Back to 1997, I became the originator of online literature

Chapter 413 Debuts at the Top of the New Book Chart

Huizhou Dewei Food Company's main product is vacuum-packed stinky mandarin fish.

Braised stinky mandarin fish is hailed as the number one dish in Huizhou, so stinky mandarin fish produced in Huizhou sells very well.

After graduating from university, Xu Linsheng came to work at this company because it was his family's company, and his family had some shares.

However, his family is not a major shareholder.

Therefore, his position here is not high; he is just a salesman.

But the income is not bad.

His position is also higher than that of a regular salesperson, so you could say he's very comfortable working here.

But he hasn't been in a good mood these past few days.

Since his chance encounter with Cao Sheng and Jiang Xiaoshuang at his maternal grandmother's village a few days ago, the news report he had been waiting for had yet to appear.

He clearly sent a message to a reporter from the Huizhou Daily to expose the story.

She also sent a message to Cao Sheng's girlfriend, Huang Qingya, telling her that Cao Sheng was on a date with a beautiful woman in his maternal grandmother's village.

According to his estimation, Cao Sheng would be utterly disgraced this time.

Why hasn't the Huizhou Daily reported on Cao Sheng's news?

In order to witness Cao Sheng's downfall, he had been buying the "Huizhou Daily" every day for the past few days, but the news he wanted to see never appeared.

"Damn it! There isn't any again!"

That noon, after lunch, he went out again to buy a copy of the Huizhou Daily and returned to his office. He read it carefully twice but couldn't find any news related to Cao Sheng. He cursed under his breath and angrily slammed the newspaper on his desk.

This attracted the attention of several colleagues nearby, but seeing his pale face, they all pretended not to see him and no one asked him what was wrong.

Xu Linsheng pondered for a moment with a somber expression, then took out his phone and sent a message to Chang Min, the reporter from the Huizhou Daily who had previously broken the news.

"Changji! Didn't you verify the information I gave you a few days ago? It's been several days, why haven't we seen it reported in your newspapers yet?"

After a short wait, Chang Min replied: "What news did you reveal?"

"Grass!"

Xu Linsheng swore again. He had liked Jiang Xiaoshuang since college. A few days ago, he witnessed Jiang Xiaoshuang and Cao Sheng going to Grandma's Village for dinner, which made him feel very upset. He felt very uncomfortable whenever he thought about it.

At this moment, he suppressed his dissatisfaction and replied with a message, "The news that Zhongyuan Yidianhui and a beautiful woman are having dinner at Grandma's Village! Doesn't this news have any value? Did you even verify it?"

After a while, Chang Min replied: "First of all, thank you for the tip. I have verified it and it is true. Secondly, I did not photograph him and the woman engaging in any intimate behavior. Although I wrote a report, the editor-in-chief said that such news was not worth reporting, so it was rejected. Thirdly, I hope you can still give me tips if there are similar news in the future. Thank you."

"Damn it! Fuck it!"

After reading the message, Xu Linsheng was so angry that he threw his phone on his desk and cursed three times.

He never expected the truth to be like this.

There's no newsworthy content about Cao Sheng and Jiang Xiaoshuang not having any intimate interactions?

Can't you even make something up?

Does this reporter even know how to write news?
He was very angry, but what happened? He kept it to himself.

……

At noon on the same day.

With Cao Sheng updating two chapters of "The Romance of Chinese Martial Arts" at noon, the total number of words published on Qidian.com has finally exceeded 5.

Meet the basic requirements for being listed on Qidian's new book chart.

Cao Sheng chose to update two chapters at the same time not to get on the Qidian new book list as soon as possible, but because of the recent opinions of readers in the book review section.

As the new book was published on Qidian, he would see some readers complaining in the book reviews that the updates were too slow and not enough to read, and that waiting for the two chapters at noon and in the evening was very painful.

Upon seeing these comments, Cao Sheng adjusted the daily update time.

I will update two chapters every day, both after lunch, with two chapters released consecutively.

As expected, this satisfied many readers.

Many readers posted that updating two chapters a day is great, and they hope he can keep it up.

It has enough words to make the new book chart.

Cao Sheng, however, paid no attention.

He wasn't interested in checking if "The Romance of Chinese Martial Arts" appeared on the new book list. He estimated that there would be a delay in the system, as his book had just surpassed 5 words, and it was impossible for Qidian's new book list to include it immediately.

So, after updating two chapters, he quit Qidian and prepared to write more.

The cigarette ash on his fingertips—ever since "The Romance of Chinese Martial Arts" was published on Qidian.com, he has been paying close attention to all the data about the book every day online, even more so than the author, Cao Sheng.

Because his novel "The Rebirth of a Swordsman" is still number one on the new book list.

He knew that once "The Romance of Chinese Martial Arts" exceeded 5 words, it would soon take the top spot on the new book charts.

He was unwilling to surrender.

I want to give it a shot, I want to take this opportunity to prove my strength.

Therefore, he has been writing frantically these past few days, accumulating tens of thousands of words in his draft, planning to intercept "The Romance of Chinese Martial Arts" before it hits the new book charts, hoping to crush it for a day or two, or even longer.

He felt that if he could achieve this goal, he should be able to make a name for himself in the industry and let more authors, editors, and readers remember the cigarette ash on his fingertips.

The time is ripe to slay gods and prove one's path!
This is what he thought in his heart.

To achieve this goal, he started updating more chapters last weekend when the various recommendation slots on Qidian changed. He used to update only two chapters a day, but he has been updating three chapters in the last two days, and he is even preparing to update four chapters today.

According to his estimate, "The Romance of Chinese Martial Arts" should have more than 5 words by today's date, which would be enough to make it onto the new book charts.

Sure enough, this afternoon, after logging into the Qidian author backend, he immediately sent out two chapters of his draft without saying a word. At the end of the second draft, he added a sentence: "Author's note: There are two more chapters today, so I'm asking for your favorites and recommendations with a clear conscience!"

After posting these two chapters, he finally opened the Qidian homepage to check the new book rankings.

I thought to myself: With the support of Sanjiang Pavilion this week, and my plan to update four chapters today, even if you were Zhongyuan Yidianhui, you probably wouldn't reach the top of the new book chart today! Your book only has 5 words today, and it's only got a small recommendation spot in the urban fiction category this week. Even if you're amazing, there's a limit, right? I don't believe you can surpass me today!

Although that's what I was thinking.

But he was still a little uneasy.

After all, Zhongyuan Yidianhui is too famous.

The first online novel he read was "I Want to Become an Immortal" by Zhongyuan Yidianhui. When he was learning to write online novels, he also learned a lot from Zhongyuan Yidianhui's works.

There was a movie in the original timeline called "The Master".

There's a line in this movie that perfectly describes his mindset.

The line was: "Once you master it, he'll revere me like a god!"

This line is spoken by the male protagonist to comfort his wife. The reason for his objection is that the apprentice he's considering taking on is someone who looks at his wife improperly and seems to have designs on her.

So the male protagonist comforted his wife, saying: Once he masters my kung fu, he will respect me like a god.

As the apprentice learns the master's kung fu, he will gradually realize just how high the master's skill level is, and the master's image in the apprentice's heart will gradually become as lofty as a god.

In fact, this statement applies to all walks of life, as long as the master's expertise is high enough.

The same applies to the online literature industry.

Those who haven't read Cao Sheng's works might look down on his achievements, thinking, "He just wrote a few mediocre novels, what's so great about that?"
Some might even think: "Writing novels? Probably pornographic novels. What's so great about someone who writes pornographic novels?"

But those who have actually read Cao Sheng's works.

If you're just a casual reader, you'll know how creative Cao Sheng's novels have been in recent years, and how his writing style is years ahead of other authors.

Writers like those who excel at writing techniques, such as those who repeatedly study Cao Sheng's works, can learn various writing methods from them.

Every single one of them will develop a psychological trauma from Cao Sheng.

Cao Sheng's image will gradually shine in their hearts, like a deity in their hearts.

That is an insurmountable mountain.

For example, in Cao Sheng's works, he not only saw amazing creativity time and time again, but also Cao Sheng's skillful and unrestrained writing style, the distinct personality traits and lifelike images of the main characters, and so on.

He even saw the rigor of the overall structure of Cao Sheng's works, as well as the foreshadowing and echoing elements throughout...

In this era, online literature has only recently emerged.

Most writers still write in a disjointed and haphazard way, like someone who's just drifting along and writing whatever comes to mind.

It lacks overall cohesion.

Most of his works give the impression of starting strong but ending weakly.

In such a context, Cao Sheng's work maintains a remarkably complete overall structure. Many chapters subtly foreshadow events, and the later plot even manages to resonate with these foreshadowing elements...

The difficulty involved might not be fully appreciated by readers who are skimming through it; at most, they might just think it's well-written, great, and enjoyable to read.

But writers like Zhijian de Yanhui, when repeatedly studying Cao Sheng's works, will realize how big the gap is between themselves and Zhongyuan Yidianhui.

They will also realize how many shortcomings they need to make up in order to barely reach the current level of Zhongyuan Yidianhui.

Therefore, although the ash on the fingertips really wanted to keep the new book "The Romance of Chinese Martial Arts" by Zhongyuan Yidianhui on the bestseller list for a day or two.

But when the time came, he couldn't help but feel apprehensive.

I could only console myself: My novel "Rebirth of the Swordsman" is almost 17 words long, while his novel "The Romance of Chinese Martial Arts" has only reached 5 words today. Surely he can't surpass my advantage of so many words in just one day?
He quickly scrolled to the top of the new book list on the Qidian homepage.

He saw the new book list.

His expression froze instantly.

The top spot on the new book charts... is it "The Romance of Chinese Martial Arts"?
His own novel, "Swordsman Reborn," has fallen to second place.

This sorting seems reasonable.

But it made his heart sink to the bottom instantly, leaving him feeling utterly cold.

How could it be so fast?

A new person was parachuted in, huh?

I was featured on the Sanjiang Pavilion list this week! You only got a minor feature in the Urban category, how did you manage to overtake me so quickly?
He subconsciously closed his eyes briefly, then opened them again.

The rankings on the new book list remain unchanged, with "The Romance of Chinese Martial Arts" still at number one.

I don't know when, but his "Rebirth of the Swordsman" has already been overshadowed.

During this period, the Qidian New Book Chart displayed the popularity score of each book.

The method for calculating popularity is fixed and follows a formula.

This formula calculates a specific popularity score by weighting factors such as the number of clicks, recommendations, favorites, and reviews for each book.

After seeing the order of the first and second best-selling books on the new book list, the ash on his fingertips paused for a moment, then his gaze suddenly fell on a string of numbers behind the two books.

He knew this was the popularity score for each book on the new book chart.

His novel, "Rebirth of the Swordsman," has a popularity score of 172242, which is more than 5 higher than the third-ranked novel.

The popularity score for "The Romance of Chinese Martial Arts" is 266383.
It has nearly 10 more popularity points than his "Swordsman Reborn".

"Popularity value... this is more like an infuriating value, isn't it?"

He muttered to himself, his face grim.

A feeling of frustration was stuck in my chest, with nowhere to vent it.

……

The new book charts that Cao Sheng doesn't pay attention to are now being followed by tens of thousands of readers, authors, and editors.

The popularity score of "The Legend of Chinese Martial Arts" is over 26, which is just a number of infuriating points in the eyes of the cigarette ash on the fingertips.

To others, this is a surprising number.

But upon closer reflection, it seems there's no need to be surprised.

Because this is a new book by Zhongyuan Yidianhui.

For example, the Qidian editorial department.

When the editors saw "The Romance of Chinese Martial Arts" suddenly appear at the top of the new book chart, they weren't surprised. They weren't too surprised to see that "The Romance of Chinese Martial Arts" had a popularity score of over 26.

Only the person in charge, Bao Jianfeng, after seeing such a high popularity rating, got up, walked out of his office, went to the data department, and asked with a smile, "Hey! You didn't tamper with the popularity rating of 'The Romance of Chinese Martial Arts,' did you?"

The head of the data department asked in surprise, "No! This book is already so popular, would we need to tamper with it?"

……

On the forum of Qidian.

There have been a sudden surge in posts discussing "The Romance of Chinese Martial Arts" today.

"Zhongyuan Yidianhui truly lives up to its name! It's amazing! It just entered the new book chart and is already number one."

"The Chinese Martial Arts Chronicle is unexpectedly wonderful! When I first started watching it, I was quite disappointed to find that it was an urban story, but I didn't expect it to be so good."

"It's number one on the new book list! 'The Romance of Chinese Martial Arts' is coming on strong! Should we all bet on when it will break into the top ten of the weekly recommendation list?"

"I heard that Changjiang Literature and Art Publishing House agreed to select 6 books from Qidian to publish every month in order to sign the contract for 'The Romance of Chinese Martial Arts'. Now it seems that Changjiang Literature and Art Publishing House has a very keen market sense! It's already number one on the new book list."

"Why is Zhongyuan Yidianhui always so strong? Doesn't he ever have a moment of weakness?"

(End of this chapter)