Chapter 44 p1
After the college entrance exams, the two children in the family were about to go to university.
Huang He and Jian Changjiang had discussed it in advance. Without asking the two children if they wanted them, they had bought two laptops with identical configurations, except for the color, and gave them to them on the night the exams ended.
Both laptops were thin and portable, one silver-white and one light green, both very beautiful.
Jian Xin looked at the two laptops on the table, overjoyed. Like a little rabbit, she hopped over to Huang He, hugged her, and swayed from side to side, saying, “I love you to death!”
She had wanted this for months, during her intensive training.
Away from home, without a computer, every time she needed to download a song or a backing track, she had to borrow one from someone, which was very troublesome.
She was going to university. How could she not have a laptop?
Even before the college entrance exams had started, Jian Xin was already thinking about asking her parents for one after the exams.
No, no, not just one. Yan Xiaolu also needed a laptop very much!
Yan Lu loved to write novels, but most of the time she could only write by hand in a small notebook.
There were two computers at home, one belonging to Jian Changjiang and one to Jian Xin.
The former was in the master bedroom and was not used much, but Yan Lu was too embarrassed to use it.
The latter was in their bedroom, but Jian Xin was often using it, making songs, promoting, chatting, playing games…
Occasionally, when it was free, Yan Lu would also save her novels on the computer.
But besides the computer class at school, she had not had much contact with computers, and her typing speed was very, very slow. With so little time, she had naturally not saved much on it.
If Yan Lu had her own computer, she could publish her serials online—she wrote so well, and more people would definitely see the stories in her pen!
As for the money…
If her parents didn’t agree to buy a laptop for Yan Lu as well, she would go to work. She would try her best to save money, set aside a part of her living expenses, and after a few months, she would always be able to buy one for Yan Lu!
But now it seemed that she had been worrying too much. Her parents still doted on Yan Lu!
But Yan Lu was not good with words. She stared at this graduation gift for a long time, and it was only with slightly red-rimmed eyes that she said softly, “Thank you, Auntie and Uncle…”
“You’re going to university, you have to have one,” Huang He said, taking Yan Lu’s hand and pulling her to her side, patting her head and telling her with a smile, “If you need anything, you can always tell the family.”
Yan Lu nodded and leaned lightly against Huang He, not saying a word.
Huang He looked down at the two little girls clinging to her on her left and right, and was suddenly filled with emotion—unconsciously, they were taller than her.
When children grow up, they will leave home and go to a farther place.
Once the summer vacation was over, these two little girls would be in university, and the house would become quiet.
She didn’t know if they would come back together after graduation, or if they would go to a higher and wider world.
No matter what the future held, she hoped that when they felt lost, they could remember that there was still a place to lean on behind them.
“Alright, go back to your room,” Huang He said, patting their shoulders and urging them softly, “Aren’t you going to study your new computers?”
Jian Xin clung to Huang He for a while longer, and finally, she happily carried the two laptops back to the bedroom.
“Yan Xiaolu, which color do you like?”
“…They’re both very beautiful.”
“If you don’t choose, then I will?”
“Mmm.”
Jian Xin thought for a moment, then placed the light green one in front of her, found a USB drive, and started to transfer the data from the desktop computer.
Yan Lu was simpler. It was her first time owning her own computer, and the software that came with it was completely sufficient. There was no data to transfer. All she needed to do was log in to QQ and get the tens of thousands of words of her manuscript that she had previously saved on the desktop from Jian Xin.
As Jian Xin was transferring her data, she was also downloading commonly used software, and she couldn’t help but ask curiously, “Yan Xiaolu, you have your own computer now. When are you planning to publish your great work!”
Yan Lu shook her head. “I don’t know…”
She didn’t know where she should publish her novel, or if there were any rules she needed to pay attention to.
So on the night the college entrance exams ended, Jian Xin very quickly set up her new computer, and together with Yan Lu, she searched for many keywords online, and finally chose a female-oriented website with a relatively fair recommendation system.
A few minutes after midnight, with Jian Xin’s help, Yan Lu registered her own author account on a green webpage.
—A Deer in the Deep Forest.
This was the pen name Yan Lu had chosen for herself after much deliberation.
Jian Xin said that this name would definitely be very, very popular in the future!
Yan Lu: “I don’t even know if I can get a contract…”
“Of course you can!” Jian Xin said, patting her chest and assuring Yan Lu, “I’ve read a lot of novels, and you write very well. More people will definitely see it!”
She said that maybe in a short while, she would be able to see “A Deer in the Deep Forest”‘s works in a bookstore!
At that time, she would write songs for this great author, many, many songs!
They would become famous together, and become household names together!
“When that day comes, we’ll walk into a bookstore and see someone reading your novel! We’ll walk on the street and hear a shop playing my work! There will be a drama adapted from your novel on TV, and in the drama, there will be a song I wrote for you—everyone who knows us will know that our relationship is very, very good!”
Jian Xin said happily, every sentence like a scroll painting, appearing in Yan Lu’s mind, sketching out a beautiful future that was full of longing.
Yan Lu knew that this future was very distant, but she was willing to do her best to get closer to it.
When one day, she became the best version of herself, she could hold the hand of the person in front of her without any worries and walk towards such a future with her.
From the day she successfully registered her pen name, Yan Lu followed the guide she had seen online and updated her chapters with about three thousand words every day.
Jian Xin was her first reader, and also her only reader.
Although Jian Xin had already read the story that was being transcribed onto the internet, she still pretended that she hadn’t and would seriously write comments in the comment section, guessing the follow-up plot that she already knew.
The website had a list to support unsigned new authors. Yan Lu’s collections grew bit by bit, and unfamiliar names gradually appeared under her work—very few, but it still made her very happy.
On the eighth day of registering her pen name, Yan Lu climbed into the top twenty of the newcomer list, and she received a contact from a website editor in her site’s private messages.
The moment she opened the site’s private message, Yan Lu tremblingly and seriously entered the long string of numbers into QQ’s search box—she was so nervous that she even forgot that she could just copy and paste.
While waiting for her friend request to be approved by the editor, she stood up, ran to the window, and, with an index finger, poked the sleeping Jian Xin.
Jian Xin was originally sleeping on her back on the bed. The moment she heard that Yan Lu had received a private message from an editor, she instantly kicked her legs and sat up from the bed.
“You got poked!”
“Mmm!”
“Really!”
“Mmm-hmm!” Yan Lu nodded vigorously.
Jian Xin spread her arms and hugged Yan Lu tightly. “Yan Xiaolu, it’s only been a few days, you’re so amazing! I knew you could do it!”
She said, then jumped off the bed, too lazy to even put on her slippers, and ran barefoot to Yan Lu’s laptop, bending down to take a look.
“It went through! The friend request went through!!” Jian Xin’s tone was so urgent, as if she were the one who was going to talk to the editor about a contract, not Yan Lu.
Yan Lu hurried back to her computer, pulled up a chair, and sat down, nervously chatting with the editor.
The editor asked some simple questions, such as why she was writing, whether she could persist, whether she was an adult, the reason for choosing to publish here, and so on.
When Yan Lu didn’t know how to reply, she would look up at Jian Xin, as nervous as if she were in an interview.
In the end, she received the contract and the address to send it to. She happily exported it to a USB drive, ran to a nearby copy shop, printed two copies of the contract, signed her name, attached a copy of her ID card, and sent them all together.
After a week of anxious waiting, one copy of the contract was sent back, and her homepage had a small “V” for a contracted author.
The editor told her that she could apply for the lists in the future, and she pulled Jian Xin along and celebrated at home for a long time.
Jian Xin was not wrong. Yan Lu was indeed being seen by more people.
The first time she was on a list, she seriously helped Yan Lu record the growth of every contemporary on the list.
It had to be said that Yan Lu’s growth was not very good, but the ones who were growing well more or less had some reader accumulation. As a newcomer’s first book, although Yan Lu’s work was not growing very well, it was still barely at the average line.
Jian Xin said—this deer, at such a young age, already has the posture of a future great author. It definitely won’t be long before she can earn her first sum of money!
Thanks to her auspicious words, Yan Lu successfully reached the “V” line on the third list and was promoted to a “V” author by the editor.
Although on the first day of becoming a “V” author, she had only earned less than six yuan, Yan Lu was still so happy that she ran to a nearby Dicos, bought two ice cream cones, and sat on the sofa with Jian Xin, fantasizing about the future.
This was a very good start.
When Jian Xin was bored, she would browse this website and encourage Yan Lu in various ways every day.
What with this website having so many authors, and those who could become “V” authors and earn money being as rare as a phoenix’s feathers!
What with so many works with good data having hot elements, and all the selling points being piled on the title, and for a work with such an honest title and genre like yours to have such data is a sign of hard power!
What with so many works with better data than yours not having as lively a comment section as yours, and if you keep writing, a diamond in the rough will definitely be discovered!
Jian Xin would follow Yan Lu around and praise her whenever she had the chance, so much so that Yan Lu’s head was a little dizzy. Every day when she woke up, she would sit at her computer and write—her typing speed was not fast, but the duration made up for a lot, and she could update at least three to four thousand words every day.
Jian Xin was not completely idle either. Occasionally, when she felt like it, she would, just like when she was promoting her own songs, go to various social platforms and intentionally or unintentionally mention Yan Lu’s novel.
The college entrance exam results had been out for a while, and they had each filled out their desired choices.
Looking at their choices together, none of them were in the same city.
Jian Xin was a little disappointed, but on second thought, a university choice was not a joke. No matter how reluctant they were to be separated, they really shouldn’t compromise on such a thing.
She thought for a moment and said seriously, “It’s fine, we’re all in the same country. How far can it be?”
She said that during the holidays, she would go and see her.
Time flew by, and it was almost time for school to start.
The serial in Yan Lu’s hand was already over three hundred thousand words, and her income had also gone from a few yuan a day to seventy or eighty yuan a day, which was even higher than working at a bubble tea shop.
