After accepting the task, Huang Yifan carefully read the task description.
A 5-million-point task was definitely not going to be simple.
And sure enough, it wasn't.
This 5-million-point task was divided into five sections: children's literature, novels, essays, scripts, and poetry.
For the children's literature section, the theme was "enlightenment," meaning to inspire children's intelligence.
This round would start with a provincial Writers Association preliminary selection, from which outstanding works would be chosen to enter the national Writers Association competition. From there, the top 50 would be selected, followed by a top 10 chosen by five major publications: Youth Daily, Guanghui Daily, Literary Gazette, Xinmin Daily, and Truth Magazine. Finally, readers across the country would vote to rank the top 10, and the champion would receive 1 million points.
In other words, this "one" task was actually five separate tasks. Although it claimed a maximum reward of 5 million points, achieving that was nearly impossible. The five tasks spanned different literary fields. Someone good at children's literature might not excel at essays; someone good at essays might not write good novels; someone skilled in novels might handle scripts but struggle with children's literature.
Being able to win even one category would already be an extraordinary achievement.
But upon seeing this task, Huang Yifan burst out laughing.
Perfect.
The earlier tasks didn't suit him, but this one felt tailor-made.
Five different literary genres? Even if it were six, seven, or ten, he could handle them all. And he was confident he could win.
The first category to begin was children's literature, so Huang Yifan carefully reviewed the requirements.
After confirming everything, he started writing.
Children's literature, with a theme of enlightenment, was best suited for fairy tales.
But it couldn't just be any story; it had to inspire children's thinking.
For Huang Yifan, such stories were effortless.
Snow White, The Emperor's New Clothes, The Ugly Duckling, Cinderella… any of these classics would easily make the top 10.
However, since this was just the preliminary round, he thought for a moment and chose another fairy tale: Little Red Riding Hood.
Of course, Little Red Riding Hood was also a classic. But all the stories in his mind were classics; anything less, he wouldn't even bother writing. Still, he had too many works in his head, more than he could ever write in a lifetime. So he decided to "splurge" a bit and use 'Little Red Riding Hood' here.
With his decision made, Huang Yifan began writing.
In his previous life, Little Red Riding Hood was part of Grimm's Fairy Tales. Strictly speaking, it didn't originate there, as the story appeared in over a hundred different versions across Europe. But Huang Yifan chose the Grimm version.
The story was about Little Red Riding Hood bringing gifts to her grandmother. Unfortunately, the grandmother was eaten by a wolf. The wolf then tried to deceive Little Red Riding Hood to eat her as well. In the end, if not for a hunter's arrival, she would have been devoured too.
The tale warned children not to trust strangers easily and illustrated how innocence and naivety could make them vulnerable.
Huang Yifan didn't need to recall the exact original text. He didn't remember it word for word anyway. Based on his memory, he rewrote it in his own style. After all, it was just a fairy tale, so strict accuracy wasn't necessary. In just over half an hour, he finished writing it.
Using the pen name Qiushui, he submitted 'Little Red Riding Hood' to the competition and logged out of the Writers Association website.
That took care of Qiushui, but what about Fanchen?
With two identities, both needed to level up to maximize his influence.
Qiushui had taken on the Writers Association task, but Fanchen now had no clear path forward.
Looks like I should go back to my roots, writing novels.
After 'The Peony Pavilion: The First Dream of Linchuan,' there were still the remaining three dreams: 'The Purple Hairpin,' 'Handan Dream,' and 'Nanke Dream.'
But these gave him a headache.
Aside from 'The Purple Hairpin,' the other two were quite similar, both revolving around dreams, where everything turns out to be an illusion upon waking. They were derived from 'The Story of the Pillow,' the origin of the "Yellow Millet Dream."
So, apart from 'The Peony Pavilion,' the other three weren't that essential.
More importantly, they were short works, not ideal for publication.
Just as he was troubled, editor Hongdou sent him a message.
"Fanchen, you've been to the Xijiang Writers Association, right?"
"Yes, I've registered. Thanks for providing the identity verification materials."
"No need to thank me, it's part of my job. By the way, are you working on anything new lately? Your 'Peony Pavilion' was incredibly moving. Even after three years, it's still selling well. I think it'll become a classic, something people will still buy in five, ten, even twenty years."
Hongdou said with admiration.
"Maybe. But I'm still thinking about what to write next."
"What's wrong? No inspiration?"
"I have ideas, but they're mostly short works. Longer novels are too exhausting. I don't feel like writing one right now."
"Short works, huh… that's tricky. Hard to publish."
"Exactly. I was even thinking of posting them online."
"Don't. Even if they get a lot of views online, traditional literary circles won't recognize their value. And they won't count toward your star rating points. But I do have an idea."
"What idea?"
"Fanchen, have you considered writing scripts?"
"Scripts? Film scripts?"
"No, stage plays. I've recently been in contact with a major domestic theater troupe. They're looking for scripts. Given your skill with 'Peony Pavilion,' you could definitely handle stage plays. Plus, the theater has been declining recently, and the government is supporting it with funding. Writers in this field get special subsidies and bonus points."
"Hmm, that does sound promising."
"I think so too. If 'Peony Pavilion' hadn't already been published three years ago, I'd have recommended adapting it for them. What do you think? If you're interested, I can pass along your contact information."
"Sure."
Huang Yifan nodded.
Didn't he have plenty of short works with nowhere to go?
And even without those, he had countless Yuan and Qing dynasty plays in his mind. Any one of them would be astonishing. Works like 'Romance of the Western Chamber,' 'The Orphan of Zhao,' 'The Lute,' and even modern ones like 'The White-Haired Girl' and 'Hai Rui Dismissed from Office' all deserve to be written.
Just thinking about it made him want to contact the theater troupe immediately.
But then again, as a 5-star author, he had to keep up appearances.
Better to wait for them to come to him.
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