Chapter 452: Donating Millions

Chapter 452 Donating a Million

Meng Fan had been very busy lately, but no matter how busy, he always made it back for meals or ate out with Wu Tong. Wu Tong was also busy; besides preparing for her senior year graduation exhibition, she had already been officially hired as a restoration artist for ancient paintings at the Palace Museum. For now, she had no assignments, but once tasks came up, it was common for her to be away for ten days, half a month, or even longer.

The profession of restoring ancient paintings certainly didn’t pay well; Wu Tong did it purely out of passion. Of course, neither Meng Fan nor his family or friends ever said anything like, “This doesn’t make money, why are you doing it?” They were all very supportive.

These days, Wu Tong had another matter on her mind: the annual “West Lake Mini Marathon Charity Run” was about to start again. Last year, Wu Tong was one of the organizers of the mini marathon charity run. This time, she accepted the invitation without hesitation, as she had originally joined the event out of interest, unrelated to her current popularity.

Besides, Wu Tong’s goal was to promote fitness and running. Now that she had more influence and reach, wasn’t that even better?

As for Meng Fan, knowing Wu Tong was busy with this, as a qualified devoted admirer, he signed up immediately, and he had to raise his hand to do so.

Thus, on the day of the West Lake Mini Marathon Charity Run, the square in front of the Huanglong Sports Center, the starting point, was packed with people. The lineup of media reporters was more than a hundred times larger than last year!

This was only because the organizers announced Meng Fan’s participation just one day before the run; otherwise, the mini marathon route would have been “stuffed” with people. Even so, a huge crowd of onlookers lined the entire route.

There were many people along the mini marathon route, and even more on the 8 Station live stream. Yes, Meng Fan was finally streaming again!

Although the announcement was made only an hour before the stream started, a massive number of people still flooded in. 8 Station added four extra lines for Meng Fan’s stream, but they were still overwhelmed. When Meng Fan went live, the online viewer count instantly shot past two million and kept climbing.

“Oh my god, a once-in-a-lifetime event!”

“Finally waited for you, glad I didn’t give up!”

“I thought I’d never see Meng Fatty here again! Crying!”

“Haha, last time I saw Meng Fatty, he was still Meng Fatty; now he’s not Meng Fatty anymore, he’s Meng Buff!”

“Don’t mention it, last time Meng Fatty was ours, now he belongs to the whole world, damn!”

“How long has it been since the last stream! We understand you’re preparing for the Olympics, but damn, you didn’t even stream the last signing event. You look down on our spending power in the stream, right? Bros, let’s boost the single-volume sales!”

“Bought a hundred copies of Volume Nine!”

“Let’s go, pump up the sales of Volume Nine, hahaha, then report Tie Shen for fake sales!”

“I just want to ask, how many copies do I need to buy to get a signature? I’m in the UK, can’t make it to the signing event!”

“Hey, UK bro, I’ve got signed single volumes for sale, want them? Eighteen bucks after sleep! I can deliver a thousand miles!”

“Haha, I’m on site, ready to run with Tie Shen! What do you think, should I trip him?”

“Bro, I once tripped over a passing car on the road. Later, well, I’m now a semi-cyborg!”

“Haha, if you can’t, you can trip the ‘commentator’!”

“Say! Was it you who tripped the ‘commentator’ at the critical moment last year, making everyone miss the finish line shot?”

“This keyboard warrior is Tie Shen’s best buddy. Roughly speaking, tripping him is like tripping Tie Shen!”

“No problem! If you can trip Tie Shen, you’re the strongest in Asia, no, the strongest in the world! Go for it, kid!”

“...”

The stream was lively, and so was the scene.

A huge number of people came this time, with many participating in groups. There were cheerleading squads and dance clubs from major universities in Hangzhou, teams from various companies and government agencies wearing matching uniforms, and even the Zhejiang Provincial Team showed up. From a promotional standpoint, this charity run had a massive impact.

Moreover, there were so many media outlets on site for live coverage, with updates posted instantly online, making it a hot topic on Weibo.

“Sorry, everyone, for not streaming for so long.”

The mini marathon had already started. Meng Fan ran while speaking to the phone held by Zhang Zhouwei, who was riding a scooter. “No excuses. Later, I’ll raffle off three hundred signed single volumes in the stream. If that’s not enough, I’ll raffle another three hundred in the fan group. Still not enough, I’ll raffle three hundred on Weibo too.”

Meng Fan wasn’t going to go all out in this mini marathon like before; he had no interest in being first. Of course, if he did go all out, with his current speed and stamina boosted by various attributes, taking first place wouldn’t be a big problem.

Despite still weighing over 200 pounds, his speed was genuinely not slow, and his endurance was excellent, easily matching the national first-class athlete standard for ten kilometers.

He didn’t aim to win, just ran easily, interacting with the crowd on site and the viewers in the stream, having a good time.

Even so, Meng Fan crossed the finish line in just 35 minutes, close to the national second-class athlete standard.

Wu Tong didn’t run this time; after organizing at the start, she went to the finish line to oversee the fundraising. Seeing Meng Fan arrive, she smiled and handed him a towel to wipe his sweat, greeting the stream viewers openly and naturally.

This time, Zhang Zhouwei was steady; he didn’t fall at a critical moment and smoothly captured Meng Fan’s entire mini marathon run. Of course, there was plenty of “nonsense commentary” along the way. Having millions of people listening to him talk was exhilarating, and the more exhilarating it got, the more he rambled. He even came up with a string of witty remarks, throwing out jokes and references so fast that many viewers in the stream were left stunned, only catching up after a long pause, missing several punchlines.

After enjoying Wu Tong’s towel wipe, Meng Fan naturally walked over to the donation booth and donated a million. This fundraising was for building schools in remote mountain villages. Meng Fan’s million could help at least a thousand mountain village students.

Everyone gave him a thumbs-up for donating a million this time, but in terms of surprise, it was far less than last year when he donated ten thousand. After all, everyone thought that since Meng Fan made fifty million from one ad, donating a million was nothing—a very realistic perspective.

Meng Fan didn’t care much, even if some thought he was showing off. It wasn’t just to complete a task, nor was it about some lofty human brilliance. It was just that after reaching a certain status and level, social responsibility naturally increased.

Three days after the West Lake Mini Marathon ended, Meng Fan flew from Hangzhou to the capital. Traveling with him were three members of the Zhejiang Judo Team, sent by Dean Zhan to join Meng Fan in an exchange activity with the Japanese Judo Team.

(End of Chapter)