It was three thirty in the morning in the capital, with only a few hours left until daybreak.
At that moment, the Renren Daily offices were brightly lit. Everyone was suppressing their excitement, and the newsroom was tense and bustling.
The paper's editor-in-chief, Zhang Jianguo, wore a pair of reading glasses as he carefully considered the copy for tomorrow's headline. Once the newsroom's top hand, he had rarely worked on articles himself since becoming editor-in-chief. These days, he was mostly responsible for administrative work and giving final approval.
But today was a special day.
Half an hour ago, the paper had received thrilling news: humanity's nightmare, the mighty Barbarian God Lord of Lightning, had been slain in Yanzhou by the God of Martial Arts, Chen Shouyi.
Following instructions from the central government, the headline that had already been approved for tomorrow was urgently pulled. Barring any surprises, tomorrow—no, today's paper was destined to go down in human history alongside this momentous event.
It was easy to imagine how the news would electrify the whole of Great Xia and, indeed, the world when it came out tomorrow.
And so, as the writer and editor-in-chief entrusted with this important task, the pressure on him was only too obvious.
He considered his words and wrote down a headline:
"Those who sow evil reap their own destruction!"
Then he swiftly crossed it out. That sort of official-sounding line might have worked on an ordinary day, but at a time like this, it was clearly out of place. It was too tame.
"Through the clouds, the sun shines once more!"
Still not stirring enough.
He stood and paced back and forth. Outside the window, the streetlights were dim, and the eastern sky was already faintly red. Before he knew it, dawn was nearly upon them.