Chapter 57: The Album Is Officially Released-Entertainment: Starting with the Song "Sunny Day"(Xiaomu does not eat cilantro.)

Zhou Ran was already in a fluster just trying to find some clothes, losing one thing after another, and it didn’t take long before the whole room was a mess. If anyone were to see Zhou Ran tidying up at home, his fans would be utterly shocked. In their eyes, the ever-competent Zhou Xiaoran would never be so frantic just looking for clothes. But Zhou Ran himself felt helpless—he wasn’t incapable of tidying up, just too lazy. If he were alone, he’d get it done by himself.

But with Li Mi around, Zhou Ran decided it was the perfect time to act a little incapable of handling daily life. “Sister Mi! Come help me!” After fumbling around long enough, Zhou Ran simply called out for his ultimate weapon—“the almighty Li Xiao Mi!”

“Oh my, my ancestor! Wait a minute, I’ll be right there!” Li Mi called out from the living room, her exasperation clear. Despite working in the living room, Li Mi always seemed to have eyes and ears everywhere. She knew instantly what Zhou Ran was up to the moment he called for her.

To put it bluntly, if Zhou Ran so much as shifted in his seat, Li Mi could already guess what he was about to do. “Alright, I’ll wait for you! Sister Mi, love you!” Zhou Ran shouted back, thoroughly pleased with himself.

The truth was, Zhou Ran could have tidied up by himself; he just wanted to pull Li Mi away from her work for a moment. When she’d been at it for too long, he’d find something for her to do, giving her an excuse to relax, so she wouldn’t always be so tightly wound.

It wasn’t long before Li Mi appeared in his room. “Oh my goodness, really now! You’re a grown man, can’t you put your own clothes away? Look, it’s right here! And why on earth are you bringing out a down coat in the middle of summer? Planning a trip to the Arctic, are you? Oh, my little troublemaker!” Li Mi lectured him in a tone that sounded just like a mother scolding her child.

But Zhou Ran wasn’t even a little upset; he simply sat on his bed, grinning foolishly. This was exactly the kind of environment he wanted. To Zhou Ran, Li Mi was family, no different from his own, as if she were his big sister.

“What are you smiling at? I’m talking to you! And you’re still grinning? Are you an idiot? Do you want me to smack you?” Li Mi was half annoyed, half amused by his response, and playfully tapped him twice.

Li Mi actually enjoyed this atmosphere too—the mutual trust and shared goals, working hard together. Being with Zhou Ran made her happy; she didn’t have to worry about scheming or manipulation as she might have before. She could simply do her job well. Besides, putting work aside, just considering their daily life together, she found Zhou Ran to be a perfect younger brother—good-looking, capable, generous, cheerful, and caring. Who could possibly resist such a perfect little brother?

As Zhou Ran and Li Mi joked and played, time slipped by, and soon it was almost midnight—the release time for Zhou Ran’s new song.

This time, Zhou Ran’s album was to be launched simultaneously across all platforms—a privilege that Xi Han had worked hard to secure for him. For any other artist, this would have been impossible. But the music platforms weren’t being charitable; they recognized Zhou Ran’s influence and agreed because of the traffic he would bring. After all, simultaneous release meant less profit for them—exclusive releases were far more lucrative.

Just one minute before the album’s release, a wave of users flooded every major music platform, crashing the servers with sheer volume. The platforms scrambled to add more servers, desperate to avoid any disruption, because even a second’s delay in recovery would mean users defecting to competitors.

Wu Ting was among the first to log in, choosing her usual cloud music platform. When she first entered, the app crashed twice, but after a minute or two, the servers stabilized.

Watching the countdown on her phone—thirty seconds left—Wu Ting silently vowed to be the very first to buy Zhou Ran’s album and brag about it to her friends.

As the countdown hit zero, Wu Ting refreshed the page, eager to buy the album instantly, but her platform crashed again—she simply couldn’t make the purchase. And it wasn’t just her cloud platform; every major platform buckled under the demand for Zhou Ran’s album.

This wave pushed the programmers to the brink. Despite adding extra servers, they’d underestimated the surge. Now, with their bosses breathing down their necks like grim reapers, they frantically worked to restore normalcy.

After more than ten minutes of chaos, and countless attempts at load balancing, the platforms finally stabilized.

Wu Ting, after furiously refreshing her app for over ten minutes, at last saw the purchase button light up in yellow. She immediately bought not one, but ten copies of Zhou Ran’s album, wanting to show her support.

Wu Ting was far from alone—countless fans snapped up multiple copies, knowing that Zhou Ran had pledged to donate all album proceeds to charity. For many, this was as much about supporting a good cause as supporting their idol.

The platforms agreed as well, pledging to donate all proceeds from Zhou Ran’s album to charitable organizations, presenting it as a gesture of social responsibility.

In the data center of the cloud music platform, the sales figures for Zhou Ran’s album shot up in a straight line across the big screen—just ten minutes after the official launch, sales had already reached half a million on that single platform alone!