Star Cluster

Star Cluster is the debut work of web novelist Lazy Lion, a space-opera light novel set against the backdrop of an interstellar empire, running to roughly 1.45 million Chinese characters and now complete. The story opens on a frontier planet called Kangding: located on the edge of the Aianos Free Star System Alliance, poor in resources, almost forgotten by interstellar trade, it is connected to the wider galaxy only by a shabby orbital tower. The boy Cong Yun grows up in this ground-level world, and before the age of sixteen his life has nothing to do with the Galactic Empire. The turning point comes from his long-missing father, Lin Heng—a man wanted by the Empire and regarded as an "evil interstellar merchant." He abducted Elya, the bride of a duke's family in the Xalan Empire, and took with him the last heir of that house. The Xalan are the mightiest branch of human society, marked in bloodline and status by the "Xalan Ear," and they have built an empire spanning countless star systems, ruled at its core by the so-called "Root Clans." The Empire throws its full strength into the tragedy and fails to undo it, so it turns its gaze to the boy in a distant land, hoping he will continue the Root Clans' "light of hope." Thus, under the double favor of misfortune and luck, the boy leaves his homeland and is thrust into a sea of stars woven from imperial nobles, fleets, and intrigue. The author writes of fractured identity and family feuds in a brisk, humorous style, placing ancient martial arts alongside interstellar civilization, with characters steeped in the dramatic flavor of Japanese manga. The setting draws on the Crest of the Stars series and shows traces of Legend of the Galactic Heroes, and the work is regarded as one of the representative light novels of early Chinese web fiction.