The richest man started taking advantage of loopholes after joining Alibaba.

Midnight.

The live stream chat lit up.

The picture quality is rough, with a 720P resolution and a low bitrate. There are slight color blocks on people's faces, and the green screen keying is not clean, with jagged edges.

In the bottom right corner, there is a line of small gray text: "Weiguang Live Streaming - Beta Version".

Online users: 3217.

Three thousand two hundred and seventeen people.

They're not here to buy anything; they're here to see a joke.

The trending topics stayed up all day: #Weiguang's Capital Chain Breaks#, #Lin Che Plays the Victim in Live Stream#. These 3,000-plus people came here by following the trending topics, with the mentality of watching a monkey show, wanting to see "how the newly crowned richest man has fallen to selling street vendor goods in a live stream".

The comments are scrolling by.

"Here it comes, live footage of the sob story."

"Brothers, get the sunflower seeds ready."

"What era is this video quality from? My home security camera is clearer than this."

"Hahaha, that green screen must be a modified curtain."

Lin Che stood in front of the camera, ignoring the comments.

He bent down and picked up a sweatshirt from the ground.

It's gray, with no brand or logo. There are loose threads on the collar and a small amount of excess glue on the cuffs, which are marks left by the sewing machine running too fast.

He unfolded his hoodie with one hand and held the collar with the other, pausing it in front of the camera for two seconds to make sure everyone could see it clearly.

Then he spoke.

"Everyone."

Two words, spoken softly, but the chat in the live stream suddenly paused—not paused, but everyone realized at the same second that this person's way of speaking didn't sound like they were selling something.

Not like.

Unlike the "Don't miss out" pitches on TV shopping channels, or the "We're bringing you a super great product today" pitches on Taobao live streams, it's unlike any sales pitch they've ever heard before.

His voice was flat, his speech was fast, and he spoke without a smile, without enthusiasm, and without any hint of flattery.

Like reporting the news.

Or rather, it was like a verdict.

"I know what you're doing."

The viewers in the live chat were stunned for a moment.

"You just spent three hours paying a deposit on Taobao, claiming coupons on JD.com, and grabbing red envelopes on Baidu."

He pushed the hoodie two inches closer to the camera.

"You know perfectly well how much money you have left in your bank accounts."

The live chat exploded.

"???"

"What is that person saying?"

"I really don't have any money in my account..."

Lin Che ignored the comments; his rhythm never faltered, like a train that never stops once it starts moving.

"The three major platforms spent 10 billion yuan tonight, buying all your attention. Do you think you made a profit? You paid your deposit and can't get a refund. You spent half an hour trying to figure out the discount rules and still couldn't understand them. You bought a bunch of unwanted junk from different stores, saving only 50 yuan in the end, and wasting three hours."

He tapped the fabric of the hoodie with his fingers.

"This shirt costs nine yuan and ninety cents."

The comments section paused again.

"It's not a discount of 9.9 yuan for spending a certain amount, it's not about adding other items to reach 9.9 yuan, it's not about getting eight coupons before it's 9.9 yuan—it's just 9.9 yuan, with free shipping."

He turned his hoodie inside out so the camera could see the lining.

"Directly from the factory in the Yangtze River Delta region, the fabric is 32-count stretch cotton, weighing 280 grams. It won't pill or shrink. You can see the stitching for yourselves; it's double-stitched."

After saying that, he threw the hoodie back into the cardboard box behind him, and then took out a second one, black, the same style.

"You want to know why it can sell for 9.9 yuan? Because the cost of this garment to produce is 6.1 yuan. There are no middlemen, no brand premium, and no marketing expenses. From factory to user, it's a one-stop service."

He spoke faster.

"Tonight, this is the only batch, 100,000 pieces."

The number of online users is increasing.

It rose from 3,200 to 5,000, then to 8,000, and then to 12,000.

It's not because the live stream has any recommendation algorithm distributing traffic; Weiguang Live is in a gray-scale version, and the homepage entry hasn't even been opened yet.

These new influxes all came from social media—someone took a screenshot of the live stream, posted it on WeChat Moments with the caption "This richest man is really mentally unstable," the image was shared, then forwarded to Weibo, and the live stream link was discovered, spreading like wildfire.

Lin Che's voice didn't stop.

"If you don't want to calculate the discount, come on over."

"Those who don't want to cross-store purchases, come on over."

"I don't want to spend three hours figuring out a bunch of ridiculous rules and end up spending extra money—"

He held the black hoodie up to the center of the camera lens.

"Come."

The number of online users jumped to 30,000.

The color of the comments changed, from uniform taunts to a mix of taunts and confusion.

"Wait, is 9.9 yuan for real?"

Free shipping? Is this a scam?

"Made in the Yangtze River Delta region...it's not counterfeit, is it?"

"Who cares? Nine yuan and ninety cents isn't expensive, might as well give it a try."

Lin Che loosened the black hoodie and let it fall back into the cardboard box.

He extended his right hand, fingers spread, facing the camera.

"100,000 items. The inventory is in the Ark Cloud Warehouse behind your screens. I'll post the link now; once it's sold out, it's gone."

There are 47,000 people online.

It's still rising.

He pulled his hand back, clenched it into a fist, leaving only his index finger pointing at the camera.

Everyone who has watched live-streaming e-commerce has seen this action before, but at midnight in December 2019, no Chinese netizen had ever seen anything like it in a live-streaming room—a person pointing at the screen as if pointing at your nose, saying a string of numbers and an instruction in an undeniable voice.

"three--"

The comments section was flooded with messages.

"two--"

There are 61,000 people online.

"one--"

"Link above."

A product card popped up in the bottom right corner of the live stream room—a gray hoodie, 9.9 yuan, free shipping.

Below the product card is a line of small print: Inventory 100000.

The speed at which the small print jumped was beyond everyone's comprehension.

100000.

99847.

She jumped.

It's not about reducing items one by one, it's about reducing them by 100 at a time.

98213.

95074.

The comments section has completely changed.

"Holy crap???"

"What speed??"

"I got it! I got it! I got it!!!"

"Gone?? It was only a few seconds???"

The inventory numbers in the backend are fluctuating at a speed that is almost impossible for the human eye to keep up with. Each refresh reduces the inventory by several thousand, like a countdown heading towards zero.

Xie Yu stood outside the storage room, holding his phone, the screen displaying real-time backend data.

He saw that number.

100000.

Then he blinked.

0.

Zero.

He wasn't mistaken.

It took less than seven seconds to go from 100,000 to zero.

The number of viewers in the live stream jumped from 61,000 to 120,000 in those seven seconds.

120,000 people flooded in, only to see a grayed-out product link and a man wearing a 9.9 yuan hoodie standing in front of a crumpled green screen.

The bullet comments only contained one type of content.

It's not sarcasm.

It's not a question.

The two words filled the entire screen, from left to right and from top to bottom, layer upon layer.

"Holy shit."

"Holy shit."

"Holy shit."

Facing the camera, Lin Che moved the microphone stick of his headset closer to his mouth.

"Second batch, change the color, will be on in five minutes."

There were 140,000 people online.

It's still rising.