241: Chapter 241 The Forgotten Beasts Attack, I Turn the Apocalypse into a Paid Livestream

At the zero second of the seventy-second hour countdown, live footage of the Pale Script Behemoth devouring the seventh story universe was forcibly pushed to the creator backends of all works still in serialization.

This included "dimension shareholder".

Lin Chen and Arrogant Dragon were in the middle of re-partitioning The Group's business map—the dual-protagonist agreement had just been signed, and the first dividing line was: Lin Chen would focus on "Platform Operations and Content Development," while Arrogant Dragon would be responsible for "Physical Assets and Armed Security."

The meeting was only halfway through when the alarms exploded.

On the monitoring screens, that behemoth composed of countless discarded words was currently tearing apart, chewing, and swallowing the entire universe of a book titled "immortal emperor returns." With every fragment it swallowed, the behemoth's size expanded a bit more, and more greyed-out book titles surfaced on its body.

"Is this the physical form of Zeroing?" Arrogant Dragon stared at those book titles. "They're all... stories that no one reads?"

"Yes." The Manager's projection quickly analyzed from the side. "The platform has the data—when a work's daily active readers drop to zero, it is moved from the 'Serialization Library' into the 'Oblivion Graveyard.' These stories devour each other in the graveyard, eventually merging into this kind of monster."

"Why are they attacking works that are still in serialization?"

"To snatch readers." Lin Chen pulled up the platform's deep-layer data. "Every story needs a reader's 'Attention Energy' to maintain its existence. Forgotten stories have lost their energy source, so they can only plunder the energy of other stories."

He zoomed in on the behemoth's core area: "Look, there's a faint flow of data inside it—those are the small number of readers it captured during its devouring. It's barely surviving on this residual energy while thirsting for more."

The countdown panel ticked: [71:59:23]

"What do we do?" a shareholder trembled. "Will our defense systems work against it?"

"Conventional defenses are useless." The Manager shook his head. "It is a product of the Narrative Layer itself. Physical attacks, law attacks, and even causality weapons cannot harm it. The only thing that can hurt it is—"

"Reader attention," Lin Chen finished the sentence.

He stood up and pulled up the backend of the Interactive Narrative Universe.

He began to operate.

"What are you doing?" Arrogant Dragon asked.

"Since it wants to snatch readers," Lin Chen quickly created a new feature, "then I'll have the readers proactively come to see it—via paid viewing."

Three minutes later.

On the homepages of all works on the platform, the same full-screen advertisement popped up:

[Emergency Livestream: Oblivion Behemoth Invasion Live!]

[Content: Witness the entire process of a universe being devoured with your own eyes (High Definition, Uncensored)]

[Ticket Price: 100 dimension points/Person (First ten minutes free trial)]

[Special Note: The 'Attention Energy' generated by watching will be converted into damage values against the behemoth]

[Every click you make is saving this universe!]

As soon as the ad came out, readers across the entire platform went crazy.

Paying to watch a livestream of the end of the world? And they could fight the monster too?

In just thirty seconds, the number of viewers broke one quadrillion!

The payment rate was as high as 73%!

Vast amounts of "Attention Energy" began to converge from various dimensions. Through the platform's data channels, it transformed into streaks of golden light beams, shooting toward the Pale Behemoth that was currently devouring the eighth universe!

Sizzle—

At the spots where the behemoth was hit by the beams, the text began to burn and dissipate!

It let out a silent roar (because no readers could hear its voice) and turned to accelerate toward the direction of the "dimension shareholder" universe!

"It's locked onto us!" The Manager said urgently.

"Perfect." Lin Chen stared at the real-time data. "The number of viewers has now exceeded ten quadrillion, and the paid revenue per minute exceeds ten trillion dimension points."

He looked at Arrogant Dragon: "Is this money enough to fight a tough battle?"

A fighting spirit flashed in Arrogant Dragon's eyes: "How do you want to fight?"

"Two steps." Lin Chen pulled up the combat plan. "Step one: you use all of The Group's armed resources to establish a defensive line at the universe's border—not to stop it, but to stall for time."

"Step two: I'll use the livestream revenue to do three things."

He deployed quickly:

"First, issue a 'Joint Creation Invitation' to all Authors on the platform—all Authors can 'second' their characters to our universe to participate in the defensive war. Secondment fees will be calculated based on the character's strength, and appearance time will have separate manuscript fees."

"Second, launch 'Plot Crowdfunding': readers can pay to purchase 'Exclusive Plot Branches,' such as 'Arrogant Dragon using a move named by a reader' or 'Lin Chen quoting a business tactic provided by a reader.' Each branch is priced at ten thousand dimension points."

"Third, and most crucially—I'm going to issue 'Doomsday War Bonds' to raise funds to establish an 'Eternal Memory Bank.' We will back up the works of all participating Authors into it, promising that even if this universe is destroyed, their stories will be reborn on other platforms."

Once the plan was out, the entire meeting room fell silent.

"You're..." Arrogant Dragon took a deep breath, "turning an apocalyptic war into a platform-wide commercial project?"

"Yes." Lin Chen nodded. "Make all Authors and readers stakeholders. That way, they'll work desperately to help us—not to save our universe, but to protect their own investments."

The orders were given.

Ten minutes later.

The first batch of "seconded characters" began to arrive at the border of the "dimension shareholder" universe.

There was a fleet commander from "star overlord," bringing his million starships.

There was a Zombie King from "Doomsday City Lord," leading an endless mutant legion.

There were even a few Immortal Venerable Dao companions from Danmei works—they were attracted by the high manuscript fees and were currently standing hand-in-hand in the void, preparing to use the "Laws of Love" to combat the behemoth.

Arrogant Dragon looked at this motley crew, his mouth twitching: "Will this work?"

"Let's try and see." Lin Chen watched the livestream viewers break one quintillion. "Anyway, the audience loves seeing crossover collaborations."

Just as he finished speaking.

The Pale Behemoth arrived at the border.

Its massive body almost obscured the entire entrance to the universe, and those greyed-out book titles on its body writhed like scales. The most terrifying part was its "mouth"—an abyss composed of countless resentful words like "Unfinished," "Dropped," and "Author Ran Away."

It opened its mouth, preparing to devour.

"First line of defense, attack!" Arrogant Dragon shouted.

The starship fleet fired all cannons, the zombie legion surged forward like a tide, and the Immortal Venerable Dao companions began to chant love incantations—

All attacks landed on the behemoth like pebbles thrown into the sea, without even causing a ripple.

The behemoth didn't even acknowledge them, biting directly toward the universe's barrier!

Crack—

Cracks appeared on the barrier!

"It's not working!" The Manager screamed. "Conventional attacks are completely ineffective against it!"

Lin Chen, however, was staring at the livestream data: "They're effective."

"What?"

"Look here." He pulled up the Attention Energy flow map. "During the attack just now, because the visuals were exciting, the number of viewers jumped by 30%. The generated Attention Energy burned away 0.1% of the text on the behemoth's surface."

"What use is 0.1%?!"

"Many a mickle makes a muckle." Lin Chen looked at the livestream revenue—that wave just now brought in another fifty trillion.

He immediately activated the second phase:

"All readers who paid for plot branches, you can now input your plot suggestions."

The backend was instantly flooded with tens of billions of suggestions:

[Make Arrogant Dragon and that Zombie King fuse!]

[Lin Chen, hurry up and use business methods to acquire the behemoth!]

[I want to see the Immortal Venerable Dao companions use love to influence it!]

[Suggest summoning characters from even more works for a collab!]

Lin Chen filtered out the ten most popular ones and coded them into the real-time plot.

And so—

On the battlefield, Arrogant Dragon actually performed a "Law Fusion" with the Zombie King, transforming into a bizarre existence that was half-immortal and half-corpse. His combat power exploded a hundredfold, and with one sword strike, he severed one of the behemoth's script tentacles!

Lin Chen, meanwhile, held up an acquisition contract toward the behemoth: "I'll give you management rights over a universe in exchange for you becoming our 'Specialty Actor.' From now on, you'll specialize in playing apocalyptic villains, with excellent pay."

The Immortal Venerable Dao companions began their "Love Influence Sermon" toward the behemoth. The content was so cheesy that the number of viewers rose by another 20%.

But the best part was—

Using the revenue from just now, Lin Chen contacted the Authors of the top one hundred other popular works on the platform and issued an invitation: "Let your characters make a cameo, with a share of the clicks."

Under the heavy reward, even more characters descended.

The Martial God from "Martial Dao Sovereign," the Mechanical Heavenly Venerable from "Cyber Investiture of the Gods," the cute Magic Instructor from "Magic Kindergarten"... there were even a few farmers from farming novels. They began to plant "Law Crops" in the void, saying they wanted to "infect the behemoth with the joy of a harvest."

The battlefield turned into a chaotic and boisterous carnival.

The Pale Behemoth seemed dazed by this display.

It stopped devouring and "looked" at this absurd scene with eyes composed of countless words.

And it was this brief pause—

That Lin Chen seized the opportunity.

He channeled the Attention Energy of one quintillion readers, condensing it into a golden giant sword that spanned across the star river.

"Arrogant Dragon," he ordered, "use this sword to strike its core."

Arrogant Dragon flew up and grabbed the giant sword.

The sword's body transmitted the thoughts of billions of readers: "Strike!" "Go for it!" "We're watching!"

He took a deep breath and struck down with all his might—

The golden sword light split the void, accurately hitting the core within the behemoth's body, which was condensed from resentful words like "Completion Rate 0%," "Hiatus for Three Years," and "Author is Dead"!

Sizzle, sizzle, sizzle—!

The core began to burn!

The behemoth let out a wail that could be heard throughout the entire Narrative Layer!

But just as the core was about to shatter—

A sudden change occurred!

Inside the behemoth's body, seventeen smaller pale individuals suddenly split off and fled in different directions!

Each individual was dragging a portion of the core fragments!

"It's trying to escape!" The Manager shouted.

"It can't run." Lin Chen had already expected this.

He activated the third phase of the plan:

"All readers who purchased 'Plot Branches' can now vote to choose the pursuit targets. We will prioritize chasing and destroying the three targets with the highest votes."

The voting interface popped up.

Readers participated frantically—it was like playing a live-action MMORPG!

The pursuit began.

Arrogant Dragon led the allied forces to chase after the clone with the highest votes.

Lin Chen, meanwhile, did something even more ruthless—

He contacted the residual consciousnesses of the story universes that had been devoured by the behemoth.

"Want revenge?" he said to those faint consciousnesses. "I'll give you a chance. Join our 'Alliance of the Forgotten.' I'll use the livestream revenue to rebuild your universes as your 'performance venues.'"

The residual consciousnesses agreed.

Thus, an even more bizarre scene appeared on the battlefield: those devoured universe fragments broke free from the behemoth's clones and attacked the behemoth in reverse!

Countdown: [48:17:09]

Of the behemoth's seventeen clones, nine had already been eliminated.

The remaining eight were fleeing frantically.

Livestream viewers broke ten quintillion, and cumulative paid revenue exceeded ten quadrillion dimension points.

Lin Chen had already begun using this money to prepare the "Eternal Memory Bank."

Just when everyone thought victory was assured—

Platform headquarters suddenly sent an emergency communication.

It was the highest-level alarm that only Lin Chen, as the controlling shareholder, could receive:

[Warning! Abnormal fluctuations in the Narrative Layer's basic rules detected]

[Reason: Large-scale cross-universe character linkage leading to 'Worldview Compatibility' collapse]

[Current collapse progress: 37%]

[If it exceeds 50%, the entire Narrative Layer will fall into logical chaos, and all story universes will merge and annihilate each other]

[Recommendation: Immediately cease cross-universe linkage]

Lin Chen looked at the alarm, then at those characters from different works and varied art styles on the battlefield.

Beside the sword-flying of the Xianxia world was starship jumping; beside the rotting meat tentacles of the zombies were cute magical girls; crops from farming novels were growing in the void...

Indeed, if this continued, the logic of the Narrative Layer would collapse.

"Stop the linkage?" Arrogant Dragon frowned after receiving the message. "Then how do we fight?"

"We don't stop." Lin Chen made a decision. "We just change the way we fight."

He connected to all the collaborating Authors: "Everyone, there's a new problem—worldview compatibility is about to collapse. The solution is: we will jointly create a massive background setting and merge the settings of all works into it."

"Like what?"

"For example, this universe is actually the dream of some 'Multiverse Creator God,' and different works are different dream fragments." Lin Chen quickly wove the setting. "That way, Xianxia, Sci-Fi, Magic, and Zombies can all coexist logically."

The Authors were stunned.

But seeing the "Setting Fusion Manuscript Fee" Lin Chen offered—one trillion dimension points per person—they all agreed.

And so, a frenzy of live setting-weaving began.

Three hours later.

A "Super-Stitched Worldview" that could barely justify itself was born.

It was full of logical loopholes, but at least it temporarily stabilized the compatibility collapse.

And by this time, the behemoth's last clone had also been eliminated by the allied forces.

The Pale Script Behemoth had completely dissipated.

The livestream frame froze on Arrogant Dragon's heroic posture as he held the golden giant sword.

The number of viewers reached its peak: one hundred quintillion.

Total paid revenue: ten quadrillion dimension points.

Lin Chen turned off the livestream and looked at the Manager: "Now, it's time to fulfill the promise."

"What promise?"

"You said that the source of Zeroing is the 'collective of forgotten stories.'" Lin Chen pulled up the data. "But now that this collective has been destroyed by us, why is Zeroing still continuing?"

He pointed toward the depths of the universe—there, more Pale Behemoths were being born from the void.

They were densely packed and endless.

"Because," the Manager said bitterly, "oblivion is eternal."

"As long as there are stories being forgotten, new behemoths will be born."

"The one we just killed was only one of them."

Lin Chen was silent for a long time.

Then, he smiled.

"Then let's turn oblivion into a business."

He opened the platform backend and created a new department:

[Oblivion Care Business Department]

Department Responsibilities: Periodically recall works that are about to be forgotten and use means such as "Classic Remakes," "Linkage Revivals," and "Reader Awakening Plans" to help them regain readers.

Operating Funds: Allocated from livestream revenue.

Profit Model: Revenue sharing from revived works.

"From today on," Lin Chen announced to the entire platform, "as long as there are still readers watching—"

"No story will be forgotten."

"If there are..."

"We'll just buy them back to life."

At this moment, the countdown panel finally stopped ticking.

The process of Zeroing was forcibly delayed.

But everyone knew—

This was only the beginning.