Late that night.

Zhao Xuming was at home wearing loose pajamas, preparing to rest. After work that afternoon, he and Eric had paid an undercover visit to Tuoguan Fitness, and seeing how the smart fitness clothing rack was being completely ignored made them feel much more at ease.

Although the smart fitness clothing rack itself wasn’t directly related to the upcoming money-burning war between the two companies, according to their intelligence, the large stockpile of unsold fitness equipment would put severe pressure on Tenda Group’s cash flow.

This meant that when it came to burning money, Tenda would definitely need to be more cautious.

Zhao Xuming and Eric both suspected that Tenda Group’s 515 Gaming Festival would likely be all bark and no bite—mostly hype with discounts that wouldn’t significantly outshine the series of promotions that Finger Company was launching.

Unlike other industries, games didn’t incur additional costs once the skins were created, but selling them too cheaply would stimulate players’ spending enthusiasm. If players spent excessively during this period, their future consumption would decrease. From a long-term perspective, this would still reduce overall revenue.

That’s why gaming companies generally never offered discounts when new games were just launched. They would typically wait several months until the hype had died down before using discounts to attract players who hadn’t experienced the game yet.

With Tenda Group’s cash flow already somewhat tight, the promotional strategy for the 515 Gaming Festival certainly couldn’t be too aggressive, or the risk would be too great.

Of course, Mr. Pei’s style had always been unpredictable. How many competitors had tried to predict Mr. Pei’s actions? All had failed, and the consequences of their failures had been extremely serious.

So Zhao Xuming didn’t dare to be complacent. He would have to wait until the specific promotion details for the 515 Gaming Festival were announced before he could truly relax.

As for Eric, he was probably keeping an eye on developments as well.

Zhao Xuming checked the time—it was already past midnight.

There was no need to deliberately search for the specific rules of the 515 Gaming Festival because all of Tenda’s game websites and most of their business websites, anything remotely connected to the 515 Gaming Festival, were displaying announcements for this new holiday event!

Even the GOG game client was showcasing the 515 Gaming Festival promotion in the most prominent position, with detailed rules just a click away.

Zhao Xuming immediately clicked to check.

Just five minutes later, his expression had turned grim. His previously calm demeanor gave way to shock.

But amid his shock, there was also a hint of confusion, even delight.

The reason for his shock was that these detailed rules completely exceeded his expectations!

Originally, Zhao Xuming and Eric had speculated that Tenda Group, constrained by cash flow pressure, would only be able to offer something similar to IOI’s promotional activities even if they decided to go ahead with the 515 Gaming Festival.

In other words, in-game purchases would still be sold, just at a discount.

It could be a direct discount or promotions that effectively worked as discounts, but either way, they would still need to collect some money to recover their losses.

But the 515 Gaming Festival activities weren’t about discounts at all—they were giving things away completely free!

The most frightening part was that there were no rules directly related to discounts whatsoever!

The only rule that was remotely related to discounts was the “random free purchases of Tenda games,” but even this was a relatively marginal provision among all the activity rules.

All the other rules could basically be summarized as: players would randomly receive gifts just for logging in and playing games. These might be in-game items, or they might even be straight-up cash!

Zhao Xuming could hardly believe it. He read through these rules again, word by word, from beginning to end.

He considered some potential problems, such as how they would handle people with malicious intent registering bot accounts to take advantage of the system.

But then he realized that for the experienced Tenda, these would likely be easily solvable minor issues.

Mr. Pei had always been very professional when it came to combating scalpers and deal hunters.

Long ago, Mr. Pei had already demonstrated remarkable foresight by integrating all of Tenda Group’s accounts. Whether for games, novels, live streaming, the Tenda Life APP, or even the TPDb website, everything used a Tenda account to log in.

On the TPDb website, each Tenda account had a completely different weight.

Simply put, accounts that were registered earlier, spent more, and had been used longer had higher weight, while newly registered accounts that hadn’t been used much or showed suspicious behavior would have very low weight.

Even if people with ulterior motives cultivated accounts, since they operated in batches using bots, their behavior patterns and the characteristics of their cultivated accounts would be very obvious and easy to screen out.

This way, although they advertised “random free purchases” and “random cash gifts,” in reality, accounts with higher weight would receive better rewards, while those with lower weight might symbolically receive as little as 10 cents or even nothing at all.

For Tenda, which held the final interpretation rights for the activities, these were all very normal operations. Players wouldn’t resent this either, since they all had genuine high-weight accounts, and cracking down on deal hunters was in their interest too.

With only so many benefits to go around, if deal hunters took them, real players would get less. Everyone understood this principle.

So, there was no problem with these rules.

The issue was that this promotion was just too generous!

Even though there were many ways to block bots and deal hunters, Tenda had such a massive user base that if everyone logged in to claim benefits, the cost would still be astronomical.

And contrary to what Zhao Xuming and Eric had predicted, this 515 Gaming Festival wasn’t about “discounts” at all—it was about “giving away for free”!

This meant that the price Tenda Group was paying would be significantly higher than what Finger Company and Longyu Group were paying!

Originally, Zhao Xuming had thought that if Tenda Group used “discounted prices” for their activities, then both sides would have a lot of room to maneuver in the money-burning war.

For example, one side could offer 40% off, the other 50% off, but since the value of items in the two games was different, players would find it hard to tell which offer was more generous.

Moreover, the discount levels could be adjusted as needed, and increasing the discount slightly would still be completely manageable.

But Tenda had gone straight to giving things away for free!

This way, although the value of items in the two games was different, players could easily see which was better value when one side was offering “discounts” and the other was “giving away for free.”

Obviously, Tenda’s straightforward giveaways seemed more generous!

The price war hadn’t officially started yet, but players’ attention had already been drawn to Tenda’s 515 Gaming Festival. Even IOI’s veteran players were envious and unimpressed with IOI’s activities. How could they compete now?

Right from the start, they had been completely outmaneuvered by their opponent!

But amidst his confusion, Zhao Xuming also felt there might be a glimmer of hope, even an opportunity.

Mr. Pei’s approach was indeed grand, but it would make Tenda’s financial problems even more serious.

Originally, discount activities could still help them recover some funds, but Mr. Pei, in order to outdo Finger Company and Longyu Group, insisted on making everything free.

The result of putting on a brave face while suffering inside was often having to swallow your own teeth.

But was Mr. Pei just bluffing, or was he confident and in control?

No one could guess.

As Zhao Xuming was pondering this, his phone on the table rang.

Sure enough, it was Eric calling.

“Mr. Zhao, you’ve seen the specific rules for the 515 Gaming Festival, right?” Eric’s voice was low, clearly indicating that this matter had also completely caught him by surprise.

Zhao Xuming nodded, “Yes, I have. What should we do?”

Although Eric’s voice was somewhat serious, it remained steady: “No need to rush, let’s observe for a while.”

“Who will win this money-burning war depends on who can burn money longer. The 515 Gaming Festival indeed completely outshines us in terms of initial benefits, but how long can they sustain such benefits? Even if they can hold on for a week and see the entire gaming festival through, what about after that? Will Tenda still have the resources to respond to our next round of offensives?”

“This is a long-term war. He who laughs last, laughs best!”

Zhao Xuming hurriedly said, “Understood!”

“Mr. Pei’s move can be described as burning his bridges, a last-ditch battle. Although it can greatly boost morale in the short term, it lacks staying power.”

“In other words, Mr. Pei’s approach doesn’t leave himself much room or retreat. As long as we persist, the longer we persist, the more advantageous it will be for us!”

“I will constantly observe Tenda’s movements and not miss any clues!”

After hanging up, Zhao Xuming felt much more settled.

Earlier, he had been somewhat frightened by the benefits of the 515 Gaming Festival. It was like being at a gambling table—just as his side had tentatively added a few chips, Mr. Pei went all-in on the other side. This had put enormous psychological pressure on Zhao Xuming and made him deeply doubt his prepared strategy.

But now, thinking more calmly, it seemed this matter could be interpreted differently.

Tenda Group’s money couldn’t appear out of thin air, could it? It would run out eventually. The smart fitness clothing racks were piling up in inventory, the movie and game of “Mission and Choice” were still in the payback period, plus Tenda’s other industries under development… No matter how you calculated it, Tenda shouldn’t have much money left.

So was Mr. Pei putting on a show with this move?

Making it seem like his side had ample funds and wasn’t afraid of a price war at all, trying to scare off Finger Company and Longyu Group?

Mr. Pei was quite cunning, playing mind games with a mix of truth and deception.

As long as Finger Company and Longyu Group’s money-spending activities could continue, let’s see if Tenda would still have money to spend after their week-long 515 Gaming Festival!

The more Zhao Xuming thought about it, the more he felt that the situation wasn’t as pessimistic as he had initially thought—in fact, it was looking quite optimistic!

With his mind at ease, he went to bed peacefully.