“Huh?”
This thing… looks, well… really strange!
And for some reason, he felt a bit embarrassed to open it.
Although Kane couldn’t quite put this feeling into words, his hand acted faster than his mind and directly tapped on the book.
After all, he was really curious—what exactly was this “Contract Marriage”?
Kane swore he was just curious about the meaning of this new term.
Not because he was expecting any sweet, ship-worthy scenes inside!
But, as soon as Kane clicked into the first chapter, he instantly felt a completely different rhythm and style wash over him.
Because this book was unusual, it had no complicated prologue or foreword; it dived straight into the story with the very first sentence!
[[When Gu Bai looked up into the mirror, he realized this pure white suit fit him to perfection.
And today, this wedding held on the Central Star had the attention of the entire universe.]]
‘A wedding scene?’
‘Wait a minute, the protagonist gets married in the first chapter!?’
‘Can there be such a good thing?’
‘Wouldn’t that mean this book would be sweet from beginning to end?’
If Kane was only curious when he clicked on the book, his mindset had now completely changed and his eyes widened in surprise.
After all, interstellar readers were used to stories where it took hundreds of chapters for the two protagonists to even hold hands.
Seeing a novel where the story opened with a wedding was beyond anything Kane could have imagined!
In a split second, Kane sat up straight and dived into this deep pit that had only been covered with a thin layer of soil with the speed of a hundred-meter dash.
[[But as one of the protagonists of this wedding, Gu Bai knew that it was all fake.
Pursing his lips, he glanced at the contract on the table and eventually placed it in the drawer.]]
Just as Kane fell vertically into the pit, the story took a sudden 180-degree turn, and the plot officially began.
Kane: “Huh?”
‘Two protagonists getting married… and it’s fake!?’
In just a few dozen words, the opening delivered a deep shock to Kane, a strong believer in pure love, and his firmly held worldview.
Even though interstellar novels generally had serious and grand themes, the writing style was often very refined and elegant.
For this reason, although Yu Mian could only quickly produce a “chasing wife to the crematorium” story, which did not require him to spend too much time designing the plot, he had still taken into account the reading preferences of interstellar audiences.
Although the story’s frame might be a classic and fixed tale of pursuing a lost love, the content definitely shouldn’t be rough or hastily crafted.
A tightly woven, and constantly changing plot paired with a clean, flowing writing style made for the perfect combination.
As for how to immediately grab the reader’s attention, Yu Mian considered it over and over again before deciding to directly open with a wedding scene.
A grand marriage into high society with a Cinderella touch is itself a naturally popular trope in novels throughout the ages.
But, of course, this was only the beginning.
So, after Kane was drawn in by the dramatic opening, he quickly realized things weren’t quite as he’d imagined.
So after Kane was immediately hooked into the story by the dramatic opening, he soon discovered that everything seemed completely different from what he had imagined!
After the line “it was all fake”, the story smoothly transitioned into a brief background introduction.
The protagonist, Gu Bai, was born on a remote star system and was currently a twenty-year-old student at the Venus Academy of Music.
As a student from a remote star, Gu Bai had made it into a prestigious academy in the Central Star System through sheer hard work.
He earned his tuition and living expenses through part-time jobs and work-study programs.
With just a few lines, Kane, the reader, couldn’t help but feel a simple fondness for the young protagonist.
After all, everyone knew that the Interstellar Federation’s professional advancement exam, or “Star Exam”, was one of the most competitive ways to change one’s fate, second only to gaining military honors on the front lines.
Even now, in the interstellar era, there were still objective disparities in resource distribution among star regions.
For a young man from a remote star system to achieve all of this without any external support was surely not just effort—it was talent.
Not to mention that, as a twenty-year-old student, Gu Bai was repeatedly depicted as having a clean and pure appearance and temperament, along with a strong, resilient spirit that strived for a better life…
The more Kane read, the more satisfied he felt.
After all, who wouldn’t like a young man with both talent and hard work, especially one who also happened to be handsome?
However, while the protagonist’s almost perfectly innocent “white lotus” setup initially gave Kane a favorable impression, he started to feel a little suspicious.
On the surface, these descriptions seemed reasonable, but upon closer thought, something didn’t quite add up.
Theoretically, achieving such excellent Star Exam results would mean Gu Bai could comfortably live off scholarships and other interstellar grants.
How could he still need to work part-time?
Did the author never study or take the Star Exam? That’s why he just randomly created a fantasy setting with plot holes!
Although Kane loved sugar, he couldn’t bear reading a book that felt like it was written by an elementary school student.
Just as Kane was starting to question the story, it gave an answer.
That was Gu Bai’s mother, she turned out to be a patient with a rare interstellar genetic disease!
For this reason, back when Gu Bai was still a child, his father disappeared due to the overwhelming medical bills, leaving the entire burden on the young man’s shoulders.
So, although Gu Bai had earned scholarships and interstellar foundation rewards due to his excellent grades, nearly all of it had gone to the hospital.
Because Gu Bai’s only wish was—for his mother to hold on.
In response to this, Kane, who had just been skeptical, suddenly felt a deep sense of shame.
While this was one of the most basic but classic setups in Blue Star’s novels, where the number of debt-ridden protagonists could circle the planet, for Kane, who was reading this kind of beautiful, strong but tragic setting for the first time, it was a great shock.
‘This young man is so pitiful!’
Thinking further, Kane wondered just how many outstanding young people from the remote stars, burdened by severely ill family members, were unable to live normal lives and study freely in the interstellar society…
For Kane, who had grown up pampered in the Central Star System, this was simply unimaginable.
Could it be that the author of this book intended to call on everyone to pay attention to the marginalized groups in the interstellar community?
And here he was, thinking only about the trivial sweetness!
Kane even felt a moment of guilt, realizing how shallow his thoughts were.
Perhaps this was the power of literature.
But was there truly nothing that could change this terrible and cruel reality?
After all, seeing something beautiful destroyed before one’s eyes was the very essence of tragedy!
As a reader, Kane’s feelings were so strong that, in his rapid page-turning, he hadn’t even noticed that within just a few hundred words of story development, he had quickly developed a strong affinity and empathy for the protagonist!
In the past, this had hardly ever happened.
But just as Kane was longing for a twist of fate, the second protagonist made a timely entrance!
