Chapter 130 The Doctor's Love Equation
The Doctor's Love Equation.
Sakai Izumi silently repeated the book title in her mind, a hint of surprise flashing in her eyes.
These few words alone convey a quality completely different from "White Night".
While she was still in a daze, Kitahara Iwa had already turned to a new page of the manuscript and picked up his pen to begin writing the main text.
Seeing this, Izumi Sakai subconsciously took half a step back, preparing to quietly leave the study.
After all, for most writers, creation is an absolutely private matter, and when inspiration strikes, they hate to be disturbed by others.
But as soon as she took a step, Kitahara Iwa's voice rang out.
"Where to?"
Kitahara Iwa didn't turn around, but simply asked a question in a casual tone.
"You're about to start writing your book, so I'll disturb you here. I'll go wait in the living room..."
"No need to go."
Kitahara Iwa interrupted her, using the hand holding the pen to lift it towards the single sofa in the corner of the study.
"Sit there. Just don't make a sound."
Izumi Sakai paused for a moment, then obediently retreated to the corner and sat down on the sofa.
She stood with her legs together, her hands neatly placed on her knees, and even her breathing was very quiet, as if afraid of making the slightest sound of the fabric rubbing together.
She stared wide-eyed at the figure standing in front of the desk.
Izumi Sakai originally thought that what followed would be a tough battle for writers, just like those legendary great writers who toil away at their desks, needing to rack their brains for long periods of time, frantically crumpling up paper, repeatedly crossing out and starting over, and struggling painfully with words.
But that's not true at all.
Kitahara Iwa didn't stop writing from the very first second he put pen to paper.
The pen tip moved smoothly across the manuscript paper, making a continuous scratching sound.
Without hesitation, without corrections, without a moment to look up and think.
It was as if the story already existed completely in his mind, and he was simply copying it onto paper.
Izumi Sakai sat on the sofa, and at first you could only see Kitahara Iwao's profile and the way he was writing with his right hand.
But when Kitahara Iwa turned the first full sheet of manuscript aside, revealing the words on it, she couldn't help but lean forward slightly and steal a glance.
Then she froze.
She thought that Kitahara Iwa's "writing a ray of sunshine" would be a story about summer.
It could be the seaside, youth, or some bright narrative full of passion and excitement that can instantly uplift people.
But the first protagonist to emerge from the manuscript was not a sunny and cheerful young man, but a withered old man with gray hair.
A PhD in mathematics.
Moreover, this doctor has an incredibly cruel limitation—his memories can only last for a short period of eighty minutes.
Every eighty minutes, everything in his mind about the present moment is completely erased.
Moreover, his timeline is forever broken in 1975; everything that happened after that is a void to him.
His worn-out suit was covered with tiny notes.
This was his only lifeline, a reminder of "what the world is really like right now."
Seeing this, Izumi Sakai, who was standing to the side, had a hint of confusion flash in her clear eyes.
What does this have to do with the promised "sunshine"?
An old man with only eighty minutes of memory, forever trapped in the past—this is clearly a suffocatingly tragic premise.
Immediately afterwards, a large number of cold mathematical terms began to appear on the manuscript.
Prime numbers, perfect numbers, friendly numbers, amicable numbers.
These concepts, which originally belonged to a purely rational world and were devoid of warmth, were naturally embedded into every corner of the story with the scratching sound of Kitahara Iwao's pen.
The first words the doctor said to the housekeeper who came to take care of him on his first day were not the usual "hello" or "please come in".
Instead, it was abruptly asked—"What shoe size do you wear?"
The housekeeper paused for a moment, then answered truthfully, "Number 24."
The doctor's cloudy eyes lit up instantly, as if he had seen some rare treasure: "24! What a beautiful number. It's the factorial of 4."
Upon seeing this conversation, a slight smile unconsciously appeared on Izumi Sakai's lips.
She may not understand the mysteries of "factorials," but she could vividly feel, through the paper, the pure, childlike joy the doctor felt when he uttered those words.
It's like suddenly capturing some kind of sacred mathematical beauty in the midst of a barren daily life.
Although the old man couldn't remember anyone's name or face, he could remember every number.
Numbers became the only language that allowed him to establish a faint connection with this world that was about to forget him.
The story unfolds quietly on the manuscript paper.
Every morning when the housekeeper came to the doctor's house, he would greet her with the same questions as if she were a stranger: "What size shoes do you wear?" "What's your phone number?"
Then, by reinterpreting those numbers mathematically, the same surprise reappeared.
He didn't know she had come yesterday.
He didn't know that she had come the day before yesterday.
He didn't even know that today was their thirtieth "first meeting".
But every time he showed surprise, it was without reservation.
For his soul, which lasts only eighty minutes, each encounter is truly a 100% first meeting.
Without realizing it, Izumi Sakai changed her posture, moving her hands from her knees to her mouth and tightly covering the lower half of her face.
She vaguely understood.
The "sunshine" in Kitahara's writing doesn't come from any exciting plot or inspiring slogans.
It comes from something deeper and more heartbreaking: a crippled person who has been stripped of almost everything by fate, yet still uses the only way he has left to embrace the world around him.
Then, the housekeeper's son appeared.
A ten-year-old boy.
When the doctor first met him, he stared at his round, flat-topped head for two seconds, then said very seriously and gently, "The top of your head is as flat as a square root."
From that day on, the professor called him "square root".
Every morning when they met, whether it was the first time or the hundredth time, the professor would affectionately pat his head and call him "Square Root".
The housekeeper couldn't help but ask the professor one day, "Why do you call this child a square root?"
The professor put down his pen, adjusted his glasses which had slipped off his nose, and solemnly replied, "Because the square root symbol is a symbol of tolerance."
"No matter what kind of number it is, no matter how big, small, complex, or even incomplete it is, the square root symbol will accept it without hesitation and firmly shelter it under its roof."
Upon seeing these words, Izumi Sakai's eyes unexpectedly welled up with tears.
She covered her mouth tightly, forcing back a sob.
Square root.
A symbol that can shelter all numbers under its roof.
This is the most tender name that an old man with only eighty minutes of memory, who can't even protect himself, can give to a child.
He couldn't remember the child's name, nor could he remember that the child had watched baseball with him just yesterday.
But he will always remember the meaning of the "square root" symbol.
And this meaning—"protecting everything"—is all his love for this child.
Upon seeing this, Izumi Sakai could no longer hold back her tears.
She desperately suppressed her voice, letting her tears silently slide down her cheeks, each drop landing on her faded jeans, leaving dark watermarks.
The early summer sun shone on the desk, and Kitahara Iwa's pen continued its work without pause, accompanied by a soft scratching sound. The story flowed irresistibly toward the ultimate redemption in the second half.
That day, the professor took his housekeeper and "Square Root" to watch a baseball game.
His memories of baseball also date back to 1975.
He still fondly remembers the players from that era, unaware that some of them have already retired, and others have long since passed away.
But when he was on the court, watching "Square" excitedly pump his fist and cheer for a good shot, a quiet, almost saintly smile appeared on his face.
He didn't know why he was sitting there.
I have no idea who the cheering boy and the gentle woman beside me are.
But he knew that the moment was good.
The bright early summer sunshine, the roaring cheers from the stands, and the round-headed child beside me—everything was just wonderful.
Even if these memories are wiped clean in eighty minutes.
But the feeling of "good" doesn't need memory to prove it existed.
In the end, the doctor's condition worsened.
He was sent to a sanatorium, and his memory window shortened further from eighty minutes.
The housekeeper brought the now somewhat grown "square root" to visit him.
The doctor sat on a bench in the sanatorium, looking at the two complete strangers in front of him.
He looked down at the densely packed notes clipped to his suit jacket.
One of the cards read: "The new butler wears size 24 shoes. 24 is 4 factorial."
Another one reads: "The butler's son. His head looks like a square root sign."
After reading the note, he looked up and smiled slightly at the two people in front of him.
Then, he took a pen out of his pocket and slowly and solemnly wrote a line on a new piece of paper:
e^(iπ) + 1 = 0
Euler's formula.
The most beautiful mathematical formula in the world.
It perfectly unifies the five most fundamental mathematical constants—e, i, π, 1, and 0—in a single equation.
These five constants seem to have nothing to do with each other and belong to completely different fields of mathematics.
But Euler discovered that there was a profound and chilling harmony among them.
The professor handed the note with Euler's formula written on it to the housekeeper and said in a gentle tone, as if explaining the deepest secret of the universe, "Look, this is what the world looks like."
"All things that seem unrelated will eventually meet perfectly somewhere."
He doesn't remember who she is.
I don't remember who this child named "Square Root" is.
But he used a mathematical formula to express his complete understanding and blessings for them—
Every seemingly unrelated encounter has meaning.
Even if I forget you, this meaning will not disappear.
Because Euler's formula does not cease to hold true simply because someone forgets it.
It will always be there.
When Kitahara Iwatsu wrote the last period, he put the pen back on the pen holder and turned his head away.
Izumi Sakai was standing to the side, her hands covering her face, her shoulders trembling slightly.
There were several dark water stains on the knees of her jeans, marks left by silent tears.
She repeatedly used the cuffs of her T-shirt to wipe the corners of her eyes, and they were already soaked.
Noticing that Kitahara Iwao had turned to look at her, Sakai Izumi quickly removed her hand and awkwardly wiped away the tears still clinging to her cheek with the back of her hand.
"I'm sorry... I... I couldn't help it..."
Izumi Sakai's voice was still trembling, with a heavy nasal tone.
Kitahara Iwa pulled out a few tissues from beside his desk, got up, and went over to hand them to her.
Izumi Sakai took the tissue and lowered her head to carefully wipe away her tears.
After wiping herself, she felt that her appearance was too undignified, and a thin blush rose to her ears.
Kitahara Iwa leaned against the edge of the desk, quietly watching her.
"The core framework of the story is complete."
Kitahara Iwao's tone was gentle, revealing a relaxed feeling that he only showed in front of close people: "If you were to write about all the everyday details inside, this would be a long novel of 120,000 words."
"However, in order to meet the deadline for the next issue of the magazine, I condensed it into a short version today, which also happened to be the most important beginning and end drafts."
Upon hearing this, Quanshui clutched a tissue, her eyes red as she stared blankly at the stack of manuscripts on the table.
Even just a condensed short story skeleton is enough to make people cry as if their hearts were being crushed.
If it were to be expanded into a novel of 120,000 words, what an immersive and exquisitely gentle world it would be!
"I'll polish the details of the short story in the next few days; it should be around 20,000 words."
Kitahara Iwa looked at her reddened eyes, chuckled, and explained, "As for the full 120,000-word version, we'll write it slowly when we have the chance later."
Listening to Kitahara Iwa's words, Sakai Izumi tightly gripped the crumpled tissue and looked up at him.
At this moment, Izumi Sakai's eyes were still red, and her eyelashes were damp with moisture, but the corners of her mouth had already curved into a soft smile, and she whispered, "Square root...that name..."
Her voice was soft, as if she hadn't yet recovered from the immense aftershocks of that tenderness: "A symbol that can shelter all numbers under its roof..."
She lowered her head again, burying half her face in a tissue, and said in a muffled voice:
"I will never forget this name in my entire life."
A few days later, at the headquarters of Shinchosha.
At 10 a.m., the door to Kenichi Sato's editor-in-chief's office was pushed open without warning.
Kitahara Iwa, dressed in dark casual clothes, casually held a brown paper envelope in his hand and walked in with a relaxed gait.
"Good morning, Editor-in-Chief Sato."
Kenichi Sato, who was engrossed in proofreading a serialized manuscript, looked up.
Upon seeing who it was, the high-ranking editor-in-chief of Shincho Publishing was so shocked that he jumped up from his leather chair, not even bothering to pick up the red pen that rolled off his fingers onto the ground.
"Teacher Kitahara?! Why didn't you call ahead so I could come downstairs to meet you...?"
Kitahara Iwa didn't respond to the polite remark. Instead, he walked straight to the large desk and handed Sato the brown paper envelope as if he were handing over a convenience store receipt.
The envelope was extremely thin. Compared to the massive, eight-hundred-page, brick-heavy manuscript of "White Night" from a few months ago, its thinness now seemed almost unreal.
"What's this?" Sato Ken instinctively took the envelope, squeezed its light weight, and asked softly, somewhat stunned.
"This is for the next issue of 'New Tide'."
Kitahara Iwao said casually, "The atmosphere in the market has been a bit chaotic lately, so I thought I'd publish a short story to give readers a change of pace."
After giving his instructions, Kitahara Iwa glanced at his watch, seemingly indicating that he had other plans to make later. He then nodded slightly to Sato and turned to leave.
Everything happened so fast that Kenichi Sato was still standing there, his mind blank for a moment.
Since completing his massive work, "White Night," which was extremely demanding, he had always assumed that Kitahara Iwa was in a long period of recovery. As the editor, he was even prepared for the other party not to write for a year or two, and he didn't even dare to subtly urge him to finish the manuscript.
Who would have thought that this great writer would unexpectedly send his new manuscript to us today?
Seeing Kitahara Iwa's hand already on the doorknob, Sato finally snapped out of his daze and hurriedly called out to Kitahara Iwa, "Kitahara-sensei—wait a minute, what's the content of this new manuscript...?"
Kitahara Iwa stopped and turned around, calmly replying, "It's a heartwarming story, probably a little over 20,000 words. Take a look first, and if you think it's suitable, we'll put it in the next issue."
After saying that, Kitahara Iwa pushed open the door and walked out decisively.
After the door closed, Kenichi Sato stood alone in front of his desk, his eyes fixed on the thin, translucent brown paper envelope in his hand.
Kitahara Iwao's new manuscript.
This is his first new manuscript after the nationwide sensation caused by the sale of two million copies of "Journey Under the Midnight Sun".
At that moment, Editor-in-Chief Sato heard his heart pounding wildly.
Without hesitation, he picked up the internal phone and canceled all the remaining meetings of the morning.
Then I brewed a cup of bitter, strong tea, locked the editor-in-chief's office door from the inside, and pulled the blinds to the most suitable angle to create a sense of seclusion and isolation.
Then Editor-in-Chief Sato sat down properly, opened the envelope, and took out the thin stack of manuscripts.
The Doctor's Love Equation.
Northern original rock.
Having learned from the experience of "Journey Under the Midnight Sun," Kenichi Sato did his homework before even opening the first page.
Although Kitahara Iwao said it was a heartwarming story, Editor-in-Chief Sato knew that most of what writers say is a lie.
Therefore, he naturally assumed that this was yet another dark new work designed to dissect the pathology of the times.
Editor-in-Chief Sato even opened a drawer and placed the largest glass ashtray beside him in advance—intending to rely on the constant nicotine to combat the suffocating oppressive feeling during the reading process.
He lit a cigarette and turned to the first page.
A math PhD with only an 80-minute memory.
A simple housekeeper.
Upon seeing this, Editor-in-Chief Sato frowned slightly.
This setting does seem heavy; amnesia, a lonely old man, a soul trapped by fate—these elements perfectly match his impression of Kitahara Iwa as a "despair-making machine."
Then he took a deep drag of his cigarette, ready for anything.
But as the pages were turned one by one...
The expected cold and damp weather did not materialize.
There was no scheming, no betrayal, and no killing.
From beginning to end, there isn't even a single villain in the entire story.
The doctor is not a tragic victim, the housekeeper is not a condescending almsgiver, and the square root symbol is not a tragic prop used to evoke emotion.
The relationship between the three of them was so pure that it made Kenichi Sato feel vaguely uneasy.
Because he was so familiar with Kitahara Iwa's writing style, he knew that Kitahara Iwa was best at planting the most terrifying bombs beneath the calmest surface of water.
So he kept waiting.
Wait for that bomb to detonate.
I waited for five pages, then ten pages.
Even as the cigarette between his fingers burned out and a long streak of ash fell onto the table, the imagined bomb never fell.
On the paper, there is only an old man who can't remember anyone but can remember all numbers, clumsily and solemnly expressing his remaining goodwill towards this world using prime numbers, perfect numbers, and friendship numbers.
There was only one simple, even somewhat dull, housekeeper who would walk into the doctor's house every morning and greet him with a smile as if it were their first meeting.
With the most ordinary meals and daily companionship, she provided this old man, trapped in an eighty-minute cycle, with a warmth he was destined to forget, yet which he could rediscover in every eighty-minute interval.
There was only one little boy named "Square Root" because the square root's flat, wide roof could shelter all the numbers.
When Kenichi Sato read about the origin of the name "square root," his hand holding the sencha tea cup froze in mid-air.
He gently put the cup down.
Then, he pushed the unfinished pack of cigarettes and the lighter to the farthest edge of the desk.
From that moment on, he no longer needed cigarettes.
Because he finally realized: this story wasn't about creating oppression at all.
It is doing something ten thousand times more difficult than creating darkness—
It uses the calmest and most rational mathematical logic to express the purest and most compassionate tenderness.
There isn't a single strained "be strong" in the entire piece.
There wasn't a single cheap and hypocritical "everything will be alright" in it.
There were no empty slogans or diluted platitudes.
All I had was that earnest reply every morning: "I wear size 24 shoes."
All that remains is Euler's formula, the most beautiful formula in mathematics—e^(iπ) + 1 = 0…
Five constants, seemingly unrelated in their respective fields, meet in a perfectly fated encounter within an equation.
When Kenichi Sato read to the end and saw the professor tremblingly handing the note with Euler's formula written on it to the housekeeper—
His finger was fixed on that page.
Then the entire editorial office fell into a deathly silence, a silence that lasted even longer than when we finished reading "White Night".
The silence brought by "White Night" is the exhaustion after the soul has been hollowed out.
This time, however, it was a silence filled with an extremely pure sense of goodwill.
Kenichi Sato slowly took off his glasses and pinched his aching nose bridge hard with his thumb and forefinger.
Kenichi Sato slowly took off his glasses and pinched his aching nose bridge hard with his thumb and forefinger.
At this moment, his eyes felt hot, and it felt as if something was tightly blocked deep in his throat, something he couldn't swallow or cough up.
But he didn't cry.
A forty-year-old man who has been working in the publishing industry for twenty years will not easily burst into tears over a 20,000-word novel.
But then, Editor-in-Chief Sato let out a long sigh.
As the breath escaped his lips, it trembled slightly, a tremor that could not be concealed.
This silent breakdown, where an adult struggles to hold back their emotions after being struck in the most hidden, tender corners of their soul by words, carries far more weight than a loud wail.
Then, Kenichi Sato aligned the edges of the thin stack of manuscript papers, carefully smoothed them out, and then put his glasses back on before his gaze fell on the documents on the other side of the desk.
This is a summary of book sales for this week.
On the first page of the briefing, a bold line of data was prominently displayed: "Shingo Fujiwara's 'The Glimmer of Early Summer' has sold 160,000 copies in twelve days, continuing to lead the list of new pure literature books."
Looking at the triumphant numbers, Sato's lips slowly curved into a barely perceptible smile.
If Kitahara Iwa hadn't specifically given prior notice, given Shinchosha's actions, they would have already started a legal battle with Fujiwara Shingo, and might even have begun to blacklist him.
Even so, everyone at Shinchosha kept their tempers down and maintained absolute restraint.
At the time, Chief Editor Sato and his colleagues were actually feeling somewhat aggrieved, but now, holding this thin manuscript, he completely understood.
He finally understood the terrifying confidence hidden behind Kitahara Iwa's "disdainful response".
Faced with overwhelming strength, engaging in verbal sparring is nothing more than a clown's charade to grab attention.
Now, compared to Kitahara Iwao's absolute masterpiece, "writing ultimate warmth with cold mathematical formulas," Fujiwara Shingo's "The Glimmer of Early Summer," which relied on false marketing and forcibly rose to fame by stepping on "Journey Under the Midnight Sun," pales in comparison.
The higher they're being praised by those literary politicians now, the more they'll be shattered by readers who have finally woken up a few days from now.
A few days later, the latest issue of "New Tide" was placed on the shelves of major bookstores and convenience stores as scheduled.
This issue's magazine cover doesn't feature any exaggerated visual effects.
Only in the blank space at the bottom right corner was a line of small print: "Kitahara Iwao's latest short story: 'The Doctor's Love Equation'".
That's it.
There was no "a literary sensation" or "redemption after the White Night," and all the marketing rhetoric that tried to create hype was removed.
Shinchosha is well aware that the name "Kitahara Iwa" is already the most dominant brand in the current Japanese book market.
The moment countless readers see these words on the magazine shelves in convenience stores and bookstores, their hands instinctively reach out.
But when they actually finished paying at the cashier and opened the book, most of them carried a hint of fear in their actions.
After all, the last time I read Kitahara Iwa's work was in "Journey Under the Midnight Sun".
The abyss and extreme evil described in those eight hundred pages still linger on the nerve endings of the people, like a cold aftershock that refuses to recede.
They took several deep breaths, mentally preparing themselves to be pierced by the blade again, and then, with trepidation, turned their gaze to the main text.
However, what came into view was not the killing, scheming, and betrayal that had been expected.
Instead, he is a mathematics PhD with only an 80-minute memory.
A simple and kind housekeeper.
And a little boy with a flat, broad head, who is called "square root".
then--
The Yamanote Line train is crowded during the morning rush hour.
"Section Chief Tanaka, are you alright? Are you feeling unwell?"
The young subordinate who was with him noticed his boss's strange behavior and couldn't help but lean closer and ask a question.
"N-nothing..."
The middle-aged man carrying a briefcase suddenly raised the magazine in his hand even higher, almost touching his face, and said softly, "The font in this issue is too small; you have to get close to see it clearly."
He desperately suppressed the tremor in his voice, but in reality, he was using the paper to cover his completely out-of-control expression after reading the description of the "square root" symbol.
In the company's break room during lunch break.
"What's going on? Is the head of the planning department yelling at people again?"
The male colleague who had just pushed open the door was startled by the oppressive atmosphere in the room.
The young female employee standing by the window turned her back to everyone, shook her head without making a sound, and simply raised her hand to cover her mouth tightly.
Another female colleague sitting at the table had eyes as red as a rabbit's. She was blowing her nose with a tissue when she pointed to the open "New Tide" magazine on the table, her voice thick with emotion, and she choked up, "Don't ask anymore... just buy a copy after get off work. I never knew Euler's formula... could be such a gentle thing..."
In a cheap rental apartment late at night.
"...will always be there."
His dry lips moved as he murmured a line from the book.
Then he turned off the light and lay flat on the dark bed for a long time.
Then, he suddenly rolled over, buried his face in the pillow, and let out a series of suppressed, continuous sobs.
Readers all over Japan were completely captivated by this short story of a mere 20,000 words.
But this "breakthrough" is completely different from that in "White Night".
"White Night" is a work that drains the soul, exposing the most cruel desolation of human nature.
But "The Doctor's Love Equation" gently plants a seed that emits a faint light in the emptiness that has drained you.
Amidst the fear of economic recession and the spiritual ruins left by the bursting of the bubble, Kitahara Iwao offered the most heartfelt comfort to the entire Japanese nation with the most rational mathematical formula.
He didn't just shout "Everything will be alright".
It simply uses an old man who can't remember anyone, a square root symbol that can protect all numbers, and Euler's formula that perfectly unifies all contradictions to tell everyone who trembles in the dark—
The bond between you and this world will not disappear just because you forget it. It will always be there, shining brightly.
As this issue of "Shincho" sparked a buying frenzy across Japan, millions of readers found long-lost healing in tears.
However, in stark contrast to the emotions felt by the general public, another circle reacted to this masterpiece in a completely opposite and extreme way.
If the average reader sees the warm sun piercing through the cold winter in these 20,000 words...
For professional writers and critics who make a living by writing, the moment they close the magazine, they feel a chilling cold.
After a brief period of silence on the first day of publication, the entire literary world fell into an indescribable collective tremor.
It's not because the novel is poorly written.
On the contrary, it's because it's ridiculously good.
It was so good that it was a suffocating, overwhelming talent that left its contemporaries feeling suffocated.
Kitahara Iwao has just proven with "Journey Under the Midnight Sun" that he can write about human malice and despair to the limit of endurance.
And now, he has announced it to the world with a short story of 20,000 words.
When he decided to write about the light, the purity and warmth of that light reached a peak that other writers could not achieve even in their entire lives.
This is what terrifies their peers the most.
A genius who can only write about darkness is terrifying, but at least people can still eke out a living in the "healing and warmth" category.
But if this monster has achieved absolute dominance over both the extremes of darkness and light... then what gap is left for others to survive?
The first to feel this devastating impact was undoubtedly Shingo Fujiwara.
Or more accurately, those readers who once paid to buy "The Glimmer of Early Summer".
After they finished reading "The Doctor" in "New Tide" and truly felt that "pure warmth written in cold mathematics, without a trace of impurity", they were deeply moved.
They turned around and took another look at the book on the bookshelf that Kohei Murota had praised to the skies, "The Glimmer of Early Summer."
With just that one glance, Fujiwara Shingo was sentenced to death.
With pearls and jade before them, even the humblest stones are revealed.
In the face of the natural, restrained, and sophisticated compassion of "The Doctor," the ornate language, the empty slogans of "good things will happen as long as you're alive," and the contrived scenes designed for forced healing in "The Glimmer of Early Summer" are stripped of all pretense in an instant.
It revealed its ugly face, a product of affectation and industrial saccharin.
So, "warmth" can be written like Kitahara Iwa.
It turns out that true "healing" doesn't require any grand principles, condescending preaching, or even a perfectly healthy protagonist. All it needs is an old man with persistent amnesia and a quiet mathematical formula.
So, what exactly is that so-called "White Night Antidote" that we bought for 1,500 yen?
It's like a bowl of lukewarm water.
A bowl of swill that's disgusting, its temperature faked through publicity and hype.
When readers personally experience the huge gap between the goods and the price, and realize that their precious empathy and money have been thoroughly fooled by a set of hypocritical marketing rhetoric, the resulting backlash is devastating.
The readers' anger came faster and more fiercely than Kenichi Sato had anticipated.
Those readers who felt "cheated" not only vented their dissatisfaction in various offline book clubs and literary forums, but also began to vehemently discourage new readers who were trying to buy "The Glimmer of Early Summer" in all kinds of situations.
The negative reviews spread by word of mouth instantly wiped out all potential buyers of the book, like a plague.
The complete collapse of reputation directly triggered a major business disaster.
The sales of "Early Summer Glimmer" plummeted on the third day after the release of "Doctor".
It wasn't a slow landslide, but an avalanche-like collapse.
Daily sales plummeted from a dazzling 10,000+ copies at the beginning of the release to below 800 copies.
Bookstores across the country began receiving a large number of book return requests.
One angry reader even slammed the book on the bookstore's cashier counter, coldly declaring, "After reading 'The Doctor's Love Equation,' this kind of artificially sweetened book is utterly repulsive. Please give me a refund."
That dazzling first-week sales figure of 160,000 copies has now become the heaviest and most fatal noose around Shingo Fujiwara's neck.
The more it sells, the more people will read it. The more people read it, the more readers will feel fooled and insulted after experiencing "The Doctor." The more intense the initial marketing hype, the more frenzied the backlash will be now.
On major media outlets and literary forums, readers' condemnations poured in like snowflakes, each word scathing: "Shingo Fujiwara's 'Glimmer' is a fake sun painted on cardboard with inferior paint, while Iwao Kitahara's 'Equation' is the true warm sun that dispels the cold wave."
"Kohei Murota said we need sunlight, and he's right. But what he forced on us wasn't sunlight, but a broken light bulb with a faulty connection that could explode at any moment."
"If you want to know what the gap is between 'whining without cause' and 'unparalleled tenderness,' read 'Glimmer' and 'The Doctor' together."
Shingo Fujiwara's name quickly went from being a "rising star of the healing era" to becoming a "clown" for Japanese readers to talk about over tea.
And his boastful statement in a magazine interview a few days ago: "I, Shingo Fujiwara, can illuminate the literary world without relying on anyone."
It has even been turned into a standard template by readers, who repeatedly bring it up to publicly ridicule it.
A phenomenal social death was completed in just a few days.
However, in this frenzy of everyone kicking someone when they're down, the first person to jump out and kick them while they're down was the most unexpected one.
Kohei Muroda.
No, to be precise, he had now given himself a completely new look—"an old senior who was deceived by his apprentice but always upheld the conscience of the literary world."
The day after "The Doctor" sparked a nationwide frenzy, Kohei Murota published a half-page open letter on the front page of both the Yomiuri Shimbun and the Asahi Shimbun.
The first half of the letter is a ruthless and almost cruel public execution of Fujiwara Shingo.
"I am deeply saddened and disappointed by Shingo Fujiwara. He is a shallow speculator who is blinded by short-term sales and lacks any sense of awe."
"He deceived me with his deliberately pandering words, and he also fooled readers all over Japan. As someone who once supported him, I cannot shirk my responsibility, and I hereby deeply apologize to the entire nation."
Every word and phrase was pushing his former beloved student into a quagmire from which there was no light, crushing him to death.
Kohei Murota made the cut cleanly and decisively, leaving no room for error.
The latter half of the open letter is an unrestrained, almost nauseating, adoration of Kitahara Iwa.
"Kitahara-sensei's 'The Doctor's Love Equation' is an unprecedented miracle in the history of Japanese literature."
"It proves that true compassion doesn't need empty slogans, pretentious sentimentality, or even a complete memory—it only needs a pure and innocent soul."
"If 'Journey Under the Midnight Sun' is a lightning bolt that cuts through the long night, illuminating all the unbearable things hidden in the shadows, then 'The Doctor' is the moonlight that falls after the rain."
"He can both tear apart the mask of hypocrisy with dazzling light and smooth the wrinkles in people's hearts with gentle moonlight."
"Such a genius, who possesses both the power to tear through darkness and the power to illuminate gentleness, is truly rare in the entire history of literature."
The essence of this open letter is extremely naked. Kohei Murota used the most ruthless means to squeeze the last bit of value out of Shingo Fujiwara, and then turned around and, in the most humble posture, handed over a pledge of allegiance stained with his disciple's blood.
This cunning and ruthless approach sends chills down the spines of countless industry peers.
But it must be admitted that this tactic was immediately effective.
Because the effusive praise he wrote about Kitahara Iwa in his open letter was, from a literary appreciation perspective, entirely true and without a single flaw.
Read Chapter 130, "The Doctor's Love Equation," now to begin your exciting day.