Chapter 2: Joining the Show

After a casual dinner, Xu Ze returned to his dormitory at the university. His two other roommates were out; only his close friend, Fatty Ye, was sprawled on the bed like a dead pig, motionless, reading a novel on his phone.

Seeing Xu Ze come in, Fatty Ye perked up and said excitedly, “Xu Ze, I’ve found another great novel! I’ll send it to you, you must read it—it’s really good!”

Xu Ze replied half-heartedly and then sat at his desk, turning on his computer.

He searched for “Huaxia Song Copyright Network” and clicked to enter. This was the official website for registering song copyrights in Huaxia. To register a song, there was a ten-yuan processing fee.

Unlike his previous life, this world had perfected the protection of intellectual property for all kinds of literary and artistic works; piracy was rare. Every music producer, after finishing a song, would first register its copyright on this website.

Xu Ze quickly uploaded his song and waited for the system to check for similarity and plagiarism; songs with high similarity or clear cases of copying would not pass the review.

Two minutes later, the review was approved. Xu Ze paid the fee, and the song’s copyright registration was complete.

He then found the application email for “I’m a Singer-Songwriter” and sent in his song. The program’s early selection was done online—only if you passed this stage would the production team contact you to join the official recording.

“All done.”

Xu Ze stretched. He noticed his phone light up on the desk—a text message. Opening it, he saw it was a notification of his bank balance after the payment; it seemed there had been a slight delay in the signal.

He looked closely—the balance was 398 yuan.

Well, that certainly suited the persona of a poor university student.

Xu Ze rubbed his brow. He needed to find a way to make money. Having an empty pocket left him feeling insecure.

Sell songs? But he was just a sophomore with no name. Even if the songs were good, no one would pay a decent price for them.

Xu Ze had no intention of letting the classic songs from his past life go cheaply.

Suddenly, he remembered the novel Fatty Ye had mentioned.

Right—novels! He could write novels and make money.

He opened the novel Fatty Ye had sent him. Its title was “The Strongest Minotaur.”

Xu Ze quickly read ten chapters, then turned to ask Fatty Ye, “This is the awesome novel you recommended?”

“You don’t like it? It’s so exciting!” Fatty Ye shot back.

Xu Ze shrugged. In his previous life, he’d read plenty of novels—he was a veteran reader. The novel Fatty Ye recommended seemed a bit too simplistic for his taste.

Could it be that the standard for novels in this world was that low?

Xu Ze then browsed the world’s leading web novel site, Flourishing Words Network.

After an hour of careful browsing, Xu Ze noticed that, among the top ten novels currently on the rankings, six were fantasy adventure stories set in alternate worlds, and the content felt rather formulaic and old-fashioned.

Popular tropes from his past life—like the “useless protagonist,” “leveling up,” or “invincible main character”—which had already become hot trends, hadn’t even appeared here.

It seemed that, whether in music or novels, this world lagged far behind his previous one. Perhaps that was why he’d been sent here.

Xu Ze continued browsing the site when a banner floated across the page: “Immortal Heroes Star Project: From next month, any work in the Immortal Heroes category with over 500 subscriptions will receive a monthly bonus of 1,000 yuan!”

Xu Ze paused. It seemed that xianxia novels were struggling in this world—there was even a need to support xianxia authors. For a professional writer, the 500-subscriber threshold was almost no threshold at all.

In that case, it’s decided!

Xu Ze entered the author’s backend, registered an author account, and chose the pen name “Xiao Yan.”

He created a new work: “Jade Dynasty.”

“In this world, there were originally no such things as gods or immortals. But since ancient times, humans, witnessing the world around them—strange occurrences, thunder and lightning, raging storms, natural disasters and catastrophes, countless deaths and suffering—realized that these were not things human strength alone could contend with or withstand…”

Xu Ze spent an hour and a half writing ten thousand words—five chapters. After checking for typos, he published them directly.

For this work, which was a milestone in the xianxia genre, Xu Ze had absolute confidence.

The night passed quietly.

At ten o’clock the next morning—

Since he had no morning classes, Xu Ze was still asleep, dreaming of living in a grand villa, attended by more than a dozen maids dressed in catgirl outfits…

Just as a wide grin spread across his face, he was startled awake by his phone’s vibration.

Clutching his chest, Xu Ze saw it was a call from an unknown number. He answered with irritation, “Hello? Who is it?”

A pleasant female voice replied, “Hello, is this Mr. Xu Ze?”

“I’m not buying anything. I’ve got no money. I’m hanging up,” Xu Ze said grumpily, wanting to get back to his dream.

The girl on the phone quickly said, “I’m with the ‘I’m a Singer-Songwriter’ program. Congratulations, you’ve passed the preliminary selection. We’d like to invite you to join the official recording. The details have been sent to your email.”

“Oh, you’re with the program?” Xu Ze immediately became polite. “Thank you, I’ll be there on time.”

After hanging up, Xu Ze got out of bed and sat at his desk, opening his laptop.

Sure enough, he found an email from the production team. They were efficient.

He noted the time and address, then opened Flourishing Words Network to check the stats on his novel.

Currently: “Favorites: 42, Recommendation votes: 25, Comments: 15.”

There were already many reader comments.

“Found a real gem in xianxia—instantly favorited!”

“This xianxia novel reads so smoothly—this author must be a master!”

“A master in xianxia? Where would you find one?”

“The writing is excellent—recommendation vote cast.”

“This is what a xianxia novel should be! What was I even reading before?”

“Only five chapters? Not enough! I want more!”

“No wonder I found this xianxia novel by staying up late—it’s overflowing with immortal spirit!”

Reading the comments, Xu Ze was delighted.

To get so many comments overnight was rare; other new novels might not get a handful in a week.

An hour later, he updated with five more chapters. Normally, a new novel like his wouldn’t require such a high word count at the start, but Xu Ze was eager to earn money—he wished he could make it to paid status tomorrow.

After all, for him, writer’s block was simply not an issue.

Now, all he needed was for an editor to see the novel and offer a contract.

—

Capital City Television Tower.

In an enormous studio, the recording of “I’m a Singer-Songwriter” was underway.

There were four mentors: the popular female singer Zhang Yingjing; Jiang Yiyan of the Era Girls group; the accomplished male singer Wei Ping; and the youngest, the fresh-faced idol Wang Yihan.

The rules for the first round: after each contestant performed their original song, the mentors would reveal their scores—A, B, or C.

According to the show’s rules, if one mentor gave an A or three mentors gave Bs, the contestant advanced to the next round. Otherwise, they were eliminated.

Ten contestants had already performed; only two had advanced, both of whom received three Bs. No one had yet earned an A.

Xu Ze was contestant number eleven.

“Hello, mentors. I am contestant number eleven, Xu Ze.”

Xu Ze stood on stage, introducing himself with calm confidence.

From the mentor table, Jiang Yiyan, the idol mentor, whispered in surprise, “He’s so handsome.”

Xu Ze was dressed in a white shirt with a black tie; at 184 centimeters tall, his long legs and delicate features gave him a clean, pure, and slightly ascetic charm.

Beside her, mentor Wei Ping nodded. “He really is good-looking, but he doesn’t have that oily pretty-boy vibe.”

Hearing this, Wang Yihan, the young idol, frowned. What’s wrong with being a pretty boy? Are you jealous we’re handsome?

After all, Wei Ping’s looks matched his name—utterly average.

But he could only think this to himself. As a junior, he didn’t dare directly challenge a veteran star like Wei Ping.

So he said, with a hint of sarcasm, “This is a show for singer-songwriters. Good looks don’t matter if the song isn’t good—it’s just empty spectacle.”

He didn’t dare speak that way to Wei Ping, but the contestant on stage, Xu Ze, was fair game.

On the other side, Zhang Yingjing, already in her thirties, listened to the discussion but didn’t join in. She didn’t like Wang Yihan much, but he wasn’t wrong—looks alone weren’t enough. The song had to be good.