Chapter 4: Intermission (2)

The system disconnected, and the gaming hub was unlocked. Feng Bujue sat up and let out a long sigh. It was noon, and the sunlight was filling up the room.

Feng Bujue live alone on the thirteenth floor, the top floor, of an apartment building. His parents knew that they had no role in his story, so they took the money that Feng Bujue gave them and disappeared from his life. The main character was thus left to himself, and this saved the author the trouble of coming up with two names for unimportant characters. Was he not clever?

Glancing at the time, Feng Bujue realized that his gaming session had only been fifteen minutes. In Thriller Paradise's non-sleeping mode, the passage of time was only half the passage of time in real life. In other words, he felt like he had spent thirty minutes in the game earlier. For sleeping mode, due to the intensity of the connectivity, the time could be slowed down up to ten times, which was what they referred to as 'still time in dream'. If the player did not log off, he could complete eighty hours of content in just one night. Of course, this almost meant that he was going through eight hours of consecutive dreams, and this would lead to serious headaches the next day. The gaming manual had already stated the warning; they did not suggest players go over four hours in sleeping mode. Feng Bujue had read and remembered that warning.

By the way, it was broad daylight, and Feng Bujue had nothing to attend to? Yes, he was that free…

The man was a novelist, and many readers must be thinking, Is he some kind of super author who does not need to write and can just live off of his royalties?

Obviously, that was not the case.

Feng Bujue was known but definitely not well-known. His writing was not bad, and every single one of his manuscripts could find a publisher. Essentially, he was that kind of author who would never run into a windfall but would never die from starvation.

He wrote a two-page column for a weekly magazine; it was a periodical for a detective story. The manuscript was handed in every month, and if the quality was not up to par, it would be rejected. The editing had to be done latest by the end of the month, and the payment was counted monthly.

But with this single income, he could barely eke out a living in City S. Therefore, he had another job writing a serial detective novel, the ones that you could find on shelves. Whenever he completed a book, Feng Bujue would earn some money, and that was enough to keep his life afloat.

In that case, why would he be so free during the day?

That was easy to explain, and to borrow Feng Bujue's own words to clarify his current living and writing situation, 'when inspiration struck, there would be meat, fish and cakes; when inspiration eluded him, there would be instant noodle and bread.' His current life was of the latter phase.

The man was a happy-go-lucky person. Since the pen would not move, forcing it would be pointless. Therefore, he went to unwind. Actually, that was not right; this was what they called 'finding inspiration'.

Therefore, basically, it was a miracle to expect someone like Feng Bujue to hand in his script on time every month.

At the middle of every month, the editor from the magazine would rush over on his bike, and Feng Bujue's landlady would use her golden finger called the spare key to push his door open and spare no prisoners.

Feng Bujue would be prepared for that day. He used his pillow as a shield and his manuscript as weapon. He stood in his room waiting for his two adversaries to arrive, and they would fight three hundred rounds, from dawn till dusk. In the end, there was nothing Feng Bujue could do but surrender with the admission, "Money? Don't have any. All I have is this stack of manuscripts."

Fine, perhaps it was not that exaggerated, but that was the gist of the main character's life.

Now, Feng Bujue's friend. As they say, birds of a feather flock together, so was Feng Bujue's friend any better than he was? Well, surprisingly, his friend was indeed better than he was.

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The man's name was Wang Tanzhi, Feng Bujue's childhood friend. They had been friends since kindergarten, and they had remained classmates until high school graduation. Wang Tanzhi had gotten into medical school while Feng Bujue had joined society.

The closeness between the two could be explained through both a fact and a speculation. First, the fact. Why would Wang Tanzhi enroll himself in medical school? That was because, since he was a child, Feng Bujue had dreamed of becoming a modern Sherlock Holmes, and since Holmes' assistant, Watson, was an old military doctor…

Now for the speculation. If Wang Tanzhi was a female, then you would see my story in the female section because Miss Wang would have surrendered herself to Feng Bujue many years ago. Your mind might be going someplace due to that saucy speculation, but remember, that was just speculation. Both were straight males.

Wang Tanzhi came from money, but how much money? That was not important. In any case, he could enjoy a good life without lifting a finger in his life. He was quite handsome and slightly taller than Feng Bujue, 180 centimeters. He was polite, kind, and rather fainthearted. He disliked the spotlight and was humble and tolerant.

There were not many negative things to say about the man, and that formed a weird contrast to Feng Bujue. Everyone had nothing but praise for Wang Tanzhi, but Feng Bujue was an arrogant, cynical, and capricious youth in everyone else's eyes.

But the world could be strange like that; they were the best of buddies.

The afternoon went by quickly. Feng Bujue spent one hour reviewing some of the information on the official website. Since he had already entered the game and completed the tutorial, when he read the information again, many places became more clarified.

The rest of the time, he was making noodles not because he particularly liked them but because he had used the money for instant noodles on flour.

This was truly a weird man. He would calculate his portion down to every meal and then come up with the exact amount of food that he needed so that he would not die. Then he used the meager savings in his account to buy a gaming hub, and the rest of the money was used on flour and utility bills…

One could say that he was good with numbers but stretched his finances to their limit to buy a luxury item. Then again, he was not one who did not know how to budget because he was never poor enough to have to beg for food.

…

In the blink of an eye, it was dusk already. Feng Bujue finished the bowl of noodles, and that was his dinner.

Wang Tanzhi called and said that he had just finished the tutorial. He had been scared to the extent that he was covered in cold sweat. Once he went offline, he had immediately called Feng Bujue to calm himself down.

Do you know how much I envy you? Feng Bujue thought. I've not felt cold sweat for who knows how many months already.

They chatted for a while before exchanging IGNs, and then they logged back into the game together.

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