He changed Tiwat

The next four, five, and six chapters are about telling more lies to cover up one lie, leading Xiao Han down the irreversible path of becoming a working-class man, while simultaneously establishing the main plot and tone of the entire book. Furthermore, I set a very tight timeframe for him; he has an exam tomorrow and a contract to carry on, leaving him no time to think about anything else.

See, in just these few chapters, the author has clearly explained who the male protagonist is, where he is, what he is going to do, and why he is doing it. At the same time, his gains are (potentially) beautiful women and power.

4. Be aware of the pitfalls to avoid.

Rhythm and niche.

The current trend is fast-paced, while mine is slower and limited by subject matter.

Try to write more mainstream themes and avoid political intrigue and history (it's purely about making money; those who think they're newbies will pick on you, but true newbies won't understand it at all). I'm really the kind of person who would make dumplings for this kind of thing, but most authors aren't like that; everyone still needs to make a living.

I believe that none of you who write online novels would want to turn down money.

Let's take the first three chapters I used as examples. These chapters are not as simple as I make them out to be, right?

For example, Gan Yu's Dihua is actually related to Xiao Han's cheat ability, Word of Power, which involves the core setting of Genshin Impact: the power of the human world. Those who have finished reading Volume 3 know that there are actually many foreshadowing elements in these chapters that will be used later, or rather, many of the earlier chapters are connected to later events.

However, I don't recommend beginners do this, because it's not good for writing performance. To put it bluntly, most readers don't have the patience to read foreshadowing.

Because the current trend of abandoning Lu Feng is prevalent, the popular style is that the protagonist does not leave any page of revenge (it's not night anymore, it's page).

I am the kind of author who is determined and not short of money. I wrote this book for myself (of course, I can also shamelessly say that my level is so low that I can earn at least several thousand a month even if I write self-indulgent works).

But if you even have the slightest thought of wanting to make money, um, please don't follow my style, like those foreshadowing elements spaced hundreds of thousands of words apart. Especially my approach of using Ningguang's secret as a subplot, leaving the events of the first volume for explanation in the third, just to develop Ningguang into a character. This is because I like Ningguang and therefore prefer her, and it has nothing to do with grades.

For the sake of good grades, use the simplest things from the first three chapters that I mentioned above, make good use of them, and use them repeatedly.

Once one goal is achieved, move on to the next; once one task is completed, move on to the next. Upgrade and change maps—the more conventional, the better.

The anticipation you create for your readers can come from various aspects of Maslow's hierarchy of needs: power and status (esteem needs), building a harem and followers (social needs), and changing the world (self-actualization needs). Just rotate them, just like how Xiao Han didn't miss out on flood control, power struggles, and entering the pass to condense light.

What's the most captivating thing about Ningguang when she enters the pass? It's hanging her on a lamppost and depicting her as a high-ranking woman, you know?

These are the most basic elements of a "feel-good" novel. Although my original intention was not to write a "feel-good" novel, you should serve the reader (and ideally yourself) at these levels to increase the readability of the text.

The core of online novels is still the "feel-good" genre, just like Lord of Mysteries, despite its world-building, is still a story about leveling up and enjoying the thrill of victory. It's about pretending to be weak while actually being strong, and the Tarot Club's worship of the Dihua (Divine) culture, rather than because of its detailed research on the Victorian era.

But even though the squid knows these things, it still does research and does many seemingly mundane but actually showy things—well, as the author, I understand, because it serves the author's own interests. In layman's terms, it's about quietly showing off and secretly enjoying yourself.

—I strongly advise against learning this kind of thing. Seriously, I strongly advise against it.

But the author really enjoyed it, he laughed.

For example, I also create hidden Easter eggs like this, such as the recently concluded flood control chapter of Volume 3:

After Ningguang reached an agreement with the Rouran, she recited a poem, "Linjiang Xian," which includes the line "The immortals and gods occupy the Dipper, and a guest star is approaching." This alludes to the idiom "a guest star invades the emperor's throne," a reference to the impending death of the Emperor in the Genshin Impact Liyue storyline. Ningguang's statement that the immortals have taken her place and a guest star is invading her throne is already a spoiler. Later, she says, "Even if it is fate, I am unwilling," which essentially reveals the entire story's development.

For example, Ningguang said she wanted to kill Xiao Han, and that Zhilan was in power and had to be eliminated. This was an allusion to Zhang Juzheng (the Grand Secretary) talking about Wang Daokun, but in reality, Zhang Juzheng was reluctant to kill him; he was all talk and no action. She recited a poem using the lines, "Let the bright moon shine upon me, I conceal my fragrant heart from all people," which is one of the two quatrains on the night-blooming jasmine written by Li Dongyang (the Grand Secretary) of the Ming Dynasty.

Later, when entering the pass, I used the line "The flowers have always been of good quality, and they are already pleasing to the eye even before they bloom." This is one of Li Dongyang's two masterpieces on the night-blooming lily. These two poems are also hints at the development of the plot, and they are combined with the image of the luminous glass lily.

And if you notice the poems I wrote about the process of entering the pass—yes, the title of the poems is all "Night-blooming Jasmine." Night-blooming Jasmine is also called Albizia julibrissin, after all.

These images are all subtly interconnected.

This is just my personal style, like putting a fake label on my writing—it's like saying, "If you see this kind of pretentious stuff, it's definitely written by me." But for the online literature market, this is completely worthless; it's just the author's pure self-entertainment.

For example, the jokes I incorporated into Xiao Han's storytelling.

The name Liu Guo, his ambition to resist the Jin dynasty, and his poem "I want to buy osmanthus flowers and share wine, but it's not like the carefree days of my youth," and his poems to the court expressing his aspirations... how many people have never heard of him? For example, some people say that I randomly inserted Yang Guo into the story, but do those people know that Jin Yong wrote the name Yang Guo from Liu Guo? Even the characters are exactly the same, "改之".

You can see from this post that many people even get the title of the poem wrong. Liu Guo's poem is "Tang Duo Ling," not "Man Jiang Hong"...

For example, I incorporated a lot of gags from Taiwanese puppet shows into it. These days, how many readers actually watch Taiwanese puppet shows? Maybe one in a thousand... These are all things that the author enjoys (speaking of which, Cuttlefish also incorporated a lot of gags into his novel "One World, One God," so I really understand his mentality).

These niche behaviors are all things you do for fun, even if you're not making money, unless you're really just doing it for fun.

However, you can easily break these techniques down into plain language, replacing niche references with mainstream ones like Naruto or One Piece... This would maximize reader comprehension.

In other words, if any of my readers who write are looking to learn something from this story, I sincerely suggest that you don't learn my plot, but rather the structure. My plot designs are all structured; you can simply take my structure and replace it with your own plot.

Choose any chapter, for example, the simplest one, chapters 22 to 30 of Volume 1, the "Legend of the Smoke and Scarlet" quest. Just extract that three-layered, flipped structure and use it. The first layer of truth is "professional fraudsters," the second layer is "fools and spies," and the third layer is "political vetting." Extract this structure, and be sure to compress it to a length of no more than 20,000 words.

The effect is very good.

Furthermore, you don't need to write any reasoning content. You can change it to a romance/brain battle! You can change it to a battle royale! The structure is versatile; you can fit anything into it.

The key is that once you've built up the reader's anticipation, you need to quickly make them live up to that anticipation. For example, if I were to write purely according to market trends, Xiao Han should have been involved with Gan Yu in the first volume, reached his current position in the third volume, and then acquired one or two new female characters in each volume—seriously. This is about the reader's sense of accomplishment, or satisfaction.

Don't believe the idea that "readers will pay attention to logic." That's not true. Most readers don't care about logic at all. When it comes to making money, the only thing that matters is making readers happy. Readers' actions are always more honest than their words.

Just like how readers of "Squid" might praise his humanistic concern, but this is merely a source of superiority for readers to "pretend to have good taste," much like how Zhai Tianlin created a PhD persona for himself, even though he's never even used CNKI (China National Knowledge Infrastructure). If "Squid" actually wrote something with humanistic concern instead of wish-fulfillment stories, look how much criticism he'd receive now… accusing him of getting arrogant? But when his fans were bragging about him, weren't they comparing him to Jin Yong, The Three-Body Problem, the Nobel Prize, and so on…?

Seriously, this kind of thing is so real.

Every time I write this article and it gets featured, some newbies pop up and tell me I can't use the theory of higher elements to analyze Oser's War. I'm honestly too lazy to argue. I can offer four different perspectives on the Oser's War, from politics to economics to in-depth character development, and these people's thinking is still stuck on the trivial notion that "brilliant schemes can't be game mechanics." Can they understand the logic of political operation? Can they see that this is about distributing political interests? Can they understand what a political show is?

The feeling of looking down from the fifth floor onto the first floor... (laughs)

So you all understand now, these are all pitfalls. If you're aiming to make money, you absolutely must avoid them. If you want to make money, you still need to align with your readers' expectations as much as possible. Taking a niche route will definitely make less money, that's a fact.

These are some of the help and insights I can offer.

Of course, what I'm sharing here is just my personal experience, and it may not be entirely accurate; it's just my personal understanding. You can choose to refer to it at your own discretion.

I can only assure you that everything I've said is true, that's all.

Finally, I would like to thank all the readers who have accompanied me along the way. Thank you everyone.

Volume Four: Yes, Yura

Chapter One: A Fateful Encounter

There is a small hill a dozen miles outside the north gate of Liyue Harbor, with a quiet environment and pleasant scenery.

Standing atop the mountain, visitors can gaze north during the day to see the vibrant colors of Liyue Harbor, admiring the wonders of nature; at night, looking south, they can see the brightly lit Liyue Harbor, a city that never sleeps, a testament to human ingenuity. At the summit stands a century-old maple tree, its branches laden with leaves, providing a perfect shady spot.

A merchant named Zhu from Liyue Harbor happened to come here to admire the scenery and was so captivated by it that he couldn't help but be moved.

He thought: With such a beautiful view, if I could open an inn here, it would surely be bustling with tourists and I would make a fortune.

So a guesthouse was built on the mountaintop, with a rather elegant name: "Emerald Maple Pavilion".

Unfortunately, things didn't go as planned. Since its opening, Cuifengting had never had many guests, and the rooms were never fully booked. Boss Zhu was barely making ends meet.

Since the beginning of May, Liyue has been hit by torrential rains, and the Biyue River has overflowed, cutting off the road from Stone Gate to Liyue Harbor. Tourists have become extremely scarce. The Maple Pavilion has been closed for almost a month.

The waiter, Aben, and the maid, Azhi, spent their days sitting in the lobby yawning. Boss Zhu had no interest in scolding them. After all, he could only sit in the shop drinking tea and looking at the sky, pondering whether he should close the inn.

On the evening of the last day of May, Cuifengting welcomed its first guest of the month.

A weary traveler entered the shop.

"Oh my, what a rare guest!" Ah Ben, the waiter who was having nothing to do, hurriedly stepped forward to greet the long-awaited guest.

"Hmm? Why are you a rare guest?" The guest took off his wide-brimmed pointed hat, revealing his face that had been covered by the brim.

The guest was a girl, a very young girl.

Ah Ben's eyes widened. He could swear to God that this was the most beautiful girl he had ever seen in his life—of course, he was comparing her to his colleague Ah Zhi. In fact, he had never seen many beautiful women in his life... Moreover, this one was a foreign beauty.

Her deep purple-black hair, gray-green eyes, and slightly rolled "r" in her speech all indicated that she was not a native of Liyue... How could such a foreign beauty end up in this deserted inn?

Ah Ben blurted out his true feelings: "Of course you're a rare guest! In this desolate wilderness, there are fewer guests than waiters, so how can you not be rare? A guest as beautiful as you is even rarer..."

Hearing Ah Ben's words, the girl covered her mouth and chuckled. Her deep purple twin ponytails swayed, making her look even more charming.

Ah Ben felt his heart swaying along with the girl's movements.

She smiled at me.

—Could this be the so-called "fateful encounter" that A-Zhi, who's gone mad from reading too many teen novels, keeps talking about?

During a casual chat, Ah Zhi once told him that the reason she came to work at this Cuifengting restaurant was because she longed for the romantic encounters described in novels: an ordinary waitress suddenly being kidnapped by a handsome bad boy and secretly pledging her life to him by the Biyue River...

Ah Ben probably meets half of Ah Zhi's requirements—he is indeed a bad boy, but unfortunately not handsome.

Before coming to work at this inn, Aben used to make a living by swindling tourists out of expensive souvenirs and taking kickbacks. He would occasionally work as a thug for gangs. In short, he had a bad reputation and didn't make much money, so naturally no decent girl would be interested in him.

Later, he heard that a silly boss ran a shop in the wilderness and paid the waiters quite well. Ah Ben got the job by using his persuasive skills to convince tourists... But this kind of leisurely job, where he just sat there in the mountains every day, made him feel even worse than before...

But meeting this beautiful girl made Ah Ben feel that everything was worth it.

He's even thought of names for his child now.

At this moment, Boss Zhu came out of the lobby and saw Ah Ben standing there dumbly staring at the guests. He quickly pushed the silly boy aside and asked, "Sir, are you here for a meal or to stay the night?"

The girl tilted her head and asked, "What does '打尖' mean?"

As Mr. Zhu led the customer into the restaurant, he explained to her, "It's just for dining. I'm the owner and also the head chef. When I was young, I traveled around a lot, and I especially loved trying the delicious local snacks. After eating my way across the north and south of the continent, I returned to Liyue and opened this 'Emerald Maple Garden.' I'm quite confident in my culinary skills."

Ah Ben chimed in, "That's right, I can't say anything else about our little shop, but Boss Zhu's cooking skills are absolutely top-notch! Especially his stir-fried pork slices, the aroma of the meat mixed with the subtle spiciness of the Sichuan peppercorns, anyone who tries it will give it a thumbs up."

The girl seemed quite interested in what she heard.

"Hmm, if we're talking about food... how much is a serving of that 'stir-fried pork slices' you mentioned?"

“It’s only 1000 Mora per serving. If you want something good, Liyue is a culinary capital. We have everything from ‘Tian Shu Meat’ to ‘Golden Crab’!” Aben answered quickly.

"Yes, and we also offer 'package services,' which include breakfast and dinner if you stay at the hotel!" Boss Zhu also took the opportunity to promote the product.

"Then... how much does this 'package' cost?" The customer stopped in his tracks and asked hesitantly.

"Not expensive at all, this accommodation package is only 20,000 Mora per night." Boss Zhu said with a big smile.

Since it was a rare opportunity to open for business, Boss Zhu naturally didn't want to miss out on this opportunity, and the price he quoted was actually only 20% of the original price.

However, the guest seemed dissatisfied with the price. After hesitating for a moment, he asked, "What if I don't want meals and just want to stay at the hotel? I... I brought my own food."

“Then… fifteen thousand…” Boss Zhu was about to announce the number when he saw the girl’s face darken, so he quickly changed his mind: “Ten thousand Mora!”

"Yes, I need to check in!" The girl's face lit up immediately, and she walked to the counter with her head held high.

Ah Zhi, who was in charge of the accounts at the counter, saw the customer pull out a delicate little wallet from his pocket, turn it upside down, and then very generously lay out ten large coins on the counter: "Ten thousand Mora in cash! Boss, a pot of tea, please... Oh, and could you also bring a dish of peanuts?"

Ah Zhi had a very accurate first impression of this girl—she was beautiful, but poor.

Sigh, those who stay at inns in this desolate wilderness can't possibly be wealthy. Rich merchants can certainly afford to hire carriages and travel to Liyue Harbor before nightfall, while only budget-conscious adventurers or "backpackers" might have to walk, unable to reach the city before dark, and thus stop at this MapleStory for the night...

It seems there's no chance of encountering any "fateful meeting" here... The kind of roguish and handsome young nobleman from novels would never come to this shop.

She originally thought that "Cuifengting" had beautiful scenery and a high-class atmosphere, which would surely bring her wonderful encounters. Now... should she consider resigning?

Ah Zhi sighed silently and said, "Sir, you need to register to stay at the inn. May I ask your name?"

“Astrologist Mona Megistus,” the girl recited a long string of foreign names.

Ah-Zhi couldn't understand many of the syllables, but he could barely make out the shortest word: "Is her name... Mona?"

The girl nodded: "Yes, please call me—the great astrologer Mona. I came to Liyue to seek a 'destined encounter'."

Chapter Two: The Old Woman's Mission

On the morning of the first day of June, while the employees of Cuifengting were still asleep, their only guest had already gotten up.

Mona sat on the mountaintop, watching the last star in the sky disappear into the light of the rising sun.

"Yes, it's a good day that you can feel without needing to divine."

She was happy about this, as the entire journey from Fontaine to Liyue was filled with rainy weather, which was really annoying.

Sigh, if it weren't for the "old woman's" orders, she wouldn't have had to come out and suffer like this.

Recently, Mona's master—an old and powerful sorceress—entrusted her with an important task.

Mona has an old friend in Mondstadt who is both an enemy and a friend, and she wants Mona to retrieve a top-secret treasure chest from that old friend's successor.

"If you dare to peek inside the box... you'd better watch out."

Mona received this warning before she set off.

If someone peeks into the box, they'll be killed—Mona didn't need divination to draw that conclusion from the old woman's expression.

Of course, if you ask her if she's interested in the old woman's top-secret treasure chest, the answer is definitely yes.

Astrology is a discipline that seeks "truth," and Mona has always wanted to see the secret hidden within the old woman.

To paraphrase an adventurer: Why climb mountains? Because the mountains are there.

The same principle applies to astrologers' pursuit of truth.

The problem lies in the risks of prying into secrets.

Mona, who calls herself a "great astrologer," learned astrology from her master, meaning her master's astrological skills are no less than hers. If she had peeked into the treasure chest's secret, her master would certainly have been able to detect it through astrology.

We need to think of a way to complete the old woman's task, uncover her secrets, and avoid being discovered by her.

Mona consulted a fortune teller about the outcome of her trip.