Insectoids: The Job of the Males

“So that’s why you can keep drawing comics now?” Zhou Xiaobao asks Cheng Zhaoci. With the government having revealed basically everything by now, he knows about the school Cheng Zhaoci and Zhou Luoluo are going to.

And Zhou Xiaobao finds himself a lot more melancholic recently. The comic trio that they are, yet he’s still the only one single, and not even having a romantic target to work on.

Cheng Zhaoci, the grade S male, getting to marry his beloved cijun as soon as he enters adulthood, fine. But how did Zhou Luoluo manage to land himself with Lu Nianqian so quickly after becoming an adult, too? Even though he’s as annoying as ever?

Do shemales like that more?

“Yeah. I haven’t much to do on the research side, so I’m reorganising my time now. The Time Turnaround series still needs new chapters,” Cheng Zhaoci says, feeling like his life is going back to normalcy.

Zhou Xiaobao then asks, “so you were completely absorbed in the research and didn’t check out BombIn’s account? Or watch the news?”

“Not really. What’s up?” Cheng Zhaoci wonders, “something wrong with my alt?”

“It’s like, many groups of males have been arguing in the comments of your page for a while. But anyway, you know that the referendum has already started, right?”

Cheng Zhaoci nods. He knows, but he also didn’t follow its updates. He knows exactly how hopeless this referendum is. It’s practically political theatre.

“Less than a month remains in the voting period. Even despite the open ballot, the Ayes and Noes are in a standoff,” Zhou Xiaobao says with a serious tone.

“Yeah, I know. No one is expecting it to work out…” then Cheng Zhaoci blanks out, and tries to reconfirm, “wait a second! What, what did you say, was in a standoff?”

“The Ayes and Noes,” Zhou Xiaobao repeats himself, “the votes for and against changing the marriage laws are about 50:50.”

Cheng Zhaoci then wraps his head and moans, “… I knew it. The President couldn’t hold himself back from committing fraud.”

“It wasn’t! You, you don’t think it’s because of some other reason?” Zhou Xiaobao asks, curious.

“The Chairman went on air to threaten the males?” Cheng Zhaoci asks, despondent. Have they resorted to committing actual coercion?

“Fuck! No! I thought you were a grade S male! Is your brain broken or what?! It’s because of you!” Zhou Xiaobao has had enough, and is shaking Cheng Zhaoci’s shoulder around to wake him up, “according to the results so far, an unexpectedly large majority of young adult males have voted ‘Aye,’ and over 80% of them are huge fans of your work! They’re your fans! Get it?”

Cheng Zhaoci then tilts his head in bewilderment, “wait, what did I do again?” Huh? He didn’t make a single status update, and only released that short little monochrome comic of his. He checked its stats just yesterday – the number of views are high compared to other comics, for sure, but it is only at the level of around his very first comic release.

It really doesn’t make sense.

“It’s actually kind of ridiculous. Here, watch this,” Zhou Xiaobao shows Cheng Zhaoci his own holodeck.

It’s a short comic. Cheng Zhaoci can see a lot of area for improvement, but it certainly has talent and heart in it. The comic is named ‘Life.’

It didn’t take that long to read, either. It’s simply the recollection of a young male of the tragedy and eventual death of his dad and demi brother.

In the end, they both died, leaving the male to fend for himself. Then, in the very last panel, ‘This was adapted from the comic artist’s personal experience.’

Honestly, the general expressiveness of the story could use some work. There are places where Cheng Zhaoci had to pause and ponder to get what’s going on in the panel. As one might expect, it doesn’t have much clicks. Not even as much as Zhou Xiaobao’s zany plot-hole extravaganza.

But never mind all that, as Cheng Zhaoci saw it for what it is – the sprout of what is to come.

“I think there’s a rift driving the younger males and older males apart now,” says Zhou Xiaobao, “most of the younger ones think that insectoids like Jin Yue are insectoids broken by the current, oppressive system. Many of them are also feeling conflicted because they also have their dads and brothers to think about.”

Cheng Zhaoci thinks he gets what Zhou Xiaobao is getting at.

It’s not that he did something dramatic over time that turned the insectoids from staunchly against to staunchly supportive of reforms.

However, through his comics over the years, he’s brought them, especially the young males, the seeds for thinking and sympathising with others’ plight. Young minds are also less set in stone than older minds, after all.

If Cheng Zhaoci was never here – if there wasn’t the little zombie king, or In a Tiny Flicker, or the demi reporter and his introverted male, or the Time Turnaround series, or all the little one-offs he’s drawn over time – without any of them, there would have been far, far fewer of young males who could see the insectoid underneath the labels of ‘dad’ and ‘shemale/demi brothers.’

The bill would have still been introduced, but all the young males who have been raised in this environment, who have never had the opportunity to question their ways, would have voted against regardless.

But thanks to Cheng Zhaoci’s comics and its crazy popularity, thanks to his many fans across all walks of life, the younger males have started to learn more about the shemales and demis around them.

Actually, the fact that Cheng Zhaoci’s status updates frequently turn into ridiculous matchmaking sessions in the comments, have shown that males and the other genders can actually interact normally and often hilariously.

When you’ve successfully pushed one male into a renaissance of values, one entire group of males, perhaps, and some of them turn out to be quite expressive, too, then a cultural phenomenon would swiftly follow.

They might be more idealistic and hot-blooded than is ideal. Some of them might even be envisioning a new social utopia right now – becoming completely blind to the complex factors government male-shemale-demi relationships, like their physical and mental capabilities, and the current societal reality.

But they’ll grow and ripen over time. Now, simply seeing that result manifest as a close race between the Ayes and Noes, is good enough.

Cheng Zhaoci has definitely changed things. A lot of things.

So Cheng Zhaoci asks, completely dumbfounded, “you mean, this vote, it might actually pass?”

“Yeah,” Zhou Xiaobao nods, only to cuss out of shock again when he sees Cheng Zhaoci’s face, “what in the world?! You, you look awful!”

Cheng Zhaoci’s face is pretty contorted for sure – excited enough to want to cry in joy, but also can’t because he has an appearance to keep up.

He, Cheng Zhaoci, the deadbeat comic artist who died of a stroke at home, and probably ended up on the local news that one time… posthumously, feels like, maybe he has accomplished more than he was hoping for in this world.

Well, it’s not like he managed to conquer and unify the universe or something ridiculous like other protagonists or something, but he’s still excited.

So excited he immediately calls Wei Zhuo on his holodeck. Unexpected, Wei Zhuo is free, and it goes through in no time.

“I feel that I’m really amazing!”

“Yes, you definitely are!” Wei Zhuo has no idea what’s going on, but that doesn’t stop him from praising his xiongzhu. He agrees Cheng Zhaoci is the best insectoid there is, no questions asked.

He continues, “you’re the most amazing insectoid in this entire universe! Ever since I met you and learned about you, I’ve come to realise this in the…”

The hologram of Wei Zhuo continues to blabber on praises for Cheng Zhaoci in speaker mode, and Zhou Xiaobao watches, with dead, glassy eyes, how Cheng Zhaoci rolls around on the couch and squeezes into all sorts of funky shapes like an earthworm.