You were supposed to have a fake marriage with the diva, so how did you become her father?

On the day of the signing, Jiang Feng flew to Shanghai specifically to bring the complete set of official seals of Chixiao Technology.

The contract was less than ten pages long. TUTU held a 40% stake, while Chixiao maintained operational control. TUTU was granted full distribution rights for three of its games in Japan.

After signing the papers, Lu Ran had someone order a table of local Shanghai cuisine. The three of them sat down to eat, and Jiang Feng's hand holding the wine glass trembled slightly.

"Mr. Lu, I've worked in Tokyo for five years, and not a day went by that I didn't want to switch sides." Jiang Feng took a sip of rice wine, his face flushed. "Before, when I didn't have a good hand, even when I went to drink with distributors, they wouldn't give me a second glance. Now it's different. After I go back, I don't even need to take out my phone; the messages from my Japanese partners on WeChat have already exploded."

Lu Ran picked up a peanut, chewed it, and swallowed it. "When we get back, the first thing we need to do is get the League of Legends servers up and running in Japan. We've already adjusted the parameters for the North American node in San Francisco. Contact the Tokyo data center about the resources there; how quickly should it be up and running?"

Jiang Feng put down his wine glass, took out his phone, and checked his schedule: "I know people at the Tokyo data center. They have existing server racks there; we don't even need to re-lay cabling to connect to the backbone network. Give me a week, and the Tokyo node will be online in a week."

"Then let's do a week. Before the launch, we'll do some pre-launch hype, spreading the word on a few mainstream Japanese gaming forums that TUTU's product is finally launching in Japan. No need to spend money on advertising; let the players spread the word themselves. The more mysterious, the better."

Jiang Feng said that he was already making arrangements. He knew several moderators of game forums in Japan, and a simple announcement post would generate a lot of traffic.

A week later, the Tokyo node went live on schedule, with the server opening time set at 7 PM local time in Japan.

When Jiang Feng later reported to Lu Ran, he said exactly what he said: "The server load curve was flat for the first fifteen minutes after the server went live, but at 7 o'clock the line went straight up, the slope was so steep that the technician and I stared at the screen for several seconds in a daze."

The number of registrations that night surpassed the total number of users Chixiao Technology had accumulated over the past five years.

Japanese players are flooding into Summoner's Rift at a speed comparable to the Tokyo subway rush hour, with new accounts being created, new matches being matched, and new skins being purchased every second.

Japanese gaming forums exploded within hours of the server opening.

The most popular post was titled "I played this game all night without stopping," and it was followed by hundreds of replies, with pages one through five filled with comments like "Me too," "Count me in," and "I just can't stop playing."

Someone posted on the forum that they only wanted to try one game after getting off work, but ended up playing until 4 a.m. When they woke up in the morning with dark circles under their eyes, they went to the company for a meeting. When their boss asked them what they did last night, they said they worked overtime.

Someone even recorded a pentakill moment in League of Legends and uploaded it to a Japanese video website with the title "Just how powerful are Chinese games?" The video garnered over a million views overnight, with comments asking for download links, how to buy skins, and whether it was possible to team up.

Even more outrageous is Minecraft.

The game received an even warmer response in the Japanese market than Lu Ran had anticipated.

Japanese players have always had a natural affinity for sandbox building games. The previous version of Minecraft sold ridiculously well in Japan, and the same is true for this game.

A Japanese player recreated Kiyomizu-dera Temple in Kyoto in Minecraft, spending three whole days meticulously crafting every pillar and every tile.

After he posted the screenshot on the forum, it stayed at the top of the trending list for a whole day. Some people asked if they could download the map, some asked how long it took him, and some even directly asked in the post, "Anyone want to build Osaka Castle together?"

Later, people actually responded. A group of Japanese players formed a temporary team to recreate Osaka Castle in the game. The project progress was updated every day, and there were more onlookers than participants.

CrossFire takes a different approach.

Japanese players are not as receptive to shooting games as Chinese players, but the fast-paced, short matches and exhilarating gameplay still attract a group of young users.

Lu Ran asked Jiang Feng to organize a small online competition in Japan. The only requirement for participation was that the participant's rank reached a certain level; there were no other restrictions.

The number of applicants exceeded expectations. On the day of the competition, tens of thousands of people flooded into the live stream, and the barrage of comments was so fast that it was impossible to see the content clearly. Some people were shouting that the players' performance was outrageous, some were complaining that their teammates were too bad, and others were asking when the next competition would be held.

After the match, Jiang Feng called Lu Ran, his voice brimming with barely suppressed laughter: "Mr. Lu, halfway through today's match, one of the opposing players smashed his keyboard on the spot because he lost. It even made the news in a Japanese gaming newspaper."

"Smash the keyboard if you win or if you lose?"

"They smashed it when they lost. They were resentful of losing."

Lu Ran leaned back in his chair and said, "That proves they're really serious. Players who aren't serious don't even bother smashing their keyboards when they lose. Keep it up, and next time increase the prize money so they'll smash their keyboards even harder."

A week later, data from Chixiao Technology showed that TUTU's three games had already surpassed the penetration rate of any other product launched at the same time in the Japanese game market.

The peak concurrent online users of League of Legends exceeded the local server's capacity limit, necessitating an emergency expansion.

Japanese gamers began spontaneously organizing offline viewing events. Several internet cafes in Akihabara, Tokyo, put up posters for "TUTU Games Zone" with characters from League of Legends and CrossFire, which stood out against the dazzling neon lights of Akihabara.

These data made Lu Ran feel gratified, but another thing kept swirling in his mind.

It's an instinctive reaction from the depths of history, and it won't disappear just because the game is well-made.

He called Jiang Feng one Thursday afternoon and got straight to the point, saying, "We're making an overall adjustment to the prices of items available in Japan. All in-app purchases, skins, battle passes, and event tickets will be increased by fifty percent."

Jiang Feng was silent for a moment on the other end of the phone: "Mr. Lu, isn't fifty percent a bit too much? Although Japanese consumers have considerable spending power, this percentage might affect their willingness to buy. Moreover, there are other similar products on the market competing on price. If our pricing is too high compared to our competitors, users might switch to other options."

Lu Ran shifted his position, leaning back in his chair slightly. "Jiang Feng, let me finish. The Japanese market is different from other places. In the European market, we offer normal pricing; in the North American market, we offer the average market price. But for the Japanese market, I need to develop a separate strategy. The core logic of this strategy isn't market supply and demand, but historical accounts. The money they made in China back then, the things they stole, and the losses they caused—converted to an astronomical figure today. We're now taking back game products to collect rent; we're collecting a portion of what was stolen back then. Fifty percent isn't a premium; it's interest."

There was a few seconds of silence on the other end of the phone before Jiang Feng's voice came through, a little lower than before: "I understand what you mean. But how do we implement it practically? Raising prices directly will definitely cause a backlash. Japanese players aren't stupid; they'll compare prices to other regions."

"So there are two things to do. First, don't raise prices all at once; adjust them in batches. Start by setting higher prices for newly released skins and items, while keeping older products at their original prices. Once users get used to this mental accounting, then gradually increase the prices of older products. Second, create exclusive content for the Japanese market. Whether it's skins, effects, or characters, there must be something that can't be bought in other markets. This way, the price increase has a basis, and users will feel that they're paying more for exclusive content, not just simply higher prices."

Jiang Feng thought for a while and said that this idea was fine. He could arrange for the design team to develop the content line for the Japan-exclusive edition separately and coordinate the scheduling with TUTU's art team.

"There's one more thing," Lu Ran said. "The profits from the price increase will all stay in Chixiao Technology's accounts; they won't be shared with TUTU. The profits will be used for two things—first, to hire more employees locally and expand the operations team. Second, to use the savings for marketing and further expand our user base. I want our Japanese counterparts to see one thing—the more they cooperate with us, the more money they make, and the larger their scale becomes."

Jiang Feng replied, "Understood, I'll arrange it immediately," and then hung up the phone.

Over the following week, Chixiao Technology implemented the price adjustment plan in stages, following Lu Ran's strategy.

The first round of adjustments focused on the new limited-edition skins and battle pass, with pricing directly targeting the European market at a 50% premium, coupled with marketing rhetoric of "exclusively for Japan".

Japanese players' feedback on this round of reviews is divided into two camps. One group feels that the price is indeed expensive, but the skins look good and they are willing to pay for them. The other group complained on the forums, asking why the prices in Japan are so much higher than in Europe.

The second round of adjustments came more subtly.

Chixiao Technology has made slight increases in the prices of regular items and heroes, each increase being only a few percent, with individual increases so small that they are almost imperceptible without careful comparison.

However, the cumulative overall increase has approached Lu Ran's target.

Most players didn't notice the change, and the few who did were shut down by other players on the forum because Chixiao Technology launched a gift-giving event, offering limited-edition avatar frames and special effects for recharging a certain amount, which largely offset the perceived price increase.

A month later, Jiang Feng sent over a revenue report.

The average spending per person in the Japanese market is nearly 60% higher than in the European market, and also significantly higher than in the North American market.

Although its user base has not yet reached the scale of Europe, its contribution per user is already far ahead.

Chixiao Technology's cash reserves have nearly doubled since the investment, the team has expanded from a dozen people to nearly forty, and the office has moved from a small room to an entire floor of a newly built office building near Akihabara.

Jiang Feng added a note at the end of his data report: "President Lu, when I was working in Tokyo to develop distribution channels, people wouldn't even bother taking my business card after hearing my company name. Now, those people who used to ignore me are calling to invite me to dinner. Your interest rate was definitely justified."

After reading the message, Lu Ran put his phone on the table and sat quietly in his office for a while.

Revenue data from Japan continues to pour into the system's backend, and each fluctuation in those numbers means more profit is flowing into TUTU's account.

These profits will ultimately translate into TUTU's investment in technological research and development, its budget for expanding into overseas markets, and the confidence to launch more product projects in the future.

The games and music he obtained from the system were originally just tools to get things started.

These tools are now being transformed into a shovel, gradually digging out what's buried underground.

Lu Ran picked up his phone and sent Jiang Feng a message with only three words: "Keep digging."

...