After the call ended, Liu Qinghe moved like a gust of wind.
Within half a day, Tidal TV’s splash ads and homepage banners had all been replaced with a single, aggressively confrontational poster.
【Authenticity Test in the Beachcombing Zone: Iceberg Koi VS Sweetheart Beachcombing, Same Live Stream, Who’s Swimming Naked?】
The moment the news broke, related topics exploded.
Su Niannian: the undisputed queen of the beachcombing zone with 800,000 followers.
Jiang Yu: a newcomer with just over 3,000 followers, her account still in the countdown to being unblocked.
To most people, this wasn’t a showdown at all—it was a sacrificial public execution arranged by the platform to quell the controversy.
Su Niannian’s fanbase was in full celebration mode:
“LMAO, the platform itself is coming down to smack a fraud?”
“3,000 followers daring to provoke my 800K streamer? Let her learn what a dimensionality reduction strike means!”
“Already reserved. Waiting for the ‘Unlucky One’ script to flop and her to quit the internet on the spot!”
Jiang Yu’s 3,000-odd unlucky fans refused to back down, carving a bloody path through the comment section:
“Who’s provoking who? Some people only know how to play the victim to keep fans. No real skill, but number one at reporting others!”
“Just wait. My Sister Jiang will rub some people’s faces into the sand!”
At the height of the storm, Su Niannian updated her status with a sweet selfie in a brand-new pink beachcombing suit.
“So excited to exchange tips with the newbie sister! Hope everyone stays friendly and enjoys the ocean’s gifts together~ [heart]”
The top comment underneath read: “Niannian is beautiful and kind! That amateur doesn’t even deserve to carry your shoes!”
In just three days, this so-called “century provocation” live showdown had surpassed 200,000 reservations nationwide.
The day of the showdown, early morning.
On the platform-designated uninhabited reef, the sea breeze carried a faint saltiness.
The rules were simple: same stretch of sea, each fending for themselves, two hours on the clock, winner decided by total market value of the haul.
Su Niannian’s team had chartered a luxury speedboat. She herself wore a full set of top-tier professional diving gear—diving goggles, beachcombing tongs, underwater searchlight… Her equipment was laid out in a neat row on the rocks, an impressive display.
On the other side, Old Chen’s battered sampan chugged to shore, and Jiang Yu hopped off.
Same clothes as always, a pair of canvas shoes on her feet.
Her entire arsenal consisted of one bamboo basket and one oyster knife.
The moment both streams went live, the stark contrast between the two scenes sent the bullet comments into a frenzy.
“Holy crap! Look at the gear gap—one’s special forces, the other’s a militia!”
“Niannian is so professional! This is what a top streamer looks like!”
“What’s going on with Jiang Yu’s side? Just a basket? Did she come for a picnic?”
The live stream officially began.
Su Niannian immediately slipped into character, flashing her signature sweet smile at the camera: “Hi babies! Today we’re taking on this unfamiliar stretch of sea! The tides here are typical semi-diurnal, with a northerly wind. We can start with the leeward rocky area!”
As she walked, she delivered flawless professional commentary, and her stream’s viewer count quickly surged past 50,000.
Jiang Yu’s stream, by contrast, was quiet except for the sound of the waves.
She didn’t say a word, silently making her way to the other side of the beach, leaving the camera only a slim, silent silhouette.
Her 30,000-plus viewers were mostly there to watch the spectacle.
[So this is how it starts? A mute stream?]
[LOL, is she too guilty to speak?]
[Props buried yet? Hurry up and start your act!]
For the first thirty minutes, the battle went exactly as expected.
Su Niannian, drawing on her rich experience, dug up a few conch shells, a handful of clams, and caught a palm-sized swimming crab.
They were small fry, but enough to prop up her experienced persona, with her stream flooded by endless “Niannian is amazing!” praise.
As for Jiang Yu…
She just walked along the beach, occasionally flipping over a rock. Empty underneath. Flipping another. Still nothing.
The bullet comments began to stir.
“No way? The Unlucky One’s luck ran out today?”
“It’s over, it’s over. Change of location and the koi’s glow is gone?”
Su Niannian’s fans swarmed in immediately, their comments dripping with schadenfreude.
“Told you it was scripted. Change the map and the act falls apart!”
“Can’t keep the act up anymore, huh? HAHAHAHA!”
“Just quit the internet already. Stop embarrassing yourself!”
Jiang Yu’s own fans were frantic, but couldn’t type a single word of rebuttal.
Just as everyone assumed the showdown would end in a total rout, at the end of the fifteenth minute, Jiang Yu stopped.
She walked to the most remote corner of the reef, where a hidden tidal pool had just been exposed by the receding tide.
To anyone else, it looked utterly unremarkable—even barren.
But in her vision, that small tidal pool was practically paved with dazzling golden light.
She crouched down, said nothing, and got straight to work.
First pry.
The oyster knife cracked open a rock, and two giant sea urchins, each larger than an adult’s fist, lay exposed beneath.
The bullet comments froze for a second.
“Holy shit! Are those horse dung sea urchins? How do they get that big?!”
Second dig.
She reached into a crevice between the rocks and pulled out one, then another, then another… a whole nest of wild abalone, seven or eight of them, each one a top-tier specimen of five-head size or better!
[Am I blind? Is that an abalone nest? She’s just reaching in and grabbing them??]
Third haul.
She lifted out a golden-yellow crab from beneath a pile of seaweed, its body gleaming brilliantly in the sunlight.
[Golden crab! A wild golden crab! Isn’t that thing supposed to be a one-in-ten-thousand mutation chance?!]
The tide of the bullet comments reversed in an instant!
[Here it comes! That familiar flavor, same recipe as always!]
[I told you! Sister Jiang was just warming up, finding her rhythm!]
[Everyone stand up! Iceberg Koi is going all out!]
Su Niannian’s livestream viewer count plummeted at a visible rate.
Ten thousand, twenty thousand… they all ran off to watch Jiang Yu!
For the next hour or more, it completely became Jiang Yu’s personal show.
She moved like she was harvesting vegetables from her own backyard—simple, direct, efficient, without a single wasted word.
She pulled two plump, thorn-covered sea cucumbers from the mud.
She dug out a geoduck clam the size of a washbasin from the sand.
She dragged a lively, leaping tiger grouper out from a rock crevice.
Finally, when she scooped up a brilliantly colored ornate spiny lobster over half a meter long from a deep pool, the entire internet froze.
The moment the lobster broke the surface, its massive tail whipped hard, sending water splashing all the way onto the camera lens. Even the platform’s hired cameraman couldn’t help but gasp.
[Ornate spiny lobster… alive! That one alone has to be worth over ten thousand, right?!]
[Crazy! Is this even beach foraging? This is printing money from the sea!]
In the corner of the screen, the platform’s real-time market value comparison had already become a brutal sight.
Su Niannian: Total market value approximately 1,500 yuan.
Jiang Yu: Total market value already exceeded 30,000 yuan.
[A twenty-fold gap… I’m bad at math, someone tell me is this even reasonable?]
[She’s gone berserk! This isn’t a showdown, this is a one-sided slaughter!]
[Su Niannian: I came, but it’s like I never did.]
Meanwhile, in Su Niannian’s livestream, the atmosphere dropped to freezing point.
The camera clearly captured her entire progression—from a stiff smile, to her lips curling downward, to her face turning ashen. The jealousy and venom in her eyes nearly spilled out of the screen.
The bullet comments changed tone too.
[Don’t worry, Niannian’s just off her game today.]
[Safety first, the harvest doesn’t matter.]
But one comment cut through the false harmony like a dagger.
[Wait… don’t you guys think this is just Niannian’s usual level? Those videos of her big catches… could they have been… pre-buried?]
That accusation pierced the paper-thin veil.
Just then, Su Niannian’s third-party cameraman’s lens inadvertently swept across the speedboat in the distance.
In the frame, her assistant was anxiously gesturing at her, secretly making a hand signal while pointing toward the rocks in a certain direction.
This image was screenshotted and screen-recorded by countless netizens, spreading like wildfire through the bullet comments!
[Holy crap! Proof! Off-screen coaching!]
[So who’s the real fraud?!]
[The fraud-buster got busted herself—best joke of the year, hahahaha!]
Su Niannian stared at the screen full of mockery and accusations, her mind going blank with a buzz.
Two hours were up.
An emotionless electronic voice sounded simultaneously in both livestreams, announcing the final results.
“This showdown’s outcome: Streamer Sweetheart Beach Foraging, total harvest market value 1,800 yuan. Streamer Unlucky Bastard’s Beach Foraging Diary, total harvest market value 38,560 yuan.”
The gap exceeded twenty-one times.
Before ending the stream, Jiang Yu finally looked up at the camera.
Her face remained as calm as ever. She simply said the only complete sentence of the day, flatly:
“Verification complete. That’s all.”
With that, the screen went black.
And the entire internet erupted.
#IcebergKoiVSSweetheartBeachForaging#
#SuNiannianAssistantOffScreenDirections#
#UnluckyBastardIsTheRealBigShot#
Three trending topics crashed into the top ten on the hot search list.
Jiang Yu’s follower count skyrocketed from 3,200 to 55,000 overnight!
In the dressing room of the luxury yacht, Su Niannian smashed everything she could smash, sobbing in complete breakdown.
After crying, she wiped away her tears, picked up her phone, and dialed a number. Her voice was icy cold: “Help me look into this Jiang Yu. Dig three feet into the ground if you have to—I want her background uncovered! There’s no way she’s just an ordinary person…”
At the same time, Deer Antler Island.
In the dead of night, Jiang Yu stood alone by the shore, letting the sea breeze tousle her hair.
Tonight, that silver-white glow from the deep sea was brighter and clearer than ever before.
It was no longer a blurry halo of light.
She could even vaguely make out that the outline of the glow faintly resembled a tall, slender human figure.
An inexplicable tremor rose from the depths of her heart.
She could feel it… an ancient and powerful call from the depths of the sea.
It was calling to her!