"Eh? When was the fatty able to draw so fast?"
Zhang Zhou Wei was in many mutual chat groups as Meng Fan, so as anticipated, he saw Meng Fan's mass text link to his stream. After he watched the stream, he was once again dumbfounded and a little confused.
Meng Fan's professional skill was strong. Although he often skipped class, his grades have always been at the forefront of his year. He possessed unique insights in various fields regarding the fashion industry, as well as he harbored interest beyond traditional painting techniques. In terms of future employment prospects and career development, Zhang Zhou Wei and the majority of his friends believed that Meng Fan would exceed most of their classmates in this aspect.
But, this had nothing to do with Meng Fan's increased drawing speed!
Zhang Zhou Wei was very clear as to what Meng Fan was capable of, his drawing speed was not that different from the other students in the academy.
Even if the character being drawn didn't require too much thought, allowing it to be completed faster than the original, but still, it shouldn't be this fast!
Others might speculate that this was due to Meng Fan's familiarity with the character, but an art student like Zhang Zhou Wei knew better; no matter how familiar he was, it was impossible to achieve this sort of speed.
An illustration of an anime character, including background and color, would require hours from someone already familiar, anyone who could do it under half an hour was already a gifted prodigy.
Meng Fan had used a mere 11 minutes!
Is this real?
Genius, monster!
"Come on, come on, the fatty started streaming his drawing, guys take a look, his drawing speed... He must be cheating!"
Zhang Zhou Wei shared the link to Wang Ya Nan who was also in the process of streaming her artwork, then called their two other roommates over. Meng Fan's speed really made him feel abnormal.
...
Two minutes later, the outline of the second character had already formed.
From the outline, it seemed like it was going to be a girl. However as the facial features slowly presented themselves, the guessing games also increased, except all the guesses were just speculations, as nobody was certain.
Five minutes later, he began to add on clothes.
First came the shorts and belt.
The belt buckle had the letter A on it.
On one side of the belt, he drew a dagger.
"Sh*t, why do I feel like this dagger looks familiar?!"
"These shorts... I feel like they're a familiar symbol, but I can't recall who it is."
"A?"
The torso had exaggerated lines that determined the figure—curves emerging.
He then drew an unbuttoned shirt, tied in a knot in the form of a bra. At the knot, Meng Fan added a small ornament.
A brooch in the shape of a skull.
"This skull... Why do I have an uneasy feeling about this?!"
"I think I know something."
"Hey Stream host, if you are really drawing who I think it is, I'm gonna beat your head in!"
He kept drawing.
Next was the accessories around the neck.
A beaded necklace.
Once these beads appeared, many people saw one figure appear in their mind.
"Hey host, are you sure you're not trolling me?!"
"Fatty, you're kidding me!"
"Meng fatty, did you coordinate with HuaXia academy, is someone endorsing you?"
After drawing the necklace, Meng Fan landed his pen on the character's head.
A hat.
A stetson appeared, with two badges adorning the trim.
When Meng Fan drew a "smiley face" on one and a "sad face" on the other, the live comments exploded.
"Ace!"
"Fire fist!"
"F**k man, when you drew the belt I thought it was Ace, but once the chest formed I wasn't so sure anymore!"
"MMP!"
"This host is poison!"
"The stream host is crazy!"
"Meng Fatty you're finished, you actually dared to draw Ace as a woman, even though she is very beautiful!"
"The brotherhood has five minutes before they arrive on the battlefield!"
"This Ace is so cool and very pretty, I like it!"
"This host womanifying Ace is a bit much, no respect for the character!"
"Meng Boss give me back my handsome happy Ace!"
"Is it not normal for ACGN (Anime, comics, games, Nijigen) characters to have genderbent versions of themselves, how come this is on the line now, there's way too many glass hearts here!"
"Oda had mentioned in various details that the sand crocodile was originally a woman, why don't you guys go bother him?!"
"Smoker also swapped bodies with Tashigi!"
"Ace is my favorite character in one piece, to me, there is no disrespect in this design. Ace is pretty as a girl, and handsome as a guy. It brings me joy just to see him appear in front of me!"
"Do live comments have to be this sappy? Come on!"
It verified the doubts of his internet friends, for once Meng Fan finished drawing the hat. He added a tattoo on her arm—ASCE, adding a line through the S and a dot inside the C.
Then, he added flames around her.
"Chubby, the chatroom is helping you pull viewers, get some mods on it in case someone tries to start something."
Meng Fan saw the incoming WeChat, which was sent from an internet friend he'd known for many years and had met in person at various gatherings, anime conventions, and 2D concerts; "AiyoNotFat".
After seeing the number of people barraging his stream, Meng Fan understood the meaning of "Aiyo not Fat".
At present, the number of viewers had reached over 200. Most of them were pulled from his chat rooms and forums, and some were pulled from other places, while a small amount was just dropping by accident.
Meng Fan's content was indeed not bad, but gender bending Ace hurt some people's glass hearts—as many distasteful comments began to emerge.
Additionally, due to the attraction he had garnered from his stream, several of the netizens from his chat rooms were willing to help share and pull people to his stream.
The more people, the more talk. He really needed some management.
After finding the username AiyoNotFat, Meng Fan set him as a moderator and began coloring.
AiyoNotFat was not new to the streaming industry. On 8th Station he was a UL55 account user, reaching the top 100 rankings list. If the contribution received value had been listed in the station, then he would not be ranked. But this month, he had already given out10,000,000 gourds, each donation equalling one golden gourd; in other words, he'd spent 10,000 HXB.
What a whale!
After picking up the moderator role, he immediately comboed 100 continuous supportive towels (Valued 2000 Gold gourds each), then quietly kicked and banned some unruly spectators, mute mute mute...
"Fifteen minutes! You're amazing!"
"I was so stunned watching the process, but I still want to say that this host is poisonous!"
"I've seen many drawing streams, but it's my first time seeing one this savage!"
"I always thought that watching drawing live streams was like watching people fish, waiting forever just for that final moment. I didn't think I'd encounter an electric fish!"
"The one who called him an electric fish hahahahahaha has some balls! So far, I haven't had the patience to watch an artist stream from start to finish, but today I've seen it all!"
"He stopped? F**k aren't you missing something?!"
"You're missing another bullsh*t Japanese sentence!"
"Hahahaha, Meng Fatty probably only knows that one line!"
...
When Meng Fan finished the second painting and prepared for the third, the number of online users in the channel had already gone up to 300. This turnout was much better than what Meng Fan had imagined.
"Chubby Meng, it's really you! Are you just playing around, or planning to do this long term?"
Before he put his pencil down, he received another WeChat message. It was also a netizen who he knew through 8th Station, username AmiTofu.
"Long time no see."
Meng Fan thought of the requirements for completing [Famous Streamer] and became agitated. To complete the final task of getting 100 million viewers, his stream might never end.
"I understand, let's arrange it!"
Meng Fan thought Ami was just going to help him pull viewers, but he didn't think she would straight toss a "Center spot halo" worth 450,000 gourds at him.
—AmiTofu has donated a "center spot halo" on channel 131225, hurry and come help the stream host-level up, you can receive rewards too!
Once this gift was sent, it triggered a lottery throughout the entire site.
In order to place a name in the drawing, it was necessary to click into Meng Fan's stream, and so his viewer count shot up.