But you guys who like to lick stinky feet, use political correctness to attack my goddess, that is your fault.

Luo Quan is so good, as the world's most beautiful, world-class superstar, but still often shoots swimsuits, does cosplay, and insists on sending welfare to netizens who like her.

Such a good star, where can I find it?

You bastards scold people every day. If Luo Quan doesn't send welfare in the future, where should they go to appreciate such beautiful appearance and such graceful figure?

Such behavior is simply destroying world peace, extremely anti-human, and must be sent to the Hague Court for trial!

So, in order to vent for Luo Quan, fans far away in the United States, without any organization, exerted great subjective initiative and began to give "The Little Mermaid" bad reviews.

At the same time, they also destroyed the false reputation of this movie on major internet platforms.

And as these things progressed, the box office of "The Little Mermaid" finally collapsed.

Originally, its North American estimated box office was about 700 million. It is impossible to make money, but if it reaches this number, it can lose a little less.

With Disney's big family and big business, losing tens of millions is just sprinkling water.

But now the trend of box office decline far exceeds expectations. If there is no accident, the final box office of this movie will not exceed 500 million US dollars.

In this case, Disney will lose at least 100 million.

Such a loss, if placed in China, is enough to make most film companies unable to recover.

This is Disney, still holding on.

As for one of the culprits who started this dispute, the heroine of The Little Mermaid, Halle, has begun to be scolded to cancel her Twitter and INS accounts.

Luo Quan's fans, although they don't speak much on weekdays, are not dead people.

After all, their idol is a Valkyrie with explosive combat power, who likes to solve any trouble by herself and doesn't need her to appear at all.

But when it comes to the critical moment, no one dares to say that Luo Quan's fans have no combat power.

As for Halle, she was lucky enough to become another negative teaching material, that is, don't try to be against Luo Quan.

Soon, TCC, which is responsible for selecting the world's most beautiful, also issued a statement:

"This selection started real-name voting a long time ago. Every year, everyone has only one voting opportunity, and every vote is the choice of the netizens themselves.

So there is no situation of kidnapping everyone's aesthetics. Luo Quan's world's most beautiful is well-deserved!"

In this case, there are not many Western media that dare to support Luo Quan.

Political correctness is the Sword of Damocles hanging over everyone's head. You never know when it will fall and stab yourself.

So even if they know that Luo Quan didn't do anything wrong, no one dared to speak for her.

TCC is an exception, because the intention of its founding is very superficial. It tells the world that this is looking at the face, and it is chosen by the public itself. They are only responsible for listing the good-looking people.

And there is no lack of black people in the list, so they are really not afraid of being attacked. 【11

In short, this political correctness storm has temporarily ended with Luo Quan's victory.

As for whether someone will bring up old matters again later, that remains unknown, but Luo Quan generally doesn't look for trouble, nor is she ever afraid of it.

Time flew by, and the semi-finals of the Bilibili Singer Contest began.

This time it was 50 down to 30; while it seemed like fewer people would be eliminated than in the preliminary round, the intensity of the competition was definitely rising straight up.

Because those remaining were all experts selected after careful screening, and every single one had reached the level of a professional singer.

The fifty singers would still complete all their matches within three days.

However, this time they had ample time to prepare, and every contestant was quite full of confidence before taking the stage.

And because Luo Quan revealed before the contest that whoever could make it to the finals would gain the opportunity to perform on stage with her, and the first-place winner would even receive a single tailored by her,

this made all the contestants even more eager to advance.

Not to mention the single personally crafted by Luo Quan, just performing on the same stage as her was already an experience worth boasting about.

Even if they didn't win the championship this time, they could go back and continue livestreaming.

When bragging to their viewers, saying they had sung on stage with Luo Quan—that would be so prestigious!

If they actually won the championship, it wouldn't just be about prestige; it would be a direct takeoff, and they would definitely have a place in the future of the Mandopop scene.

Of course, although the contestants were eyeing this championship covetously, they also knew in their hearts that they had an insurmountable gap from the three people—Chen Zhou, Lan Aide, and He Xuanyu—in everything from vocal technique to fan count.

The championship would most likely come from these three people.

But people always have to have dreams; what if they came true?

After the semi-finals, they still had two more performance opportunities; maybe they could pull off an upset?

As long as the competition wasn't over, anything was possible.

So after the semi-finals began, the contestants' states were all very fiery.

Just on the first day of the semi-finals, the popularity of the Bilibili Singer Contest hit a new historical high.

The combined real-time popularity across the five major platforms—Bilibili, Douyin, Constable, Huya, and Douyu—surpassed a staggering one billion!

This was a figure that had never appeared on any livestreaming platform, representing the current peak of the livestreaming industry.

Although popularity doesn't represent the actual number of people, the number of people watching the Bilibili Singer Contest at this moment definitely exceeded any television program this year.

The terrifying nature of livestreaming traffic was revealed at this moment without doubt.

And during these three days, the Weibo hot search was bombed once again.

With the traffic of the Singer Contest being so terrifying, many singers and celebrities also began to ride the coattails of its popularity.

Some posted on Weibo saying they favored a certain contestant and called on their fans to vote for them.

Others, in the posture of professional singers, evaluated the contestants' stage performances.

Although they didn't say it, netizens could tell that these people riding the popularity really wanted the production team to invite them to be a guest for an episode.

Of course, there might be some among them who were truly following the program and posted on Weibo simply because they liked it.

But in a situation where the whole internet was riding the popularity, netizens didn't care whether it was true or false anymore.

They were just happy—happy that the Bilibili Singer Contest could gain such great influence, allowing so many celebrities to post about it and participate in the discussion of the competition.

This gave them an inexplicable sense of pride, and this was also what Luo Quan hoped to see.

When a variety show can make the audience feel pride and satisfaction after watching it, it means that this variety show has already been done more than successfully.

It is worth mentioning that because the bold and unconstrained folk singing style is quite popular in the program's scoring, one-third of the contestants in the program chose folk-style music.

And folk-style music is basically synonymous with the mainstream melody; as soon as a contestant opened their mouth, the barrage was filled with "peace and prosperity," and those who didn't know better would have thought they had arrived at the scene of a gala.

Such a positive-energy program, coupled with such great influence, soon received a named commendation from the GQT:

"A good program should be able to be appreciated by both the refined and the popular, and share joy with the people.

The Bilibili Singer Contest has set a very good example, facing the public from the very beginning of the auditions and focusing on discovering folk singers with real strength.

On this stage, you can have no background, no marketing, and no fans.

But as long as you sing well enough, you can become a big star in the spotlight!"

After reading this praise, netizens always felt there was some implication.

It was like it was hinting at a certain person or a certain group, yet it didn't name names.

So netizens very thoughtfully stated the names of those they felt should be criticized in the comments.

This made the scene appear even more spectacular.

No program can be smooth sailing without controversy.

The Bilibili Singer Contest, of course, also faced questioning; some said the judges were too few and too gentle, not sharp enough.

Some felt that the mechanism of letting netizens vote was too low; do netizens know what vocal technique is? Do netizens know what music theory is? Can they evaluate?

Those who made such comments were mainly music critics.

Luo Quan dismissed them with just one sentence:

"From music theory to vocal technique to the production of the program, your level is not as good as mine. According to your logic, you should be shutting up right now.

Therefore, I suggest that you experts publish fewer suggestions."

Music critics offering criticism is actually a good thing.

Luo Quan also agrees that music needs critical voices, but if it's criticism for the sake of criticism, then it's completely unnecessary.

For people like this who fish for fame and think they can talk nonsense just by wearing the title of a music critic, she never indulges them.

This Weibo post expressed her attitude; as for the subsequent counterattacks from those music critics, she was already too lazy to pay any more attention to them.

These people are just trying to ride the popularity; the more you pay attention to them, the more excited they get. Leaving them alone is the best way to handle it.

The three-day semi-finals ended in an atmosphere of nationwide carnival, with twenty more of the fifty contestants eliminated.

At the end of the program, many contestants shed tears on the scene, emotionally recounting what kind of moving experiences this participation had brought them.

For many contestants, this was definitely a rare experience in their lives.

Because it was genuine emotion, the scene was truly very moving.

The barrage was full of tears; who knows how many viewers were wiping away tears behind their screens.

Even Luo Quan had tears glistening in her eyes.

"You actually didn't cry?" Afterward, Seeing Wen Xia, with red and swollen eyes, looked at Luo Quan in surprise.

"Maybe I'm just tougher, so I can still hold it in." Luo Quan also wiped her eyes with a tissue. "Scenes like this will appear two more times, and they might be even more moving each time.

So, let's save the emotions and keep the tear-filled face for next time."

"You can even do that? Awesome." Seeing Wen Xia gave Luo Quan a thumbs up.

The semi-finals ended successfully, and next would be another week of rest.

This period is often when netizens are at their most active.

Because there is no competition to watch, they can only argue on the forums.

The content of the arguments, of course, is mostly about the contestants' vocal techniques.

They say experts are among the people; this Singer Contest selected so many powerful singers all at once.

Actually, there are also quite a few music critics among the people; they are proficient in all kinds of music theory terminology, and their ears are more sensitive than sonar detectors, capable of accurately pointing out which word at which minute and second of a contestant's performance wasn't handled well.

By picking on others, they then praise the contestants they like.

This is the eternal theme on the forums, with related content occupying seventy percent of the Singer Contest discussions.

Although this kind of confrontational discussion easily leads to flame wars, that's just how competition is.

If the environment isn't intense, then the championship wouldn't have any meaning.

So Luo Quan is still very happy to see this atmosphere, as long as it doesn't escalate to cursing other people's families or setting up fights, it's all fine.

After handling the sponsorship and broadcasting contracts for the competition, Luo Quan returned to Huanyu once again.

The last time she came back was to cook a "Last Supper" for the believers; this time, it was for the legendary "Gui Qu Feng Chi" banquet that could improve longevity with side effects.

The Gui Qu Feng Chi banquet, personally hosted by Her Majesty the Empress Dowager, was set to begin in two days.

Luo Quan had received notice from Ye Zhining in advance, saying she wanted her to make "Buddha Jumps Over the Wall" one more time to bring to the Gui Qu Feng Chi banquet for the guests to taste.

Thinking that she would also need to ask the Empress to pack a table of the banquet for her later, Luo Quan naturally didn't refuse.

In fact, when Luo Quan left, she had already told Ye Zhining the ingredients and the method.

She also immediately had the imperial chefs try to make it.

However, although these imperial chefs had the title of "God of Cooking," the Buddha Jumps Over the Wall they made didn't have Luo Quan's flavor at all.

So the first thing Ye Zhining said when she saw her was: "My beloved concubine, you wouldn't have added something else to this dish that you didn't tell me about, would you?"

"What else could I add? I gave you the recipe." Luo Quan appeared very aggrieved. "Do I look like the kind of person who would hold something back? I'd be happy to see Buddha Jumps Over the Wall flourish in Huanyu, alright!"

"Then why couldn't any of these cooking gods make it well?" Ye Zhining's expression was puzzled.

"It means they didn't put enough heart into it. Cooking has to be done with heart; after all, no matter how high the technique is, it's just that." Luo Quan gave a very abstract, very idealistic explanation.

Actually, the real reason is very simple: because these cooking gods weren't using the magic pot given by the system.

This magical kitchenware can greatly stimulate the flavor of the ingredients; others don't have this kitchenware, so of course, they can't replicate it.

But this kind of thing definitely couldn't be spoken of, lest her treasure be coveted by others.

Fortunately, the magic pot is unassuming and doesn't contain any energy fluctuations, so even if it's placed in the kitchen, it won't attract anyone's attention.

So the dish "Buddha Jumps Over the Wall" will most likely become her unique specialty.

But that's fine too; maybe later, when her culinary skills improve to a certain realm, she can even enter the Dao through this Buddha Jumps Over the Wall.

It is said that the more times one enters the Dao, the more profound one's spiritual power becomes, which is definitely a good thing for her, as she craves power.