I am not a literary giant

Chapter 131 I'm Not a Literary Master

After hanging up Ye Lan's call, Wang Zixu was still thinking, "The book signing event?"

Of all the things the author does, book signings are one of the things he dislikes the most. It's not that he doesn't want to reveal his "Little Prince" identity, but rather because a writer once held a book signing at his high school, leaving an indelible impression on him.

The author's name is Xie Dongyu, and he is a children's book author. His stories tend to be traditional and conservative, often featuring animals as protagonists, with some allegorical elements, and are highly readable. He is even more popular with teachers and parents than with readers.

In reality, students prefer reading works by other children's book authors who have achieved better market performance. However, some of those authors' descriptions are too bold, and parents perceive them as more for entertainment than educational value. Xie Dongyu's works, on the other hand, are far superior to those outdated and rigid books. Therefore, in the children's book world, this moderate choice has become the most prestigious author.

At that time, Wang Zixu had just entered his first year of high school, and the book signing was held on the playground. It was more of a book sale than a book signing. Students were happy to be out in the sun, even if it meant sitting in the classroom. Wang Zixu followed his classmates onto the playground, laughing and joking. While Xie Dongyu was giving a speech, Wang Zixu's attention gradually shifted to the girl next to him.

"The vocal cords should be a writer's appendix. Instead of wasting time babbling and swindling money from students, they should go home and hone their writing skills and stop plagiarizing..."

Prince Xu looked over with great interest. He saw that the girl had a ponytail and was shading her eyes with her hands. Her eyelashes were as thick as curtains, and her skin was as white as snow, whether on her arms or her slender neck. It was dazzling in the sunlight.

He thought to himself, no wonder she looked so unhappy. Such fair skin, if it got tanned, even he would feel it was a pity.

"Hey, feed," Wang Zixu said to the girl, "You're saying he plagiarized?"

The girl turned and gave him a sharp look: "What's wrong? He's your idol, are you going to defend your idol? So what if he plagiarized?"

Wang Zixu said, "No, I'm just interested in the fact that he plagiarized. Who did he plagiarize?"

"Dietrov Lacey's *The Golden Mouse*. His *Clever Mouse* almost completely copied the structure of that book," the girl said.

Wang Zixu said, "I've never heard of it."

"Hehe." The girl chuckled twice, then turned her head away and stopped talking to him, probably because she thought he was too ignorant.

Wang Zixu was also unsettled. He felt that this girl was a bit aloof and somewhat aggressive.

After a while, he heard the girl whisper, "Many older generation writers rely on their extensive reading and take advantage of the relatively closed domestic market to plagiarize works that have already become famous in mature foreign markets, making a fortune in China. I really can't stand this kind of behavior."

She seemed to be talking to herself, yet also to Wang Zixu. He wasn't sure. Although he was convinced this girl was aloof and planned to treat her coldly and give her a taste of being turned away, he couldn't resist turning to her and saying, "You look like you've read a lot of books, you can copy them too."

The girl rolled her eyes at him: "Who do you take me for?"

The prince remained silent. "I'm sorry, I don't know you."

After a while, Wang Zixu said, "I think we should show more respect to the senior writers. They came all this way to give us a lecture, it's not easy for them."

The girl scoffed, "What speech? You think this is charity? He's here to sell books!"

She continued, "Look, how many students are on this playground? There must be at least 5000, right? Do you see that truck next to the playground? He's going to move his old books up there to sell later, 39 yuan a book. Do you think he can make a lot of money?"

Prince Xu asked, "How do you know all this so clearly?"

"Isn't this an unspoken rule in the industry?"

Wang Zixu did the math in his head: if every student had a copy, that would be close to 20 yuan in revenue. He was secretly amazed. At his age, 20 yuan was a huge sum of money.

The girl said, "If you need us to go upstairs to buy books later, just say you didn't bring any money."

Prince Xu asked, "And you?"

"I didn't bring any money with me."

Prince Xu was silent for a moment, then said, "Dietrof Lacey, is that right? I'll go see him another day."

The girl raised her face, glanced at him with the lower half of her eyes, her gaze filled with disbelief.

Later, Wang Zixu realized her intentions. It turned out that she didn't just hit it off with him at first sight and want to save him money. The main reason she encouraged Wang Zixu not to buy the books was that she was afraid that if she was the only one not buying them, she would be scolded by the teacher.

Sure enough, they were the only two in the class who didn't buy the book. The teacher's criticism was entirely focused on Wang Zixu, while she remained unscathed.

Of course, she honestly admitted it afterward, and Wang Zixu forgave her. However, Wang Zixu still preferred to believe that she had encouraged him not to buy the book because they hit it off at first sight.

That was the first time Wang Zixu spoke to Chen Qingluo.

……

He wiped his face, jumped out of bed, groped for his slippers on the floor, opened his music app on his phone, randomly played a song, and went to the bathroom to brush his teeth.

The phone played Ivan & Alyosha's "The Fold." Wang Zixu tapped his foot to the beat until his mouth was full of toothpaste foam.

The band's name, translated into Chinese as "Ivan and Alyosha," undoubtedly comes from "The Brothers Karamazov." The milk of that Russian writer continues to nourish the world, whether it's Americans across the ocean or Prince Xu here.

Americans are singing "Don't You Fold" on their phones; it's slang, roughly meaning "Don't give up, don't abandon, don't back down." "Fold" means to fold or fold. So a more colloquial translation would be: You need to stand up straight!

You need to stand up for yourself.

The blond, blue-eyed American suddenly transformed into Ma Dashuai, speaking with a Northeastern accent. The localization work was done perfectly. Wang Zixu chuckled to himself, feeling proud of his extraordinary talent.

If his English were a little better, he could have done both writing and translation, like Haruki Murakami. Unfortunately, his foreign language skills were frustratingly poor. Chen Qingluo's English, on the other hand, was excellent, consistently scoring around 140 points on tests. The two teachers almost came to blows over whether she should be the English or Chinese class representative.

After brushing his teeth, he stared at the phone screen showing two calls from Ning Chunyan and Zuo Ziliang, hesitating about who to call back first.

In the end, he chose Zuo Ziliang. It wasn't because he had any particular preference for bald men, but because he would feel guilty for prioritizing Ning Chunyan over his friend if he called her first.

"Hey, you're only just waking up?"

Wang Zixu said, "I've only been getting an average of 4 hours of sleep this month. I can't make up for it even if I sleep 24 hours a day."

The person on the other end laughed: "That's true. Speaking of which, do you even know what the ego, id, and superego are?"

"what?"

Prince Xu had just woken up and was about to go to the kitchen to crack an egg and make himself an omelet. It was completely unexpected for him to be talking about the ego, id, and superego at this time.

"Is this a concept from psychoanalysis? The id is the individual's most primitive animalistic impulses, the superego is the pursuit of lofty morals and ideals, and the ego is the self-awareness formed between the tug-of-war between the two."

Zuo Ziliang exclaimed, "You've read so many books. Your explanation is even better than I could have imagined."

Wang Zixu cracked open an egg, somewhat flattered: "Thank you. But why did you ask?"

Zuo Ziliang said, "It's nothing, I just suddenly thought of it."

baffling.

Zuo Ziliang then said, "You should find a woman to hug."

Wang Zixu said, "Hey, what are you talking about? This is even more absurd. My wife just left home yesterday, and you're telling me this kind of thing? What are you thinking? I'm not the kind of person who can forget all my troubles just by holding a woman."

"I know, I know, your superego is exceptionally strong. But that's not what I meant."

"What does that mean?"

On the other end of the phone, Zuo Ziliang seemed troubled by something difficult to talk about, and it took him a long time to finally say, "I've read your 'Wild Grasses'."

Prince felt that the conversation was finally getting back on track: "Let's start with 'Wild Grasses' and not digress so much. Let's talk about something I can understand."

"I don't know if you've noticed it yourself," Zuo Ziliang said, "but in your story, your protagonist never hugs his wife. When faced with pressure within the marriage, he always deals with it all by himself."

When the topic turned to novels, Wang Zixu's tone softened: "Novels are merely artistic cross-sections of life; they may not necessarily reflect the entirety of life's truth, nor may they necessarily reflect the entirety of everyone's truth."

Zuo Ziliang said, "Yes, but it can reflect your subconscious to some extent."

Prince Xu remained silent.

Zuo Ziliang said, "I am a real married person. Although the kind of marriage you described does feel suffocating and unbearable, and in some ways it is terrifyingly real, there are also some bright spots in marriage. For example, some problems can be solved with a hug."

The prince replied absentmindedly, "Yes, a warm harbor."

"So, try to embrace her," Zuo Ziliang said. "You're the best speech therapist I've ever met. You understand loneliness more deeply than anyone else, which is why you can heal so many people. But you also need to heal your own hidden wounds; please pay close attention to that."

Wang Zixu fell silent. He always sensed that Zuo Ziliang was implying something, but he hadn't said it explicitly. It seemed he was hiding something.

Rather than a hidden wound, it's more accurate to say that he's implying a blind spot in Wang Zixu's vision, a blind spot he himself couldn't even see. That blind spot vanished under the dazzling light of fifty Nobel Prizes in Literature.

Zuo Ziliang added, "Oh, right. There's one more thing. The editors at the publishing house are looking for you."

"Ye Lan told me about it. She asked, 'What kind of book signing event are you going to hold?'"

Zuo Ziliang said, "She doesn't understand and talks nonsense."

The prince breathed a sigh of relief: "I knew it! Why would I possibly go to some kind of autograph session?"

"The point isn't the book signing itself, but that you're put on the spot, it's difficult for you to go or not to go, in short, this is something a literary giant has to bear."

Wang Zixu looked completely bewildered: "What literary giant? What are you talking about?"

"you do not know?"

Zuo Ziliang's tone made it sound like he was ignorant, while Wang Zixu retorted with a hint of irritation, "What should I know? I just got up this morning, brushed my teeth, and am making egg pancakes right now when I overheard you talking to me about my own knowledge and whatnot. What should I know?"

Zuo Ziliang said with some regret, "You should still take a look at the news, especially the news related to yourself."

After Zuo Ziliang finished speaking, he hung up the phone, and the music stopped playing as a result. Wang Zixu stood there blankly in the silence.

News related to myself?

Wang Zixu quickly made himself an egg pancake, then rushed to the dining table and picked up his phone to browse the news.

He quickly found the news that Zuo Ziliang had pointed out—he didn't need to search carefully; it was already circulating on social media and was very popular, even appearing at the top of portal websites.

"The Desperate Literary Giant: A Lament for the Fate of a Mysterious Erotic Writer and a Rising Female Author."

The article has this title. Wang Zixu seems to have already guessed why it became popular.

Who is this mysterious erotic novelist? Is it me?

Who is this up-and-coming female author?

Prince Xu's heart raced a little as he clicked into the article and quickly skimmed through it.

The article begins with Prince Xu's heartfelt expression of "despair" during a live broadcast yesterday, leading into the story of the Little Prince's rise to fame, and then interweaving in information about Atsushi Nakajima.

The story then introduces its second protagonist: Xiao Mengyin.

The article says that this is a newly established young writer who recently won the Fei Shi·Sui Han Literature Award.

Wang Zixu also saw some familiar names: "...Yan Zishan commented: She is the author who surprised me the most this year..." and "Dai Jinhua: Like a flame seen in solid ice..." and "Su Fei: Number one on my reading list this year..."

These names were mostly household names, and they all showered this "rising young female writer" with praise and encouragement. Upon seeing this, Wang Zixu immediately exited reading mode and ordered her award-winning work on Dangdang, paying the original price of 39 yuan without even trying to reach the minimum spend threshold for discounts.

He opened the page and continued reading. The article compared the Little Prince and Xiao Mengyin, both of whom had discussed their own "despair," noting both differences and similarities in their despair. The "despair" that Wang Zixu had discussed yesterday was more specific, while Xiao Mengyin's "despair" was more expansive, reaching a higher level of understanding.

Although the article was written as objectively as possible, and every sentence was supported by evidence, Wang Zixu still felt a lump in his throat after reading it. The article didn't praise or criticize either of them, but the comparison made Wang Zixu seem somewhat despicable. He had gained far too much.

After reading it, Wang Zixu glanced at the article's publication time, which was at midnight, less than four hours after his live stream. Wang Zixu suspected that the article had been written long ago to praise the up-and-coming female writer Xiao Mengyin, and that he was just a target to gain popularity and traffic.

Wang Zixu finally understood why he had felt so uncomfortable reading it earlier—he felt like he had been framed.

Just as he was in a daze, the news page displayed "New developments in this topic." Clicking on it, he saw a screenshot of Xiao Mengyin's newly posted Weibo.

Xiao Mengyin: I feel like I've been scammed... [eating melon.jpg]

Prince Xu slightly opened his mouth.

Isn't this a case of the guilty party accusing the innocent first?

The key is that he can't get angry. The other person's Weibo post didn't name names or point fingers at anyone; it was just a cryptic post made at this particular time, implying something that everyone already knows.

Moreover, from her perspective, it seems that she really was the one who was framed, after all, the Little Prince is just an "erotic writer".

He downloaded Weibo, searched for it, clicked into Xiao Mengyin's Weibo, and immediately saw several of her photos.

From a writer's perspective, it's impeccable. Wang Zixu's personal opinion is that it's not as good as Chen Qingluo's.

He then clicked into the comment section of that Weibo post and found that it had already received over 10 views.

The comments below were all over the place, some comforting her, some praising her, some criticizing the Little Prince, and some even arguing back with those criticizing the Little Prince... In short, it was extremely lively. Everyone seemed to have a strong opinion on this matter, as if everyone was an insider who knew all the inside stories.

Prince Xu felt a little tipsy.

The article was signed by an editor at Jieshi Publishing House, the same publisher that produced "The Little Prince's Love Letters." Xiao Mengyin's award-winning work was also published by them (at this point, Wang Zixu understood why such an article existed).

I opened Ye Lan's WeChat, accepted the contact information of the publishing house editor she sent, and added the other party.

He had initially been aggressive, intending to demand an explanation, but to his surprise, the other party was unusually enthusiastic from the start, with messages popping up one after another:

【The Little Prince's teacher!】

[Finally, you've been added!]

I am extremely honored!

[Your book is already more than half sold! Have you read that viral article from today? A reprint might be just around the corner!]

Prince rubbed his head and sent a message:

Did you write that article?

The reply came back: "Yes, our editor-in-chief wrote it personally, and the result was unexpectedly good. After reading it, I felt that you are truly amazing!"

Am I good at this?

Wang Zixu typed blankly: "But this doesn't quite match the actual situation."

The voice on the other end said: "Are you not satisfied? What's not true to the actual situation?"

The prince pondered for a long time before saying, "First of all, I am not a literary giant."

They've been typing for ages over there.

You are being modest.

These days, who dares to call themselves a literary genius? In this age of competition to see who's the worst, everyone's harboring malicious thoughts and wanting to hurl insults; whoever dares to speak up gets attacked.

But what others say is another matter.

In my heart, you are a literary giant!

(End of this chapter)