I am not a literary giant

Chapter 170 The Deadly Writer

"Yesterday, that old man Yao Duanyang said that 'New Appreciation' is a popular magazine that young people like. He was praising it on the surface but criticizing it on the surface. He thought I couldn't understand it. What he meant was that we have no depth and are only liked by young people. Once the trend is over, we are nothing."

"Hmm, you're smart."

"Isn't it just the number one magazine in the South? Just wait and see. Sooner or later, our 'New Appreciation' will beat 'Ancient City' and 'Yangtze River', and even surpass 'Modern'."

"Passed."

"Qingluo, you're being a bit too modest. I know perfectly well that we're still no match for 'Modern'."

"I know perfectly well what you mean, because what I mean is... never mind, you've had too much to drink, I won't hold it against you."

"I'm not drunk. Look, I can still spin around."

Prince Xu's advice was correct; Ning Chunyan could only handle three cups of wine, enough to get drunk even from beer.

After watching Ning Chunyan perform a circular motion and then lie flat on the ground, Lu Qingxuan asked Chen Qingluo worriedly if she needed help, but Chen Qingluo said no.

She skillfully lifted Ning Chunyan and shoved her into the car without touching her head.

Judging by her appearance alone, you would never guess that Chen Qingluo, with her small frame, could do physical labor so efficiently.

She used Ning Chunyan's phone to pay the bill, which signaled the end of the banquet and the beginning of everyone's parting ways.

Lu Qingxuan asked through the car window, "Are you sure you don't need my help?"

"No need," Chen Qingluo started the car. "If you go back late, you'll miss the school's curfew, and then you'll have to sleep on her sofa."

"All right."

After watching the car leave, Lu Qingxuan said to Du Kezhu, "It's just the two of us now."

"Let's go back to school."

"Hey, are all the dorm doors closed now? Are you confident you can convince the dorm manager to open them for us later?"

"no."

"Hey, you must be quite experienced, right?"

"...What gave you the impression that I often come home late?"

"Your hair."

Green hair swayed under the streetlights, its color and texture somewhat resembling phosphophyllite.

Du Kezhu said, "I thought you were the student council president, with the privilege of asking the dorm manager to open the door whenever you wanted."

"no."

"No?"

"I'm sorry, I've let you down."

After walking for a while, Lu Qingxuan finally mustered up her courage: "You just said you're doing a part-time job?"

Did I say that?

"Yes, when Sister Xiaochun invited you to the magazine office just now, you said," Lu Qingxuan took a deep breath, "that you actually know what you're doing."

Du Kezhu remained nonchalant and indifferent: "What?"

"I found out by accident. I didn't specifically look into it because I cared about you; I just happened to find out..." Lu Qingxuan stared at her. "An innocent poet, right?"

Du Kezhu stopped in her tracks.

Lu Qingxuan was a little nervous: "I didn't mean to blackmail you with what you did. We were just chatting, you know? I just wanted to talk."

"Where did you find that out?"

Lu Qingxuan's breathing stopped abruptly. Because Du Kezhu's voice suddenly turned icy cold, she fell silent like a grasshopper sensing the first autumn breeze.

Du Kezhu turned to look at her, her dark eyes shining like stars. In the dark streets after 11 o'clock, the charcoal fire in the oven was gradually cooling down, sewage flowed slowly along the roadside ditch, and the vendors made a metallic sound as they closed their shops.

"Who told you that?"

Lu Qingxuan was pushed closer, feeling a drop of cold liquid on her back. She took half a step back, her eyes flickering.

"It doesn't matter who you heard it from! I'm not going to tell anyone. But what I'm curious about is why you did that. You don't seem like someone who's short of money."

Du Kezhu blinked, as if she had said something stupid.

"What gave you the illusion that I don't lack money?"

Lu Qingxuan glanced at her hair, her voice involuntarily rising:

"What I mean is, of course, you can never have too much money, but some things are more valuable than money, especially for students from Nanjing University. What I mean is, this 'part-time job' of yours will definitely require you to give up some things, such as self-respect, integrity, and so on. I don't think you're so short of money that you need to abandon those things, because in my eyes, you've always been..."

That's enough.

Words, like an ice dagger, interrupted Lu Qingxuan's passionate statement. The innocent poet placed his hands on her shoulders, and then she felt an irresistible force pushing her into a side alley, her back against the wall.

"Just tell me, who told you that?"

Lu Qingxuan stammered, "It's all hearsay..."

"Who told you that?"

"I promised someone..."

"I don't care who you promised, I just want the name."

Under her aggressive gaze, Lu Qingxuan finally gave in, seemingly deflated.

"Duan Xiaosang".

Du Kezhu frowned.

"Duan Xiaosang is a well-known book marketer..."

"I know," Du Kezhu said. "Why would she know my ID? And what exactly are you and her planning?"

Lu Qingxuan swallowed hard and spoke rapidly, "A few days ago, she contacted me, saying she knew your online aliases and that you were a top influencer on Wen'ai, so she deduced that you must know about Little Prince. She offered me a very tempting deal to get information about Little Prince from you. To be honest, I wasn't interested in that deal at all. I was more curious about Little Prince's true identity, but what I was even more curious about was why someone like you would do something like that?"

Du Kezhu blinked for a while before asking, "What did you just say she wanted to do?"

"She wants you to know the Little Prince's true identity."

A gentle breeze blew by, and Lu Qingxuan subconsciously pressed down on the hem of her skirt.

Du Kezhu frowned and then relaxed, finally asking in a tone of utter disbelief, "You're not joking, are you?"

"No, what's so funny about something like this?"

Du Kezhu stared at her for a long time, as if examining a rare and precious object.

The little prince's identity was quite ordinary; he actually sat in their office and was usually no more than 3 meters away from Lu Qingxuan.

But she actually went to such lengths, going in such a big circle, running back and forth as if she were sprinting towards him, hoping to get an answer.

From her perspective, the whole thing was ridiculous, no matter what. Ridiculous beyond belief.

But it was this ridiculous reason that led to her being arrested, even offline. It's truly both laughable and pathetic.

Du Kezhu said, as if giving up, "You're such a silly girl."

"What?!"

Lu Qingxuan's face gradually turned red. In the blink of an eye, Du Kezhu was already four or five meters away.

"Du Kezhu, you need to give me a reason!"

Lu Qingxuan chased after him out of the alley, but could only see his opponent's resolute departing figure.

"You still haven't answered my question!"

Lu Qingxuan called out to Du Kezhu's retreating figure in vain once more, drawing the attention of many passersby. She couldn't understand why the renowned "non-emperor" would become an "innocent poet." Perhaps she really was writing poetry, but was she truly "innocent"?

At least in the public eye, she is not innocent.

The poet did not answer, and disappeared into the night.

……

The poet returned to his dorm room, where one of his roommates grumbled a complaint, turned over, and went back to sleep. The poet gently closed the door, and, bathed in the white moonlight, sat down at his computer.

She quietly lowered the bed curtains and turned on the desk lamp, adjusting it to the lowest brightness. Their dormitory was a four-person room with bunk beds and desks underneath. To avoid the light from her work at night disturbing her roommates' sleep, she bought blackout curtains, but she still inevitably heard her roommates complaining.

Before this time of year, renting an apartment off-campus becomes a very tempting option, but every time she calculates her income and expenses, she dismisses the idea.

She took out her phone and noticed two unread messages from her mother. After a moment of mental preparation, she opened them.

Immediately, a hospital diagnosis report came into view. She clicked on it and saw that it read:

"The lung markings are clear, with a small nodular dense shadow visible at the apex of the right lung; patchy and sheet-like areas of increased density are visible in the middle lobe of the right lung and the upper lobe of the left lung..."

Du Kezhu pursed her lips, trying hard to suppress her impatience, and typed on her phone:

"What's wrong?"

They replied very quickly:

"I went to the hospital for a checkup, and the situation is quite serious. I didn't want to delay your studies, so I'm sending this to you to take a look."

Du Kezhu said, "The diagnosis here says there might be inflammation. If it's just inflammation, then it's alright."

Mother: "What's good about it? I'm afraid it will affect your studies, so I haven't dared to tell you. I've been feeling breathless these past few days."

A while later, another message came from the other end:

"I live alone in the hospital with no one to care for me. The more money I spend, the more I realize there's no point in living. I might as well go home and wait to die."

Du Kezhu, holding her breath, asked, "Where's your husband?"

"He's busy with work and needs to earn money. We're already poor; if he doesn't earn money, are we all supposed to starve?"

A year after Du Kezhu's biological father died, her mother found a boyfriend. His dressing style was quite shady, and he claimed to work for a freight company, but the mother and daughter later discovered that he was actually unemployed.

After living together for a year, the two secretly got married because Du Kezhu had always been against it. Later, Du Kezhu found their marriage certificate at home, and only then did her mother officially acknowledge it to her.

The stepfather said that girls don't need to have a high level of education, because a high level of education makes it harder for them to get married. Du Kezhu is so beautiful, she should get to know more people while she's young and get married early. By the time she finishes her studies, she'll be too old.

My mother said, "Your father is right. How much money can you earn after you finish your studies? How many years will it take to cover the family's expenses? Why don't you just finish high school and stop studying?"

Du Kezhu didn't think so. She felt that ever since her mother got married, her brain had been filled with dog shit. She used all the family's money to spend on her husband's debauchery, but complained that she couldn't afford to study.

So she wrote, read, earned money, and took the entrance exam for Nanjing University.

At first, her family had a negative attitude towards her writing, believing that writing couldn't make money and that she was wasting her time. Until the day she packed her royalties into a suitcase and threw it on the dining table at home.

She felt great at the time, but it also became the thing she regretted the most. After that, her family kept asking her for money every few days, so she had to change her identity again and again.

If she hadn't been so eager to leave her family, she wouldn't have rushed to buy a house; and if she hadn't been so eager to buy a house, she wouldn't have ended up with an unfinished building because she hadn't done enough research.

If she hadn't bought an unfinished building, she wouldn't have needed to become a brothel owner.

Du Kezhu replied, "Just tell me straight, what do you want?"

"If I need to be hospitalized, I'll need to hire a caregiver, and there will be costs for nutrition, medication, oxygen..."

"How much?"

"It'll cost at least 5."

After the transfer was made, the other party fell silent, and the night returned to stillness.

Lu Qingxuan's words echoed in his ears again: "This 'part-time job' of yours will definitely require you to give up some things, such as self-respect, integrity, and so on. I don't think you're so short of money that you need to abandon those things..."

Du Kezhu smiled bitterly.

Excuse me, but she doesn't think making money requires abandoning one's self-respect.

If she really needs to abandon her self-respect to make money, then she didn't have self-respect in the first place.

She will only lose her self-respect if she can't make money.

……

"Hello, I am Wang Zixu, the author of 'Fire in the Stone'... No, that's a bit dry."

"Hello, I am Wang Zixu, and I wrote 'Spark in the Stone'... That's weird."

"...Hello, I'm Wang Zixu, the one who wrote 'Spark in the Stone'... um..."

Wang Zixu practiced in front of the mirror several times, but the effect was not satisfactory, and something always felt off.

He glanced at his watch; it was 8:08 AM, two hours before their agreed meeting. He then looked in the mirror and said:

"Hello, I am Wang Zixu, and 'Fire in the Stone' is my work... no, I thank my humble work 'Fire in the Stone' for giving us the opportunity to meet... ugh..."

He gagged at the washbasin, but nothing came out. His stomach felt like it was filled with a bag of stones, which collided and made a "clattering" sound.

He turned on the tap and washed his face, then shivered.

His recent experiences have made him extremely paranoid. Although he received an unexpected and wonderful promise on the phone yesterday, he still feels like he is standing on the edge of an abyss, as if he is about to fall into a hole.

Before he knew it, the appointed time arrived. Wang Zixu waited anxiously outside the train station for a long time before receiving a phone call. The editor told him that she had already left the station and gotten into a taxi, and asked him to meet her at a certain coffee shop.

Prince Xu rushed over, and as soon as he entered the store, he saw a woman stand up and wave at him with her hand raised high.

The woman had short hair, wore light makeup, and had a slightly chubby face, giving her a cute appearance. Upon seeing Wang Zixu, a smile appeared on her lips.

"It really was you. When I saw your name, I wondered if it could be you, and it really was you."

Wang Zixu stared at her, stammering, his mouth open for a long time, her name on the tip of his tongue, but he just couldn't say it.

"Pu Yuyang, do you remember me? Old classmate."

The woman extended her hand and shook his. Only then did Wang Zixu finally say, "I never expected to see you here."

The woman was his high school classmate. They had some interaction in high school, but lost contact after college. Neither of them expected to meet here, especially in this way.

Wang Zixu sat down opposite her. Behind him sat an elegantly dressed elderly man drinking coffee, who kept leaning towards him, but he didn't pay much attention. The two chatted about the past and both felt quite nostalgic.

"Do you remember Xiao Fei? The one who always got first place. I heard he got into Nanjing University of Finance and Economics and is now his own boss. And Ye Ting, she went to the US to study after graduating from the Central University of Economics and came back to work in foreign trade... And also, Xie Cong, aren't you quite familiar with him?"

When Pu Yuyang started talking about his school days, Wang Zixu became somewhat hesitant. He had lost touch with his classmates long ago, and talking about those things felt like a distant memory. The more he listened, the more he felt he had accomplished nothing in his 30 years of life. Fortunately, Pu Yuyang quickly got back to the main topic.

"When I called you yesterday, I was thinking, 'Your name sounds familiar,' wondering if it really is you. But judging from your writing style, it doesn't quite match the impression I had of you before. I was afraid it was just a coincidence of names and didn't dare to acknowledge you. I never imagined you would go down the path of literature, and write so well! It's unbelievable. I remember you applied to a science and engineering university, right?"

Wang Zixu nodded: "I studied at Beijing Institute of Technology. By the way, do you remember which universities all your classmates went to?"

Pu Yuyang smiled: "I remember some of the classmates who left a deep impression on me."

Prince Xu sighed inwardly, thinking that this was truly a talent.

"How did you end up as an editor at Get?" Wang Zixu asked.

"What, you can't take it?" Pu Yuyang laughed. "I like literature, and I majored in Chinese literature in college. If I don't take the civil service exam, I can only become an editor."

Wang Zixu was very envious of her experience and nodded, saying, "That's wonderful."

"Getting back to the main topic," Pu Yuyang took out his manuscript of "Fire in the Stone" from his bag. "Many editors in our editorial department have read your work and are amazed by it, but we have a question."

Wang Zixu tensed up: "Ask away."

"I noticed that you didn't submit this manuscript to 'Get' magazine at first, but to 'Ancient City' magazine. May I ask why?" Pu Yuyang cautiously leaned closer and asked.

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