Chapter 17 – Becoming Popular

After finally reporting the good news to Xia Ping, Meng Fei finally managed to calm down. “Mr. Blackhearted Wolf, please just wait. I’ll definitely let even more readers come and read such an outstanding book.”

As he finished speaking, he hung up.

“Two hundred thousand subscribers. This really does exceed my expectations,” Xia Ping breathed out in wonderment. Even though he knew that his publicizing was very good, however such popularity really did surprise him.

Yet now, he could earn a huge amount of money. With that money, he could then use it to purchase spirit medicines, monstrous beast meats, and the like to strengthen his martial arts cultivation base.

”Although there are a lot of subscribers, I still don’t know what the reviews are like.”

Xia Ping gently gave his cell phone a few clicks and it immediately projected a page onto his desk in front of him. This page was his web novel’s main page on Penguin.

Of course, he could also project the web page onto his retinas, but that type of function would greatly harm his eyes. Unless it was something private, most people wouldn’t use it at all. Before, his conversation with his editor Meng Fei wasn’t suitable for other people’s ears, thus he used the retina projection, but now that he was just viewing a web page. There was no need for it.

Xia Ping swept an eye over his web novel’s review section. ”Oh? There are no more curses?”

Two days ago, due to his fame scam tactic, a lot of readers came over to cuss him out on his review section and caused a great mess there. However now, two days later, those readers’ tempers had long since disappeared and they gradually stopped. As for those cussing comments, if they weren’t censored, they were lost amongst a sea of reviews.

Casually taking a look, he saw that a reader named Big Treasure Sword had his review highlighted. Opening it, he began to read its contents. “Originally, I was one of Gu Zhiwei’s fans. After seeing a reader of this author come over and slander Master Gu Zhiwei, I was absolutely furious. So I gathered several dozens of my brothers and came over here to massacre the review area. However, after thinking about it for a bit, I realized that I couldn’t cuss something at all without even knowing its contents. Not only would that have no substance, it would also be unsatisfying. So I spent some money to take a look. If it wasn’t good, then I would just treat it as feeding a dog. Yet who would’ve thought that it would drag you in and trap you just like gambling? Even now, I still can’t stop. It’s as if it’s magic. So scary is the effect that I’m still trembling.”

“I know right? I was also tricked into coming here by that post on the forums. Once I finished chapter one, I just couldn’t stop. It was as if I ate some sort of ancient spiritual medicine.”

“Good book! This is the best book I’ve read so far this year! Honestly, I can’t even fathom how many films this author has watched or how many women he’s been with to have such a firm foundation. He’s absolutely a veteran. If he’s not, then I’ll stream myself eating shit.”

“All of you are complimenting him, but I want to curse him! This author is too shameless! Too blackhearted! Writing such an evil web novel, no wonder he’s called Blackhearted Wolf! I live in the slums with only an average income, but ever since I started reading this web novel, my money for nutrition is almost gone! Not only is my body now a wreck with bags under my eyes, I haven’t left home for over three days. My mom almost kicked me out of the house from sheer anger.”

“I am one hundred percent certain that this author is a slut. He probably started playing around with women when he was nine, had five to six girlfriends by the age of twelve, and started bringing women to hotels by fifteen. Now, incomparably experienced he’s thirty to forty years old and is a master of flowers, maybe even reaching a mighty ten thousand. There’s just no other way otherwise. His writing style is too experienced. After all, even an extremely seasoned otaku who has observed countless women such as myself was pulled in. You can just imagine how scary it is.”

“Fuck, fooling around with women by the age of nine? This author is absolutely a slut!”

“Everybody, calm down. That is only a guess. There is no truth to those false rumours at all.”

“Tch, although it’s a guess, but it’s probably seventy to eighty percent true.”

Below the main review was the replies. Just that review alone had several thousand commenters with a very active discussion.

There was also another review written by a reader named, I am a Potato. “After reading this web novel, my heart clenched. Although this is an erotic web novel, but it transcends the category of erotic web novels. As I see it, it is a piece of writing that criticizes and scrutinizes reality. The protagonist Bai Rong truly is a tragedy. Not only is she a glorious teacher of the people, she also had a family and a husband. However, her husband was a useless punching bag who was a coward. When her career and future was blocked, he couldn’t understand her nor could he help her at all. With no friends standing by her, she was isolated and hollow inside. This is a lonely and beautiful woman.

Although it’s sad, but beautiful women always have countless sexual rumours swirling around them. It doesn’t matter whether they want to or not, there will always be all sorts of gossip about them. This is envy. The darkness of society. At the same time, it makes the pressure that the protagonist experiences even bigger. A pity that her useless husband couldn’t help her or understand her.

So she had an extramarital affair. This extramarital affair was so natural, as if it was meant to be. And so, she began a game of feelings and emotions with many men. The principal, the department head, her colleagues, the hooligans on the streets, her first crush, even a student. However, I don’t think that it’s her fault. It’s society’s fault, with its unfairness and pressure that turned her into that state.

As everybody knows, even in our technologically-advanced day and age, women still suffer from sexism and have to conform to many traditional customs and rules.

Because of that, many women have to suppress themselves and their wishes. Make concessions for the bigger picture. These types of restrictions hinder the talents and freedoms of these women and have resulted in many tragedies.

I think that the author wants to use this web novel and its protagonist Bai Rong’s vividness to drive home his point about how unfair society is, of what the evils of our times are and what we can do to fix them. A scene to shock and awaken our hearts.

After reading to the end, I was already in tears and unable to stop crying for a long time. Right now, I don’t even care about the ending that the protagonist has. Just the thought of how there are millions of women like Bai Rong out there, living in extreme misery and tragedy, and my heart hurts. It hurts so much that I can’t even sleep at night.”

“Big brother, this is just porn. The author really didn’t think that much.”

”The poster really has talent to be able to read so much about society from a web novel! Please, accept my knee!”

“Seeing the poster’s words, I’m practically prostrate in worship. I really need to go back to grade school and learn how to read.”

”What the poster said is right. There really are a lot of women living in extreme misery in this world. So I plan on calling a few over tonight and spend some money to save them.”

“I also feel as deeply to the point where I also cried. I just cried from a different place”

”Is there really emotions involved? Why is it that I feel that it’s all action?”

Several readers replied to the review.

After seeing those replies, Xia Ping felt as if his world-view had been renewed several times over.

“Xia Ping!”

As Xia Ping was reading his web novel’s reviews, Jiang Yaru suddenly came over.