179: The Grandmaster Emerges from the Mountain

The glow of the computer screen reflected on Lin Que's slightly tired face.

A long email from Wang De'an lay in his inbox, with an irrepressible excitement radiating from between the lines.

This business-is-business Editor-in-Chief now seemed like a believer who had completed an impossible mission.

[Teacher Jian Shen, I have fortunately fulfilled the mission.]

[Regarding the English translation of "the ferryman," I originally visited old Mr. Yang Xianyi with just a "try and see" mindset.]

[You might not know, but he is a "living fossil" in our translation world, a master who introduced "Dream of the Red Chamber" to the world. He has been living in seclusion in Hangzhou for many years, and no amount of money could move him.]

[The old gentleman refused at first, not even bothering to pour me tea. That was until he saw your quote from the Moyun Award, "the ferryman does not go ashore," and I insisted on showing him your book, "the ferryman."]

[Guess what? After the old gentleman finished reading, he was silent for a long while and said only one thing:]

"What flows through this book is not Western fantasy, but Eastern karma and destiny."

"If we let foreigners translate it haphazardly, it would be a waste of a precious thing and a severing of cultural roots."]

[Old Yang accepted. He won't take any money, saying only that this book is worth his old bones catching fire once more.]

Lin Que looked at the screen, his heart deeply moved.

Yang Xianyi.

The weight of this name was much heavier than the royalties from millions of sales.

With this old gentleman's blessing, "the ferryman" going overseas would no longer be a simple commercial act, but a true cultural export.

Those Eastern philosophies regarding redemption would be hammered into the minds of Western readers in their original flavor.

Lin Que took a deep breath, a long-lost sense of pride and ambition surging in his heart.

[Please thank Old Yang for me.]

[Let this book, "the little prince," be a thank-you gift for New Tide and Old Yang. May we all find our younger selves in the sunsets of Planet B612.]

Click send.

The email turned into a stream of data and flew into the cloud.

Lin Que closed his laptop and turned to look out the window.

The night in Jiang City was still dull, but he seemed to see across the ocean,

to the scenes of blonde-haired, blue-eyed readers being so shocked by the Eastern sense of destiny that their scalps tingled... By the end of May, Jiang City had fully entered summer.

Cicadas screeched tirelessly in the treetops, and the air was thick with the smell of parched dust.

The ceiling fans in the classroom whirred "hu-hu,"

but they couldn't disperse the "dark clouds pressing down on the city" low-pressure atmosphere in grade 11, class 3.

As the June Gaokao approached, even though they were only in grade 11,

the sense of urgency, like "when the lips are gone, the teeth are cold," had already enveloped everyone in advance.

"a-b-a-n-d-o-n, abandon, to give up..."

Before morning self-study had even begun, Wu Di was clutching his hair, wearing a mask of pain as he memorized vocabulary.

This guy was usually shiftless, caring for nothing but eating and playing, but these past few days, he seemed to have changed his nature.

"Brother Que, do you think I'm a lost cause?"

Wu Di covered his face with his English book, his voice muffled:

"I was doing practice tests last night, and my Cloze test errors looked like they'd been sprayed by a machine gun.

At this rate, while you're sitting in an office commanding the world in the future,

I'll be downstairs delivering takeout to you, and I'll even have to beg you for a five-star review."

Lin Que was slumped in his chair like a puddle of mud, with two dark circles under his eyes.

"Going all out?"

Lin Que yawned, squeezing out two physiological tears from the corners of his eyes.

"Right now, I just want to stay alive."

Recently, he had been nearly drained dry for "soul ferry."

In just one week, he had released three heavy-hitting chapters in high-intensity succession.

"The Doll"

It told the story of a control freak who transformed his girlfriend into a perfect silicone doll, satirizing the current extreme objectification of women and distorted possessiveness.

"The Fugitive"

It focused on the plight of the lower class, telling the story of a father who robbed a pharmacy to pay for his daughter's medical treatment, struggling on the edge of good and evil.

"Guest of the Ghost Festival"

It used the mouths of ghosts to reflect on the cruelty of war and the preciousness of peace.

Each of these three stories required extremely delicate psychological profiling and the creation of an oppressive atmosphere.

Especially the chapter "The Doll"—since the original was a short drama, trying to write that "uncanny valley" effect of being human-like yet not human on paper,

Lin Que had locked himself in a small dark room to ponder over it all night.

Fortunately, the effect was explosive.

The entire internet was buzzing, and the "Dream Weaver's" reputation reached god-tier status once again,

being hailed by readers as a "Cyber Judge" who dared to dissect societal tumors.

But the price was that the real-life Lin Que now felt like his brain was about to dry up.

"Brother Que, don't be in such a hurry to sleep!"

Seeing Lin Que skillfully pile up a stack of books into a fortress, Wu Di hurried over and whispered:

"What time do you think it is? The Principal, Old Fei, and Old Shen—that 'Trio of Doom' is watching you every day!

You're the only hope of our whole village... no, the whole No. 1 High School! How's the preparation for the finals going?"

These past few days, the school leadership's concern for Lin Que had reached an appalling level.

Lin Que glanced at Wu Di through a gap in the pile of books, then casually pulled out a copy of "Five Years of Gaokao, Three Years of Mock Exams" and covered his face with it, blocking out the harsh sunlight from the window.

"Preparing?"

Lin Que's voice came out muffled from under the book, carrying a hint of laziness:

"Inspiration is something you wait for, not something you beg for.

Just like you memorizing words; even if you memorize 'abandon' ten thousand times, it's still giving up,

you might as well take a nap; you can find anything in your dreams."

"Don't bother me, I'm going to look for inspiration in my dreams."

After saying that, his head tilted, and he fell asleep instantly.

Wu Di's mouth twitched.

Helplessly, he continued to pick up his English textbook and "abandon" himself to his studies.

Just then, the crisp sound of high heels came from the front door of the classroom.

Shen Qingqiu walked in with lesson plans under her arm, her gaze scanning the room like lightning.

Finally, her gaze accurately locked onto the conspicuous "book fortress" in the back row.

Wu Di shrank his neck in fear and quickly picked up his English book to pretend he was reading aloud.

Shen Qingqiu walked straight to the last row.

She looked at Lin Que, who was sound asleep on his desk, her brow furrowing slightly.

As a homeroom teacher, her instinctive reaction upon seeing a student sleeping during morning self-study was to slam a book on the desk to wake them up.

But when she saw Lin Que's messy hair,

and the exhaustion she could feel even with his face covered, her raised hand stopped mid-air.

"This child..."

Shen Qingqiu sighed in her heart.

In her view, Lin Que must have been working through the night to prepare for the finals.

After all, he was a candidate for the province's "Twin Stars," carrying the hopes of the entire province; the pressure must be staggering.

Geniuses are human too; they also need rest.

Wu Di was just about to reach out and shake his deskmate awake when a hand lightly pressed down on his shoulder.

Shen Qingqiu had stood in the aisle at some unknown point.

She looked at Lin Que, who was sleeping soundly on the desk, and a rare trace of softness flashed across her usually stern face.

This child probably stayed up late again last night for the finals, didn't he?

Shen Qingqiu extended her index finger and made a "shh" gesture to her lips,

stopping Wu Di's movement, and then she reached out to push Lin Que's precarious water bottle further onto the desk.

"Let him sleep."

Shen Qingqiu mouthed the words silently, then turned and left the classroom with light steps.

The whole class: "???"

A few top students nearby who saw this scene were so jealous they felt like their cell walls were separating.

Is this the treatment of the strong?

If it were them daring to sleep in Old Shen's class, they'd probably have been dragged to the hallway to serve as door guards long ago.

But when it came to Lin Que, a strange sense of reasonableness actually rose in everyone's hearts.

Lin Que didn't know that everyone had just filled in the blanks about him again.

He slept deeply, but not peacefully.

In his mind, the real-world sounds of reading and the whispers from "soul ferry" were intertwined.

One moment it was the roar of Zhao Li's stylish Cherokee off-roader, and the next it was Wu Di's clumsy English pronunciation.

This sense of fragmentation left him in a dissociated state between dreaming and wakefulness.

Until—

"Zzz—zzz—"

The loudspeaker above the classroom suddenly crackled without warning,

and the piercing static sound startled everyone.

Immediately after, Dean of Students Fei Yuncheng's signature loud voice,

carrying an irrepressible urgency, exploded over the entire school.

"Interrupting with an urgent announcement!"

"grade 11, class 3, Student Lin Que!"

"Please come to the Principal's office immediately! I repeat, come to the Principal's office immediately!"

Lin Que was jolted awake, and the copy of "Five Years of Gaokao, Three Years of Mock Exams" slid off his face.

He blinked in confusion, not yet fully conscious.

The eyes of the entire class instantly focused on him, their gazes filled with terror and curiosity.

This kind of school-wide broadcast summon usually only happened in two situations:

either you had broken a heavenly law, or... something monumental had happened.

Wu Di swallowed hard and tremulously poked Lin Que:

"Brother Que... Old Fei's tone doesn't sound like it's anything good.

You didn't get your 'water meter checked' for writing some reactionary comments online, did you?"

Lin Que rubbed his throbbing temples, his eyes gradually clearing.

Checked for the water meter?

Impossible. He hid his identity as the Dream Weaver deeper than anyone.

Then it must be about the "Fu Zhi Yao Competition" finals?

Lin Que stood up, pulled back his chair, and calmly walked out of the classroom under the complex gazes of his classmates.

However, he was also wondering to himself.

If it were a notice about the finals, having Old Shen pass on the message would suffice,

was it necessary to use the school-wide broadcast for such a display?

Unless... something had happened that even the Principal couldn't handle?

...