Besides posting in those infertility forums, Xia Ping also specifically chose to post in the forums of renowned 18+ authors like Jia Zhiwei and Bao Pichang.
Those two 18+ novel masters are the paragons of their genre — they've written countless classics and have numerous fans. Just the number of fans paying attention to their forums alone is 30 million people.
If he could cook up a hot topic in those threads, he could definitely attract a huge number of readers.
So Xia Ping immediately registered several sockpuppet accounts. One of them posted an article titled:
*"Discussion: Modern Society Wouldn't Care About Jia Zhiwei's Work."
This article deliberately took a seemingly fair‑sounding angle, but actually repeatedly criticized Jia Zhiwei's work, saying that his novels aren't worth a red cent.
A sockpuppet posted:
"I agree with the original poster. Although Jia Zhiwei is an 18+ novel master of his time, his work is extremely old‑fashioned and dated. In today's era, no one would read it. I honestly don't understand it at all — it seems like it was written just to satisfy himself."
Another sockpuppet chimed in:
"Right? If Jia Zhiwei were to personally write a novel now, apart from a few loyal fans, other people would curse him out. I think this new sharp 18+ novel Teacher Bai Rong is more interesting. The gap between them is at least a hundred years."
Another sockpuppet spread a rumor:
"According to hearsay, Jia Zhiwei hasn't totally retired — he once secretly published a novel online under a different pen name, but it flopped and no one read it."
"People said that when he saw Teacher Bai Rong, he felt the new wave push the old away, cried all night in shame, and decided he'd never publish again. The great master has declined."
A fan responded angrily:
"Damn right, that sounds like the truth. But don't fabricate rumors here! I've never heard Jia Zhiwei ever publish another novel under another name — he's in his sixties or seventies, how could he have the time or mood for that?"
Another fan blasted the original poster:
"Shameless! Jia Zhiwei is a great master whose novels have affected many people. Today's 18+ novels are all influenced by his thinking. You little newcomer thinks you can shame the great master?"
Fans continued angrily:
"It's unfair to accuse him — go check Jia Zhiwei's sales records before you speak."
"I've never even heard of this novel. How can you say it's better than everything Jia Zhiwei has written?"
"This guy must be a fan of that author, here just to get yelled at."
"Everyone surround his comment section and scold that author until he can't take care of himself!"
"If I see that author, I'll smash him with a brick to wake him up from his daydream!"
A crowd of Jia Zhiwei's fans were furious, and the general sentiment was turbulent and fiery.
Seeing all these replies, Xia Ping thought to himself smugly — this hype‑style tactic was already very popular in his previous life on Earth, and there's a slang for it: "Celebrity touches the porcelain."
In simple terms, it's when a person with low fame deliberately says something provocative about a big celebrity, stepping on the bigger name to boost their own exposure. If the celebrity replies, it increases the attention even more. If they don't reply, the celebrity's fans will still go wild defending them — and all this discussion increases the visibility of the original poster.
For a minor celebrity or someone with no fame, celebrity‑touching the porcelain is hugely profitable — at least it gets their name known and not completely anonymous.
Although such a tactic is extremely shameless, from a hype perspective, it undoubtedly works the best and fastest for advertisement.
So Xia Ping copied the pattern and one after another wrote provocative posts in other famed 18+ authors' forums, stirring those fanbases into fits of rage. As a result, his novel Teacher Bai Rong's exposure skyrocketed.
After such crazy hype, the effect was obvious — in threads where there were originally no replies, sockpuppet accounts suddenly appeared in huge numbers, like an organized army all railing against Xia Ping and hurling abuse.
In just half an hour, a novel's comment section that was previously empty had over 500,000 replies, increasing the novel's views by 3 million and its bookmarks by 300,000.
"Success." Xia Ping clenched his fist. He knew that even if many people scolded him, a considerable number would still be curious and choose to subscribe to his novel.
Even though the proportion of genuinely interested readers might not be very high, those comments were the spark that could start a wildfire. He believed that with this seed of attention, his novel would definitely catch fire quickly.