You were supposed to have a fake marriage with the diva, so how did you become her father?

The internal rifts within Japan are deeper than Lu Ran had anticipated.

Those young Japanese people who came across historical information through games, after experiencing initial shock and self-doubt, began to dig up information themselves.

Jiang Feng's briefing mentioned a detail: the borrowing volume of materials about the invasion of China in several Japanese university libraries has increased several times in the past two weeks.

During an interview, the librarian said, "These books used to go untouched for a whole year, but now people come and browse them every day."

Someone started a topic on an anonymous forum in Japan called "Things I found that aren't written in textbooks".

The topic has garnered thousands of replies, ranging from specific atrocities committed during the war to issues of reparations and censorship of history textbooks.

Most of the posters are young people in their twenties and thirties. Their wording carries a unique awkwardness and confusion that comes with being exposed to new information, but that confusion itself is more persuasive than any well-organized argument.

There were also many debates during that period.

Some people dug up the relevant information and posted it on the forum, saying, "If these figures are true, what exactly did we learn before?"

Immediately, someone replied, "How dare you question the country's education system?" Then the two started arguing, and after dozens of floors of arguments, a third person joined in, posting more information to support the first person's claim.

Every argument is like throwing a pebble into the water; although the surface quickly calms down again, the sand on the shore has already quietly shifted its position.

By the third week, the issue began to circulate from the grassroots level to higher levels.

Japan's opposition parties publicly questioned the ruling party's stance on history education policies in the Diet.

The congressman who asked the question was a man in his fifties, wearing silver-rimmed glasses. He spoke slowly but clearly.

During the questioning, he took out a thick stack of documents from his briefcase, held them up and waved them at the camera, saying, "These are all publicly available archives from China, original reports from Western journalists, and records from the International Red Cross at the time. I don't understand why these contents are completely blank in our own history textbooks."

He placed the stack of documents on the podium and slapped it, prompting a few low murmurs from the audience.

The ruling party sent an official from the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology to respond.

The official stood in front of the microphone and read from a prepared statement for a full ten minutes, without directly answering a single question.

He said that "textbook compilation follows professional procedures," that "historical understanding should respect academic research," and that "the government does not interfere with academic freedom."

Each sentence is fine on its own, but when listened to together, it says nothing at all.

The opposition party pressed for a second time.

This time the wording was more direct than the first time, asking directly, "Does the government acknowledge that there was a deliberate avoidance of certain historical facts during the textbook writing process?"

After a few seconds of silence, an official from the ruling party spoke up, saying, "The Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology has clear standards and procedures for compiling history textbooks, and the situation you described does not exist."

The video of the interrogation was uploaded online.

The reactions from Japanese netizens in the comments section were more complex than Lu Ran had anticipated.

Some people criticized the ruling party for "still fooling people," while others said that "the opposition party is trying to use this issue to bring down the government."

There were people on both sides, and neither could convince the other.

But a few comments caught Lu Ran's attention.

One of them said, "I used to think that history was far away from me, but now I realize that it has always been there, but no one told me."

There's an even shorter one, just one sentence: "I plan to talk to a friend from China about this."

Another message from Jiang Feng indicated that several mainstream Japanese newspapers began publishing related reports that week.

The report remained relatively restrained, mostly using vague statements such as "some people have differing views on history," without addressing the core issues.

But this is a change from the previous situation where there was no reporting at all.

A local newspaper published a short news item about a surge in the number of people looking for information in a county library. The content itself didn't have any particular stance, but the news item was reposted by several larger media outlets.

Lu Ran finished reading through all the summaries Jiang Feng sent in his office.

He saw screenshots of the inquiries, changes in library borrowing data, trends in online discussions, and changes in the wording of newspaper reports.

Each event, taken individually, may not seem significant, but when viewed together, the scattered fragments slowly piece together a picture.

He turned off the screen, leaned back in his chair for a while, and his mind was racing with thoughts of what to do next.

The impact of "Bloody Battle of Shanghai" has already spread quite far.

This game has brought that period of history back into the public eye, but its main function is to provide a reminder and trigger it. Subsequent penetration will require a more lasting and accessible tool to take over.

He browsed through the system and found another game.

That was the predecessor of a series of works, called "Anti-Japanese Landmine Warfare".

The previous version was a turn-based strategy game where players controlled a small Eighth Route Army squad to lay mines, set ambushes, evacuate civilians, and disrupt Japanese supply lines in enemy-occupied base areas.

The game itself is of high quality, but due to its high difficulty, it has never truly broken into the mainstream.

The version currently running in the system has undergone numerous changes.

The screen resolution has been improved to a higher level, the character illustrations have been changed from pixel art to a more realistic hand-drawn style, and the UI layout has also been reconstructed to adapt to high-definition screens.

The most significant change is to the difficulty curve—the original enemy AI was too intelligent, and novice players would be blown up and question their existence by the second level.

The optimized version lowers the intelligence of the enemy AI in the first few levels and adds detailed tutorial levels, allowing players to learn various tactics step by step.

Lu Ran exported the game from the system and saved it to his hard drive.

Instead of arranging tests, he left the package on his desk for a whole day without even unpacking it.

The next morning, when Zhao Yiming passed by his office, he saw the hard drive on the desk and asked, "Is it something new again?" Lu Ran replied, "Don't worry about it for now, you'll find out when the time comes."

That afternoon, he gave the hard drive to Zhao Yiming and asked him to do a round of basic tests first.

When Zhao Yiming took it, he asked, "Is it still a single-player game this time?" Lu Ran said yes, and Zhao Yiming said, "Okay, single-player games are easier to play than online games anyway."

After the test was completed, Zhao Yiming's feedback was more positive than Lu Ran had expected.

He said the game's tutorial level was quite solid, the strategy depth was good, and it would take about ten hours to complete on medium difficulty.

Moreover, this turn-based strategy game is naturally suitable for multilingual versions. Although the amount of text is not small, the sentence structure is regular, so it is not difficult to translate.

Lu Ran instructed the operations team to prepare for the launch of the Chinese version.

When the announcement was released, it didn't have the same sensational effect as "Bloody Battle of Shanghai" because the audience for strategy games is much smaller than that for shooting games.

But people started posting in the comments section one after another. Some said, "The mechanism of this minefield is so interesting." Some shared the perfect defensive formation they found in the third level. Others posted screenshots of the tactics in the game on the forum to discuss with other players.

By the third day, some players had already completed the game.

Someone posted a thread on the forum titled "I played level 9 six times before I finally passed it", and the comments were full of replies like "Me too" and "Can you teach me how to place the mines in level 7?"

Someone created a complete mine placement guide, marking what type of mine should be placed at each key intersection. That guide has been shared many times.

What really concerned Lu Ran was the feedback from overseas.

Several European gaming media outlets have rated "Anti-Japanese Mine Warfare" as "the most underrated strategy game of the year," citing its tactical system as not complex but deep enough, and the fact that each level is designed to fit perfectly with the real terrain and historical background.

A player in North America posted a question on a forum: "Are the tactics in this game real or fictional?"

Someone posted a bunch of historical data links below, proving that most of the tactics in the game did indeed originate from guerrilla warfare textbooks from that time.

Some players in Japan downloaded the European version using a VPN.

Someone posted on a Japanese forum, saying, "When I got to the fourth level, I suddenly realized that the map in the game was the place where my grandfather used to be stationed."

That post was shared several times, and someone commented, "So now you know what your grandfather was doing there back then."

After reading the feedback, Lu Ran closed the page.

He remembered that his father-in-law had already received the script for "Bright Sword" and called to say he had finished reading it. His tone was much stronger than usual as he said, "I'm going to film this script."

Preparations for filming are already underway, and Shen Zhiwei has assembled a production team to start scouting locations and coordinating with actors.

Those elements together form a complete narrative chain.

The game's archives simply allow players to browse through materials, the later strategy game lets players experience the tactical logic of that war, and the TV series restores history as a complete storyline of the characters' destinies.

Lu Ran stood by the window for a while, then turned around and sat back down at his desk.

He picked up his phone and sent Jiang Feng a message: "Keep an eye on the feedback regarding the strategy game. No need to do anything special, just observe normally."

Jiang Feng replied with a simple "Okay".

As Lu Ran put down his phone, the sky outside the window in Shanghai was gradually darkening.

The apology posts, the protests, the inquiries, and the surge in library borrowing all grew naturally along this path.

All he needs to do is continue to lay new things along that line, making it longer and thicker.

He opened his computer and created a new document, typing the following line: "Phase Three—Make the international version of that strategy game available in more languages." He paused, then added another line: "Simultaneously monitor changes in the domestic political landscape of Japan; once they reach an internal consensus, we should move on to Phase Four."

He saved the document, turned off the computer, stood up, picked up his coat, and left the office.

The lights in the corridor were all on, and the night shift cleaner was slowly moving forward from the end of the corridor with a mop. When she saw Lu Ran come out, she nodded and greeted him.

Lu Ran nodded and then stepped into the elevator.

As the elevator doors closed, he saw his face reflected in the metal door panel.

He was thinking about those young people in Japan.

Those who borrow library materials, those who argue with others on forums, and those who send messages to their Chinese friends asking historical questions.

They won't change their entire worldview because of a game, nor will they overthrow their country just because they play a game.

But they will remember the information they researched, the arguments they had with others, and when asked "Do you know that period of history?" someday in the future, they will give a different answer than before.

Each of those small changes seemed insignificant, but Lu Ran knew they would keep seeping in.

I wonder if the flapping of TUTU's little butterfly wings can bring an unprecedented giant storm to Japan.

...