Rebirth 04: Starting from Taking an Unconventional Approach

Chapter 162 The Gilded Cage

Han Fei smiled slightly: "That's too kind of you. We know our limitations. If it were really as you say, Shengda's negotiation team would have come knocking on our door long ago."

Wu Wenhui smiled again and shook his head. Han Fei thought to himself that Wu Wenhui's smile wasn't a cowardly smile because he felt he had said something stupid, but rather a charming smile that showed he had let his guard down, meaning, "You've got me, buddy."

This was a lavish congratulation from someone as accustomed to victory as him.

"Then let's not talk about that. Anyway, I wasn't trying to convince you. I'm not an employee of Shengda, I'm the founder of Qidian. I came to see you not because Chen Tianjiao sent me, but because I wanted to come myself. How was the glass noodle soup?"

Han Fei, biting his chopsticks, said, "It's so delicious I want to move house."

Wu Wenhui laughed heartily: "I think we're actually quite similar. We both grow crops that others don't value on our own land, and we're always worried that one day a hailstorm will bring down a complete crop failure."

"Yeah, I'm more worried about someone coming and digging up the ground. Like those people today, uprooting it completely."

"Qidian was also hacked last year. Back then, we had just started charging, and someone wrote a program to register accounts in bulk, download our paid chapters, and distribute them everywhere. We modified the code overnight, but it was hacked again the next day. We were back and forth for three months, and we almost burned out our servers."

"What held on in the end?" Han Fei patted the cigarette box, pulled out two cigarettes, and handed one to Wu Wenhui.

"It's not about skill," Wu Wenhui said with a laugh, taking the cigarette. "I rarely smoke."

"Oh?" Han Fei said, taking out a lighter.

"We modified the code, they cracked it; we added firewalls, they found new vulnerabilities. For those three months, I slept next to the server every day, my ears filled with the roar of the fans, dreaming about where they would strike next," Wu Wenhui said, carefully taking a drag of his cigarette. "Then it suddenly dawned on me. The chapters they stole were already paid content, and the ones they posted elsewhere were already read by readers. The ones who truly endured were those who were willing to wait."

"Are you willing to wait?"

"Yeah, every time we get exposed, the system crashes for several hours. During those hours, the forum is full of posts cursing us. But after the cursing, there's always someone who adds at the end: 'Let me know when it's fixed, I'm waiting to read the next chapter.' President Han, you know what? It was at that moment that I truly realized that what we were doing wasn't just a few of us carrying the burden, but those readers who were willing to pay, who helped us get through it with their patience and trust."

Han Fei nodded slowly. He saw Wu Wenhui begin to relax. It's human nature for someone who hasn't met someone who understands them for a long time to talk nonstop as soon as they do.

"So later I set a rule," Wu Wenhui said, "that is, at any time, we must prioritize the experience of paid users. If the server crashes, we must first ensure that subscribed users can read normally. If a chapter is stolen, we must push it to paid users as soon as possible. As for those who come to steal or plagiarize... let them plagiarize. They can take away the text, but they can't take away the readers' patience in waiting for updates."

"Well said," Han Fei said, exhaling a puff of smoke towards the ceiling fan. The fan spun slowly, attracting many flies. "Like those newsstand owners whose stalls were smashed but who still continued to sell our magazine, those paid subscribers who waited for us to fix the system even when it crashed, and those authors who, despite being called trash, still painstakingly wrote word by word. For us, these are the most important people."

"Yes, Qingniao and Qidian are essentially doing the same thing." Wu Wenhui took a few thoughtful breaths. "We dig out those stories that the mainstream literary world looks down on, clean them up, and put them in front of people who want to read them. Your path is more difficult. Mobile phone screens are small, user dwell time is short, and it's hard to build a community. But you also have advantages that we can't match. Qingniao's push is proactive, and users passively receive it. As long as you push the right story at the right time, they'll click on it and read it. Qidian relies more on users searching and choosing for themselves."

The two sat in silence, listening to the buzzing of the city and watching the smoke rise and swirl.

"You're thinking about something," Han Fei said.

"Yes, Mr. Chen did mention Qingniao..."

'

"What are your thoughts on this?" Han Fei asked, looking at Wu Wenhui.

"I was thinking, if Shengda really takes over Qidian, will I still be able to treat people to rice noodles in the middle of the night like I do now?" Wu Wenhui said, with a wry smile.

Are you afraid of being locked in a cage?

Wu Wenhui's bitter smile widened: "I'm afraid the cage is too big, but I'll still think I'm flying in the sky."

"I understand. In the first few days after Bluebird came back to life, I looked at the money in the account and felt both happy and scared. I was afraid that the money would spoil us and make us write even worse things in order to earn money. I was even more afraid that one day I would wake up and find that the readers no longer recognized us."

""

"So what do you think is the most valuable part of the Bluebird?"

"They are authors who write works like 'Borrowing Seed' and 'Living as a Widow.' Their writing is honed through life experiences, not something we cultivate. You can't buy those kinds of authors with money or push them with traffic. We just happened to find them."

"The same goes for Qidian," Wu Wenhui said. "However, our authors are more like they've been nurtured. It took us almost two years to convince our first batch of authors that writing online novels could really support a family."

"So?" Han Fei said, stubbing out his cigarette in the ashtray. "Do you think Shengda understands this?"

"President Chen understands capital. He..." Wu Wenhui took a drag of his cigarette. Han Fei suddenly realized that this gesture of smoking halfway through a sentence usually meant he needed time to think. "When he looks at Qidian, he sees copyright libraries, copyright derivatives, and game adaptations. When he looks at Qingniao, he might see mobile entry points, user data, and payment channels. What he sees is all correct, but..."

"But he doesn't look at people," Han Fei said.

Wu Wenhui pondered for a moment. "That's why I came to see you." Wu Wenhui looked at Han Fei, a slightly bewildered expression on his face, as if pleading for help. "I want to know, what choice would someone who, like me, crawled out of the mud, make?"

Han Fei stroked his chin. He hadn't fully determined what kind of person Wu Wenhui was, but he had already sensed that Wu Wenhui's true purpose in coming to him was quite complex. Besides conveying Shengda's "interest signal," Wu Wenhui wanted to find a mirror at this crucial turning point in his life and career—to find an entrepreneur who was equally young, equally questioned, and equally charging through the fire, someone who, despite the immense temptation of capital, could still maintain reverence for people, devotion to content, and a clear understanding of life, thus confirming that he hadn't lost his soul. He wanted to use these as a silent support, so that even if he had to step into the "cage" in the future, he would remember why he started.

Han Fei was acutely aware of Wu Wenhui's inner conflict: he wanted to leverage capital to expand his business, yet feared losing control; he wanted to preserve the essence of Qidian, yet knew the limitations of going it alone. But the future cannot be reflected in a mirror; everyone can only make choices and bear the consequences on their own timeline. He couldn't directly tell Wu Wenhui, "You'll regret it in a few years." The other wouldn't believe him, and he had neither the right nor the obligation to change someone else's fate.

Han Fei sighed: "Mr. Wu, have you ever seen anyone forget they have wings just because their cage is gilded?"

Wu Wenhui looked directly into Han Fei's eyes, but suddenly blinked, his gaze shifting. It was only a fleeting moment, but it was enough.

Han Fei watched as Wu Wenhui's Adam's apple moved up and down in his stubble-covered neck. Then Wu Wenhui spoke again, his voice a little hoarse. Han Fei wasn't sure if it was because Wu Wenhui wasn't used to smoking.

"President Han, if one day Shengda really comes to talk to Qingniao, I hope you will remember what you said tonight. I will remember it forever too."

Wu Wenhui stood up and disappeared into the night three seconds later.

The morning sun hangs low in the sky, illuminating every pane of glass in the Jiaotong University Affiliated Hospital.

When Han Fei entered the ward, Han Baohua was sitting on the bed reading a newspaper.

.

"Dad, you look pretty good."

Han Baohua put down her newspaper and looked Han Fei up and down: "You've lost even more weight. Didn't you sleep well again last night? Your eyes are all red."

Han Fei sat down on the chair by the bed without replying.

"What brings you here today?" Han Baohua asked.

"I can come over a little later on Saturday, and then I can give you a report," Han Fei said, reporting on the results achieved in Guangdong.

"Seven hundred and seventy thousand, ten yuan each," Han Baohua said, his voice and expression full of joy. "Your dad has been in the publishing industry for thirty years, and he probably hasn't even earned a fraction of what you're getting this time."

"We've exceeded the target set by headquarters—5 million RMB in revenue over three months—ahead of schedule," Han Fei said. "Although there were some minor hiccups along the way, the technical team reacted quickly and fixed them in just over ten minutes."

"Yeah, it's not the problems that are scary, it's the lack of people to fill in. Your tech team is a real blessing for Qingniao," Han Baohua pointed to the newspaper on the bedside table. "The newspaper said you went to rescue someone in the middle of the night. Was it someone you know?"

"The reporter who interviewed me before."

"Aren't you afraid when you make the call?"

"Um... I'm a little scared," Han Fei lied.

"To do something you're afraid of is taking responsibility," Han Baohua said. "The thing your father could never do in his life was to see something wrong and pretend he didn't. And some people say your work isn't literature, it's garbage. Doesn't that hurt you?"

"I used to," Han Fei said with a smile, "but not anymore. Because I know that those who criticize us aren't bad people; they're afraid that what they've guarded their whole lives will suddenly become worthless."

Han Baohua smiled slightly and nodded: "You see things more clearly than I do. I was afraid back then too. When private publishing houses were liberalized in the 1990s, I felt like the sky was falling. Later I realized that the sky hadn't fallen at all, only the ground had changed. We had to change with what readers wanted to read, which is why we created Qingniao. Now you have money and fame, and you're slowly starting to gain influence."

But the most valuable thing about the bluebird is that you dare to tread a path where no one has walked before, and after treading the path, remember to look back and see if you've left anyone behind. Those people in "Stories of the Common People" only focused on money, forgetting that they were standing on someone else's land. Remember, the bluebird can fly high, but it cannot fly so high that it cannot see the ground.

"I understand, Dad."

"The doctor said I'm recovering well," Han Baohua said, looking out the window. "After a while, I'd like to go back to the publishing house."

Han Fei was overjoyed: "Really?"

"Hmm." Han Baohua smiled and said, "I'm not going to interfere. I'm just going to see what my son has turned Qingniao into, and also to see my old and new colleagues. If I'm lucky, I might even meet a few authors, like Wild Grass and Old Locust... I've read their manuscripts while I was in the hospital. They're rough, but they're written with heart."

7

Zhang Ruiyi stared at herself in the mirror in her bedroom. She had the window open so she could hear the sounds of cars and footsteps on the gravel path outside. It was already 8:30 in the morning, but no cars had yet left the garage. Looking at the family photo in front of the dressing table mirror, she always felt that her father in the picture was young and innocent.

As usual, she secured her hair with small hair clips. Should she change her hair color? Zhang Ruiyi removed the hair clips, tossed her head from side to side, letting her honey-colored hair fall in front of her. He heard footsteps downstairs, then Li Ting's voice and Zhang Qiming's low laughter.

She stepped out of the room and down the stairs, only to see Zhang Qiming and Li Ting turn to look at her with surprised smiles on their faces.

"Hey," Zhang Qiming said, "Did the sun rise in the west today? Our Comrade Rui Yi is still not out at this hour? Did Han Fei give you a day off?"

Li Ting smiled slightly and walked into the kitchen.

Zhang Ruiyi rolled her eyes: "It's Saturday today, we can go later." She sat down at the table, picked up a fried dough stick, and said, "What about you? It's the weekend, why don't you sleep in a little longer?"

"I couldn't sleep, so I watched the news for a while. With all that commotion you guys made yesterday, how could I possibly sleep?"

"We didn't cause this commotion," Zhang Ruiyi said, her mouth full of fried dough sticks. "It was those people who were making illegal publications."

""

That's not what I meant.

"What is that?"

Zhang Qiming sat down: "Last night, your Uncle Chen called me."

"Which Uncle Chen?"

"That Chen Yuanshan at headquarters. I have to go to headquarters on Monday."

"Is it related to the Bluebird?" Zhang Ruiyi asked, raising her eyebrows.

"Yes," Zhang Qiming said, a slight smile playing on his lips. "Yesterday's push from Guangdong was so successful; we completed the task set by headquarters almost two months ahead of schedule, and even exceeded it. Headquarters definitely needs to hold a meeting to discuss something this important."

"A meeting to discuss this?" Zhang Ruiyi suddenly stood up, knocking her chair backward. "Really? What are we going to discuss? Something good or something bad? A reward or new requirements?"