Webnovel writer

"You..." In the café, Gu Ruoyan set down her coffee cup, hesitating slightly. "I hear you're a writer?"

Saxophone music drifted through the café. Afternoon sunlight spilled through the floor-to-ceiling windows onto the table, where dewdrops still glittered on the rose in the center, its petals lush and vivid, its fragrance pleasant.

The setting was beautiful, and so was Gu Ruoyan. For this blind date, she had deliberately changed into a long dress, something she seldom wore, and let down the hair she usually kept in a practical high ponytail. Her long, waterfall-like black hair made her look all the more elegant.

She had had hopes for this blind date, but the man in front of her left her somewhat disappointed...

Although he could be considered tall and handsome, he was dressed casually and hadn't even shaved properly. At the very least, that proved he hadn't taken this blind date as seriously as she had. That aside, he seemed to lack vitality, too, and looked so nervous at meeting her, like a shut-in who spent all day gaming at home and never saw anyone.

Hmm... a writer. Maybe that was just how they were? Listless, unkempt, bad at socializing?

A writer sounded interesting... That was also why Gu Ruoyan had been willing to take this blind date seriously, although, for all her professed love of reading, she had never heard of this supposed writer.

Chu Ge sat opposite her, propping his chin on both hands, his heart racing. He had been through plenty of blind dates arranged by his mother. He had always just gone through the motions, and so had the other person. By unspoken agreement, they would part ways after the meal without even exchanging WeChat details.

He had never expected his date this time to be such an elegant, beautiful woman. Why would a woman this gorgeous go on blind dates instead of acting in films?

He hadn't been mentally prepared at all!

"I asked you a question..." Gu Ruoyan sighed. "Auntie Wu said you're a writer. Could you tell me about your work, so I can read some of it?"

"...Ah, yes." Chu Ge gave a dry cough. "I've written plenty of novels, but I don't think any of them fully demonstrated my true abilities. As the ancients rightly said, literature is a vehicle for the Way. At present, I'm developing a grand narrative set against the backdrop of a particular historical period, focusing on the vast cosmos and the boundless natural world, expressing the indomitable spirit of ordinary people striving against adversity, contemplating profound questions concerning the fate of China and even all humanity, and shouldering the social responsibilities a writer ought to bear! That's why I've been searching for my goddess of inspiration, my Muse..."

"Could you speak like a normal person?" Gu Ruoyan folded her hands on the table, her gaze slightly lowered.

Chu Ge sheepishly lowered his gesticulating hands. "Uh, I've been writing a Xianxia novel lately. The loser-to-hero kind."

A hint of understanding entered Gu Ruoyan's eyes.

This was a... webnovel writer.

Did webnovel writers count as writers?

She wasn't sure whether they did. In any case, it was a field Gu Ruoyan knew little about, one very different from her usual conception of a writer.

"How much do you make a month? Is it stable? Do you have the five social insurance schemes and a housing provident fund?"

"Rousseau once said: writing for bread would soon stifle my genius and destroy my talents. Nothing vigorous, nothing great, can come from a mercenary pen. Necessity and greed might make me write faster, but they cannot make me write better..."

"Speak like a normal person!"

"It's not very stable. Some months I make less, but I've made over ten thousand this month..." Chu Ge's eyes shifted slightly. "As for insurance and the housing fund... you can actually pay your own social insurance contributions these days..."

"Isn't that just being an unemployed loa-" Gu Ruoyan blurted out, but ultimately swallowed the rest.

Chu Ge smiled faintly and said nothing.

Gu Ruoyan regretted her slip of the tongue. That had been hurtful... but she felt that being unemployed at twenty-seven or twenty-eight meant even his autobiography would fit the loser-to-hero genre. How was this blind date supposed to continue?

In the end, she gave an apologetic smile and rose from her seat. "I have something to attend to..."

Chu Ge sighed. "Go ahead."

Many people had said that the name Chu Ge's parents had given him wasn't very good. It sounded like the phrase "beset on all sides," a terrible omen, dooming him to find success difficult in anything he did. Other things aside, if finding a girlfriend didn't work out, another way to put it was that he was destined to be single for life.

Besides, it sounded like "first-timer," too. Wasn't that just asking for trouble?

And so, Chu Ge had been on eleven blind dates without a single success.

Of course, the real reason his previous dates had failed was that he hadn't wanted to find anyone in the first place.

How could women be as much fun as games? If his mother hadn't pushed him, those eleven dates would never have happened.

What a shame... this one really was beautiful. So beautiful that even now, she felt a little unreal to Chu Ge. That instant flutter of his heart still hadn't subsided.

Chu Ge sat quietly in his seat, looking at the dewdrops on the petals rather than watching Gu Ruoyan's lovely figure leave. After two or three seconds, however, his whole body seemed to relax. He leaned lazily against the soft backrest, lifted the coffee he had taken only one sip of, and sipped it leisurely. As though what had just happened had never happened at all.

The coffee cost 120 a cup. Chu Ge wondered whether this bitter stuff, as bitter as his mood right now, could prolong his life. Why did it have to be so expensive?

He lazily took out his phone, opened QQ, and tapped on a group chat called "Friendly Fire."

It was a small group, with only a little over three hundred members, including Chu Ge. Compared with some dead groups that claimed to have two thousand members but were utterly lifeless, this one was lively despite its modest size. Every member's mouth was like a Gatling gun. A trip to the bathroom was enough to come back to 99+ messages.

Chu Ge deserved considerable credit for such a small group being so active.

Someone had once drawn up a lengthy list of twenty requirements for an active group. The first and most important was that it needed an idiot group owner...

That assessment was spot-on. Chu Ge was the group owner.

This was his reader group. He was the author, and his pen name was his real name, Chu Ge. "Friendly Fire," naturally, meant a bunch of readers in one group screwing... never mind.

At the moment, the group seemed to have reached an unspoken consensus over a screenshot of some news story, and the members were repeating the same line.

"Another point toward my fear of marriage today."

"Another point toward my fear of marriage today."

Out of habit, Chu Ge tapped +1.

Chu Ge: "Another point toward my fear of marriage today."

"..."

The group went quiet for a moment before someone asked, "Chu Da? Didn't you say you were on a blind date? Why are you back so soon?"

"How long does a blind date take?" Chu Ge tried hard to sound calm. "GG."

The group grew cheerful again. "Good thing it's GG. How could women be as much fun as writing? You haven't updated today!"

Chu Ge's fingers paused over the keys for a few seconds. He didn't reply.

Most people wouldn't care how you felt on the other side of the internet. All they cared about was that you hadn't updated today. That was why Chu Ge usually preferred not to take time off even when he was a little ill: the response was often not "get some rest," but "making excuses again."

Unless they were longtime readers who had developed an attachment to him. Unfortunately, Chu Ge hadn't built up that kind of readership yet.

In the end, he was still at the stage where his blind date considered him an unemployed loafer...

He put away his phone and drained the now half-cold coffee. "The bill, please."

The server came over. "One hundred and twenty."

Chu Ge paused. There had been two cups of coffee. "Is everything half price today?"

"The lady paid for her own coffee earlier."

Chu Ge instinctively turned to look out the window before remembering that Gu Ruoyan had left at least five minutes ago.

Although Gu Ruoyan's thoughtless remark had stung a little, Chu Ge didn't hate her for it. That was how the vast majority of people saw this profession anyway. He had long since grown used to it.

Besides, his nerves had made his performance far too overblown... what the hell had all that nonsense even been...

Chu Ge didn't know why someone with Gu Ruoyan's looks and bearing even needed to go on blind dates. If he were to assume the worst...

Forget it. Why bother? What did a passing stranger's past have to do with him?

For him right now, that uncomfortable remark in the group chat was the reality he needed to face: he hadn't finished writing today's update. If he kept dawdling, he would miss it.

(End of chapter)