337: Chapter 337 The Wall Did Not Die

In front of the floor-to-ceiling windows of the second-floor VIP passage,

Hu Yizhao watched the purchasing frenzy downstairs, which rivaled the Spring Festival travel rush at a railway station; the palm holding his walkie-talkie was drenched in sweat.

He had just contacted logistics, and the reply he received gave him a splitting headache.

"Chairman Lu, the reprint order was approved overnight, but the printing factory says the earliest they can deliver the first batch is this afternoon."

Hu Yizhao swallowed hard and glanced again at the real-time inventory report in his hand, his voice tight.

"At the current rate of consumption, the remaining stock in Shanghai really won't last until noon.

Once we run out of stock, this fire that we've finally managed to light..."

He didn't finish, but everyone understood his meaning.

Hu Yizhao took out his phone, scrolled through the monitoring data on the Microblogging platform's backend, and couldn't help but sigh.

"To be honest, that long review by the young pianist Ye Xi was simply too powerful.

Three thousand words directly ignited a nationwide discussion, with various platforms following the trend to draw traffic, and even several sociology professors are reposting it.

This single article has practically single-handedly lifted a new author's physical book to a level of dissemination it shouldn't belong to."

Hu Yizhao spoke sincerely and logically.

From the perspective of the data chain, last night's long review was indeed the fuse that ignited public opinion.

Chairman Lu stood motionless in front of the floor-to-ceiling window with his hands behind his back.

His gaze passed through the glass, over the noisy crowd,

and landed on the youth behind the signing desk on the first floor, who was currently bowing his head to sign books.

After a few seconds of silence, he slowly shook his head.

"Little Hu, your way of looking at things is still too limited by the online traffic mindset."

Hu Yizhao was stunned and turned to look at Chairman Lu.

"That pianist's long article is, at most, a catalyst that lit the fuse ahead of time."

Chairman Lu looked at the long queue behind.

"Even without her, the knife of 'folding beijing' that dissects class is sharp enough and painful enough.

Look at those people queuing downstairs; how many of them came because they saw a long review on the Microblogging platform?"

Hu Yizhao followed Chairman Lu's gaze back downstairs.

At this look, the hair on the back of his neck stood up.

The composition of the crowd in the right-hand queue had already far exceeded his entire understanding of a traditional literary book signing.

Delivery riders, construction workers, couriers, programmers with dark circles under their eyes, middle-aged white-collar workers carrying briefcases,

and even a few white-haired elderly people leaning on canes were standing in the line.

How many of these people are active users of the Microblogging platform?

How many people would follow the account of a young pianist?

The answer was self-evident.

They didn't come because of the traffic from some viral article, but because this book was written about them.

"It was only a matter of time before this fire started burning."

Chairman Lu withdrew his gaze, his tone flat but carrying an irrefutable certainty.

"That kid named Lin Que has found a pen that can pierce through all class barriers.

This kind of penetration has nothing to do with promotion and nothing to do with traffic."

Hu Yizhao opened his mouth but ultimately said nothing.

He looked down at the data report in his hand and suddenly felt that the numbers on it were more persuasive than any editorial.

The first-floor hall.

The crowd at the New Tide booth on the left was still massive, but it was visible to the naked eye that

more and more readers, after checking out, did not head for the exit but instead carried 'ordinary world' straight across the center of the hall to join the book-buying queue on the right.

At the edge of the crowded throng, a middle-aged man wearing a dark blue Polo shirt looked out of place.

He didn't flip through the book he had just bought like the others;

instead, he hid in the shadow of a pillar, his right hand tightly clutching his phone, his thumb tapping rapidly on the screen.

As the supervisor of the Shanghai branch of New Tide Publishing House's marketing department, he had been sent by Wang De'an to keep an eye on the scene.

He had originally intended it to be a mere formality, but now, watching the completely out-of-control flow of people on the right, he felt a cold sweat on his back.

When they finished yesterday, his report to Wang De'an was still 'has some popularity, but poses no threat.'

Now, looking at the queue in front of the right-hand checkout counter that had already folded three times,

the supervisor felt that his judgment yesterday was absolute nonsense.

He hurriedly squeezed behind a pillar in the corner of the hall, turned his back to the crowd, opened the messaging interface, and with trembling fingers, typed a line to send to Wang De'an.

[President Wang, the right side is about to go out of control.

Today's foot traffic is at least triple that of yesterday, and the reader demographic... is very complex.]

After sending the message, he looked up at the seventeen-year-old youth behind the signing desk on the right.

The youth was calmly signing for a white-haired old gentleman.

The supervisor gritted his teeth and added another message.

[At this rate, the inventory will be zeroed out before noon.]

The queue in front of the signing desk moved forward slowly and orderly.

Lin Que finished signing the book in his hand and stretched his slightly aching wrist.

Just as he picked up the next one, the person at the front changed.

A middle-aged man wearing a gray casual suit stood before the desk.

His hair was slightly thin, and a pair of semi-rimless glasses rested on the bridge of his nose.

He wasn't holding a book; instead, his hands were crossed in front of him, and his gaze scrutinized Lin Que with curiosity.

Lin Que was all too familiar with this look.

Not a fan, not a reader, but someone from academic circles.

The middle-aged man was in no hurry to take a book and pay; he stood at the desk, his tone peaceful,

yet carrying the sharpness unique to academia, as he directly posed a question.

“Student Lin, I've finished reading your book.

There is a core proposition I'd like to discuss in person.”

He pushed up his glasses, and several nearby readers in the queue curiously pricked up their ears.

"In the folding mechanism of your book, the First Space occupies all the sunlight and resources, while fifty million people in the Third Space share the remaining night.

I want to ask, are you implying that the upward class mobility of the lower strata has completely died within this system?"

Once this question was asked, the air around the signing desk seemed to be sucked out by a layer.

Several media reporters who were filming and recording immediately turned their lenses toward this spot.

Zhang Hao and Liu Yu stopped their pens, Tang He looked up, and everyone's gaze converged on Lin Que.

This wasn't a question from an ordinary fan.

This was a cross-dimensional interrogation with an academic benchmark, precisely pointing to the most core and sensitive proposition of the entire book.

The surrounding noise miraculously dropped by several decibels.

Even a few readers in the left-hand queue who were peeking over stopped in their tracks, wanting to hear how this seventeen-year-old author would respond.

Lin Que put down his signing pen.

He didn't think for long, nor did he strike any pose of feigned profundity.

He looked at the scholar before him, his tone as calm as if he were stating a fact he had long ago thought through clearly.

"The wall is not dead."

Four simple words made the middle-aged man start slightly.

"It has simply become transparent."

Lin Que's voice carried this sentence clearly through the microphones in front of him.

"Every day, Old Knife can see the sunlight of the First Space through the gaps in the garbage chute.

He knows what is over there, and he knows where he is.

But transparency does not equal disappearance.

Only when you crash into it with all your might will you know how much it hurts to bleed."

...