Mystery Detective of the Steam World

Chapter 263 Responsibilities

The printing factory that Qiong mentioned was located outside of Fog City.

However, this was different from the unlicensed printing shop on Glass Street that Li Wei had visited before, which only had a shabby printing press. When Li Wei entered the factory, he could hear the roar of the machines and smell the rich aroma of ink.

"Welcome, both of you."

A round, chubby man, dressed smartly and clearly not like a worker, walked over. He greeted Joan first.

"Ah, Miss Lista, welcome as well. The poster for the next stage play has been printed. It will be loaded onto the truck and transported soon. I think it won't be long before people all over the streets will be able to see your new stage play."

"Your actions are as swift as ever. I think the commander will be very pleased to hear this news, Mr. Richards."

Joan smiled slightly at the man with the bucket, then turned to acknowledge him.

"This is Sir Levi, I'm sure you've heard of him."

"Ah, Sir Levi!"

Upon hearing Qiong's introduction, the man with the water bucket paused for a moment, then hurriedly and enthusiastically walked up to Li Wei and bowed.

"I never expected you to grace us with your presence. Please forgive me for not welcoming you properly..."

"No need to be polite."

Li Wei waved his hand, and then Joan spoke up from the side.

"Actually, Sir Levi came here this time to have his picture book printed."

"Picture book?"

"That's right, Sir Levi made some very interesting drawings, so he wanted to print them into a book for sale."

"Ah, I see. I understand what you mean. Please follow me."

The man with the water bucket, also sporting a warm smile and hopping along with his little legs, led the two away from the noisy factory and into a house next to it. He asked them to sit down, then went behind a desk, his expression immediately turning serious.

"Then, may I see the drawings you brought?"

"of course can."

Li Wei handed over the sketchbook, which the man with the bucket took and flipped through. Throughout the process, the man's expression remained unchanged, like a serious teacher grading student work. After a while, the man finished looking at the last sheet of paper, then closed the sketchbook and handed it back to Li Wei.

"This is... quite a surprise to me."

"is it?"

"Yes, I heard from Miss Lista that you were planning to publish something. I thought you were planning to publish something about crime or solving cases. I didn't expect it to be such a... very ordinary little story."

"It's precisely because I'm always solving cases that I need to find some fun. If you encountered cases of killing seven or chopping eight people every day, you wouldn't find it interesting, would you?"

"Uh...that's true..."

Faced with Li Wei's answer, the man with the water bucket twitched his lips and replied with a wry smile.

"As you said, I don't want to encounter such an incident... So, are you planning to publish it?"

"I did have this plan. Of course, initially I drew this mainly for children to see, but later I also wanted to let other children see it."

"Ah, I see, it was watched by a child, no wonder..."

Upon hearing Li Wei's explanation, the man with the watery build nodded in sudden understanding.

"I was wondering why the story seemed a bit bland. Now I see. It's just right for children. Sir Levi, would you be willing to entrust this picture book entirely to our 'Seven Colors Pen' Publishing House? We will handle everything from printing and packaging to distribution according to your requirements."

"Yeah, no problem."

"Then, let me explain the specifics of the picture book printing to you."

Upon receiving a definite answer from Li Wei, the man with the water bucket became even more enthusiastic.

"As you can see, the batch of sketchbooks needs to be printed. For printing, we will first make prints, which is based on the original manuscript you provide. Then we will find a craftsman to carve it on a wooden board, then print it, and finally compile it into a book for publication."

"I know this."

When they were investigating the painter's case, Li Wei had heard from art dealers that they had taken the original painting with the intention of making it into a print and selling it.

Fortunately, that thing didn't get to the printing stage, otherwise it would have been even more difficult for Li Wei to clean up the mess.

Imagine those paintings that would cause mental pollution with just one glance plastered all over the streets and alleys of Chongqing—it's a nightmare.

Thankfully, the industrial age wasn't so advanced back then. If you drew something like that on the modern internet, it would spread like wildfire in no time.

Just like Sadako wasn't much of a threat in the videotape, but short videos are a different story...

"And regarding the price, well... to be honest, the direction you've chosen is indeed interesting. There aren't any picture books specifically designed for children on the market right now, and the interesting techniques you've used in this picture book are also quite intriguing. However... this is something that has never been done before..."

"money is not a problem."

Li Wei knew exactly what he was going to say and gave a direct answer: "It's just self-publishing, I have plenty of money, I'm just doing it for fun."

"That... of course would be best, but..."

"but?"

"Please forgive me for having some questions, but... why don't you just publish it in the newspaper?"

"A newspaper?" "Yes, didn't you know? Our printing plant has always been responsible for printing the 'Exploration' newspaper..."

"Well…………………"

Oh right, Li Wei suddenly remembered that MI7 was actually a newspaper company... Why did he have to be so stupid as to come here asking people...?

Damn it, it's all because of that lousy painting I saw a while ago that I went insane, I'm almost turning into an idiot.

"So, I have a suggestion."

"please say."

"As I just said, printing and publishing require the creation of prints first, but the creation of prints takes a long time. Although your sketchbook is only about twenty pages long, if you were to carve all of them into prints and then print and publish them, it would take a long time. As it stands... just carving all the prints alone would probably take at least a month. With typesetting and printing, it might not be until three months before it is actually published."

"Hmm... it is a bit long."

"So, my suggestion is, don't you have a collaboration with the 'Exploration' newspaper? Perhaps you could submit your sketchbook to them for publication in 'Exploration'. Since our factory is responsible for printing the 'Exploration' newspaper, we can slowly produce prints, one or two pages at a time. If the readers' response is good, then we can compile all the prints and print them into a book... What do you think?"

"This..."

Li Wei was no stranger to this; martial arts novels used to be done this way too—first serialized in newspapers, then published as standalone books. And for printing plants, it meant fewer prints to produce, and faster processing times. It also served as advertising; if readers responded well, then publishing standalone books would be a natural progression. If readers didn't like it, well… we'd deal with that later.

Of course, it will definitely be published; Li Wei is not short of money. However, since this is printing, the number of copies must also be considered.

If everyone likes it, we'll print more.

If people don't like it, we'll print fewer copies.

It's a solution.

"Thank you for your suggestion, Mr. Richards."

Li Wei stood up, shook hands with the man in the bucket, and nodded to Joan at the same time.

"Of course, thank you too, Miss Lista."

"You're welcome, Sir Levi, it was nothing."

Joan blinked, then giggled.

"Actually, this wasn't my idea; it was Miss Matilda's."

"Her?"

“Yes, didn’t you say you wanted to publish it? Miss Matilda tugged at my sleeve and whispered the name of the publisher to me. She really admires you, but unfortunately, the girl is just too timid.”

"Um………"

Levi also remembered that Matilda was indeed hiding behind Joan at the time, or rather, she was like that most of the time.

"Then, please convey my gratitude to her."

After that, Li Wei slunk back to MI7 and went to see the old steward again—it's no wonder Li Wei couldn't remember, since every time he came to the editorial department, he was basically reporting on tasks or taking on cases. Although there were a bunch of typists outside, Li Wei never associated them with the newspaper editors.

Even the case records of Li Wei published in the "Exploration" newspaper were rewritten by someone specially hired by the old butler based on Li Wei's case reports.

So it's definitely not that Li Wei forgot his MI7 cover identity at the newspaper office; it's just that he's never done any work related to newspapers here.

"That's why you went directly to the printing factory."

The old butler glared at Li Wei with displeasure, and the latter gave an awkward smile.

"Well, you can't blame me for that, I've been a bit busy lately..."

"Why……………"

The old butler sighed silently.

"Although this is a disguise, the work still needs to be done, otherwise people will become suspicious of us."

"I've been doing it all along."

"If I had been doing this all along, I wouldn't have gone to a publisher."

The old butler shook his head helplessly.

"Well, thankfully it wasn't anything serious this time. As for this... well, we'll arrange a special section for you. We've had quite a few readers write in recently saying that the newspaper's content is a bit too stimulating, so we can use this cute little dog to lighten their mood."

As he spoke, the old butler put down the sketchbook in his hand and looked at Li Wei.

"In that case, I'll arrange a job for you at the 'Exploration' newspaper."

"Sure, is there anything interesting?"

"This is a letter from a reader that we received previously."

The old butler took a letter from the drawer and handed it to Li Wei.

"The letter's owner comes from a place called the Great Salt Lake. He says that many strange things have happened there since long ago. I originally planned to send those little guys to check it out, but now... as a special guest of the 'Mystery' newspaper, this task is entrusted to you."

"...Okay, I understand."

Seeing the old butler's mischievous smile, Li Wei could only nod in agreement.

(End of this chapter)