Rebirth 04: Starting from Taking an Unconventional Approach

Chapter 171 Charlatan

Lu Hai squeezed the envelope in his hand, his face beaming. "Oh, boss, this feels really solid. It doesn't look like thirty bills; it probably doesn't contain fifty, does it?"

"You talk too much."

"The 800 yuan bonus," Zhang Ruiyi said, "plus the 2,000 yuan you lent to Han Fei before."

"You're paying me back so quickly?" Lu Hai clicked his tongue. "If I had known, I should have lent the president 10,000 even if I had to sell everything I owned. The return would have been much higher than putting it in the bank. Alright, extra dinner tonight! President, remember to come to me again if there are any investment opportunities like this in the future."

"Don't rush off yet, there's something else I need to do," Han Fei said.

"President, you go ahead."

Han Fei took out a cigarette, lit it, and put it in his mouth. He looked at Zhang Ruiyi, then at Lu Hai.

"Do you guys remember that car I pawned to Liu Dong at the used car market?"

"I remember," Zhang Ruiyi said. "Didn't you say that guy was pretty righteous? What's wrong? Do you want to redeem the car?"

'

"The car needs to be redeemed. But do you remember I told you that I promised him something back then?"

Zhang Ruiyi thought for a moment and said, "Oh, you promised to help him find an author to write a novel and put his name on it."

"Huh?" Lu Hai said in surprise, "That used car dealer wants to be a cultured person?"

"And it wasn't just him." Han Fei gave a wry smile. "He called over four friends on the spot, one for each of them, five in total, each priced at an average of two thousand five. I agreed immediately because I needed to raise the money. Now, I have less than a month left on the loan for my car, and I need to redeem it quickly. But before I can redeem the car, I have to settle the things I promised them first."

Han Fei watched Lu Hai frown, observing his head as he drew a simple, logical conclusion. Then Lu Hai finally understood: "Hmm, five articles, you definitely can't write them yourself, President. Your time is more precious than anything. So..."

"You expect me to handle this? You want me to find someone else to write it?"

Han Fei nodded: "Three principles. First, the manuscript will be credited to Liu Dong and the others, but the real authors will not be listed, and they are not allowed to disclose their identities. Second, the manuscript does not need to focus on quality or word count; you can even find manuscripts from the discarded ones. Our company has accumulated a bunch of manuscripts that do not meet the publication standards over the past two months. Go through them, find five that are passable, and see who wrote them. Then ask them to make some minor revisions. Anyway, discarded manuscripts are of no use to us. Now we're giving them a chance to turn them into custom-made articles. We'll charge sixty yuan per thousand words. This job won't take much effort; it can be done in half an hour and won't interfere with your regular writing."

"What if they don't want it? They'll complain about not being credited, or feel it's beneath them?"

"If you don't want to, then write another one," Zhang Ruiyi said. "There are so many rejected drafts, there's bound to be one that's acceptable."

"That's right," Han Fei said. "Lu Hai, make it clear to the author that this is just doing the editor a personal favor. There will be no credit, and the payment will be made immediately, without delay or debt. If you're willing, great; if not, we won't force you. Just don't let them feel like we're ordering them around."

Lu Hai smiled and said, "President, you've done a really good deed. A draft is just a waste of paper if you keep it, but now you're giving them a chance to monetize it; they're overjoyed."

"That's not necessarily true," Han Fei said. "Most authors still care about their right to be credited. Even if it's a rejected draft, they feel that not being credited is a waste of their hard work. So you should never force them. If they don't want to, just find someone else."

"I understand," Lu Hai said. "What about Liu Dong? He wants the prestige of being a cultured person; just giving him the manuscript isn't enough, is it? Do you expect us to publish those five revised drafts that were rejected?"

"Of course not. Even if the content is excellent, let alone the quality, we can't publish ghostwritten manuscripts through our official channels. I've already thought this through. What Liu Dong and his group want is face and talking points, not to become Tolstoy. So, once you've collected all the manuscripts, I'll have Teacher Zheng do a nice layout. We won't need an ISBN; we'll just print ten copies as regular internal printing material, and each of them can keep two. That way, there won't be any legal risks. All expenses will be covered by me personally, not through the publisher's account. Finally, let me emphasize again: you must make it clear to the authors who take on this job that this is the president's personal commission, and it has absolutely no connection to Qingniao's normal business."

"What if Liu Dong and his group go around showing off the book, or even if it's used by malicious people to accuse us of publishing illegal materials?"

"No," Zhang Ruiyi said. "For something to be considered an illegal publication, the object being examined must first be a publication itself. The stuff we printed for Liu Dong doesn't have an issue number, isn't publicly distributed, poses no social harm, and involves no commercial activity. Even if Liu Dong shows it to others, those who don't know much about publishing will just see it as something superficial, while those who do will immediately recognize it as a privately printed booklet. Furthermore, we can leave the cover undesigned, without any fonts, using only solid colors or patterns from our template library. And since the booklet was printed privately by Han Fei, even if someone with ulterior motives tries to use it to their advantage, they won't be able to link it to Qingniao."

"Eek." Lu Hai grinned, revealing his two rows of teeth. "You two really know how to think fast when you're in charge. You handled this perfectly, without crossing any legal lines, without overdrawing the publishing house's brand and resources, and you even repaid a favor cleanly and efficiently. Alright, I may not be the best at thinking, but I'm good at getting things done. Don't worry, President, I'll make sure you get it all sorted out."

Han Fei and Zhang Ruiyi laughed at the same time.

"Alright, go call the next person over," Han Fei said.

"Next is..." Zhang Ruiyi glanced at the payroll, "Cheng Xu."

Two minutes later, Cheng Xu came in to collect his wages. Han Fei instructed him to take two hundred magazines to the Yushan Post Office that afternoon to deliver them to Sun Jianguo.

The last one to enter was Zhou Tao. Han Fei could tell from the expression on his face that he had something to say.

Zhou Tao took the envelope from Han Fei, thanked him with a smile, and remained standing in front of the desk, showing no intention of leaving.

Zhang Ruiyi looked at Zhou Tao with a questioning gaze, then at Han Fei.

This is not a good thing, Han Fei thought to himself.

"Hmm," Han Fei took a breath, "Just say what's on your mind."

Zhou Tao sighed, as if relieved of a great burden.

"President, there's something else... I wanted to tell you in advance."

"explain."

"My childhood friend from my hometown is getting married around mid-September," Zhou Tao said, a little embarrassed. "He insisted that I go back to be his best man. I was thinking that being a best man means I have to go back two or three days in advance to help with the arrangements, like the wedding procession, rehearsals, and fending off the drinks... Especially the drinking part, according to the customs of Zhejiang Province, especially in the Jinhua area, the best man has to drink about 70-80% of the drinks for the groom. If I arrive only the night before the wedding, I definitely won't make it in time."

"Trying to avoid drinking?" Zhang Ruiyi laughed a few times. "Then you'll probably come back drunk this time."

"That's right. My childhood friend can't hold his liquor as well as I can, and there were a lot of relatives coming, so his dad specifically asked me to take his place."

I couldn't refuse.

"Sure," Han Fei said. "How many days would you like to take?"

"Three days, four days at most," Zhou Tao said, quickly adding, "Don't worry, President, I'll finish compiling all the final drafts and data analysis from Zhejiang Province and hand them over to Brother Lu Hai before I leave. It definitely won't delay important matters."

"Okay, approved. Just finish your work as soon as possible during this period, and let me know when you leave."

"Okay, President."

"By the way, aren't you going back to have a wedding? When you leave, take some magazines from the warehouse with you, as many as you can, don't worry about them being heavy. You have a lot of relatives there, so they can flip through them while waiting for people at the banquet or visiting. Don't say they're for sale, just say they're from our publishing house. If someone finds them interesting and asks how to buy them, just say the newsstand will have them later, or write down their number and send it back to me. If no one asks, just think of it as bringing a fresh New Year's picture to a relative, it's not much trouble."

Zhang Ruiyi turned her head to the side, squinted at Han Fei, and a slight smile appeared on her lips.

Zhou Tao grinned: "President, I'm going to be a groomsman this time, and you're even letting me be a scout for the club. No problem. My childhood friend's family lives in town, and the banquet is being held in the village's cultural hall. There will be at least a hundred or two hundred people, including relatives and neighbors. I'll bring a few extra books; they're not that heavy anyway. I'll bring five, six, seven, or eighty books and put them on the ceremonial table and by the tables so they can flip through them."

"Okay, that's all for now. Go ahead and get busy."

Zhou Tao thanked him again and left the room.

"President Han, you really know how to seize every opportunity," Zhang Ruiyi said with a smile.

"Oh dear, it's become a habit, I can't control it," Han Fei said. "Besides, wedding banquets in rural towns are natural traffic drivers. With a couple hundred relatives sitting together, waiting, eating melon seeds, and watching the fun, it's so hard to pass the time without anything to read. But if you put a magazine there, you'll get engrossed in it as you flip through it. And Zhejiang Province is our next focus, and Zhou Tao is a local. The magazines he brings back will be much more effective than a newcomer trying to distribute them."

"You just said not to complain about the weight, and you made it sound so casual. I almost thought you were going to make him carry a whole sack of it back."

"That's how it is. I didn't force him. If he wants to, he can bring more; if he doesn't want to, he can bring less. I'm giving him a chance to contribute casually, not assigning him a task."

"You are... um..." Zhang Ruiyi stared at Han Fei for a while before continuing, "You are the kind of person who calculates everything very clearly, but the way you act makes people feel that you are very easy-going and very loyal."

The same thing you just mentioned about Lu Hai—it was clearly repaying a favor, but it looked like you were helping him monetize a discarded manuscript.

"Isn't that how it is?"

"Do you know what you're like?"

"Like what?"

"Like those Go players. When others see you place a stone in the corner, they think you just want to occupy that corner. But after a dozen or so moves, they realize that your stone was actually aimed at the entire center all along."

Han Fei smiled slightly, feeling gratified, because Zhang Ruiyi completely understood him. He wasn't used to dwelling on past successes, nor did he crave praise from others. But Zhang Ruiyi's evaluation gave him a great sense of security, making him feel that he wasn't carrying the burden alone. He was no longer fighting alone as he had in his previous life. Every step he took was being observed and understood.

"Hey, I have a serious question for you," Zhang Ruiyi said.

"explain."

"Don't you think it's a bit of a coincidence that Zhou Tao mentioned his childhood friend getting married?"

"What's so special about it?"

"He's from Jinhua, Zhejiang Province," Zhang Ruiyi said. "We just finished the bidding process in Zhejiang Province, and the results are expected in the next couple of days. Next, we'll work on the project details. He just happened to take leave to go back and be a groomsman, and you had him bring the magazine back with him. Don't you think this is fate?"

Han Fei took a breath: "Ruiyi, you're right. This really isn't a coincidence. Let me tell you the truth, I knew Zhou Tao, my childhood friend, in my past life. On his wedding day, I got drunk at the banquet and stuffed Qingniao magazine into the bridesmaid's bag. As a result, the bridesmaid later became the largest township channel distributor in Zhejiang Province. So in this life, I recruited Zhou Tao in advance, just waiting for him to take leave to go back and be the best man, so that history can repeat itself."

Zhang Ruiyi smiled. Han Fei noticed that he was smiling too, and he didn't know who smiled at whom first. Zhang Ruiyi's body trembled slightly, because she was filled with laughter, which was quickly spreading throughout her body, and she would burst into laughter sooner or later.

"You don't believe me?" Han Fei said. "Then think about it, why do I specifically ask Sun Jianguo to wait for me at the Sheshan Post Office every Wednesday?"

Because the number three in Wednesday's name is associated with the concept of "three giving birth to all things" in metaphysics, and the post office is a place where information converges, while Yu Mountain is a branch of the dragon vein. Zhou Tao is from Jinhua, and the name "Jinhua" can be broken down into "gold and jade on the outside, and brilliant writing on the inside," implying that his trip back home, ostensibly as a glamorous best man, is actually paving the way for our true "literary sales" strategy.

Zhang Ruiyi patted Han Fei on the shoulder and laughed heartily, "Stop talking nonsense with such a serious face, and make it sound so profound, even bringing up metaphysics. Hua Zhang is included? Is that what they actually said? You're just forcing good luck on him."

"Alright, alright," Han Fei chuckled a few times. "I'm not joking anymore. All I can say is that I'm probably better at turning coincidences into opportunities. The real 'divine will' is this: if it succeeds, it's strategic vision; if it fails, it just gives my colleague a chance to go home, and it can also pave the way for our future plans in Zhejiang Province. You can interpret it however you like, I'm not losing out either way."

"Well, to be honest, your metaphysical theories actually sound pretty plausible."

Zhang Ruiyi looked at Han Fei, took out a tissue, and only then did Han Fei notice the tears glistening in the corners of her eyes, the tears left after she had laughed.

"I was just making that up," Han Fei said with a laugh. "I'm not kidding anymore. Let's get down to business. Do you want to go over and check on this month's magazine cover with Teacher Zheng again? Your design idea last time was really good, so we need to strike while the iron is hot this time."

"Okay," Zhang Ruiyi said, taking a breath and standing up. "We've already finalized the general design concept last time. I'll go take a look now."