The thing is..... I believe China needs to build up its soft power alot more before it tries to leverages its hard power, you'll see the western powers use its hard power in the egregious way possible and face minimal criticism(usually just some grumbling that's forgotten within weeks), let alone actual consequences. First, what they are gonna do? Sanction and invade themselves? China is the only country with enough hard power to do that outside of the west and they are scared shitless at the mere idea of it.
Second, they control the global English media and the most spoken language globally is English and everything reported will naturally be framed in favour themselves and unfavourably against their rivals, plus, their entertainment industry does goes a long way to cushion foreign public opinion against you in neutral countries.
Soft power isn't a thing. It's bullshit created by Western journos and academicians to promote the liberalization of Chinese and other politically 'regressive' nations' media.
Lots of people all over the world watch Hollywood movies, in Brazil in Egypt in Russia in China, yet being a fan of Marvel movies has never convinced anyone to shit on their own country or become strong allies with America. Hell most of the people producing film or music or games in America are far-left liberals that hate America. Even Captain America (Chris Evans) is a far-left liberal opposed to US military spending or conflict of any kind.
Sure, there is diplomatic power (called political power though I don't know why that word is used). That is the alliances with other countries, both economic and military. This diplomatic/political power allows a nation to leverage other nations military, industrial capacity, cognitive abilities, production, population, etc. for many reasons (as long as the alliance is strong enough). The United States has many of these of varying loyalty, but not because people listen to Snoop Dog rap music or pop stars like Justin Bieber, or movies like The Avengers, or have a love of basketball (Kim dynasty anyone?).
They have these alliances for many reasons, some are partly due to shared history, both racial and sociocultural (and similar democratic political structures). Examples include Canada, UK, Australia, NZ. Other alliances are due to trust, the belief that liberal America would never chose to surprise attack or sanction them and that America will always be for a stable unending global order of peace & commerce as long as you follow their general rules. Examples include Japan, S. Korea, India, along with many European nations like Germany, France, Spain, Italy, etc (though those non-Anglo European nations also have some of the shared history aspect as well). Other alliances are due to the belief that they can extract concessions out of a US that is desperate in insuring nations don't get too close to China or Russia. There are many countries like this and they vary over time, depending on how much they feel they can take advantage of US relations. Anyone from Philippines to Egypt.
Of course not all the nations listed above are perfectly allied the US. The Indians maintain officially they are non-aligned (but are moreso desperate for American approval and alliance than they let on) while the S. Koreans maintain extensive military ties with the US (but this is not exactly indicative of their true feelings which are more in-between China and the US, though still leaning US overall).
And of course all these different categories are not set in stone and tend to be flexible. The Persian Gulf nations (Saudi Arabia, UAE, Kuwait, etc.) do not have shared racial/sociocultural/political histories with America, but they certainly have the #2 category; trust in America allowing them a place in the global economic and military community (this trust is eroding as China steps up as an alternative that does not question their human rights issues, a weakness of the United States that it can't help due to its liberal ideals).
