Until the moment she transmigrated, Tu Tang was still working diligently for the marketing department.
“Don’t write about dating tactics. Change the perfume copy to ‘I’m not trying to please anyone. It doesn’t matter whether they like it. What matters is that I think the air smells wonderful today.’”
“The guest for the one-day store manager event? I’m the one who made her famous.”
“No matter what you’re selling, make sure you have a good story. You could talk someone with a great pair of legs right out of their pants.”
Making stars, marketing, image management, advertorials... These irritating, shamelessly dishonest jobs were how she made a living.
When she woke again, she found herself in an interstellar federation with no stories.
War had coursed through the bloodlines of dozens of generations. The Steelborn were heavy drinkers, numb, and emotionally blunted, while the birth rate continued to plummet.
They had the thickest war histories in the universe and the thinnest books on art. Their only poetry was longing for a home planet they didn't even know existed.
Here, material prosperity was boundless, but spiritual life was barren. At her side was the coldest, cruelest warrior species in the universe, while she was the frailest, strangest Earthling of all.
Tu Tang gave a dry laugh.
“Can you give me two minutes to tell you a story?”
In stories about domineering CEOs winning back their wives, a crazy animal town, Snow White and the Minions, red flowers came to represent love, four-leaf clover meant good luck, and burning paper offerings at a grave meant remembrance. Designer toys and fast-fashion stores sprang up everywhere, and “TV dramas,” “pets,” “comics,” “actors,” “idols,” and “variety shows” began appearing on brain-computers...
For the first time, the Federation's people, who had spent dozens of generations at war, had their emotional needs taken seriously. They called stories “painkillers for the soul.” This entire species, traumatized by war, gradually emerged from its grief.
It seemed as though a new life had truly begun. People became peaceful, gentle, and courteous. They no longer talked about war, but about dining tables, movies, clothing, and literature.
Until the Silicon Empire, their sworn enemy for ten thousand years, solemnly argued that the master storyteller was not, in fact, a Steelborn.
She belonged to all the nitrogen-based, sulfur-based, plasma, and other life forms across the galaxy. She did not belong to this cruel and violent carbon-based species.
The Steelborn had enjoyed love and peace for barely a few years before they instantly donned their military uniforms.
“What are you doing? We’ll kill you, kill you, kill you!”
Theme: Cultural export
