Su Jin’s face darkened, and a thousand curses burned in her heart.
Right now, she felt utterly humiliated, completely losing face, and wanted to run away!
Being inexplicably seen by a guy while using the bathroom—anyone would break down.
She could stay calm because she was “mature.”
But why the hell was Shen Xiyan—the “prime suspect”—so calm?
He was the one curled up in the corner of the sofa, blushing furiously, clearly feeling like he’d caused a huge disaster. Only then could he magnanimously forgive her.
The more Su Jin thought about it, the less she could stand it, which led to the current conversation.
There are two kinds of scumbags in this world:
One type has very distinctive personalities, is witty when they speak, ruthless without any taboos when they turn vicious, cunning and full of street smarts, and probably fears nothing in the world.
The other type appears polished and easygoing on the surface, comes from enviable backgrounds and families.
Before deep contact, girls all think they’ve met their dream Prince Charming and easily give themselves away.
But neither type has the shamelessness of Shen Xiyan.
Knowing he couldn’t dodge the issue, Shen Xiyan just looked up and met Su Jin’s gaze.
He dropped the flippant attitude he’d had moments ago and explained with a wry smile: “… I really didn’t mean to. If I’d known you were inside, even if you lent me a hundred courage, I still wouldn’t dare to go in.”
Out of respect for the girl in front of him, he thought an apology was necessary.
He had taken advantage of Su Jin’s “inconvenience,” tainted her “purity,” so no humility was too much.
“If it was intentional, you’d be dead already.”
“… The door wasn’t locked!”
“So you’re saying it’s my fault?” Su Jin bit her silver teeth tightly and asked sharply.
“Of course not your fault. I meant the ‘door was unlocked,’ not ‘the door was unlocked.’”
The first “lock” is a noun; the second is a verb.
Shen Xiyan thought for a moment, then put on a serious face: “Neither of us is at fault. It’s Song Wan’s fault. How about… we laugh it off?”
Compensation was out of the question. He couldn’t just let Su Jin see him as the second young master of the Shen family.
He’d be assassinated by Qin Sheng in no time.
Besides, not locking the door while using the bathroom was definitely Su Jin’s fault!
But Shen Xiyan didn’t dare say that because he was an unplanned presence here. Song Wan probably never expected anyone other than herself, Su Jin, and Qin Sheng to come.
Girls seeing each other was one thing, but he was a guy.
And as for not knocking before entering?
Come on!
The door opened straight into the bathroom. Anyone with a normal brain would assume the door was closed, right?
Plus, he’d been chatting outside with Lin Ci and Wenwen for a long time. He wasn’t sneaking in silently to use the bathroom.
It was just bad luck that he ran into Su Jin listening to music while on the toilet. What could he do?
He didn’t want to take the blame, and neither did she.
This black pot was way too heavy—it could crush a person instantly.
“Forget what you saw just now, or I’ll gouge your eyes out!”
“Definitely!”
“And now… take your eyes off my chest!”
Shen Xiyan: “……”
It was the law of gravitational attraction to breasts—completely uncontrollable.
Why did the girl’s chest muscles have to be so exaggerated?
No, I need to say something to lighten the mood.
Then Shen Xiyan saw Su Jin’s phone case.
“Wow! Isn’t this Tifa?”
Su Jin raised an eyebrow. “You play Final Fantasy too?”
“Final Fantasy? What’s that?”
The atmosphere got even more awkward.
“Well… I heard from Qin Sheng that you write novels?” Shen Xiyan asked timidly.
Su Jin nodded firmly.
Shen Xiyan examined Su Jin’s flower-like face. Under his soft gaze, her heavy eye bags didn’t diminish her beauty but gave her a delicate charm. “Can I ask what you write?”
There’s a big difference between male and female authors.
Female readers are all “perverts”—the more tragic the story, the more money they spend.
Male readers seek “fun.” They’re strict. Don’t pull the “first suffering, then sweetness” routine. If the protagonist suffers a little, they curse your ancestors.
When your target audience is completely different, taking advice from the other side is pure crime.
“Want to know?”
“Go ahead.”
Su Jin’s expression suddenly became animated, then she tossed over a phone screen.
Shen Xiyan saw the first story’s protagonist was Bai Jie and almost lost it. The next one was A Bin, which made him want to curse even more, until finally…
【Ye Linyuan woke up in a quiet, dark room, with a rusty sword beside him.】
“… What does this mean? These aren’t even your stories.”
“Oh, I’ve read them all. The views are quite high! I thought I was the only ‘well-read’ one here.”
Su Jin casually crossed her legs, accidentally kicking the coffee table, and an old, thick book fell to the floor.
Shen Xiyan picked it up and glanced down—stunned.
《中国古代十大艳情小说》, and it was a pirated copy.
Flipping through the table of contents, the ten weren’t limited to ten:
Shuang Zhu Feng, Seng Ni Nie Hai, Deng Yue Yuan, Wu Shan Yan Shi, Jue Shi Wu Tong Ying, Chun Deng Mi Shi, Yi Qing Zhen, Yao Hu Yan Shi, Mei Fu Ren, and many more—a hundred or so names just in the index.
“There’s a book like this?”
Rolling his eyes: “What do you know? This is called art!”
Shen Xiyan was shocked.
When he was in middle school, the most he did was click through Baidu and see some adrenaline-pumping ads. How did Su Jin reach this level?
Shen Xiyan flipped through casually. “Could it be your masterpiece… is in here?”
“Definitely not!”
“But has anyone told you not to casually ask an author about their works? Especially someone you know in real life.”
It doesn’t matter online; who hasn’t written some embarrassing scenes in web novels?
But in real life… it’s like being naked with no clothes.
Except for very close friends, it’s an invisible shackle.
Like:
You don’t recklessly drive a car, right?
You don’t write your classmates into books as prototypes, right?
It’s a little embarrassing to be castrated… well, that’s not embarrassing.
What’s worse is when your friend asks you to teach them how to write web novels. What do you do?
Su Jin’s earliest story started with the protagonist watching porn and masturbating, then suddenly a naked catgirl appears—perfectly matching.
Fortunately, it was published on another site and has never been found, or she wouldn’t dare imagine.
Shen Xiyan hurried to explain: “It’s not… I’m writing too. If the directions are similar, I wanted to ask for your advice…”
“You’re crazy?!” Su Jin glared.
“What?” Shen Xiyan was stunned.
“You’ve written anything before?”
… No.
Actually, he’d written reports for years, but didn’t know how to tell Su Jin about this, and his major wasn’t related.
“Then why do you want to write?”
“Suddenly got a brainwave.”
Su Jin sneered: “Kennedy also has brainwaves!”
Everyone has flashes of inspiration or imagines stirring scenes.
But thinking and writing are two different things.
Great authors are great because they can vividly turn those images into words, producing hot works.
Or a simple, understandable example: the flood of little yellow books online, like “Yin Zhi Li, Third Segment”!
Some people’s fanfics are just for laughs.
Others’ fanfics can be used.
So, to some extent, authors who can write erotica are extremely talented.
“Advising someone to study medicine, thunder strikes; advising someone to study law, a thousand cuts; advising someone to write novels is even worse.”
“Then why do you still write?”
“Do you think I want to?”
Su Jin glared, hugging her knees on the chair: “It’s a one-way road. Minors have few options. This is one of the few ways to make money…”
“Otherwise, with my looks, streaming would be more than enough. Need to stay up all night writing? Look at my dark circles—no foundation can cover this.”
Of course, the streaming remark was a joke. Su Jin was quite fastidious about her mind.
When streaming platforms first emerged, female streamers still had some decency—just chatting and singing normally, sometimes sweetly calling out “big brother” shyly.
But once it became so profitable, all kinds of beauties crowded in, pushing boundaries further and further.
At the same time, a Southeast city exploded, the real economy was hit, and there were even oddities like people swallowing eels with their mouths…
For someone like Su Jin who relied solely on her face, it wouldn’t work.
Now, even playing piano required stripping down to underwear; food and fitness streams flirted with the edge.
“Though it may sound like bragging, I was born with talent. Writing talent has always been great since childhood. From elementary to middle school, my compositions often won awards. That’s why my creative desire swelled.”
“I wrote during extracurricular time, without a phone I used a notebook, hunched over the desk writing word by word. Then proudly let classmates read it as fun reading material.”
“Kids were so gentle back then. Even if the plot was terrible, they still read eagerly, constantly boasting: ‘Wow, you’re amazing! You wrote so much!’”
Su Jin curled her lips: “Unlike readers now, who only say: ‘Is one thousand words a day even an update?’”
But good times didn’t last. Su Jin’s “feat” was soon discovered by the homeroom teacher.
The teacher was furious, face red: There are plenty of good books to read, why write novels? If you can’t get into college, don’t blame anyone later.
At home, her parents beat her and tore her notebook to shreds.
Now, of course, “thirty years east, thirty years west,” but the teacher wasn’t wrong. For students, grades are the hard truth; hobbies are just distractions.
“Writing web novels always starts with imitation. No matter what brainwaves you have now, you need to read first, know what style you like, then imitate and learn…”
“Like me, after reading the book you’re holding, I was super into writing erotica for a while. If you think you can just ask a couple of questions and write a book, what do you think writing is?”
An 800-word essay—how many people kill themselves writing those?
Web novels easily reach three to five million words. That’s not something you can keep up with just enthusiasm.
So even though leaving plots unfinished is punishable by thunder and sons born without genitals, many authors still start and start again.
“… But I still have to ask, right?”
“Ask what? You’re a high schooler who isn’t dropping out and is aiming for the college entrance exam. Writing novels now? Are you crazy?”