Chapter 18: A Sensational Debut

When I was a child, the elders used to tell me stories: "A star in the sky, a person on earth." Back then, gazing up at the vast starry sky, my heart brimmed with wondrous fantasies. I imagined that one day I would also become a star and soar into the night sky. At that time, I was ignorant and unafraid in the face of death. Now, one after another, my dearest relatives have left this world before me—perhaps they've become stars, or perhaps they've vanished into the depths of dust. At this moment, when I look up, the starlight is faintly visible, yet stars are not kites; there are no strings to guide me to you... "The Brightest Star in the Night Sky," premiering on Eastern Music Network (single link).

At nine o'clock that evening, as soon as the special feature for the single premiere of "Night Star" appeared on Eastern Music Network, Zhang Qiyang immediately posted the above on Weibo to promote the release.

The post was quite literary, even a little sentimental. It was Qin Xueyang who, following the emotional thread of his composition "Night Star," had polished and written the text for him. Zhang Qiyang had originally wanted to write something more direct, but Qin Xueyang felt her revised version was better and snatched his phone to post it herself.

After the recent tide of public debate, Zhang Qiyang’s Weibo followers had surged by another four million, reaching a total of twenty-seven million.

Although most of these followers were there to watch the spectacle or to criticize him, and perhaps not even a third could be called true fans, such a high level of attention still had immense advertising value.

During this period, many people had been watching his every move, waiting for him to fire back at public criticism and ignite another round of the "tycoon’s son versus the masses" spectacle.

No one expected that the fiery "Cannon King" would not respond as usual, but instead would suddenly release a single!

This caught many by surprise.

Driven by intense curiosity, hundreds of thousands of fans clicked the link on Weibo at the first opportunity, leading them to the single’s page on Eastern Music Network to listen to the newly renamed "The Brightest Star in the Night Sky."

Within the first five minutes after the single’s release, the number of listens astonishingly reached 790,000!

Its popularity far outstripped that of singles released by other singers.

Even Li Xuan’s record-breaking digital single "Straight to the Point," which set an online sales record, had never reached such heat at its initial release!

The technicians at Eastern Music Network remembered very clearly: when Li Xuan released "Straight to the Point" last year, it broke 500,000 listens in half an hour, setting a record at the time.

But Zhang Qiyang’s "Night Star" was about to break 800,000 listens in just five minutes!

These numbers were simply outrageous!

The servers were almost crashing from the traffic!

The Eastern Music Network team had anticipated that, as the center of public attention, Zhang Qiyang’s hot-topic single "Night Star" would likely explode if released while the buzz was high.

But they had never imagined in their wildest dreams that it would reach such a mind-blowing level of popularity!

“It just broke 800,000!”

On the large screen in the conference room at Eastern Music Network, the homepage data for "Night Star" was being projected in real time.

All the staff were stunned.

Mouths agape, they stared in disbelief at the rapidly skyrocketing numbers on the screen, which showed—

At 5 minutes 6 seconds: "Night Star" reached 800,000 listens!

At 7 minutes 23 seconds: it surpassed 1 million!

At 10 minutes 30 seconds: it broke 2 million!

...

All these figures set new records for single premieres on Eastern Music Network, and possibly even set a new record for the entire web!

Ma Ru, the sales director at Eastern Music Network, was a refined, elegant woman of thirty-five. Staring at these "miraculous" numbers, she was restless, torn between laughter and disbelief.

Brushing a strand of hair from her ear, she asked Zhao Zhe, the head of the tech department beside her, “Did you guys go overboard with the botting?”

Earlier, when planning the launch, the team had decided to give "Night Star" a boost. Every time a popular singer released a new song, the debut site would help artificially inflate the numbers to create hype and attract listeners—a common practice in the industry.

But when done by the site, it was usually subtle enough that outsiders couldn’t tell.

Yet this time, with "Night Star," the numbers looked as explosive as a volcanic eruption!

Even if it wasn’t all bots, it certainly looked like it!

Zhao Zhe whispered in awe, “We were going to boost him a bit, but before we even started, his numbers had already exploded. If we tried to add to it, the servers would crash. Two of our servers are already overheating. The heat for this song is just insane.”

Ma Ru exclaimed, “So you’re saying there’s not a single fake listen in his stats?”

Zhao Zhe replied responsibly, “There shouldn’t be. I had the tech team analyze it—the listening IPs are scattered all over the country, not concentrated like bot traffic. Most of the inbound links are coming from Weibo. We have to admit, our ‘Cannon King’ really has massive influence. His self-promotion this time was brilliant.”

Ma Ru’s expression shifted from shock to a smile, and finally she was grinning from ear to ear.

She had thought the numbers were all artificially inflated. Never expected they were real!

Although the paid-to-listen conversion rate for "Night Star" was abysmally low—when listens broke two million, there were just over 3,000 paid downloads, a conversion rate of less than 0.16%, far lower than most singers—the attention and talk value Zhang Qiyang’s single generated for Eastern Music Network was an enormous, invisible fortune.

At last, their huge investment in Zhang Qiyang was starting to pay off.

At the same time.

In the Starlight Hotel.

Zhang Qiyang and Qin Xueyang sat glued to their computer, eyes fixed on the public data on the single’s homepage, frantically munching on barley biscuits and chanting inwardly, “Best seller! Best seller! Best seller! Best seller!...”

The listens on the webpage soared ever higher, breaking record after record, but the paid downloads crept up agonizingly slowly. Qin Xueyang was on the verge of a meltdown, grumbling repeatedly, “How can they not buy such a beautiful song? Is freeloading really that delicious?”

“Of course freeloading is delicious. If you’re given two identical meals, one free and one not, which would you eat?” Zhang Qiyang replied.

“That’s different! The sample version of this song is only ninety seconds long, about as much as you sang on ‘My Song.’ If they want to hear the full version, they have to pay to download it.”

“I know, but in no time pirated versions will pop up. They’re not my die-hard fans, why would they pay for my song?” Zhang Qiyang said lightly, though there was a hint of bitterness in his heart.

In his previous life, he had been an online novelist. Authors and singers were alike—the thing they feared and hated most was rampant piracy.

But there was nothing they could do. It couldn’t be eradicated in the short term, so they just had to grit their teeth and endure.

Qin Xueyang, fuming, stuffed her mouth with more barley biscuits and exclaimed, “It’s almost at 2.5 million listens! Incredible! When your last song, ‘A Dark Dream,’ hit 5,000 paid downloads, it only had 150,000 listens! By that ratio, ‘Night Star’ should have sold 80,000 downloads by now! Why is it still just over 3,000? Could there be a problem with Eastern Music Network’s database? Are they skimming your stats?”

“Impossible.”

“How can you be sure? You made them sign that bombshell contract with outrageous terms and bled them dry. Now they finally have a chance to get back at you!” Qin Xueyang licked her fingers, stood up, and said, “I’m calling Sister Coco to check. These sales numbers aren’t just low—they’re outrageously low! I can’t let them cheat us!”