My System Forces Me to Live off Women-Chapter 91 - 88: Weren’t We Supposed to Be Useless Together?
The bourgeoisie has stolen the workers’ free time!!
At half past midnight, the three-person meeting convened by Xu Manning on the topic of the "True Self" brand development strategy finally concluded.
"Free-loading off my ideas, and taking up my writing time. After helping you so much, you can’t even agree to something small like a tongue kiss in front of her. Xu Manning, mark my words—I’ll never help you again!"
Li Peifeng cursed Xu Manning, this heartless capitalist, in his heart, and reluctantly returned to his room to continue writing.
He was drafting a new book outline, based on that dream of another world, tentatively titled "The Chronicles of Sword and Magic."
From the serious and somewhat dull title, yes, after much deliberation, Li Peifeng astonishingly decided to break away from clickbait and humor-driven styles, aiming for a more traditional route.
Li Peifeng initially intended to use this idea for practice, but the more he brainstormed, the more he couldn’t let go, and his ambition grew.
"This is a world I personally experienced, just randomly writing it for practice? Is that appropriate?!!"
"If I don’t write it well, that dream would have been for nothing!"
To live up to the dream, Li Peifeng now plans to write "Sword and Magic" as a serious fantasy novel with internally consistent architecture, similar to "A Song of Ice and Fire," "The Lord of the Rings," "The Witcher," and "The Wheel of Time." It’s like a modest budget ballooning to a lavish one.
Although the aforementioned works are also popular literature, they are evidently different from the style of typical web novels on the market.
For this reason, Li Peifeng intends to tone down the deliberate stimulation of thrill points in "Sword and Magic," focusing more on the novel’s majestic internal world and character depiction, with a rigorous requirement for language and meticulous plot construction.
Li Peifeng is confident in his ability, yet he doesn’t plan to entirely abandon commercial aspects.
Li Peifeng is simply unwilling to narrate the epic legends he experienced on the Narnia continent using the typical web novel’s "invincible protagonist" narrative style; that would be a cruel desecration.
At the same time, Li Peifeng harbors a small ambition; he hopes this book can achieve some form of success, unlike traditional web novels.
"Slaying Immortals," "Battle through the Heavens," "Heaven’s Cover," and even "Mysterious," no matter how popular in the web novel circle, haven’t broken through that circle nor have they made people outside think much of them, because although they might have high commercial value, their literary merit is lacking.
The criteria for determining literary merit are probably twofold: first, has it depicted rich and deep humanity and life? Second, has it contributed to the literary language of the nation?
In recent years, only "Three-Body" has achieved this. Da Liu used language capable of describing time and space, reflecting on and exploring humanity to perfectly blend commercial success with literary merit, breaking out of the sci-fi circle, becoming renowned, and marking a monumental achievement in Dong’s science fiction industry, widespread beyond the sci-fi circle itself. Any reasonably cultured, news-attentive Chinese person, familiar with sci-fi or not, would think of this book upon mention of sci-fi.
Li Peifeng wishes for "Sword and Magic" to become such a novel—relating to the web novel circle as "Three-Body" does to the sci-fi circle.
This is just his wishful thinking, but one must always have some dreams in life...
So how to transform the fantasies in his mind into a novel?
This in itself could fill a two-million-word manual for study.
According to Li Peifeng’s previous experience, writing a novel could be simplified into three steps.
First, think of the beginning and the ending.
Second, think of the title and the summary.
Third, pick up the keyboard and start writing.
Outline? What outline do you need when you have the beginning and end ready?
Only newbies need an outline to write novels!
Just start typing, and everything will fall into place!
This was Li Peifeng’s past writing experience, but for this book, the previous experience was evidently not applicable.
For those brainless, detail-free, just-for-money novels, Li Peifeng could vogue and write without an outline, but not for this one.
Li Peifeng even overturned the previous outline he had written—no more Zhao Feng and mentor Li Qingge’s crossing; he had to rewrite the outline!
The protagonist wasn’t even the focus anymore, starting directly with the world setting of Narnia.
Continental shifts, the birth of various races, the founding of nations, the formation of federations, drawing the map of Narnia...
This was a grand project.
How grand?
"I’m compiling the history of Narnia, damn it!!"
"Damn it, over 8,500 glorious years, more complex than the history of Dong!"
Li Peifeng was a bit overwhelmed because there were some crucial details he simply couldn’t recall—after all, it was just a dream; how could he remember everything about Narnia?
Li Peifeng used his weary eyes to glance at the time in the bottom right corner of the screen—3:10 AM.
Time to sleep; he would have to wake up at 7:30 to contribute to society.
But, "Sword and Magic" had no inspiration...
Li Peifeng retrieved a key, opened the drawer of the computer desk, and looked at the dark little glass bottle inside.
"If I consume it without anyone noticing, it should be me crossing over, right?"
After a brief thought, he picked up the "Breath of Nether Sea," poured a drop inside with the lid, and drank it all.
"A familiar taste, fifty-two degree sauce-flavored!"
"For the sake of literature, Narnia, here I come again."
Li Peifeng drowsily fell asleep. Before he completely lost consciousness, he put the perfume back in its original place, locked the cabinet, and lay down to sleep.
His eyeballs twitched rapidly under his eyelids as he lay in bed, and he once again slipped into a dream.
...
...
11:30, Beihua University, Teaching Building No. 8, Room 102.
"Alright, that’s it for today’s class."
The course "Studies on Modern Literary Trends in Dong" is over. The teacher, Liu Chao, packed his books precisely on time and leisurely left.
"Class over! Class over!"
Other students also picked up their books and walked out of the classroom with their textbooks.
"What’s wrong? Not happy?"
Seeing Shen Liao looking listless, Li Peifeng put a hand on his shoulder and casually asked, "Didn’t have a good time at the gathering yesterday?"
Shen Liao sighed, "Had too much fun, so much that we forgot the theme."
Li Peifeng was surprised, "What happened?"
"Mom..."
Mentioning this made Shen Liao a little angry, seeming like he was about to curse but instead shook his head with a reminiscent smile, "It was supposed to be a job and entrepreneurship support meeting among classmates, and then these guys..."
Li Peifeng was intrigued, "What exactly happened? Hurry up and tell me."
Shen Liao explained, "After everyone arrived at the hotel, we ate, drank, and played music. Folks from the music department gathered together with guitars, singing songs from ’Ten Years’ to ’Love Transfer’ to ’You at the Same Table,’ lamenting our youth. Then, our literature department recited poems we wrote ourselves, reminiscing the past and hoping for the future. A few guys from the philosophy department drank too much and claimed to have been possessed by Gadamer, telling everyone that no one could understand them and that they wanted to return to the sea."
"There was also a guy from the philosophy department sitting on the hotel rooftop smoking Huazi, and some classmates thought he was going to commit suicide and tried to pull him down. But he said, ’Don’t bother me, I’m engaging in the fastest subject-object exchange.’"
"I asked him what the subject exchanged with the object, and he told us—loneliness."
Shen Liao sighed, "Loneliness..."
This group of pretentious literary youths!
Li Peifeng scratched his face, "If I remember correctly, wasn’t the theme of the gathering supposed to be post-graduation employment exchange?"
"Yes," Shen Liao sighed, "But everyone forgot or didn’t want to bring it up. In the end, we all walked back to school from the hotel, discussing ideals and reality while looking at the moon and stars, unanimously agreeing that even begging in the future would be romantic."
"Hearing you say that, I kind of regret not going."
Li Peifeng also expressed a bit of longing, then patted Shen Liao, agreeing, "We’re only in our twenties, still at an age where we can become whatever kind of failures we want to be."
Shen Liao nodded, suddenly remembering something, "By the way, why didn’t you come yesterday? What were you busy with?"
That was quite fulfilling...
Li Peifeng thought for a moment, replying, "Played some games with two girls, submitted an article to a core Chinese journal, outlined my new book, and wrote a script for the ’Online Literature Creation’ lecture I’m hosting tomorrow. Yeah, the lecture starts at 7 PM tomorrow night. You can notify the class and have anyone with time come over to make up the numbers. It’s in Le Yu Building 204, and I’m the speaker."
Shen Liao was stunned, overwhelmed by the amount of information, and continued walking mechanically while pulling out his phone to check something.
He opened the Beihua Normal University of Arts and Sciences’ WeChat public account and looked at the first article: "Notice on an On-Campus Lecture by Online Writer ’Renjian Yiliangfeng’"
"Renjian Yiliangfeng is an online writer born within our university’s School of Arts and Sciences, signed with Endpoint Female Channel, with works including... and adaptations of film and television rights..." 𝕗𝐫𝐞𝕖𝕨𝐞𝗯𝚗𝕠𝘃𝐞𝚕.𝐜𝗼𝚖
"This lecture is specially organized for the faculty and students of the School of Arts and Sciences to share their literary creation journey. Faculty and literature enthusiasts from other schools are welcome to attend and exchange ideas. The lecture is co-hosted by the Beihua Normal University School of Arts and Sciences and the school league committee."
Shen Liao came to a sudden realization, "So you’re Renjian Yiliangfeng?"
"Yes."
Seeing that he didn’t mock the name of his works, Li Peifeng was relieved. It seemed the literacy tolerance among everyone was relatively high...
Who knew that after hearing the confirmation, Shen Liao’s eyes turned complex, his tone resentful as he asked, "Weren’t we supposed to be failures together? How come you secretly became a writer and held a lecture in school?"
"It’s just low-level stuff without fame, all commercial work for making ends meet."
Li Peifeng comforted, "If it weren’t for my advisor’s backing, how would I have the qualifications to host this lecture?"
"You’re lying; you sold the film rights and still call it low-level?"
Shen Liao looked at him with angry eyes, gritting his teeth as he complained, "While we’re worried about future jobs, you secretly turned into an online literature guru? You still have time to submit to a core Chinese journal, achieving both academic and career success?!"
"As classmates, you rolled us like this, do you even have a conscience?!" Shen Liao’s spit was about to hit Li Peifeng’s face, his expression extremely furious, as if looking at a class traitor.
"It’s not that serious, not that serious. I’ve just achieved a slight, tiny success..."
Li Peifeng indeed felt a bit scared, so he quickly ran away, "Talk later!"
"Where are you going?" Shen Liao stopped for a second, "Not going to the cafeteria to eat?"
"A director wants to discuss film adaptation matters, he’s treating..."
"Screw you!!!!"
