Translator: Henyee Translations Editor: Henyee Translations

“Only third?”

To be honest, Lie Mengmeng was flabbergasted at this result.

It hadn’t been two months since Father Wang had released his new book, but the reader rating on the website was eighty-seven percent, which was quite a high number. What was more, a major characteristic about Father Wang’s novels was that his readers were very loyal. Based on this strong loyalty, the average number of subscriptions to Father Wang’s chapters was as high as three hundred thousand.

This was an astonishing amount.

The most important thing was that this three hundred thousand was just the number of subscriptions on Cultivation Chinese Network. Subscriptions to Father Wang’s chapters on forty-plus other novel collaboration platforms were also considerable. Of course, Father Wang couldn’t see these subscription channels, but Lie Mengmeng would take a look every month, and the number of current subscriptions on these channels for Father Wang’s chapters in total was going to break one million very soon.

Of course, the success of Father Wang’s last book, Let Go of That Wet Nurse , was a big part of the reason for this staggering volume.

But despite that, the number of votes in this month’s double monthly votes battle had ended with an unprecedented and thrilling result.

The monthly votes for the first and second novelists were very close, and both were on the verge of breaking one million…

This month’s monthly votes were a bit of an exaggeration!

“Brother Wang, what should we do?” Lie Mengmeng was a little anxious. “How about you explode 1 and plead for monthly votes?”

“Explode?” Father Wang raised his eyebrows. “Didn’t I just explode yesterday? There’s no way I can do it again so soon, absolutely impossible. It shaves a few years off my life each time… the gains don’t make up for my losses! Want me to explode? I’d rather dress in women’s clothes. How about I do that and beg for monthly votes? I can wear black silk stockings, but on the condition that you don’t show my face; I need to uphold my reputation!”

Lie Mengmeng was shocked. Father Wang could actually come up with such an unprincipled operation… This was quite shameless behavior!

“Better not, elder brother. You in women’s clothes is too much of an eyesore,” Lie Mengmeng said. “Besides, even if you don’t show your face, you’ll have to shave your legs if you wear silk stockings, which will be too troublesome! Also… it’s not very good for men to shave their legs…”

The editorial board had previously organized a hot springs salon trip for their gurus, and both Father Wang and Lie Mengmeng had gone.

As he had soaked in the hot spring, Lie Mengmeng had glimpsed Father Wang’s thick leg hair.

If he had to describe it in words, he thought that he could stir-fry a pot of Chinese leeks if all of Father Wang’s leg hair was shaved off…

“In any case, elder brother, I think something’s unusual about the votes!”

Lie Mengmeng hugged a pillow as he sat on the sofa and defended Father Wang.

Father Wang lit a cigarette and said very calmly, “What’s unusual? It’s completely normal for people to willingly throw money at their favorite writers… Besides, aren’t these Braised Pork Shoulder and Braised Pig Feet in Sauce also old writers on the website? It’s not like you don’t know that rich readers can send red packets now, which causes the monthly votes to soar.”

Lie Mengmeng sighed. The fact was that he had overlooked this; he should have noticed it sooner.

He had always assumed that with Father Wang currently sitting at a stable number one on all the lists, the top position on this month’s monthly votes ranking should be a given, so he hadn’t paid close attention to it. In the end, on the last day of the double monthly votes campaign today, Lie Mengmeng was immediately dumbfounded when he saw the vote counts on TV.

There were still six hours left until the end of the double monthly votes at midnight; to be frank, Lie Mengmeng thought that it would be near impossible to make up the difference of nearly half a million monthly votes in that amount of time. But if they didn’t seize this opportunity to double the monthly votes, it would be even more difficult to surpass this number after the campaign was over.

Lie Mengmeng looked at the book review sections for the two writers with the top monthly votes.

Sure enough, because the difference in the number of votes was so close, almost on each other’s heels, fans on both sides had already started a series of campaigns for votes in the book review sections in support of their respective writers.

This monthly votes battle was actually a way to stir up fans. In addition, Cultivation Chinese Network had introduced a fan tag operation where the tag for the writer you supported would be displayed next to your ID. So if the writer came out on top in the monthly votes, the fans who supported them would definitely burst with pride.

However, once the monthly votes battle entered the white-hot stage, a war of words would inevitably flare up between fans of the different writers. Lie Mengmeng hadn’t been in this profession long, only a handful of years, but he had gained a lot of knowledge and experience in that time.

As a veteran who had entered the industry earlier than Lie Mengmeng, Father Wang was wearing the expression of someone who was already used to the big waves; he didn’t even need to look at the book review sections to know what was going on. “Have the fans on both sides already started fighting each other?”

Lie Mengmeng: “Mm… Looks like it’s pretty rowdy; Braised Pork Shoulder’s champion fans 2 entered Braised Pig Feet in Sauce’s champion fan group; because of some conflict, some of Pig Feet’s champion fans have been kicked out, and both sides are now making noise because of this.”

Father Wang tsked. “Hey, hey, hey, both writers haven’t said anything, have they?”

Lie Mengmeng shook his head. “Not yet, but the spectators are increasing… Everyone knows about the quarrel between both sides, not just on our novels website, but also on other literature forums, and they’re all discussing it right now.”

“That sounds about right.” Father Wang nodded.

Who was the happiest when fans squabbled? The writers, for sure!

This maneuver might look like a quarrel, but it was in fact a joyous and harmonious trick for helping each other pull in votes. Father Wang thought this was pretty brilliant! Not only did it incite the readers to support their authors by pulling in votes, it would also draw in large numbers of spectators to read the books; subscriptions would thus rise and the number of new fans would increase, and the authors would reap huge rewards…

After watching the vote count on the TV screen for five minutes or so, Father Wang said, “Take a look and see if Braised Pork Shoulder has released a standalone chapter as a statement.”

Lie Mengmeng looked at his phone and was stunned. “He really did! He released a standalone chapter! Brother Wang, how did you know without looking at your phone?”

Father Wang pointed at the TV. “Just now, the vote count on TV soared again. Braised Pork Shoulder’s votes are now nearly 1.1 million. It must have been because he issued a statement, thus injecting his readers with chicken blood.”

“…”

Lie Mengmeng refreshed the novel’s table of contents and was shocked yet again. “Damn! He released two standalone chapters in a row! And the title of the second chapter is so aggressive! It’s called ‘Please Break The Sky Open WithMe 3 !'”

“It’s fine, I’ll catch up. I reckon that at the absolute most he’ll only have a million and a half votes by twelve o’clock… I’ll look for people later to directly make my votes three million,” Father Wang said lightly.

“Bro, but now… We’ve only got nearly half a million votes. If that happened, won’t we be suspected of rigging the votes?” Lie Mengmeng was suddenly a little worried.

At that point, he suddenly noticed that Father Wang was done with his cigarette and had switched to a cigar…

Father Wang raised an eyebrow. “Rigging votes? That Braised Pork Shoulder can get 1.5 million monthly votes with an average of one hundred and fifty thousand subscriptions; I have three hundred thousand subscriptions, how can I not get three million monthly votes?”

Lie Mengmeng: “…”

Father Wang: “Help me put together a standalone chapter; I’ll dictate, you write it down.”

Lie Mengmeng gave a quick nod. “Okay! What’s the title?”

Father Wang: “‘What Do I Need This Cudgel For 4 ?'”

Lie Mengmeng: “…”