Chapter 296: Searching for a New Theme
The blonde girl was cooped up in her small room. Instant noodle boxes were scattered on the floor, and there was also a lot of trash. Many of her ruined manuscripts were crumpled into balls and thrown on the floor. Her dark circles were getting more and more obvious, but her workload was not decreasing at all.
The whole room was also a mess. As the weather began to warm up, it would soon be the season for air conditioning, but she still had no intention of installing an air conditioner. The room hadn’t been cleaned for a long time, and the leftover instant noodle boxes were emitting a smell. In the past, when she was poor, she ate one-yuan-a-pack instant noodles, and a bowl at home was enough. But now, she was even too lazy to buy packaged instant noodles, directly buying a whole box of cup noodles, eating several a day, and throwing them away after she was done. And she had been wearing pajamas for several days in a row, her hair getting messier and messier.
Her whole person exuded a decadent aura.
No longer as lively as before.
“Sigh…”
She leaned back in her chair, looking at the computer screen, feeling physically and mentally exhausted.
She had been considering good illustrations, good stories, but the more she pushed herself like this, the less progress she made. Time entered April, and a new page was turned. The animation of Ballad of the Enchantress had long since ended, but the plot had not changed at all. It was still as bad as it could be. The score on the Douzi website had dropped to 3.8, solidifying its place as the worst film of the year. In comparison, Air-sensei’s The Rich Man’s Game had a huge reputation, high ratings, and plans for a second season were in the future. At the same time, the work of science fiction author Canwu-sensei, Space Castle, was broadcast on television and received widespread praise as soon as it was broadcast. The drama tells the story of future humans building a military castle in outer space, which triggers a space dispute between countries, with a tendency to evolve into a third world war. After the animation was broadcast, its reputation was very high, and many people gave it a high score.
And in this April, the novel of Ballad of the Enchantress ended.
Yu Linna had stopped serializing Zixuan and the Paper Airplane since February and had been wholeheartedly writing Ballad of the Enchantress, publishing two volumes a month. By April, it had reached 14 volumes, and after all the stories were told, it ended.
Ballad of the Enchantress was originally about the story of a male protagonist who traveled to the future and met a female protagonist from the government side. The male and female protagonists, who had been loving and killing each other throughout the whole book, finally had a resolution in the final volume. The male protagonist let go of everything and returned to the past, and the female protagonist also followed her to the past, putting an end to the future war. The dispute also ended, and the plot holes were filled.
Although some readers complained that such an ending was cliché, like the fairy-tale endings of countless novels, and that the readers wanted to see an ending with profound reflection and humanity, for most readers, this was the ending they wanted to see. No sacrifices, no stomach pains, just a simple ending. This was the ending they wanted.
Although the animation’s reputation was too bad, the quality of the novel was still very high. Many passersby who had been poisoned by the animation got into it after watching the original novel, which was also a good thing.
But the end of Ballad of the Enchantress was equivalent to Yu Linna pushing herself to a dead end. This novel had been less than two years since it was first written, and the accumulation of popularity was obviously not enough. Finishing it like this was too hasty. But the most fatal thing was that Yu Linna had to write a new long story, but after a month of hard work, she still had no harvest. She could only first release the short story she had previously procrastinated on and the new volume of Zixuan and the Paper Airplane to deal with May. But what should she do next month? This was a problem that had been troubling her.
Yu Linna’s creation had encountered the biggest problem. She could no longer create a satisfactory work.
But there had been other things happening recently, for example, Xiao Yanhan. Her short manga Phantom Thief Idol had passed the editor’s review for the first time and was published in a magazine. Xiao Yanhan had finally received her first manuscript fee, which was a recognition of her several years of creation. That day, she had told everyone while crying. And after that, she threw herself back into creation, hoping to draw better works to achieve the goal of a long-term serialization.
Yu Linna closed her computer. She felt tired. Because of staying up late and pulling all-nighters, the pimples on her face had increased, and her skin was no longer as smooth as before. She was really too tired. She couldn’t write a satisfactory story. She had even redrawn the character designs no less than a hundred times, but there was still no progress. Yes, this phenomenon was writer’s block.
The inspiration, the feel, and even the state of creation from the past were all gone. She was like a factory on an assembly line, creating mechanically, without any characteristics. This was also a problem she had to face.
A phone call came. Yu Linna answered it.
“Linna, when are you coming back? You’ve been on leave for a long time.”
“I know. Tomorrow, maybe.”
She could only say this to the person on the other end of the phone.
Hanging up the phone, she lay on the bed, holding her head, quite a headache. She never thought that after entering university, she would still like to ask for leave as before, and even her habit of skipping class hadn’t changed. If it weren’t for her good academic performance, she might have been destined to fail her classes.
Putting school matters aside for now, her work matters were enough to trouble her. She had always wanted to write a good story to replace the position of Ballad of the Enchantress, to create new wealth, a new status. She needed a work too much to prove herself, to prove her strength. Because of the failure of the animation, her popularity had been snatched away by Air-sensei, and she was no longer as glorious as before. Although she was still a god-tier author, it was extremely difficult to step into the position of a supreme god.
“What did she say?”
In the dorm, Lan Ranyan made herself a cup of cocoa and asked.
Xiao Yanhan helplessly shrugged.
“She said she’s coming back tomorrow.”
Everyone in the dorm felt helpless. Although the Yu Linna of the past was also like this, often running out, she had never been like this before, running home because of work and locking herself up to force herself to write. This was an unprecedented situation.
Yu Linna’s popularity had declined. This was an indisputable fact, but she was eager to prove herself with a new work, almost to the point of paranoia.
This made it impossible for people not to worry.
And she was pushing herself too hard.
She was tired and needed to rest, but she never thought so.
“I once thought that if she encountered a setback, she would stop her steps, reflect well, and then put on her armor again. But the fact is not like that. She did not stop her steps, but instead forced herself to walk forward on a road full of nails. If she continues to walk like this, even if she can finish, her feet will have long since rotted.”
Lan Ranyan said.
The Yu Linna of the past was the god of their dorm, a person with a near-god status. But they gradually discovered that this so-called god was just an ordinary person, who would cry and laugh, and would be troubled. She was definitely not the god that people said she was. She was just an ordinary person who had been placed on a pedestal by people. But that fall had shattered her completely.
“Hopefully she can think things through.”
Fang Jiangning put on her headphones and continued to make her video, not saying much more. Among everyone, she had known her the longest. She knew that this girl was very stubborn and hard to pull back. The only way was to let her figure it out herself.
The next day, Yu Linna did indeed come back, but with a tired face, her dark circles very obvious, as if she had put on smoky eye makeup. As soon as she got back, she put her things away and climbed into bed to sleep. Looking at her, she seemed really tired.
“Linna, should I call you for lunch?”
“No need. Just call me for dinner.”
The roommates looked at each other, and in the end, they didn’t say anything. Just as they had said, Yu Linna was too tired. She needed to rest, and she couldn’t push herself like this anymore. During this time, without the crazy script and character design work she had before starting school, she was just simply writing novels, but she was even more tired than before, her workload even exceeding that of before. They all knew she was too tired.
Recently, besides Yu Linna’s matter, there were of course other things happening, for example, the results of this year’s Golden Horse Awards were about to be announced. Tang Yumeng was nominated for Best Supporting Actress for Dream Life, and Dream Life was also nominated for Best Film and Best Editing, and there was a high hope of winning an award. Not long ago, Tang Yumeng had invited Yu Linna to attend the award ceremony, saying she would attend as Shion-sensei, but was rejected. Director Wang Weifan had even personally invited her, letting her attend as an ordinary guest. He said he could ask the organizers about this matter, but would not announce her real identity.
To be honest, when he first found out that Yu Linna’s identity was Shion-sensei, Wang Weifan was indeed a little surprised, but he quickly accepted it. In this day and age, young people all have to fight to get to the top. Without some outstanding performance, how could they take over from their seniors?
And Nangong Ying’s movie Blue Pupil, after its release last Christmas, had passed all the hurdles, even being extended in theaters for two months, participating in the Spring Festival competition. In the end, the movie’s box office even reached 2.733 billion, exceeding the 1.8 billion box office of Nangong Ying’s personal film career, Storm Chronicle, once again proving her box office appeal in the market.
And the pop star Zhou Shilan was invited by a Hollywood film company to participate in the production of the Hollywood movie Speed Limit, playing a Chinese-American female role, but she herself didn’t seem to want to agree. Paramount even specially sent people over, to her company’s entrance to invite her to participate, which could be said to be full of sincerity. Zhou Shilan had originally refused, but Paramount had promised her a concert tour during the movie’s promotion, and the movie’s promotion was global. This move had made Zhou Shilan waver.
Of course, the most important news was that the Chinese-American actress An Xiayue had officially signed a five-movie contract in the country and would appear in major domestic films as the first female lead. An Xiayue was originally a child star who had grown up in Hollywood. Her ancestral home was in China, but she had grown up in the United States. An Xiayue was her stage name in the country. But for a Chinese-American star, especially one who was somewhat popular in Hollywood, to come to the country to act in movies, there were still many people paying attention. And An Xiayue was also a friend of Tang Yumeng. The two had met through the internet before.
None of these things had anything to do with Yu Linna. She was just thinking about how to write her new novel now.
