I asked you to write a light novel, but you wrote about living?

On the other two sofas, Zhou Chenglin and Chang Liren also stopped scrolling on their screens.

Zhou Chenglin looked at the last line of Chinese characters.

In the shack across the road, the old man was sleeping face down. A child sat beside him, watching over him. The old man was dreaming of lions.

His gaze lingered on the last sentence for a long time.

As a native of the Eastern region, Zhou Chenglin had never seen a shark processing plant on the West Coast, never smelled the fishy wind blowing from the bay, and didn't like watching baseball leagues. He didn't even understand the rules of baseball.

Those place names and customs were just unfamiliar terms to him.

He couldn't sense the deep-seated connection to his homeland that Carter felt.

But when he saw the old man tie a knife to the oar and stab the shark in the eye, one cut at a time;

When I saw the old man holding up the broken rudder and smashing his bloodied hands into the dark sea, I was deeply moved.

Something that transcends geographical boundaries directly penetrated Zhou Chenglin's more than ten years of professional experience.

Before he arrived, his mind was filled with the countless copycat works from the Eastern region.

System-based fishing, mecha fishing boats, deep-sea monsters, the Dragon King's son-in-law...

Those books offer the most stimulating sensory experiences and the most precise rhythm of face-slapping moments; every chapter is calculated to give readers a brief moment of pleasure.

He was originally thinking about how Yu Wen would use a more intense and exciting opening to suppress those copycat works.

Now, he was looking at the huge marlin skeleton on the screen.

The old man risked his life, but brought nothing back.

But Zhou Chenglin felt as if a hard rock had been stuffed into his chest, heavy and unbearable.

He took an e-cigarette out of his pocket, but didn't smoke it. He just held it between his fingers and unconsciously twirled it around.

The plastic casing makes a slight sound when rubbed between the fingers.

The e-cigarette at my fingertips stopped.

Those works of the same name that he originally regarded as his greatest enemies and that dominated the charts in the Eastern region now seemed incredibly ridiculous to him.

It's like a group of clowns in brightly colored costumes showing off in front of a real tsunami.

Zhou Chenglin lowered his head, his gaze sweeping over the split-screen window on the side of the light screen.

There was still hanging there, which was the book he was reading when he came: "Statistical Data on Following Trends in the Eastern Region".

Traffic curves, alternating between red and green, were jumping around, with book titles containing words like "system," "cultivation," and "golden finger" crammed together.

He stretched out his finger and tapped the upper right corner.

The page is closed, and the flickering light and shadow disappear.

The screen returned to that page with black background and white text, back to the huge white skeleton tied to the side of the ship.

Chang Liren sat in the main seat, leaning against the sofa cushions.

He watched as "To Live" gradually swept across the entire internet.

He knew how Fugui, under the wheels of history, bowed his head to the soil and endured all the suffering.

That is the deepest underlying characteristic of the Eastern Region: patience, endurance, and unwavering perseverance.

And here is Santiago.

The image of the old man raising the harpoon flashed through Chang Liren's mind.

Do not dodge, do not endure.

Bleeding and cramping, he smashed the wooden stick in his hand at the shark in the water.

One is an old ox on the Loess Plateau.

One is about the lion in the Gulf Stream.

The directions are completely opposite.

But Chang Liren knew very well that if the two books were placed on opposite ends of the balance scale, the pointer would not deviate in any way.

They weigh the same.

Chang Liren's gaze moved downwards and landed on Yu Wen's hand.

Those hands were resting quietly on the armrests of the wheelchair.

Not long ago, these hands struck the earth, revealing the story of an old farmer who had buried all his loved ones in the soil.

Now, those same hands have created another image: an old fisherman smashing a shark's head in the middle of the night in the ocean.

The apartment is equipped with the most advanced constant temperature system in the Midtown area, and there is not a breath of wind.

But Chang Liren clearly sensed a stream of air mixed with the smell of coarse salt and blood seeping out from the gaps in the old mechanical keyboard.

Chang Liren loosened his crossed hands and picked up the teacup in front of him.

The tea had completely cooled down, with a very thin layer of tea oil floating on the surface.

He took a sip, and the bitter tea slid down his throat.

He put down his teacup, turned his gaze to Carter, and then to Zhou Chenglin.

Carter maintained the posture of loosening his tie.

Zhou Chenglin held an e-cigarette in his hand, looking at Yu Wen without saying a word.

No one speaks.

In the spacious living room, the air vents of the central air conditioning system emitted an extremely faint sound.

Sunlight streamed through the huge floor-to-ceiling windows, quietly spreading across the light-colored wood-grain floor.

Three senior executives at Weiguang Literature, who wield significant power and decide the fate of countless works.

Silence fell at that moment.

……

Sunlight streamed in half an inch through the floor-to-ceiling windows.

Chang Liren put down his teacup, the porcelain bottom hitting the wooden coaster with a soft sound.

The sound broke the silence in the living room.

Zhou Chenglin stopped turning the electronic cigarette and turned to look at Carter across from him.

Chang Liren's gaze followed.

The two of them understood the weight of the marlin and saw the old man's unyielding spirit, but when it came to whether this thing could break through the cultural wall of the West Coast, Carter, sitting opposite them, was the one with the most authority to speak.

"Carter."

Zhou Chenglin spoke first, "What do you think?"

Chang Liren remained silent, his gaze fixed on Carter's face.

Carter maintained his forward-leaning posture.

Upon hearing Zhou Chenglin's voice, he did not turn his neck, nor did he lift his gaze from the wheelchair even slightly.

He raised his hand, ran his fingers through his meticulously styled hair, and pulled it back forcefully.

Her chestnut-colored hair fell loosely over her forehead.

He did not answer Zhou Chenglin's question.

Instead, he looked at Yu Wen, who was sitting in a wheelchair:

"Teacher Yu."

Carter's voice was somewhat hoarse.

"Are you...?"

He paused for a moment, then asked a question that even he found unbelievable:

"Grown up on the West Coast?"