He looked at the -3 in the upper left corner, felt utterly disheartened for a moment, then directly cut to the home screen to delete the game!
…But it still couldn’t be deleted.
Li Shuoxing calmed down a bit and moved his finger away from the delete button.
I’ve already spent the money. Even if I were to delete it, I have to play back the money before doing so. What’s more, favourability will increase when the little person reads books. Now, I’m only one step away from 5 favourability points. I’ll wait a little longer until the chat box is unlocked…
He thought, then went back to the game.
He didn’t know when it happened, but after a quick look, the little person was no longer sitting at the table reading!
Li Shuoxing: “…”
Great master, are you trying to start a fight with me on purpose?
He looked at the little person with a complicated expression and watched as he walked across the room, arrived in front of the bookshelf, crammed the book in his hand into it and looked at the other books.
Books came to Su Mingqian’s hands from the bookshelf. Their covers were different. If he looked carefully, he could see the titles and a few designs. When Su Mingqian flipped them open, he could even see blurry text marks on the pages inside.
This game was quite interesting.
The content that should be done well wasn’t, but the meaningless details were abundantly done.
But there was no denying that the little person, squatting under the little bookshelf and seriously flipping through books, was very cute.
Li Shuoxing watched for a while and recovered from the blow.
He was a bit overcome with cuteness, and his heart just couldn’t help but move a little as he thought again:
There’s still one shelf on the three-shelf bookshelf that hasn’t been filled. Should I give it a shot?
It just costs 68, not 680, not 6800, and I’ll be able to bring home favourability!
You won’t lose out if you buy it. You won’t be cheated if you buy it!…
Li Shuoxing’s finger hovered around the purchase button.
He was still a little hesitant.
Money isn’t a problem.
But buying the same thing will reduce the increase in favourability. If after this purchase the favourability doesn’t even increase by 9 points, what should I do? Give a few more cups of water to the little person and see if it can add favourability?
While thinking about things, Li Shuoxing suddenly found that the little person in the game had taken all the books off the bookshelf and placed them one by one on the table.
Li Shuoxing was quite puzzled.
What’s this for? Does he want to bask the books in the sun? Is he that bored?
Before he could finish his thoughts, he saw that Su Mingqian had gone back to the bookshelf. He buried his head in it for a while and removed one leg from the iron bookshelf.
Li Shuoxing: “?”
He continued to watch as Su Mingqian, holding the steel pipe, walked all the way to the window, stopped to raise his hand, and hit the window with the pipe in his hand.
Li Shuoxing: “???”
The narration, worried that he didn’t understand, jumped in to explain.
[Su Mingqian is attacking the window with a bookshelf.]
[Su Mingqian is trying to escape.]
What did that mean?
He’d paid 69 yuan to develop the little person’s skills, and he learned to escape?
Li Shuoxing was thunderstruck and could only watch dumbfoundedly as Su Mingqian hit the window again and again.
Fortunately, the game was also worried that the frequent face slapping of its money daddy would discourage him from playing. Therefore, although Li Shuoxing was dazed for a long time, the window hit by the steel pipe remained intact, as firm as before.
Even though the little person wanted to escape, he obviously failed to open up an escape route.
Li Shuoxing’s heart suspended in mid air drifted back to its original position.
He pressed his chest and slowly exhaled a breath of turbid air.
Although the duck in the dish is ready to fly, it hasn’t flown out yet after all, right? I can still salvage this, as long as I pay another 68 to bring the favourability to a positive number…
That was his reasoning, but Li Shuoxing still felt it was hopeless.
You and I have no chance; it’s all on me to spend money!
Finally, after turning it over in his mind, Li Shuoxing gritted his teeth and chopped down his hand, paying another 68!
This is the last time!
After I pay this 68, I’ll never spend any more money! This trash game won’t cheat me out of my money again!
After spending the money, the newly bought books appeared. Li Shuoxing instantly fixed his eyes on the little person.
The sudden appearance of the new books had obviously attracted the little person’s attention.
The little person stopped hitting the window. He turned his head to the bookshelf and his eyes unblinkingly looked at the newly appeared books on it.
Su Mingqian: “…”
A line of ellipses jumped out of his head.
After the ellipses, another number jumped out.
-1.
The small negative number seemed to represent the little person’s inner fluctuation.
Before Li Shuoxing could react, another number jumped out.
+15.
More sentences.
“Did you buy me books again? Thank you. I didn’t know you were there and was startled.”
Li Shuoxing’s attention moved to the favourability pool after seeing the number 15, and he let out an exhale after watching the -4 turn into 11.
A “bang” of fireworks.
The system spirit, which had disappeared for a long time, reappeared with ribbons and roses, and a chat box popped up at the same time.
“Dear player, congratulations on completing the task. Now you can chat with your lover. Please say hello to him first. Different conversations will produce different levels of favourability…”
Li Shuoxing didn’t wait for the system spirit to finish the demonstration before he started typing in the chat box.
He felt sore about the little person’s attempt to escape and needed an explanation. “I thought that we had initial trust in each other after I agreed to help you get out of here. I didn’t expect that you would choose to escape on your own.”
Another small change took place in the room.
Some blue spots of light emerged and converged in mid air into a light screen.
The light screen was level with Su Mingqian’s line of sight.
Lines of text appeared on the light screen.
“…You’ve really let me down.”
The black words were set against the blue light, flashing a cool and enchanting rose colour.
Su Mingqian was silent, hiding the shock in his heart. Since he woke up yesterday, his mind had been blank. But a blank mind also knew that such a situation was baffling.
“I’m sorry.” Su Mingqian first apologised to the person he couldn’t see. “I’m just a little anxious. There’s nothing here but me. The world shouldn’t be like this. My world shouldn’t just be this.”
He replied so fast!
And what’s more, there are many philosophical questions between the lines. Are paper people so up to the times now?
But I can’t explain to you that you are a pile of data, and you can only live in a data pile…
Li Shuoxing was a little surprised. He thought about it and replied:
“The world isn’t like this, but your world is.”
When he finished, he looked at the screen again and saw a grey mist sweep down from the frosted window and curl up at Su Mingqian’s feet while he stood still.
Then, a sentence jumped out of the little person’s head.
“Is it like that…”
“I want to ask you one more thing.”
Li Shuoxing: “What?”
“Why did I appear here? I woke up yesterday with a blank mind.”
Li Shuoxing saw the first word of this sentence and guessed what would follow.
Su Mingqian continued:
“I lost my memory.”
“Can you tell me about my past?”
No surprise.
Very cliche.
Li Shuoxing couldn’t answer this question, so he simply did the same routine as the common domineering presidents in female channel novels. “For you now, the past isn’t important, only I am.”
After saying that, Li Shuoxing suddenly felt a bit concerned.
Wait, an answer like this wouldn’t lose favourability points, right? If the favourability falls below 5 again, will the unlocked chat function be locked again?
But surprisingly, the little person’s favourability neither rose nor dropped. He just stood there, silent for a long time, and Li Shuoxing didn’t know what he was thinking.
Did the system crash?
Li Shuoxing thought of this possibility. He moved his finger on the interface, but everything was normal.
Then is what I said too complicated, so the system is currently calculating?
Li Shuoxing thought again. He took a look at the time and found that it was already 11am, so he simply exited the game and went back to his computer to do something serious, like writing or whatever.
Just as he returned to the computer, he received a message from someone else, his Terminal editor Calamus.
Calamus: “Ximu, are you there? I want to talk to you about something. The editor in chief has approved the application you sent before. When you officially begin your novel, the website will arrange an opening screen recommendation and feature interview for you. I came to confirm with you, can you start your novel on time next Monday?”
The opening screen recommendation on Terminal referred to the advertisement when the app opened, and the feature interview would appear on the website page. Both were very good recommendation positions.
Li Shuoxing: “Yes.”
Calamus: “The opening screen recommendation requires the novel name and advertisement words. You can send them to me later. The feature interview is a little more troublesome and requires you to write an interview script. But I know that you’ve never liked to write it, so I wrote it for you beforehand. If you see anything wrong, you can change it [kiss].”
Li Shuoxing: “…”
Just about to say that he’d finished the interview script today, he slowly swallowed his words, received the document from Calamus, opened it to take a look, then passed it back intact.
Li Shuoxing: “It’s fine.”
Calamus: “Hey, you didn’t even bother to change a single word?”
Li Shuoxing: “…”
He looked at his unfinished “You wrote it very well”, paused, then slowly deleted it.
Calamus: “Have a think about the advertisement words and remember to send it to me by the end of the week. By the way, how much stock do you have for your new novel?”
Li Shuoxing learned his lesson and finished his words at once. “Outline of 100,000, official text of 10,000.”
Calamus: “[cry][cry][cry][cry][cry].”
She sent a series of tearful expressions.
But Li Shuoxing was as calm as ever, not rushing to send expressions. He knew that Calamus would certainly speak again.
Sure enough, it hadn’t been two minutes before Calamus opened her mouth again, her tone still very optimistic. “It’s okay. When you officially write your novel, just write a bit more, and remember to add extra updates from time to time. I believe in you, Ximu! 3,000 words is the very, very, very least you can write. You absolutely can’t write any less!”
Li Shuoxing didn’t answer.
Everything had been said by the other, all he needed to do was send ellipses.
Calamus: “I won’t disturb you anymore. Message me when you officially post the novel.”
Li Shuoxing: “Ok.”
He thought about it, but still didn’t tell Calamus that although he’d written ten thousand, he still hadn’t chosen a name for the main character. If she knew this, it wouldn’t be conducive to the emotional harmony between the editor and author…
He ended the conversation and turned to open the document of the new novel.
There weren’t too many words on the document, but this was the official version after three draft versions. If the number of words were really to be counted, there’d actually be fifty or sixty thousand.
It was just the name. Although he’d changed it a lot from beginning to end, it always lacked some feeling and hadn’t been officially decided.
After opening the document, Li Shuoxing got out a notebook from his desk.
There was a page in the notebook with alternative names he’d written over time.
He took a pen and picked out some names.
Wei Sheng, Xu Tongguang, Chen Fang, Qin Lecheng… Su Mingqian.
Su Mingqian?
The ink marks crossed his retina, bringing some familiar feeling. Li Shuoxing’s drifting spirit suddenly gathered. When he looked closer, he found that at some point he’d actually written the two words Su Mingqian on the draft paper.