287: Chapter 287 The Twin Stars Showdown

Inside the studio.

The cold air from the air conditioner, carrying the bubbly scent of iced cola, permeated the cramped space.

Lin Que leaned back in his chair with his legs crossed, holding a can of cola in his left hand while his right hand toggled the mouse back and forth between two screens.

The screen on the left showed the writer's backend for "Jian Shen" on the New Tide APP.

The curve of the subscription data had surged into an almost vertical red line, and the comments section was filled with "tearful eyes" and crying emojis.

The screen on the right showed the backend for "Hell Dream Weaver" on Hong Guo Net.

Less than three hours after the release of "the colour out of space" series, the view count had exceeded five million, and a group of people in the comments section were greeting each other with Cthulhu prayers.

Lin Que took a sip of cola, the icy carbonated liquid sliding down his throat, making him squint in comfort.

Tens of millions of people across the internet were arguing incessantly because of him alone.

Half of them were crying and shouting "Master Jian Shen is a saint," while the other half were howling "Great Master Dream Weaver is a true god."

And the "saint" and "true god" himself was currently wearing a pair of large boxer shorts, curled up in an air-conditioned room drinking cola and watching the spectacle.

He scrolled through a few more pages of comments.

On Jian Shen's side, someone had written a doggerel poem, the last line being "Willing to follow the Master for ten thousand miles."

On Dream Weaver's side, someone had drawn a folding fan with a chibi version of Cthulhu embracing the Earth, captioned "Master, take me into the sea."

Lin Que wiped the corner of his mouth; he had seen enough of the fan frenzy on the two major platforms.

He casually closed the backend webpages, his gaze falling on the "Wenyuan Pavilion" bookmark in his browser's favorites bar.

This forum, known as the most professional cultural exchange forum in the country—

What would the scene be like there at this moment?

With a hint of curiosity, he clicked the link.

Unlike Longde Kong, which leaned towards web literature,

Wenyuan Pavilion was the largest comprehensive cultural exchange forum in the country.

Its user base covered traditional literature enthusiasts, university scholars, cultural critics, and all sorts of omnivorous readers,

making it the closest thing to a "public square" in the domestic cultural circle.

He had just entered the website.

The stickied post on the homepage made his finger stop on the mouse.

The title was a line of bold Songti characters, no exclamation marks, no fancy punctuation, just clean.

《Dirt and Starry Sky: The Duel of the Twin Stars in the Chinese Literary World

The poster's ID was "Qiu Yuan Shui Chang," a name Lin Que remembered.

This person was a professor of comparative literature at North China Normal University, who frequently published long articles on Wenyuan Pavilion that were academically strong yet readable, and always had a good reputation.

Lin Que scrolled down; the posting time showed—twenty-three minutes ago.

The body of the post was a full twelve thousand words long.

Lin Que raised an eyebrow, leaned back in his chair, and began to read.

The opening of the post had no nonsense, cutting directly to the theme.

[Recently, an extremely rare phenomenon has appeared in the Chinese Literary World: two works with diametrically opposed styles and vastly different audiences have simultaneously triggered a nationwide reading craze.]

[One is Master Jian Shen's realist masterpiece, "ordinary world," and the other is the urban legends of the "cthulhu mythos" serialized online by Hell Dream Weaver.]

[As an explorer who has been engaged in literary research for over twenty years, I must say that this level of "twin stars shining together" has never appeared in the history of modern Chinese literature.]

The corners of Lin Que's mouth curled up slightly.

He continued reading.

The middle section of the post was the core of the entire article; the professor used nearly six thousand words,

conducting a detailed deconstructive comparison of the two works from three dimensions: textual analysis, narrative structure, and thematic core.

["ordinary world"'s core writing is the "dignity of the soil rising from death."]

[Sun Shaoping gnaws on black flour buns on the Loess Plateau and wears his back raw carrying stones; he faces structural social poverty and class solidification. But he never kneels. This posture of fighting to the death in a limited world is the oldest and most simple spiritual pillar of human civilization.]

[In contrast, what the "cthulhu mythos" displays is the "absolute nothingness of the cosmic perspective."]

[In the latest series, "the colour out of space," the meteorite brings not a visible enemy, but an erosion that transcends the physical level, cannot be perceived, and much less named. Humans don't even have the qualification to resist before it. This fear does not come from external threats, but from the fundamental negation of one's own meaning of existence.]

[This is the peak collision between realism and nihilism in the Chinese Literary World.]

[One says "living through gritted teeth is being a hero," the other says "even your meaning for living is an illusion."]

Lin Que put down the cola can.

He had to admit that this professor's foundation was indeed solid. With just a few paragraphs, he had stripped bare the spiritual cores of both works.

At the end of the post, the professor's tone shifted from academic to emotional.

[That the Chinese Literary World can simultaneously produce two creators like "Jian Shen" and "Dream Weaver," who have extremely opposite styles yet have both reached the pinnacle, is a stroke of luck for this era and for all readers.]

[Dirt and the starry sky have never been an either-or choice. The former teaches us how to stand firm in suffering, while the latter reminds us to look up at the unknown above our heads after we have stood firm.]

[I sincerely hope that readers from both sides can set aside their prejudices and jointly cherish these two diametrically different literary monuments. After all, good writing is never too much.]

Signed: Qiu Yuan Shui Chang.

After Lin Que finished reading, he nodded gently.

Well written. Objective, insightful, and the wording was restrained.

His gaze moved to the reply section below the post; twenty-three minutes after posting, there were already over a hundred replies.

Lin Que placed his finger on the scroll wheel and swiped down.

The first dozen floors were fairly normal.

Some praised the post for being well-written, some added their own reading experiences, and some cited classics to discuss the historical origins of realism and nihilism.

The academic atmosphere was thick, and the phrasing was elegant.

But starting from the seventeenth floor, the direction of the comments section took a sudden turn,

as if someone had thrown a red-hot iron into a pool of clear, still water,

instantly stirring up a boiling turbidity.

[Floor 17 · Loess Does Not Bury Poetry]: "What twin stars? A thing like Dream Weaver that writes monsters to scare people is worthy of being mentioned in the same breath as Master Jian Shen?

One bleeds and sweats in the mud to write about great worldly justice, while the other makes up tentacle monsters on a keyboard to trick kids out of their pocket money. Can these even be compared?"

[Floor 20 · Faith of the Sunflower]: "Floor 17 is absolutely right! Master Jian Shen lowered the book price to 0.1 yuan per thousand words for grassroots readers and even donated the profits to start a foundation.

What about Dream Weaver? What has he done besides lowering the SAN values of readers? One is a true Scholar of the State, the other is a terror peddler. There's simply no comparison!"

[Floor 21 · Ia! Ia!]: "You two above, did you eat too many black flour buns and get them stuck in your throats? Do you need me to call a Deep One to help clear them out for you?"

The smile at the corner of his mouth could no longer be suppressed.

Lin Que leaned back in his chair and continued scrolling down.

The growth rate of the replies became faster and faster, from a few per minute to a dozen per minute, and eventually, he couldn't even refresh fast enough.

Moreover, the camp divisions were as clear as if they had been cut with a knife—

Jian Shen's fans uniformly spammed one sentence: "Suffering forges the backbone; the ordinary is the truly great!"

It was neat and orderly, like a military parade formation.

Their avatars were mostly changed to the desolate background of the Loess Plateau or fan art of Sun Shaoping gnawing on black flour buns in the rain. A few fanatics even changed their signatures to "Under the Gate of Pen Name," carrying a tragic, ascetic-like piety.

[Floor 43 · Under the Gate of Pen Name]: "Readers of Dream Weaver, I advise you to read 'ordinary world' properly and see what real literature is.

You shout about the abyss and nothingness every day, but to put it bluntly, you're just escaping reality. Reality is too bitter for you to face, so you hide in fantasy to move yourselves.

What Master Jian Shen writes about are living people, not your slimy tentacles!"

[Floor 44 · Under the Gate of Pen Name]: "Dream Weaver's books are spiritual drugs! They make young people feel that everything is meaningless and that striving is futile. If this kind of thing spreads, it will destroy a generation!"

As soon as those words were spoken, Dream Weaver's fans wouldn't have it.

The speed and intensity of their counterattack far exceeded the expectations of Jian Shen's fans.

In the comments section, rows of IDs in dark blue fonts were like jellyfish surfacing from the bottom of the sea, densely filling the screen.

[Floor 52 · The Drowned on Land]: "The works of both masters are great. Master Jian Shen teaches us how to stand in the mud, while Master Dream Weaver lets us look up at the starry sky beyond standing."

I don't think the two conflict; why must a winner be decided? Fighting in the ordinary is courage, and facing the nothingness of the universe also requires courage.

[Floor 56 · Under the Gate of Pen Name]: "What is Floor 52 pretending to be a rational observer for? People like you are typical fence-sitters!

Both require courage? One is realism for the country and the people, and the other is nihilism spreading despair. Can they be the same?

Look at your ID 'The Drowned on Land,' so cynical and weird.

In real life, you must be a loathed, gloomy loser!"

...