Although Sister Zoe had turned off her livestream, the players' yearning and excitement for Sekiro couldn't be switched off so easily.
The netizens who watched the broadcast were still hyped up. With the game not yet released, they had nowhere to vent their energy—so they began sharing Sister Zoe's recorded livestream for repeated viewing.
In no time, the replay videos skyrocketed to the top ten most viewed on major video platforms.
Other content creators even began analyzing Sekiro in-depth, using Sister Zoe's footage to predict the full plot, future bosses, and possible game mechanics.
Netizens eagerly listened to the analyses. After all, they couldn't play yet—this was the next best thing!
Honestly, they were suffering.
Overseas viewers were just as captivated. Although the game's Chinese setting and language left them a bit confused about the story, they could easily tell just how incredible Sekiro was, just from the gameplay alone.
Within a few hours, every major Chinese social media platform had Sekiro trending at the top of the charts!
The game hadn't even released yet, and people were already making fan art and pairing up characters:
Yuko × Wolf, Eve × Wolf, Sculptor × Wolf, even Yuko × Eve...
The shipping energy was insane—more intense than anything even Deep Sea Trek had generated!
Meanwhile, overseas, at Valve's headquarters, the director had once again gathered the staff to watch Sister Zoe's livestream, just as he had during Deep Sea Trek.
When the stream ended, the entire room fell into stunned silence.
They couldn't compete.
There wasn't even a comparison.
Sekiro had completely redefined the action game genre!
Sure, in older games, you could perform flashy moves against enemies—but you just pressed buttons on a controller and watched animations happen.
But Sekiro?
It let players actually move. Actually swing swords. Actually fight!
The level of immersion and realism wasn't even on the same planet.
The director even thought, "You could record gameplay footage and literally market it as a martial arts movie."
"How the hell did such a monster studio even exist in this industry?!" he thought, practically tearing his hair out.
Last month, when Deep Sea Trek came out, it had already caused Valve's player base to drop sharply.
Now with Sekiro looming on release day?
They were finished.
"Team, this is a life-and-death situation for our company. Any suggestions?" the director asked solemnly.
The employees, after a beat, all raised their hands and gave their thoughts:
"Keep reaching out to [New World] Studio—see if they'll agree to some kind of partnership!"
"Work even harder to reverse-engineer their tech. Maybe we can eventually create our own VR engine!"
"And when Sekiro drops... just buy it and play it hard!"
"...Eh?"
The director had been nodding approvingly until that last line.
He glared around the room but couldn't figure out who said it.
Still... he had to admit. That wasn't wrong either.
Even if they were competitors, there was no denying it—Sekiro looked like pure, addictive fun.
It wasn't just Valve feeling this way.
Nintendo, Ubisoft, Tencent—they all watched Sister Zoe's stream too. And every single executive came to the same conclusion:
We can't beat them. We're not even in the same league.
The somatosensory suit assist technology alone had already put [New World] decades ahead.
But no matter how much these companies sighed or grumbled, deep down, every one of their employees couldn't wait to play Sekiro themselves.
Meanwhile...
At 1:00 a.m., inside a hospital inpatient ward in Shanghai.
Sister Zoe slowly opened her eyes, staring blankly at the white ceiling.
The air smelled strongly of disinfectant, and the muted sounds of footsteps and hushed conversations filled the air.
"Where... am I?" she muttered groggily.
"You're awake..." came an old, raspy voice next to her.
"To be honest, you've crossed over. You're now in the world of Sekiro. You've become a one-armed wolf."
"WHAT?!"
Still disoriented, Sister Zoe's heart jumped into her throat. The voice even sounded eerily like the Sculptor's!
Panicked, she immediately checked her left hand.
Was it a prosthetic now?!
To her immense relief, her hand was still fair, slender, and attached to a normal human arm—only with an IV drip secured by medical tape.
So... just an infusion. Not a mechanical arm.
"Whew... scared me to death," Sister Zoe exhaled.
"Pfft. You actually believed it," chuckled a younger voice.
She turned her head and saw Charlie sitting beside her, grinning mischievously.
"Charlie..." she muttered, her memories slowly returning. She remembered ending her stream, sitting in her chair, asking Charlie for something—and then everything went black.
She couldn't recall anything after that.
"Here, drink some water." Charlie handed her a warm glass of water.
Sister Zoe sat up carefully, leaning against the pillow. She sipped the water—neither too cold nor too hot, just right. Charlie's carefulness warmed her heart.
She gave him a soft, grateful look—only to find him looking at her like she was some sort of idiot.
No, not just an idiot—a special idiot.
Did she misunderstand? Maybe it was because she fainted?
Feeling suddenly uneasy, she quickly asked, "Charlie, what's wrong with me? Is it something serious?"
"Serious? Pfft." Charlie snorted. "You've got a serious case of being an idiot."
"Hey! I fainted! Don't joke about serious stuff!" Sister Zoe protested, pouting.
"Serious my ass!" Charlie shook his head.
"I've seen people faint from heatstroke. I've seen people faint from exhaustion.
But I've NEVER seen someone faint from... starvation."
"...Starvation?" Sister Zoe blinked.
Then it clicked.
Right—after the livestream, she'd felt incredibly hungry...
"The doctor said you exercised too much, barely ate anything all day, and passed out from low blood sugar," Charlie explained, spreading his hands helplessly.
"Ah, um..." Sister Zoe scratched her head awkwardly.
She tried to play the victim: "It's not my fault! Your Sekiro was just too much fun—I couldn't stop playing!"
Charlie raised his hand as if to smack her with a big slap of reality.
Sister Zoe immediately flinched, quickly changing the subject: "O-oh! By the way, what were they giving me in the IV?"
Charlie smirked.
"Your... precious fluids," he teased in a fake serious voice.
"????" Sister Zoe looked at him, utterly confused.
"Glucose," he said, rolling his eyes.
"What else could it be? You starved yourself, genius."
"Oh..." Sister Zoe mumbled.
Charlie handed her a pack of bread and milk.
"Here. Eat something."
The moment she smelled food, her stomach growled loudly. She grabbed the bread eagerly.
Her hands were a little clumsy with the IV still in, so Charlie punctured the straw into the milk carton for her and held it to her mouth.
Nibbling bread and sipping milk, Sister Zoe finally felt alive again.
"You scared me half to death, you know that?" Charlie grumbled.
"You locked yourself in your room for hours.
I thought you were resting—until I checked and found you collapsed on the floor next to your chair.
Face pale, cold sweat everywhere."
"I had to carry you to the car and rush you to the hospital myself.
It was so bad that I didn't even have time to register you properly.
I just sprinted straight into the ER, shouting:
'Doctor! Doctor! Someone's dying here!!!'"
Sister Zoe turned red, half mortified, half amused.
"And then what happened?" she asked weakly.
Charlie snorted.
"The doctor rushed over, checked you, then rolled his eyes and said:
'Relax. She's just starving.'"
"Pfffft!!!"
Sister Zoe couldn't hold it in—she burst out laughing.
"Yeah, laugh it up," Charlie grumbled.
"You have any idea how many people gathered around? All of them thought it was some life-or-death situation!
When they heard it was just hypoglycemia, they laughed so hard they almost needed emergency treatment themselves!"
Sister Zoe laughed even harder, nearly spitting out her milk.
Seeing Charlie glare at her like he wanted to smack her, she quickly wiped her mouth, straightened her face, and said solemnly:
"I'm sorry, Charlie...
It won't happen again."
"Hmph. Next time you faint from hunger, I'm leaving you there," he said, pretending to be stern.
"But then you'd lose your cute, lovable big sister!" Sister Zoe said, batting her eyelashes.
Charlie deadpanned, "Losing such a dumb sister would honestly be a blessing."
Sister Zoe chuckled, finishing her bread and milk.
Charlie, meanwhile, scrolled through his phone.
Almost every trending topic online was related to Sekiro.
He smirked.
Foolish mortals. Worship me more!
Then something else caught his eye.
"Huh... already? Someone's posted Sekiro fanart on P Station?! And it's pretty spicy too!"
"Wait, seriously?" Charlie muttered, intrigued.
He glanced over to make sure Sister Zoe wasn't paying attention, then quietly leaned against the wall and opened P Station.
Sure enough, the homepage was flooded with Tifa fanart—Tifa in various outfits, most of them very... creative.
Charlie wasn't surprised. Ever since Tifa's release in Deep Sea Trek, she had taken the internet by storm.
Her popularity had exploded across all fandom spaces.
Charlie briefly considered whether he should release Tifa's 3D model to the public...
It would make a lot of fans happy, but also risk exposing [New World]'s modeling technology.
Hmm... better not.
Maybe he could secretly upload some short Tifa clips himself, using a burner account...
Cough. Focus, Charlie, focus.
He scrolled down and finally found the Sekiro fanart.
"Hmm, this Eve × Wolf art looks pretty nice."
"...Wait, what's this? Yuko × Wolf?!
Bro, she's like twelve—have some decency!"
"And what the hell—who paired the Sculptor with the Wolf?!"
Charlie's expression froze.
He looked just like that old meme of an old man glaring at his phone on the subway.
Several times over.
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