Legend of Sword and Fairy

On the first day after Wang Siyi left, Li Changle felt somewhat unaccustomed to it. When he was making dinner,

he habitually made enough for two, then looked at the leftovers and sighed. What a waste.

The guitar had arrived at noon today. The courier delivered it not long after Wang Siyi left. He simply picked it up to see how much of his half-baked guitar skills remained.

As expected, Li Changle was so rusty that he was practically below beginner level. Fortunately, he still remembered some basic music theory, which was a relief.

Li Changle remembered a master once saying something very reasonable about guitars.

Miss one day of practice, and you'll know it. Miss two days, and others will know it. Miss three days, and everyone will know it.

He had not practiced for at least three or four years, so his current level was easy to imagine. Still, forgetting came quickly, and picking it back up should not be difficult. If he practiced for an hour or two every day, he should recover quickly.

After practicing guitar, his hands felt a little sore. Sitting before the computer, Li Changle pondered. He had already finished the opening of Legend of Sword and Fairy 1—nearly a hundred thousand characters. It was about time to publish it.

He opened the Chinese Web Novel Platform, wrote the title and synopsis, then directly uploaded six thousand characters. The whole process took less than ten minutes.

Li Changle was not sure whether a work like Legend of Sword and Fairy 1 could become hugely popular given this world's web novel standards, but supporting himself should not be a problem.

Before deciding to write novels, Li Changle had looked into this world's web novel scene. It was roughly where Earth's web novels had been in their earliest days, when Zhu Xian had exploded in popularity.

Li Changle thought that Legend of Sword and Fairy 1 had a better story than Zhu Xian, and its ending was even more tragic...

It should not be worse than Zhu Xian, at least based on the state of early web novel development.

Readers back then would only be moved to tears when the protagonist or heroine died. They had not yet started considering mailing Razor Blades to authors...

Legend of Sword and Fairy was such a good story that Li Changle would regret not writing it. Since he had already decided to write novels, he would stick with it. No matter how bad it was, it could not be that bad.

The day after Legend of Sword and Fairy was published, at the headquarters of the Chinese Web Novel Platform in Beiping.

A junior editor named Ruyi was listlessly browsing new books and checking the mailbox for internally submitted manuscripts.

Most of the time, she found it torturous, because most of these novels were barely readable. Some did not even seem to be telling stories at all.

If she found one novel worthy of approval in a day's work, that counted as meeting the standard.

If she found two, she could add a chicken drumstick to dinner tonight to celebrate her accomplishments.

"Ugh..."

Forget chicken drumsticks today. She probably would not find even one qualified work.

Ruyi was a girl around twenty-three or twenty-four years old. She had only recently joined the Chinese Web Novel Platform as a junior editor, mainly responsible for reviewing new books.

Having loved reading and novels since childhood, she had gotten her wish and joined the Chinese Web Novel Platform. She had thought she had found a career worth loving for the rest of her life.

But now... she was close to losing the joy of reading novels. Facing hundreds or thousands of novels with no basic logic every day would extinguish anyone's enthusiasm.

It had been a long time since Ruyi had experienced that immersive feeling from a novel.

Most of the novels she saw now looked like stories written by elementary school students.

Forget immersion—even understanding them was exhausting.

Although Ruyi hated these novels intensely, she still kept reading one after another. Skimming rapidly, she could usually tell after six thousand characters whether a book was any good.

Though she had only been employed for half a year, the practiced speed of her mouse clicks and reading was almost heartbreaking to watch.

With a blank expression, she rejected an absurd novel whose character relationships were not even sorted out, then saw a novel titled Legend of Sword and Fairy 1.

Legend of Sword and Fairy was a pretty good title, but why add a 1? Did the author plan to write a second and third installment? That was way too confident when the first one had not even been signed yet.

Judging by the title, this person was either a veteran master or a complete newbie. Most likely a newbie. What a shame for such a good title.

Still, Ruyi clicked in to take a look. After one glance, she could no longer look away.

The synopsis was simple: a doggerel poem.

Young and ignorant of love's despair, beneath the eaves, a gifted drink formed an immortal bond.

Beauty's favor was too much to bear, so sword in hand, he roamed the world for his beloved.

Then the opening immediately drew Ruyi in.

It was said that in a small fishing village in Yuhang County, there lived an orphan named Li Xiaoyao. His parents were known as the immortal couple of the martial world, but they had vanished without a word when he was young. He was raised by his aunt and worked as a waiter at the family inn...

She quickly finished the six thousand characters. Since the Legend of Sword and Fairy material Li Changle had read was not very long, he had padded it out to turn it into a web novel.

Li Changle chose to add filler, and six thousand characters took the story to the point where Li Xiaoyao met the three Moon Worship Sect members searching for Immortal Spirit Island.

Even so, Ruyi read with great relish, only to reach the end just as her interest was rising.

"That's it? It's over already? It's way too short..."

Reading this Legend of Sword and Fairy gave Ruyi that long-lost feeling of being immersed in a story.

It was as if she herself were someone living in Yuhang Town, watching Li Xiaoyao grow up there, watching his mischief and his romantic nature.

Without hesitation, Ruyi approved Legend of Sword and Fairy and signed it directly!

But when she saw the author's pen name, Ruyi froze for a moment. This guy's pen name was actually Li Xiaoyao.

Could it be deliberate?

What an interesting author. Based on Ruyi's years of reading experience, as long as this book maintained the quality of its opening, it would be against all reason if it did not become popular.

Ruyi was delighted to have discovered such a good book. Chicken drumstick for dinner tonight!

With Wang Siyi gone, Li Changle had temporarily lost interest in cooking.

He had ordered takeout for both breakfast and lunch today. Other than mealtimes, he had spent the entire day writing.

He was always saying that working for someone else was impossible. But whenever he had free time, he could not sit still.

He really was asking for it, born with a life of toil...

Li Changle mocked himself as he wrote, but his typing fingers never stopped.

Then he suddenly received a site message from the Chinese Web Novel Platform: Dear author, your work [Legend of Sword and Fairy 1] has passed review and meets the signing criteria. Please visit the following address to fill in your basic information: ...

Li Changle was stunned. It had only been six thousand characters, and it was already being signed? Still, signing was a good thing, so he happily followed the instructions and completed the contract.

He also directly uploaded another ten thousand characters. He had nearly two hundred thousand characters in reserve now. Setting everything else aside, that was downright lavish!

Ruyi saw that the author named Li Xiaoyao had completed the signing at lightning speed. She checked his QQ account through the backend and added him, but received no response for a long time.

Ruyi was not surprised. Many authors rarely used QQ anymore. Then she saw that Legend of Sword and Fairy 1 had updated again, and she was instantly overjoyed as she happily went to read it.

Ruyi felt as though she had returned to the days when she used to enjoy novels, and she could not help feeling emotional.

"Woohoo... my youth is back!"

"Why are you screaming, Ruyi?"

A colleague beside her could not stand Ruyi's outburst and could not help saying something.

"Hehe, I found a really good new book called Legend of Sword and Fairy 1. You should all go take a look."

Ruyi was completely unruffled as she smiled and spoke to the colleagues around her.

"Really? Can a novel be that good?"

That colleague did not quite believe Ruyi. Ruyi was a nice person, and a cute newbie girl.

But she had only been employed for such a short time, so her judgment probably was not very good. She had likely seen a merely decent novel and started howling over it...

Young people really were immature and unsteady. Why could they not be like him, maintaining a calm expression even if Mount Tai collapsed before them?

That was the quality an excellent editor should possess.

"If you don't believe me, go read it. If you don't think it's good, I'll buy you a chicken drumstick tonight!"

To Ruyi, treating someone to a chicken drumstick was already a very serious wager.

"Keep your chicken drumstick. If the novel really is good, I'll buy you ten chicken drumsticks..."

The editor named Tianming immediately replied. He knew this cute newbie girl's personality.

Treating someone else to chicken drumsticks really was a major thing for Ruyi.

But not everyone liked chicken drumsticks as much as Ruyi did...

"Then it's a deal! I want five five-spice chicken drumsticks and five spicy chicken drumsticks..."

Ruyi looked as though she had already won. She was not afraid that he would go back on his word at all. The world of cute newbie girls was truly hard to understand.

Tianming shook his head, worried about the cute newbie girl's intelligence.

Tianming found the novel called Legend of Sword and Fairy 1. He wanted to see whether this novel was really worth ten chicken drumsticks.

He looked over the synopsis. Not bad. An ordinary little doggerel poem. Then he read the opening. Nice, this beginning was interesting, and then...

"Damn, that's it? It's way too short."

At some point, the cute newbie girl Ruyi had already come to stand in front of him, smiling at him.

She stretched out both hands and swayed them together as she said, "Ten chicken drumsticks—five five-spice, five spicy, Tianming bro~"

Just hearing that sweet "Tianming bro" made those ten chicken drumsticks worth it. More importantly, this novel was fucking good!

He had been at the Chinese Web Novel Platform much longer than Ruyi, yet he had never seen a Xianxia novel like this before. This book was bound to become popular!

"Woohoo, my youth is back too..."

He could not help letting out a woohoo as well. The surrounding colleagues had also heard the conversation between him and Ruyi.

Most of them went to read the novel, then unanimously said,

"Damn, that's it?"

"Ruyi, do you have this author's contact information? Hurry and urge him to update. This book is definitely going to blow up!"

"Yeah, yeah, urge him to update!"

"What's with this author? The new book has only been out for a few days, and there are so few words. Ruyi, the job of urging updates is yours..."

"It would be best if it could go premium soon. Then people will definitely send rewards, and he can mass-update..."

A group of editors instantly became readers clamoring for updates. Ruyi wore a miserable expression too. She wanted to urge him to update, but she could not find this person named Li Xiaoyao...

Li Changle did not yet know people were urging him to update. Even if he did know, he would not care.

Overtime?

No way. Overtime was impossible. He would never work overtime in this life.

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