Damn, He Really Showed Off

"Great God Xiaoyao! Did you write that song called 'Red Bean'?"

Ruyi messaged him excitedly. Li Changle thought it was Wang Siyi, but when he opened the message and saw it was the big-eyed cutie he'd met once, he felt a little disappointed.

"Yeah."

"Wow! You really did write it, Great God Xiaoyao! Did you write it for Sister Wanjun?"

"Yeah."

"I knew it, I knew it!"

As Ruyi typed, she muttered to herself, wearing a kindly, aunt-like smile. She was even happier than if she'd gotten a boyfriend herself.

Li Changle had no idea what Ruyi thought she knew, but he wasn't in the mood to chat with her. So he kept his replies to a minimum. Ruyi, however, clearly had no intention of letting him off the hook.

"So, Great God Xiaoyao, what made you write that song for Sister Wanjun?"

"Was it because Sister Wanjun was making her comeback as a singer, and you couldn't bear to see her go, so you wrote 'Red Bean' for her?"

Ruyi asked, her curiosity already blazing out of control.

"What are you talking about?"

"She didn't have any songs to sing, and she wanted to sing, so I just wrote one for her..."

Li Changle replied casually. The girl seemed pretty nice.

She was just a little too excitable, and she liked asking all sorts of questions. But he had nothing better to do, so he simply chatted with her.

"Oh, so that's how it was..."

Ruyi felt a little disappointed. It seemed they still weren't together. Sister Wanjun, you have to keep trying...

But she couldn't help admiring Li Changle. He'd just casually written a song like "Red Bean"?

Then she remembered the Five-Character Quatrain, "Longing," which had been all the rage online a few days ago.

"Then, Great God Xiaoyao, did you also write that Five-Character Quatrain about longing that's so popular online?"

"Yeah."

"Then did you just write that poem casually, too?"

"Not that one. That poem took a little more effort. I spent several minutes thinking it through before I wrote it."

As Ruyi read Li Changle's message, she couldn't help clenching her fist.

"Damn, he really showed off!"

Li Changle thought he'd just been telling the truth. He'd spent several minutes thinking about it before deciding "Longing" was the best fit for the theme.

But he didn't care much about that right now. Wang Siyi hadn't spoken to him all morning, and he couldn't figure out why.

"Ruyi, can I ask you something?"

"Sure, sure! Go ahead!"

Li Changle pondered for a long while, trying to figure out how to phrase it. Then he typed:

"Well, I have a friend..."

"There's this girl who used to chat with him all the time. They talked almost every day, but lately they've been talking less. The main thing is, the girl doesn't seem interested in talking to him anymore. Why do you think that is?"

A relationship problem? Ruyi froze.

She had no idea how to answer that...

Uh, what should she say to Great God Xiaoyao? He'd finally asked her for help; she couldn't just say she didn't know.

As an editor, she'd read plenty of sweet romances, fluffy romances, and tragic romances. Surely love and relationships could all be figured out from books. After thinking it over, she quickly typed:

"Great God Xiaoyao, do you think there's a chance your friend did something to upset the girl, or said something he shouldn't have?"

Li Changle fell into thought over Ruyi's guess, then carefully reread his chat history with Wang Siyi. He didn't think he'd said anything out of line.

The main thing was, whenever Wang Siyi took a long time to reply, he felt restless. He kept checking his phone every few minutes, and it was miserable...

"Hmm... I don't think so."

"Then maybe that girl's been dealing with something stressful lately and doesn't feel like chatting with your friend..."

"Your friend could just ask her directly if something's going on, then help her sort it out..."

Li Changle suddenly saw the light and nodded.

Wang Siyi really had been busy lately, promoting her new album. And he seemed to remember her saying the company had no plans to promote it.

So that was why she was so exhausted. Li Changle opened the music platform again and checked the rankings on the New Song Chart.

The music platform app was now plastered with promotions for the new songs of a singer named Su Yanying.

Wasn't Su Yanying another female artist from Xinyi Huyou?

She was also the one who'd taken two songs from Wang Siyi before. Now she was releasing her album on the same day as Wang Siyi.

Xinyi Huyou's intentions were obvious. They weren't just trying to suppress Wang Wanjun; they wanted to rub it in, too, and show her what happened when she didn't obey.

Su Yanying's new song had shot straight into the top ten on the New Song Chart, while Wang Siyi's lead single, "Red Bean," was barely scraping the bottom of the list.

With so little exposure and no promotion, it had to be a blow to Wang Siyi. No wonder she didn't feel like chatting with him.

Li Changle thought he'd figured out why Wang Siyi was unhappy, and hurriedly opened the Chinese Web Novel Platform's author dashboard.

How about posting another chapter today, then asking readers to listen to a song? That wasn't too much to ask, right?

"An extra update for today! I wrote a song called 'Red Bean' on a whim. Feel free to give it a listen!"

He posted a chapter and asked his readers to check it out. Li Changle didn't think it would do much to boost sales of Wang Siyi's new album.

But even the smallest contribution counted. Anything he could do to increase her album sales was worth it.

In truth, Li Changle had no idea how many readers he had. His novel Legend of Sword and Fairy 1 had earned him several million followers on the Chinese Web Novel Platform.

But he never checked...

As the story of The Legend of the Condor Heroes unfolded, readers began to see what made the novel so different. It was absolutely a Wuxia masterpiece.

Quite a few readers who'd struggled to get into it at first picked it back up and found that The Legend of the Condor Heroes was even better than Legend of Sword and Fairy!

Legend of Sword and Fairy sometimes had a bit of padding, but in The Legend of the Condor Heroes, almost none of the characters' dialogue was wasted.

In other words, the plot moved at a brisk pace, with one development following another.

From Wind and Snow Shocking Change, to the eighteen-year agreement between the Seven Freaks of Jiangnan and Qiu Chuji, to Guo Jing's journey south to meet the Seven Freaks in Jiangnan—every plot point made perfect sense.

So The Legend of the Condor Heroes had brought Li Changle plenty of new fans as well.

Qinghe was already over the moon. He hadn't stopped smiling since The Legend of the Condor Heroes came out.

Watching the number of new readers arriving from outside the platform each day, along with the steadily rising graph of on-platform readership, he knew most of that success came from Li Changle's The Legend of the Condor Heroes.

His decision to do everything he could to keep Li Changle had been the most important one of his career.

He'd been in a bad mood today. He'd meant to play a few games to blow off some steam, but then he lost three matches in a row and didn't even get his first win. Now he felt even worse...

This poor author was asking for votes and follows again. Today had been brutal...