In the factory area.
The light in the top-floor office was not bright, somewhat dim, casting a slightly gruesome shadow on Old Bao's face.
He stared at the video on the tablet, took a harsh drag of his cigarette, and finally exhaled the smoke onto Mi's face, "Can you find his information?"
"Yes!"
Mi nodded immediately, opened a file on the tablet, and said, "I've already ordered several technicians to look into his information. Here's what they found."
Old Bao looked at the information on the file.
[Pen name: Mr. Lin.]
[Works: "Thief," "Swindler," "This Assassin Is Too Professional," "Hacker Kingdom," "All-In."]
In a short time, only the information related to Lin Chuan the writer was found.
Mi pointed to "All-In" and said, "This book is his participation in the anti-fraud essay event held over there. It's said to be plagiarized from another book 'The Years I Was Tricked into the Factory Area.' You know the author, boss, Ming."
Upon hearing the name 'Ming,' Old Bao immediately furrowed his brows, "Ming, is it the one who escaped?"
"Yes, that's him."
Mi nodded, "He's now doing live streams online, and he wrote this book, which even has characters based on us. It's quite popular among readers."
Old Bao turned around, crushing the cigarette butt viciously in the ashtray, and said in a fierce tone, "He escaped, and then exposed all my secrets?"
"Yes, as of now, only his and Mr. Lin's novels have thoroughly exposed some of our factory area's secrets." Mi responded.
The whole office was silent, and the night seemed even more sinister.
The wind blew, only to circle around and escape with panicked whimpers.
After a while.
Old Bao sat in his leather chair, one hand propping up his forehead, "The anti-fraud propaganda is increasing over there and it's getting harder to deceive the foolish pigs."
"Yes," Mi responded with a single word.
"Ming and the other web novel writer..."
"Mr. Lin."
Old Bao narrowed his eyes, "Yes, those two men, how do you think we should deal with them?"
Mi, feeling nervous looking at Old Bao's demeanor, suggested, "Take them out?"
"Hmm."
Old Bao's face darkened as he replied with a hum.
Swallowing hard, Mi said, "I'll immediately find someone to prepare for action."
Snap!
Old Bao slapped Mi's gaunt cheek, cursing, "Fool! If we take him out now, wouldn't it be a clear sign to them that we did it?"
"Please instruct me, boss," Mi said, wincing in pain but immediately speaking with respect.
"Wait until Mr. Lin's heat has died down, then we can take him out!" Old Bao's face looked very grim.
"Yes, boss." Mi responded.
Old Bao continued, "Before that, deal with the books they have written first. Our secrets are nearly fully exposed; it will be difficult to deceive those fools in the future!"
The factory area's business mainly involved carrying out fraud through the internet.
The form of anti-fraud essay promotion would cause more people to deepen their understanding of internet fraud.
"How should we deal with it?" Mi asked.
"You collate some evidence of Ming's crimes and forge some criminal evidence for Mr. Lin, then report it to the Cyberspace Administration over there. Buy some troll accounts too; they will naturally run into trouble," Old Bao said with a cold laugh.
Realizing what Old Bao meant, Mi immediately praised, "Boss, that's brilliant, truly brilliant!"
"Also, continue to investigate that Mr. Lin. Before we take him out, let's collect some interest, see if there's any suitable fish around him," Old Bao instructed further.
Mi immediately left the office to carry out the orders.
It wasn't long before.
Mi hurried back hectically, his face beaming with joy, "Boss, one of our guys has hooked a fish, and it's just related to that web novel writer. The fish has taken the bait."
The night quietly faded away.
At dawn, the golden sunrays pierced through the clouds, showering the land of Yundian Lincang with a tranquil and natural light.
Lincang was indeed a city worth visiting.
In the early morning, Lin Chuan walked on the slightly moistened bluestone pavement, gazing at the distant Dali mountains enveloped in mist, where a temple stood among the mountains, its bells echoing through the empty valleys.
By his side were the two beautiful sisters, walking under the warm sun, looking particularly bright and vivid.
The breeze was gentle, the atmosphere peaceful and lovely.
Perhaps, this is the meaning of travel.
But beautiful moments always pass unknowingly and quickly; in the blink of an eye, it's time to return.
On the afternoon of May 5.
The trio from Lincang arrived at Dali Airport. The passenger plane soared across the clear blue sky, flying from Yundian Dali back to Han River Anling.
Their seats were the same as on the way there.
Shen Qianqian and Xia Qingqing sat on either side, with Lin Chuan in the middle.
The flight back was quite long.
After two days of tourism, Shen Qianqian and Xia Qingqing seemed a bit tired. Considering they had work the next day, they unintentionally leaned on Lin Chuan's shoulders and fell asleep.
Lin Chuan, unable to move, and without other forms of entertainment, summoned the system panel he hadn't called up for a long time.
[Work: "All-In."]
[Current Status: Ongoing.]
[Popularity Value (Average Subscription): 0/10000.]
[Notice: No paid chapters have been released yet, therefore Popularity Value (Average Subscription) is 0. "All-In" has a total word count of 800k, with an estimated 600k words for paid chapters, which means around 280 chapters required for a total subscription of 280w to meet the Popularity Value (Average Subscription) requirement, and to start the next professional life experience.]
[Current Collection Count: 155278.]
"Ten thousand average subscriptions; there is a long way to go," Lin Chuan muttered to himself.
Indeed, the system did not calculate average subscriptions based on the already released paid chapters but based on the total number of paid chapters in the entire book. For instance, in the current situation of "All-In," it required a total subscription of 280w to meet the standard.
Luckily,
After a few days of fermenting, the 'arresting the fraud ring' incident brought a deluge of traffic to Lin Chuan's "All-In," skyrocketing the collection by 15w+.
When paid VIP chapters are released, "All-In" should quickly achieve the total subscription of 280w necessary.
There's another piece of good news.
That is, "All-In" has now risen to second place in the anti-fraud themed novel section.
[1- "The Years I Was Tricked into the Factory Area," Ming.]
[2- "All-In," Mr. Lin.]
[3- "A World Without Fraud," Handon.]
Ming started promoting early and immediately captured a large volume of traffic.
Handon, using the gimmick of being 'scammed out of three million,' also garnered a considerable amount of traffic.
However,
it was only a matter of time before Lin Chuan rose to first place.
After all, this surge of traffic was enormous.
"Advancing to the next round in June should yield good results, and maybe even lead to an adaptation," Lin Chuan had a certain longing for adaption.
Every writer wishes for their work to be adapted.
It's not just about the royalties, but also the market's recognition of their work, and only then can one truly be called a writer.
Before that, you can only be called an author.
Although there is only a one-word difference between the two, there is a great distinction.
Lin Chuan reminisced about how his mother struggled to explain his job to relatives and friends, the reason being he was just a web novel writer.
Web novel writers are at the very bottom of the literary scene's hierarchy of contempt.
In terms of social recognition, they are often classified alongside the idle and unemployed.
His mother often arranged blind dates for him, but the moment the ladies heard Lin Chuan was a web novel writer, they would block him outright.
However,
Lin Chuan was lucky to have met a few girls who recognized his profession.
This was rare, but also somewhat troubling.
"Web novels, company, life... the road ahead is long. It's only just beginning," concluded Lin Chuan.
As for web novels, he was currently at the stage of climbing towards the milestone of ten thousand subscriptions.
The company, the newly registered 720 Network Security Company, was slowly getting on track with Little Landlady's planning—raising brand awareness and developing anti-fraud apps.
But it was still a far cry from Lin Chuan's goal of acquiring Sailing Novel.
After all, Sailing Novel was worth tens of billions.
Unnoticed,
the plane had already entered Han River Province and landed at Anling Airport.
The twilight glow spread over the old district, like an old vinyl record, playing the familiar melodies of memories.
Lin Chuan had just entered the gate of his rental place
when a series of loud knocks on the door began—
and a familiar voice called out, "Chairman, open the door!"
Lin Chuan opened the iron gate and smiled, "Little Landlady, what brings you here?"
"I'm here to report to work."
Little Landlady stood outside the door, dressed in a light gray skirt that fell just above her knees, wearing white sneakers. It wasn't a skinny type of leg that she showed off; there was a bit of fleshiness in the firmness. She had applied a light makeup, her eyebrows exquisitely painted, and her cheeks delicate. She carried a bag in her hand, which contained several lunch boxes.
Lin Chuan took the lunch boxes, "How did you know I hadn't eaten?"
"It's takeout I ordered for myself. Since you just happened to be back, it's your lucky day," Little Landlady Zhang Xinxin said with a laugh, finding a clumsy excuse.
"Come in,"
Lin Chuan touched his stomach, indeed hungry, and placed the lunch boxes on the table.
Little Landlady sat across from Lin Chuan with a beaming smile, asking, "Chairman, was Yundian fun?"
"It was quite nice," Lin Chuan said, taking a bite of vegetables.
"Next time you have an operation, can you take me with you? I can do the recording," Little Landlady said with a smile.
"Record? What recording?" Lin Chuan was taken aback and asked.
"Didn't you catch a fraud ring in Lincang? But I can't find any footage of you online. I wanted to see you in action, and it's not possible," Little Landlady pouted.
Lin Chuan smiled, "You know about fraud rings. What if I can't pay attention to you? What then?"
"Would you really not pay attention to me?" Little Landlady pursed her lips.
"You're the financial director of the company, a pillar of strength—you can't collapse!" Lin Chuan laughed, "These dishes taste good. Where did you order them from?"
"Hee hee... They're not takeout; I made them." Little Landlady's face lit up with a radiant smile.
"You made them?"
Lin Chuan was surprised and skeptically eyed Little Landlady, "You can cook?"
"I recently read in the news about some restaurants' unsanitary conditions, so I decided to learn a bit. I cooked these few dishes today and brought them all to you," Little Landlady said, her playful smile adorning her face.
"Then I'm in for a treat tonight," Lin Chuan said with a smile, then looked at Little Landlady and asked, "If you cooked all this for me, what about Old Zhang?"
"Old Zhang... he's gone off to be in love, barely ever at home these days," Little Landlady said with a moue.
"In love?"
Lin Chuan's hand, in the midst of serving himself more food, stiffened as his expression turned blank.
Little Landlady grew up in a single-parent family, and Lin Chuan had never heard anything about her mother.
In all his time renting here, he had never heard about any woman in Old Zhang's life.
And now, unexpectedly, he was in a relationship.
But Little Landlady had grown up, so it was normal for Old Zhang to find love at this point.
"Yeah, he said someone from the Anti-Gambling Association introduced her to him. She's in her thirties, but I haven't met her yet, so I don't know what she's like," Little Landlady said softly.
"You don't object, do you?" Lin Chuan asked.
"Of course not. It's about time Old Zhang found someone, but he's always out, and with you not around, I feel uneasy when I'm alone," Little Landlady sighed.
"Next time, ask Old Zhang to bring his partner home, so you can check her out," Lin Chuan suggested with a laugh.
"Okay,"
Little Landlady nodded, then said with a smile, "Will you join me at that time? I'm not very good at judging people."
"No problem, I'm pretty accurate at assessing people," Lin Chuan laughed heartily.
Little Landlady smiled sincerely, "I'll ask Old Zhang about it in the next few days and have him bring her over for you to check her out."

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