The next day, Ancient and Modern Evening Post began promoting it with great fanfare. Splashed across the front page was Jung's editorial, "Writing History and Realism Are the Foundation of Trust."

"So the Revivalists are bringing in outside reinforcements now?" one coil spirit scoffed. Even so, it obediently bought a copy.

Its political leanings were complicated. It was once an earnest supporter of Revivalism, and later followed the crowd by declaring itself a Futurist. Yet deep down, it still read Revivalist critiques with the frustrated attitude of someone disappointed in a wayward child.

"Seriously, what am I supposed to say about you people? I could find thirty articles refuting this viewpoint alone. Why are you still reheating old leftovers?"

That was the coil spirit's most common reaction whenever it read Ancient and Modern Evening Post.

It often felt embarrassed by the Revivalists' shortcomings, yet it wasn't sincerely devoted to Futurism either. The complexity of ideology was on full display.

"The Foundation of Trust? Can't tell much from the title."

It clicked its tongue and turned to the front page.

Jung wrote:

[

"Writing only bizarre and fantastical stories may satisfy readers and gratify authors in the short term. But over time, writing detached from reality ultimately destroys readers' trust in the author.

Every fantasy becomes more compelling because it remains connected to reality. In Western fantasy, the relationships between elves, dwarves, and giants mirror human politics. In xuanhuan* fantasy, immortals who shoulder the fate of the world still possess ordinary human emotions. In science fiction, humanity's future can never be separated from humanity's past.

If, instead, your protagonist were replaced by a slime and some monstrous brute, no matter how exciting the story, half your human readers would leave, because the story would have no connection to their own reality.

Why can fictional history satisfy readers? Because readers believe that behind it lies a genuine and often cruel history. If a novelist neglects history while indulging only in fantasy, it is no different from ignoring a building's foundation while polishing its murals. One gust of wind, and the flowers wither.

"When readers consume too many falsehoods, they begin to believe that everything is false. Starving refugees in an imaginary dynasty no longer evoke sympathy. Strange folk legends no longer inspire fear, because readers assume such things could never exist.

When every street is filled with pre-packaged meals, people begin doubting authentic ingredients. When every street is filled with AI, readers stop trusting even what is real. Art loses its meaning and becomes no different from waste paper.

The speed of information will only continue to increase. Only by studying reality and history can we rebuild trust with readers. That is the true meaning of writing history and realism."

]

...

"What a fresh perspective!" the coil spirit exclaimed.

"It doesn't repeat the old cliché about history enlightening readers. Instead, it frames everything through the relationship between readers and authors. That's genuinely original and true. Once I learned that web novels were all being re-created by the Intelligent Machines, I lost much of my enjoyment of reading them. Even though I know many writers work incredibly hard, I simply don't have the energy to dig through them anymore. That's what a loss of trust looks like."

It read the article over several more times, and felt a refreshing current flowed straight through its body. Reading criticism that cut directly to the heart of an issue was as refreshing as drinking ice water in the middle of summer.

Moreover, Jung's article also answered Future Morning Post's challenge from yesterday.

"Didn't you say readers still love unrealistic stories?"

This article argued that readers loved them only because they trusted that the reality beneath them was genuine.

"...Blue Planet..."

The coil spirit rolled the name over in its mind and, for the first time, felt a hint of anticipation for the future.

"Why are you carrying Ancient and Modern Evening Post?" A coworker spotted it on the street and looked surprised. "Aren't you a Futurist supporter?"

The coil spirit instinctively hid the newspaper in embarrassment.

A few seconds later, however, it dramatically shook the paper open again.

"Forget those trivial details. Just come read this review and tell me what you think!"

On Fangquan Peninsula, a large number of neutrals sat between the two factions. One alien creature accepted the newspaper and had only reached the middle of the article. Right as it was starting to find the thing remarkable, the newspaper was abruptly snatched away again.

Looking up, it saw the coil spirit already floating off into the distance.

Only one sentence drifted back:

"If you want to read it, buy your own copy!"

Meanwhile, all across the streets, countless Peninsula residents were reading Ancient and Modern Evening Post.

Sales skyrocketed, reaching their highest level in weeks.

The elderly editor-in-chief watched readers' enthusiastic reactions to Jung's essay with satisfaction and picked up his pen to write another invitation for a featured interview.

Then the intern editor stumbled into the office, shouting:

"Something terrible has happened! Blue Planet has released another article!"

"You need to cultivate your temperament," the old editor sighed. "Don't panic over everything. Which Blue Planet author? What did they publish? Where is it appearing?"

"It's... Blue Planet's... Fuling..." the intern stammered.

The editor immediately recalled his files.

He knew a little about Fuling and asked eagerly, "Is it another essay defending Revivalism?"

"No..." the intern replied. "She's published a short story."

One look at the intern's face told the old editor that this was bad.

"It's in Weekly Literary Selections."

Weekly Literary Selections was the Peninsula's famous neutral publication. It printed works from both schools of thought, and almost all were fiction rather than ideological arguments. Even so, it remained a battlefield that both factions competed fiercely over.

Today happened to be the release day for its newest issue.

Anyone passing a newsstand could see the promotional slogan:

[

The Dying Man

A New Work by Blue Planet's Fuling!

The Pinnacle of Dark Satire!

]

Readers couldn't help wanting to buy it after seeing such exaggerated advertising.

...

A Peninsula reader named Miudan eagerly opened the magazine.

It had previously read Blue Planet's novels and was deeply impressed by Fuling's writing.

It considered itself politically neutral and decided not to look at the ideological label attached to the work, intending to finish the story first and then guess which literary philosophy Fuling truly favored.

[

The Dying Man

By Fuling

Rivisky was a novelist.

Not a prestigious one, merely someone scraping by with contributions to cheap tabloids and literary magazines.

His greatest dream was to publish in a first-rate newspaper.

He had heard that many nobles spent their afternoon tea listening to servants read the papers aloud.

Unfortunately, elite newspapers had extremely strict review standards. If a submitted manuscript contained any serious problem, the Literary Protection Bureau could throw the author into prison without the slightest concern for submission confidentiality.

But today, fortune had unexpectedly smiled upon him.

An excellent article, or at least an excellent one by his standards, had already been scheduled to be read for the General.

Unfortunately, its original author was sitting in prison.

Thus, that name could not appear before the General.

The publisher urgently needed someone else's pen name to fill the impossible-to-explain vacancy.

The replacement needed to be someone with little fame but with a modest publishing history.

Recommended by a literary newsletter, Rivisky, who had never caused trouble before, was selected.

He was so delighted that he couldn't sleep.

He immediately wrote a letter thanking the publisher, then warmly inquired after the health of the newsletter editor and all the editor's relatives, expressing concern down to the smallest detail.

Yet, he still retained some sense of literary ethics.

If he simply put his own name in the author's line, wouldn't that be theft?

So he spent the entire night making small revisions to the manuscript before finally convincing himself that it had become his own work.

He began memorizing it.

Whenever he encountered awkward wording, he pulled out his fountain pen and revised it again.

But the more he revised, the hazier his memory became.

He couldn't even remember which version was the final one.

His heart hung suspended in anxiety.

He paced endlessly around his room, then searched his bookshelf for memory techniques, trying every method imaginable to memorize the article.

"Slap Method: slap yourself whenever you make a mistake..."

"Initial Letter Method: turn every initial into a word..."

"Sleep-Talking Method: play the article over and over like a lullaby..."

But everything only grew worse.

The harder he tried to remember, the more he forgot.

It felt as if a thief were slowly eating his brain.

His vision blurred.

The tiny letters before his eyes began spinning like swarms of flies.

With a loud smack, he slapped at them, only to hit himself squarely across the face.

Instantly, his mind cleared.

The flies were gone.

So was every last word of the article.

The clock ticked relentlessly toward the appointed reading time.

His mouth became dry as dust, while cold sweat streamed down his forehead.

His skin seemed to shrivel by the minute, as though he were about to dehydrate into a corpse at any moment.

"Come on, Rivisky. Today is the day you'll earn great merit. Why do you look like you're heading to the execution grounds?"

The publisher's owner shoved him forward from behind.

Execution grounds!

Rivisky shuddered violently. It was as if the executioner's blade already hung before his eyes.

His lips trembled as strange, incoherent sounds escaped his mouth. In a daze, he stumbled before the General.

The publisher's owner anxiously smacked him on the back of the head several times, and he instantly fell silent, like an alarm clock whose switch had been pressed.

The General drew out his words.

"So... where is your article?"

"Y-yes..."

Rivisky desperately searched his mind, trying to recall the original sentences. By sheer luck, he managed to seize upon one or two fragments of memory and awkwardly pieced them together into something resembling an article.

"We are describing... a mop.

It is a very large mop.

This mop is extraordinarily rare, and its rarity lies in its immense size...

I believe it fills a conceptual void concerning largeness itself and represents a groundbreaking advancement in mop design."

"Very good."

The General nodded.

Then shook his head.

"That's enough. Stop reading. I have other matters to attend to."

Thus, the afternoon tea reading ended in haste.

The publisher's owner was delighted, convinced that Rivisky would surely be entrusted with greater responsibilities in the future.

Rivisky, however, looked utterly drained and insisted on going home to rest.

The publisher's owner kindly saw him onto the bus.

"A mop..."

"A gigantic mop..."

Even on the bus ride home, Rivisky remained obsessed with the absurd words he had recited.

He replayed every sentence over and over, determined to reconstruct what exactly had happened.

"Perhaps enormous would have been more appropriate here?"

The doubts inside his head grew larger and larger, as though they were draining away his very life force.

"An enormous mop... that sounds richer than a gigantic mop..."

"Damn it!"

"I remembered it wrong!"

"It should have been a mop bigger than a mountain!"

Standing before his apartment door, cold sweat soaked through his back.

"I actually recited it incorrectly..."

"I ruined the entire article..."

A wave of dizziness washed over him, then he took a deep breath.

The room smelled stale and moldy from sitting closed too long, carrying the odor of a prison cell.

Was he already in prison?

Was everything else merely his fantasy?

Perhaps when he appeared before the General, the General grew impatient and threw him into the dungeon.

Perhaps there had never been any article at all.

He was already a dying man!

"Ggh..."

A strange groan escaped his throat.

He lurched forward and grabbed the curtains for support as he staggered several steps.

His instinct for survival drove him to open the window for fresh air.

He stepped forward and yanked the curtains open.

Sunlight burst into the room like a sword.

He inhaled deeply, only to remember that behind the curtains was not open air, but a perfectly transparent pane of glass.

The window was firmly embedded in the wall, displaying the scenery outside while not allowing the slightest breeze to enter.

Poor Rivisky.

After the violent emotional turmoil he had endured, he was struck by sudden illness and died alone in his room.

]

...

"What an outstanding piece of satire."

Miudan couldn't help but think about how much it loved Fuling's writing.

"So much packed into such a short story. The imposture of claiming another person's work as one's own. Self-censorship* brought on by excessive scrutiny. Fear of authority so overwhelming that one literally scares oneself to death. And that glass window sealing the room shut... In a prison-like environment, the thing being killed is far more than a single life. Rivisky's death is both a tragedy and an utter farce."

"The target of Fuling's satire is obvious."

"It's Revivalism."

Miudan frowned.

It assumed Fuling would lean toward Revivalism, but why was she criticizing it as well?

Soon enough, it figured out the answer.

Both Futurism and Revivalism contained many internal factions.

Among the Revivalists were hardline traditionalists who worshiped historical orthodoxy and censorship down to the smallest detail, making countless novelists miserable. That was a stain on Revivalism's own history that could never be erased.

Fuling, as a poet who cherished natural expression, naturally disliked such extremism.

Perhaps one glance at it was enough to fill her with disgust.

Satisfied with its own interpretation of Fuling's thinking, Miudan did not investigate further.

Instead, it happily ran off to recommend the story to everyone it knew.

...

Blue Planet Forum

News of Fuling's latest work immediately spread among her loyal readers.

Despite transmission delays, they hurried to download the magazine.

Blue Planet readers interpreted the work somewhat differently from the Peninsula readers.

"Fuling has officially entered the era of fighting with fiction! Place your bets, which author will strike back with a novel next?"

Some were simply enjoying the spectacle.

"Fuling actually supports Futurism and is standing on Canghai's side? That's so unexpected. Did the two of them ever interact before? I wonder if they sit around trading stories about Qiongtian's office antics."

Others were there purely for the drama.

But readers who cared about the relationships among Blue Planet's authors felt their hearts sink.

"Why... why are Fuling and Jung standing in opposing camps? I thought they were going to stay best friends forever!"

"It's hard to say. Neither of them is the type to have a public falling-out. Maybe this disagreement won't affect them much. They're still coworkers, after all. Writers having different opinions is perfectly normal."

"You have no idea how serious disagreements between writers can get. Some stop speaking to their own siblings. Some sever ties with their mentors. Even with a knife at their throat, they refuse to compromise."

"Help! Ancient and Modern Evening Post just published an interview with Ms. Jung asking what she thinks of Fuling's story!"

"They asked Jung how she first met Fuling..."

Every reader's attention shifted instantly.

[

After I started working, Yujin told me it was acceptable to bring a portable lounge chair into the office for naps.

So I brought a coffin instead.

It made me feel at ease.

I drove a carriage carrying the coffin to work and asked professionals to move it beside my desk.

Many people stared at me along the way. I knew they meant no harm, and I didn't mind.

Just as I climbed into the coffin for my afternoon nap, Fuling suddenly appeared above me.

With a serious expression, she asked whether I needed a funeral wreath.

I thanked her but said I preferred flower stems after the blossoms had been cut away.

Fuling nodded. She removed every bloom from the bouquet she had brought, bundled together the bare stems, and gave them to me.

She said she liked flowers, while I liked the stems after the flowers were gone. We complemented each other perfectly.

What a coincidence.

]

"AAAAAAAAH! Even though they like completely different things, they can still get along peacefully! Is this what Blue Planet friendship is like? I'm crying!"

"Jung's hobbies are bizarre, and Fuling is such a cool, stoic woman. So that's how they became friends!"

"According to previous interviews, they shop for clothes together, ride bears home from work together, and occasionally exchange black tea and vodka to drink together. Everyone else thinks they're weird. But they have each other. I believe in friendship again!"

Readers unanimously declared that Jung and Fuling's friendship must surely be the strongest imaginable.

Then someone commented:

"Don't celebrate too soon..."

"The interview later asked Jung what she thought about Fuling's short story becoming a bestseller. Jung answered..."

"May her road ahead be covered with flowers."

The entire forum froze for a second.

When readers finally recovered, they replied while clutching their aching hearts.

"So elegant. Far too elegant."

"How could it be like this..."

"It's such a simple blessing, yet somehow it feels like a knife straight through my heart. If ordinary people wish someone a bright future, that's one thing. But when Jung wishes that someone's path be covered in flowers... perhaps there is a grudge in her heart that still won't dissolve."

"Aren't you all overthinking this? They just have different opinions. They've worked together for years."

Then one reader stepped forward with an analysis.

"I've thought it through. Jung and Fuling published their articles almost simultaneously. There's no way either of them read the other's piece first and then rushed to write a response. They probably already knew what each other intended to write. But afterward... something happened between them. Friends who once walked side by side ultimately chose different paths. The Peninsula's literary debate was only the spark. The real issue was that they had already changed long ago."

"Jung expresses herself by sending flowers as a blessing. Fuling expresses herself by standing in the opposite camp and telling you a dark joke."

"What an elegant and understated duel! I'm crying while shipping them!"

The more readers thought about it, the more convincing it seemed. They could only sigh at the unpredictability of fate.

"What is going on lately? Canghai and Qiongtian were bad enough. Now Fuling and Jung too? @Yujin, could you please check on Blue Planet's writers' mental health? There have been way too many emotional knives* lately! I'd rather get stabbed by fiction than have a reality that hurts this much."

The readers never got a reply from Yujin.

Instead, someone who always stirred up even bigger trouble appeared.

On his personal page, Xunming posted:

"How could you all start this excitement without inviting me? I'm writing an article called "Data Explains Everything" right now."