Chapter 1 Half an Hour Later

More than half an hour later, Pei Qian arrived at the Inspiration Class location of Zhongdian Chinese Network.

The "Study Class" and "Inspiration Class" were on two different floors. Pei Qian went to the Study Class to take a look first.

The Study Class had only one room at the beginning, and later expanded to three rooms. But now, all three rooms were overcrowded. From the doorway, you could hear the sound of mechanical keyboards clacking, like a cheerful ocean made of crisp tapping sounds.

Most of the authors inside were unfamiliar faces, but their expressions were very focused, looking quite excited, as if they couldn't wait to turn the stories in their minds into words.

Pei Qian couldn't help but feel a pang of heartache.

This Study Class had cultivated countless backbone authors for Zhongdian Chinese Network. Although this income was insignificant to Tenda's current size, the entire Zhongdian Chinese Network's book library was constantly being enriched, and the author and reader groups were also expanding.

Over time, the possibility of a hit book would greatly increase.

Pei Qian didn't disturb these authors, but continued upstairs to the floor where the Inspiration Class was located.

This floor was much quieter. Pei Qian only heard the sound of one person typing, and it was intermittent, indicating that they were struggling quite a bit.

The Inspiration Class had three areas: an inspiration collection area, a work area, and a large audio-visual room. The inspiration collection area and the work area had a long conference table, occasionally used for meetings or brainstorming.

In the inspiration collection area, each author had a single sofa, a TV, and a game console. The light in the entire space was dim, and each person's sofa was equipped with a reading lamp, so they could read novels and comics, or watch movies and play games.

The entire audio-visual room was soundproofed and equipped with cinema-level projectors and audio equipment. The authors could order films on demand and make reservations to use it.

The Inspiration Class initially had only a dozen people, but it had gradually expanded to a total of 25 people.

These 25 people were basically the top authors of Zhongdian Chinese Network from some time ago, the kind that ranked high in various categories.

And now, there were only about ten people in the inspiration collection area. Some were playing games, some were watching movies, and some were reading books under the reading lights. Because they were all wearing headphones, it was very quiet. You could only occasionally hear the sound of book pages turning and the sound of buttons being pressed on game controllers.

There were two authors in the work area. One had both hands on the keyboard, only typing a few words every once in a while, while the other was holding their cheek with one hand, staring blankly at the computer screen, wondering what they were thinking about.

As for where the other half of the authors had gone?

Obviously, they were in the audio-visual room watching movies.

Although the entire audio-visual room was soundproofed and wouldn't affect the inspiration collection area and the work area, you could still faintly hear sounds outside the door of the audio-visual room. It seemed like a very tense war movie was playing inside, with fierce gunfire constantly erupting.

Pei Qian was simply too pleased.

Look, look!

Compared with the Study Class, the difference was obvious!

The authors in the Study Class were all working hard, while the people in the Inspiration Class were all seriously "collecting inspiration." There were only two people in the work area, and they were both spacing out.

Pei Qian couldn't help but feel a little proud. After all, the idea for the Inspiration Class was his own, and the facts proved that it was very effective.

Everyone was so focused that no one noticed Pei Qian's arrival.

After all, the Inspiration Class didn't have any restrictions. It didn't matter if you were late, left early, or didn't even come for two or three days in a row. Authors often moved around to find books, game discs, or go to the bathroom, so everyone was used to it.

Pei Qian casually found a place to sit in the work area. The two authors were focused on their own things and didn't notice him.

After waiting for a while, the movie in the audio-visual room finished, and the authors came out one after another.

Several authors were discussing the plot of the movie in low voices, but obviously they weren't very interested either, and they each returned to their seats.

Pei Qian could see that these authors were very confused now, and it was time for him to show them the way.

Cui Geng followed behind the crowd and came in. He subconsciously turned his head and saw President Pei sitting in the work area seat, looking at the authors with a smile.

"President Pei?!"

Cui Geng's shout made the others turn their heads as well. Then, the authors' faces all showed ashamed expressions.

Oh no, President Pei caught them red-handed!

When they first came to this Inspiration Class, most of the authors were in a high-spirited state. Although it was a buyout contract, with such good conditions, they definitely had to roll up their sleeves and make a name for themselves.

But as they wrote, they realized that they were a bit unable to keep up. The more good works they saw, and the more inspiration they accumulated, the more they felt that their own writing was garbage. Naturally, they wrote slower and slower, and they had less and less inspiration.

Over time, they had degenerated into their current very salted fish state. They worked eight hours a day, and seven of those hours were spent watching movies, reading novels, and playing games to accumulate material or come up with plots like searching for a needle in a haystack. It was good if they could write for an hour.

If they had known that President Pei was coming, then everyone would have definitely prepared carefully and put on their best mental state.

After all, President Pei had arranged such a good working environment for them and prepared such generous treatment. As a result, they had not only not written any particularly brilliant works, but they had not even maintained their most basic creative enthusiasm. How could they live up to President Pei's good intentions!

Pei Qian smiled and said, "If everyone has time, can you put aside your work for a while and chat together?"

Everyone quickly nodded.

Most of their time now was spent "collecting material." The time they spent truly maintaining a highly focused state for creation was very little, so what "work" did they have on hand?

There was a long table nearby, and everyone quickly took a seat. The authors who couldn't find seats pulled chairs from the work area and surrounded the table.

Many authors were very nervous, feeling like they had been caught by President Pei.

Even if President Pei didn't interrogate them, he would definitely make some adjustments to the form of the Inspiration Class.

After all, it cost a lot of money to maintain this Inspiration Class. Not to mention the cost of the entire venue and daily expenses, the authors' articles were bought out at high prices, but the result was just some novels of this quality. This definitely wouldn't satisfy President Pei.

Some authors were very ashamed and couldn't wait to pat their chests and promise President Pei that they would definitely no longer be salted fish and would seriously create. Even if they had to hang themselves by their hair and write until they foamed at the mouth, they would have to write a classic masterpiece.

There were also some authors who were determined to admit their mistakes to President Pei and voluntarily withdraw from this Inspiration Class, go back to writing their old routines. They weren't cut out for this, and they didn't want to waste President Pei's good intentions.

Pei Qian looked around at everyone and said with a smile, "The Inspiration Class has been open for three or four months now, and I have seen all of your efforts during this time."

"I think the Inspiration Class is very successful and has completely met my expectations!"

Everyone was petrified.

Huh?

Completely met his expectations?

We know what kind of state we're in, right? How can this be considered "very successful"?

This caused the authors who wanted to seriously repent and admit their mistakes to be collectively silenced, and they didn't know how to respond for a while.

Cui Geng weakly said, "To be honest, President Pei, most of the authors in the Inspiration Class are not writing smoothly, including me… Moreover, our results have not met expectations at all…"

Of all the authors here, Cui Geng was the most familiar with President Pei, so naturally Cui Geng had to tell the truth.

Pei Qian waved his hand, "Of course I know that."

"But these are all normal phenomena!"

"You are originally in the exploration stage of transformation, so a little bit of growing pains is very normal. The writing styles for stories of millions of words and stories of hundreds of thousands of words are completely different. You are essentially starting from scratch, so how can you succeed all at once?"

"When you first started writing online novels, you didn't succeed with your first book, right? You had to accumulate millions of words."

"The creation of the Inspiration Class is the same. If there was no Inspiration Class, you might not have touched this topic in your life, right?"

"As for the results, to be honest, to be able to write to the top 50 on the entire internet on an online novel website with such a slow update rate and such unpopular content, doesn't that just highlight your strong skills?"

President Pei's words left the authors a little confused.

According to President Pei's meaning…

So what we're writing is actually very good?

It must be said that people are very easily influenced and guided by the outside world.

If a large number of people run to the book review section and say that this book is very garbage, the author themselves will also doubt themselves, and many of the content they had originally planned to write will not dare to write, and they may even want to give up;

But if many people encourage them, saying that although the data for this book is not good, the content is particularly brilliant, the author will also be greatly encouraged, and they may even be bolder to try some new plot designs and ideas.

Although only President Pei gave such a high evaluation, and most traditional online novel readers were not optimistic about these works, that was President Pei!

President Pei's praise can at least offset the criticism of ten thousand readers, right?

So, the authors silently ignited some confidence in their hearts.

Many people had the illusion that "maybe what I'm writing is actually okay."

Pei Qian smiled slightly. It seemed that his great persuasive skills had improved.

In the past, he was only persuading one person at a time, but now he could persuade a group of people, and the effect was not bad.

But he couldn't be satisfied yet, he had to strike while the iron was hot.

Pei Qian paused slightly, letting the authors' mood settle down, and then continued, "In order to consolidate the achievements of the Inspiration Class at this stage, and also to support and commend outstanding authors, I have decided to select the top three creations of this Inspiration Class and give them rewards!"

"For the book *Eternal Reincarnation*, I will arrange for the game department to develop a large expansion pack for *Turning Back is the Shore*, using the content of *Eternal Reincarnation* as the story background. The author can participate in the entire production process and can propose their own modification opinions on any details in the game."

"Cui Geng's *Successor* is a superhero-themed work, and I will commission Fei Huang Studio to film a web series. Similarly, the author can also participate in the entire process and offer their opinions."

"And there's the last book."

"*Agent Academy* is a story with *GOG* as the background, but it is more inclined to be lighthearted, humorous, and a bit of a parody. I think the form of animation would be more suitable."

"So, I will let Fei Huang Studio acquire an additional animation studio and animate *Agent Academy* as the first work of this animation studio!"

"Moreover, the author can get 15% of all the revenue generated after the adaptation!"

All the works of the Inspiration Class had already been paid a buyout fee higher than the market price, so in principle, this percentage was completely unnecessary. But Pei Qian would definitely not let go of this opportunity to spend more money, so he gave a very generous percentage.

Pei Qian paid more attention to the first two works, and the third one was purely for filling the numbers.

This book, *Agent Academy*, is a work with *GOG* as the theme, but what it describes is not the official story background of *GOG*, but more inclined to the feeling of a light novel. It is composed of many short stories, and the overall style is humorous and a bit nonsensical.

This work did not perform as well as the previous two, after all, similar themes would seem out of place on online novel websites, and writing short stories well is actually more difficult than writing long stories. Many of the humorous points that can be expressed with tone and actions will have a much weaker effect when written in words.

The works of these authors have been proven to be commercially unsuccessful works. Since this is the case, then they should be promoted even more!

How much money can one novel waste originally? It's just a little bit of buyout money. But if the novel is adapted into a web series or animation, the cost will be high!

With so many costs burned in, and the audience not liking to watch it, wouldn't that be wonderful?

As for why he wanted to make a web series and animation…

The main reason was that Fei Huang Studio was giving Pei Qian a headache.

He had filmed so many themes before, short videos, documentaries, and two movies…

They were all hits.

Letting Fei Huang Studio film them, even the garbage script written by President Pei himself could be made into a hit, which shows that Zhu Xiaoce has the power to turn decay into magic.

What if he handed these books over to Fei Huang Studio to make into movies, and they took off again? What would he do then?

So, change the subject matter.

This time's web series is different from previous web series. It's not a small-budget production, but a big-budget, large-scale production. But it's not a movie and can't be released in theaters to collect box office revenue, so the possibility of losing money will naturally increase greatly.

As for animation, it is a field that Tenda has never been involved in before.

Pei Qian could just spend money to buy an animation studio. The road of film is blocked, so animation shouldn't be a problem, right?

And the fact that these three works can be made into film and television or animation will inevitably give other authors very large encouragement and motivation.

When other authors see that, wow, writing something so garbage can be adapted into games, web series, and animation, then they will definitely squeeze their heads to get into the Inspiration Class.

In this way, the entire website's top authors will all enter the Inspiration Class, this "large salted fish culture dish." Over time, won't things get better?

Pei Qian couldn't help but feel complacent.

What a perfect plan!