Chapter 71 Bowing Down for Five Pecks of Rice

Chen Fanglan breathed a sigh of relief, having finally escaped a calamity.

On Sunday afternoon, when it was time for Shen Xuewei to return to school, Chen Fanglan happened to be going back to work in the county, so she took the car with her.

The van only took them to town. After they got off in town, she and Shen Xuewei bought some fruit on the street to take back to school. She also slipped five yuan into Shen Xuewei's pocket, saying it was her pocket money.

Shen Xuewei put away the five yuan note, but instead of returning to school, she stood by the roadside with Wu Yuhong, waiting with Chen Fanglan.

Looking at the two well-behaved and sensible girls beside her, Chen Fanglan smiled with satisfaction.

"I didn't expect you two to be so kind, willing to wait for my bus with me."

Shen Xuewei smiled brightly, "Auntie works hard, and Weiwei wants to spend more time with her."

Wu Yuhong turned her face away, thinking to herself: She's not being kind at all; she's clearly worried that Fang Lan will linger in town and affect her trip to the internet cafe, so she'll only feel at ease after watching Fang Lan get on the bus herself.

The three waited by the roadside for a while before a minibus finally appeared in the town.

Chen Fanglan quickly got into the car and then urged the two of them to hurry back to school.

Seeing the two obediently nod, he finally felt relieved and sat down, waiting for the vehicle to start.

The minibus stayed by the roadside for nearly ten minutes before finally leaving the town and heading towards the county.

Shen Xuewei waved her hand, and lowered it when she saw the vehicle getting smaller and smaller.

Wu Yuhong helped her take the bag of fruit back to school, while Shen Xuewei rushed into an internet cafe in a bit of anxiety.

Even on market days, the town is bustling on weekends.

The mornings and noon are fine, but the afternoons are the peak time for boarding students to return to school in both primary and secondary schools.

If you go to the internet cafe too late, you might not even be able to get a computer.

However, it is clear that fate was still on her side.

When she arrived at the internet cafe, there was only one computer left, which she managed to snag.

The internet cafe was crowded and the environment wasn't good.

The various strange smells mixed together didn't smell good.

In this environment, Shen Xuewei went from feeling uncomfortable at first to getting used to it now, and even unknowingly, it slightly cured her motion sickness.

At least now I don't throw up every time.

She took out her notebook, which she had filled up last week, and quickly typed the contents into the document.

During this time, a new editor named Yunli was added. When asked if she had any new manuscripts, she casually sent them to the editor.

Now that she's getting the hang of it, inspiration keeps flowing into her mind.

I have inspiration, but my writing speed is really not good enough.

If she could use a computer for a few hours every day, she felt she could easily write three books of 100,000 words each month.

However, given the circumstances, we can only do our best to take care of what's in front of us.

Occasionally, a flash of inspiration will come to her. If it's not suitable for the novel she's currently writing, she'll jot it down in a notebook and add it in later when she has a more suitable novel.

After typing away for a while, it took less than two hours to save all the contents of the notebook into a document.

She stretched and then noticed that her editor, Yun Li, had sent her a lot of messages on QQ.

Click to open it...

"This opening is so well written, it really feels like I've returned to my youthful school days."

"The male and female leads' names are such a perfect match, their interactions are so sweet, what's the ending? They'll end up together, right? Don't write them apart like in the last book..."

Shen Xuewei didn't want to rely on just one magazine. She wanted to develop in multiple directions. After comparing various options, she submitted her previous novel to another magazine and successfully got a 70-word contract per thousand words.

However, because the ending she wrote was a tragic ending, her editor, Yunli, would repeatedly bring it up whenever she talked to her about it.

...After looking at the message she sent, Shen Xuewei paused for a moment before replying:

"In the end, the female lead becomes the principal dancer and never marries; the male lead's family goes bankrupt, he is in a car accident and becomes a vegetable."

Editor Yunli: !!!

"I don't accept this ending. If I publish it, the readers won't be able to stand it either. The ending you wrote in your last book still has readers sending letters or calling to scold you. You need to change it right now!"

Shen Xuewei objected, "Their previous generation had a blood feud, they're destined never to be together. Besides, I've already written the outline..."

Editor Yun Li took a deep breath and typed another line.

"What a pity, the beginning was very well written. If only the ending could be changed... Oh well, what a shame. I was going to mention to my boss that the price had increased to eighty yuan per thousand words..."

Shen Xuewei's eyes lit up when she saw the text she sent.

The price has increased to 80 per thousand words?

Isn't this just a pay raise?

She quickly replied, "Really? Can you really raise it to eighty per thousand words?"

Editor Yun Li: "It's basically a sure thing, but only if you write a good ending. What a pity..."

Shen Xuewei was so willing to compromise her principles for a meager living that she overturned the previously agreed-upon outcome.

"No regrets, no regrets. It's just changing the ending, right? I have no problem with that. I'll change it to a happy ending for you right now!"

Lured by the money, she quickly changed the ending in just over ten minutes and sent it over.

Upon seeing the ending she sent, editor Yun Li blew on the hot tea in her thermos and smiled with satisfaction.

"Okay, if this is the ending, 80 yuan per thousand words is basically guaranteed. When can you expect to finish this book? Ten days is fine?"

Shen Xuewei was a little embarrassed. She had only written a little over 30,000 words so far, and she expected to write 100,000 words, which would probably take about 20 more days.

What's more, she only has more than ten days until her exam.

But when she thought about the 80 yuan fee per thousand words, she gritted her teeth and decided to give it her all.

"Okay, don't worry, give me ten days, and I'll definitely finish writing it for you."

It was already 7:20 PM when I came out of the internet cafe.

Shen Xuewei carried her schoolbag and ran quickly towards the school, just in time to sit down in her seat before the evening self-study bell rang.

As soon as she sat down, Teacher Yao walked around the classroom with her hands behind her back.

He tapped on the podium. "Hand in all the homework I assigned you last week. First, Chinese, then math, and then English."

Immediately, the students who had been pretending to read attentively burst into groans.

Shen Xuewei unzipped her schoolbag and placed the three completed assignments on her seat.

Teacher Yao said sternly, "What are you shouting for? Your class is the noisiest on this floor. I let you play at home for two days over the weekend, can't you get back to your normal routine?"

Under his stern reprimand, the students in the class all shrank back and dared not make a sound.

Seeing that the class had quieted down, he nodded slightly, then walked down and knocked on the desk of class monitor Jiang Yuanshuo.

"Squad leader, please sit on the stage. If anyone below is not studying seriously, come to my office."

The class monitor responded softly, picked up his book, and sat down behind the lectern.

While reading, he would occasionally glance up at the students below.

The workbooks were passed from the last desk to the front, and all the workbooks in a row were collected at the front and finally placed on the teacher's podium.