After returning home to Repulse Bay, Lu Chen had just finished taking a shower when he received a call from his assistant, Li Zhen.
Only then did he learn about the argument that had erupted on the Hong Kong Island Blog. He discovered that he had somehow become the center of the whole incident, and in just a few short hours, his Hong Kong Island Blog followers had exploded from a few dozen to over 100,000!
Back on the Mainland, Lu Chen had more than 20 million followers on Wave Blog, but he was not well-known in Hong Kong. On top of that, he had only recently arrived and had no connections or foundation there yet. He was still trying to adapt to the local environment and atmosphere, so he had no intention of hyping himself up for the time being.
As Lu Chen's assistant, Li Zhen had long ago applied for verified status for him on the Hong Kong Island Blog. His identity was listed as a famous Mainland singer and actor, and the verified "V" badge had already been approved.
But up until yesterday, Lu Chen only had 57 followers on Hong Kong Island Blog. He also had just a single post, a standard promotional article reposted by the workshop, and both the view count and comment count were pitifully low.
The content of that post was nothing more than the usual: "Just registered and verified my Hong Kong Island Blog account, please take care of me," and so on.
Since Lu Chen had come to Hong Kong very quietly, neither the Mainland media nor his fans knew about his whereabouts, so this situation was perfectly normal. Otherwise, if his fan club organized a follower campaign, they could easily boost his Hong Kong Island Blog followers by hundreds of thousands or even millions.
Yet things turned out unexpectedly well. Because of a post by the famous Hong Kong Island Blog blogger and music critic "South China Sea Madman," Lu Chen was instantly pushed into the spotlight. The comments under his one and only formulaic post suddenly exceeded ten thousand, and the repost count was also remarkably high.
When Lu Chen turned on his computer, went online, and logged into his Hong Kong Island Blog account, he was startled by the thousands upon thousands of system notifications and private messages.
After spending quite a bit of effort sorting through everything, Lu Chen finally understood the full story.
The previous night, his performance of "Favorite in Life" at La Dolce Vita 97 had been recorded by customers and uploaded to a forum. Then this "South China Sea Madman" used it as ammunition to criticize Hong Kong's pop music scene and songwriters, ultimately triggering a massive blog war.
As the key figure in the controversy, Lu Chen was quickly dug up by Hong Kong netizens through blog searches. He even made it onto the trending search list, causing his follower count to skyrocket.
As for being innocently dragged into the crossfire, Lu Chen truly didn't know what to say.
Of course, these rapidly increasing followers were not all genuine fans. Most were casual onlookers enjoying the drama, while some were outright antis. The comments and private messages were filled with insults and mockery.
"Go back to the Mainland, Hong Kong doesn't welcome you!"
"So what if you played and sang one song? What's so amazing about it? You really know how to hype yourself up!"
"Honestly, how much did you pay South China Sea Madman to praise you like this?"
"Did you plagiarize this song from somewhere?"
"You look down so much on Hong Kong's music creators, do you really think you're that great?"
"Eat shit, loser."
There were even filthier insults, but they were directly blocked by the blog's smart filtering system. Still, it was enough for Lu Chen to see another side of some Hong Kong people online.
However, there were also many people who genuinely liked "Favorite in Life." They expressed their support for Lu Chen and agreed with what South China Sea Madman had said, that this song was one of the finest Cantonese pop songs of the past decade.
These newly gained fans were eagerly hoping that Lu Chen would release an official single and create even more and better works.
"Welcome to Hong Kong!"
"Mr. Lu Chen, I didn't even know who you were before today, but now I'm already your fan!"
"'Favorite in Life' sounds amazing. You sang it so well, I've replayed that video ten times already!"
"Was this song written for your girlfriend?"
"Thank you for letting me hear such a wonderful song."
After spending more than half an hour reading through part of the comments and messages, Lu Chen finally finished browsing them. Ignoring the insults and mockery from the haters and trolls, he felt that he needed to say something.
After giving it serious thought, Lu Chen posted a new entry on Hong Kong Island Blog for the very first time.
The title of the post was "Thanks to My Friends in Hong Kong."
In the post, Lu Chen expressed his gratitude to the Hong Kong fans who supported him and enjoyed his work. He specifically explained that his purpose for coming to Hong Kong this time and establishing a film and television workshop was to prepare for shooting a movie project, so for now he had no plans to release a music single or album.
He also explained that "Favorite in Life" was his very first Cantonese song. He had performed it spontaneously the previous night while gathering with friends at La Dolce Vita 97 in Lan Kwai Fong, so it was not deliberate publicity hype. As for himself and South China Sea Madman, the two were complete strangers.
Finally, Lu Chen stated in the post that he truly liked Hong Kong's prosperity and beauty, but he was very disgusted by some of the verbal attacks people were making online, as they went against Hong Kong's image of openness and tolerance.
Lu Chen's blog post could be described as both courteous and measured. His wording was gentle yet firm, neither aggressive nor timid, displaying remarkable writing skill.
After the post was published, it quickly received a large number of reposts and comments. Most noticeably, the number of malicious attacks and insults dropped significantly.
What Lu Chen never expected was that only half an hour after the post went live, the number one most-followed verified account on Hong Kong Island Blog, Hong Kong entertainment industry superstar Liu Gangsheng, actually liked the post and even commented on and reposted it.
In his comment, Heavenly King Liu first welcomed Lu Chen to develop his career in Hong Kong. He said he had just watched the bar performance video of "Favorite in Life" and that he personally loved the song as well. He also expressed hope that he might have the opportunity to collaborate with Lu Chen in the future.
Additionally, he told Lu Chen not to pay attention to the malicious remarks online, because those people did not represent Hong Kong as a whole.
The moment Liu Gangsheng's blog comment appeared, the entire situation was instantly suppressed.
This Hong Kong Heavenly King superstar, born in the 1970s, was also a household name in the Mainland. Coming from a poor background but working incredibly hard, his personal achievements were inseparable from the prosperity of Hong Kong's entertainment industry during the 1980s and 1990s. He was one of the symbols of that golden era, a true triple-threat superstar of film, television, and music!
Although Liu Gangsheng, now in his forties, had already passed the peak of his career, his status in the hearts of Hong Kong people remained absolutely unique. Moreover, he still possessed enormous influence in Japan, South Korea, and throughout Southeast Asia.
This Heavenly King Liu had over 17 million followers on Hong Kong Island Blog, greatly exceeding Hong Kong's actual population. But these followers were not fake numbers; Hong Kong Island Blog's registered users included not only Hong Kong itself, but also Taiwan, Macau, and Chinese communities across parts of Southeast Asia.
Liu Gangsheng's support for Lu Chen undoubtedly dealt a heavy slap to the haters. It was also an enormous help for Lu Chen in establishing himself in Hong Kong, and Liu Gangsheng's expressed desire to collaborate with him left plenty of room for speculation.
As the saying goes, twists and turns come one after another. After all these developments, Lu Chen had truly become famous in Hong Kong.
The number of people who knew his name increased by thousands, even tens of thousands, of times overnight!
(End of Chapter)
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