On June 28th at midnight, the new series of NFT project Azuki called Azuki Elemental Beans officially went on sale.

This sale reserved a presale window for Azuki and Beanz holders, followed by a Dutch auction for regular users, starting at a price of 2 ETH. The final price of all three rounds of sales is the same and depends on the final price in the public sale. If it sells out before the public sale, the price will be 2 ETH.

Originally, it was going to be a hot night

However, even though many regular users were ready with their ETH, just like that hot early morning of January 13th last year, despite the page's lag and delay, Azuki Elemental Beans were sold out shortly after the presale window for Azuki holders and the following presale window for BEANZ holders began, even before the public sale window for regular users arrived.

As the sale ended, some users who missed out on Azuki Elemental Beans tried to buy them at a higher price through the secondary market. Based on my observation, bids on Blur were pushed up to around 2.4 ETH shortly after they sold out.

Originally, the story seemed to be going smoothly, with a bustling community and massive fundraising (a total of 20,000 ETH). Everything seemed no different from that night last year. Although the floor prices of Azuki and Beanz fluctuated, considering that some users bought Azuki and BEANZ for short-term gains in order to secure their chance to buy Azuki Elemental Beans, it was expected that these fluctuations would happen after the sale ended.

Opening the image, is it revealing Azuki's underwear?

However, as Azuki Elemental Beans were officially unveiled, the story took a different turn.

Although Azuki Elemental Beans has not disclosed the specific use of the series before its release, the project team only released a promotional video with an explosive art style. However, as a major move after nearly a year of preparation, this disclosure instead gives Azuki Elemental Beans greater room for imagination. Many community users firmly believe that Azuki will take this opportunity to "do something big".

Odaily note: The judgment of well-known Azuki holder "secondary title" before the sale represents the views of many community users, that is, the new series "at least will not be too bad".

However, with the revelation of Azuki Elemental Beans’ content, even the most loyal community users were "broken" when they saw this pile of "small pictures" that are almost completely copied from the original Azuki work (in fact, there are also some new pictures, but the proportion is small).

The two sets of pictures above, one is Azuki, and the other is Azuki Elementals after the opening. For users who are not particularly familiar with Azuki's various traits, what is the difference between these two sets of pictures...

For a while, disappointment, anger, and a feeling of being deceived quickly filled the entire community.

Some users accused Azuki of this "scythe" operation, pointing out that the project team never intended to make something new, but just wanted to reap another wave of benefits —— shortly after the sale ended, the Azuki team quickly transferred the 20,000 ETH raised in this sale.

Even more loyal users expressed their disappointment, directly criticising that they earned a lot of money but didn't want to provide liquidity support.

And users have dug up the past, claiming that Azuki founder ZAGABOND.ETH, who has a history of rug pulls, has "returned to the old business".

There are also onlookers jokingly saying that Azuki can make nearly $40 million just by copy and pasting, and who in the industry can rival this revenue-generating ability.

There are also rational users attempting to objectively analyze the reasons behind Azuki's bizarre move, speculating that it may be due to a royalties war between trading platforms that has made it difficult for the original Azuki series (Azuki, Beanz) to contribute income from royalties to the project. Because users can completely bypass royalties through trading platforms, but Azuki Elementals, as a new contract, can lock in royalties, making its trading value greater than that of the previous Azuki, Beanz.

In summary, as community sentiment crumbles, the entire Azuki series is falling. At the time of writing, the floor price of Azuki is reported to be 9.87 ETH, a 28.29% decrease during the day; the floor price of Beanz is reported to be 0.67 ETH, a 43.06% decrease during the day; Azuki Elementals has also hit the market, temporarily reported at 1.59 ETH; due to the probability of obtaining rare editions, the floor price of Azuki Elemental Beans without an opened image is slightly higher, temporarily reported at 1.81 ETH.

Both buoy and capsizing

After the explosion of community sentiment, the Azuki team finally responded.

Azuki co-founder location tba tweeted an apology, stating that there were flaws in the forging process of Azuki Elementals, severely underestimating the time needed for holders of Azuki and Beanz to participate in the presale of the first and second stages. The duration should have been extended to more than 10 minutes to provide sufficient buffering in case of any problems (which indeed occurred).

However, the apology that missed the point did not receive widespread forgiveness from the community, and more users are still waiting for official explanations from Azuki and ZAGABOND.ETH.

The NFT market is already in a deep bear market, and Azuki's actions not only once again drained the already scarce liquidity, but also caused a trust crisis that dealt a heavy blow to the entire market. As the narrative of small images comes to an end, the NFT industry is urgently seeking new incremental directions. As a top project that has been expected indefinitely, Azuki should have set an example in this regard (just as the community expected), but the operation regarding Azuki Elementals is truly hurtful.

With its excellent art style, Azuki once attracted a group of loyal community users in the previous era of NFTs, and it was these users who propelled Azuki to its current height. But now, Azuki should think about how to appease these "family members" who have been hurt.

Water can carry a boat, but it can also capsize it. This is not just a question of distinguishing between good and bad development, but also a matter of life and death.

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13:51 Update:

Today at noon, Azuki officially released an announcement on Discord regarding the forging and opening of Elementals, stating, "We have heard all the feedback clearly. Team members are working on determining the next steps. You can look forward to a statement and next plan released later tonight. We know the next steps are very important, and we want to do them well. We understand your feelings and frustration. We will continue to fight for the garden, for this brand, for this magical community, and none of these will change."

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18:43 Update:

Azuki once again published a lengthy response and apology on their official Twitter account, and mentioned "One more thing" at the end, accompanied by a cover image of "Green Bean".

At the same time, several community members discovered that a new contract named Green Bean has been deployed on all addresses owned by the Elemental Beans contract. The total number of NFTs is 10,000, and they may be airdropped to Azuki holders.