Chapter 496: Chapter 302: 100-Chapter Premium Release

Many people couldn’t sleep that night.

...

12:58 AM

In Su Mao and Wang Sujuan’s bedroom.

The lights had long been turned off, but the glow from a phone screen persisted.

Su Mao usually fell asleep the moment his head hit the pillow, snoring loudly.

Today, however, he had uncharacteristically picked up the bad habit of looking at his phone in bed.

This kept Wang Sujuan awake as well. She leaned against Su Mao’s broad chest, letting out a dissatisfied whimper. Like a kitten, she nuzzled against him repeatedly.

"Stop playing with your phone and play with me~"

"Go on, stop fooling around."

"Who’s fooling around? I’m serious..."

She was genuinely getting angry now. That bite really hurt...

After a good while of comforting her and explaining in a soft voice, Wang Sujuan’s anger finally subsided a bit, and she raised an eyebrow.

"Oh, so it’s that Wu Bao’s book going premium tonight..."

"Yeah, yeah! You know how important the first-day subscriptions are for an author!"

"I know that."

Wang Sujuan pouted jealously. "But why are you so invested in him? This Wu Bao isn’t a female author, is she?"

Su Mao said, "Huh?"

"She is?!" Wang Sujuan was instantly on alert. "Is she pretty? What are her measurements?"

Su Mao didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. "How could that be! Wu Bao is a kindred spirit, one who appreciates the same ’study materials’ as I do! Where is your mind going?"

"Oh, I see..." Hearing this, Wang Sujuan finally relaxed.

After all, girls usually watched a different kind of "study material." Anyone on Su Mao’s wavelength had to be a guy.

BEEP—

As the couple chatted, the alarm clock chimed, marking the hour.

"It’s about time!" Su Mao opened his phone and found the chat window.

[Gou of Gou Mao]: Wu Bao, my brother! How many first-day subs?

Wu Bao’s book had a premium launch event, so you could technically see the number of first-day subscriptions, but it wasn’t accurate. The real number was based on the backend data.

[Wu Bao]: I... I haven’t dared to look yet...

In his garage, Wu Bao typed out a timid reply.

What a coincidence. Wu Bao had been agonizing for a while and had just worked up the courage to look when Su Mao’s message came through, shattering his nerve all over again.

The more an author cared about a book, the more they felt this way. Every author hopes the work they’ve spent so long preparing will be loved by their readers.

Most of the time, the decision to continue a book isn’t made by the author, but by the readers who vote with their subscriptions.

After all, if a work you’ve poured your heart and soul into is only liked by a handful of people, who would have the morale to keep going?

Conversely, seeing tens of thousands of fans clamoring for their work encourages the author, creating a positive feedback loop.

And the first-day subscriptions were the starting point for it all.

The subscription data for the first paid Chapter within 24 hours essentially determined the book’s future potential.

[Gou of Gou Mao]: WTF, you posted a hundred Chapters for the launch?!

[Gou of Gou Mao]: I thought the daily limit was eighty thousand words? The system locks you out if you go over.

[Wu Bao]: I arranged it with Er Shang beforehand. Er Shang gave me special permissions for today, so I can update without a limit...

[Gou of Gou Mao]: You silly kid, that’s not how you do a Chapter bomb!

[Gou of Gou Mao]: Releasing a dozen or so Chapters to reward your readers is enough for the launch. What’s important is maintaining a stable update schedule afterward!

[Gou of Gou Mao]: You’ve dumped your entire stockpile at once! What are you going to do for future Chapter bombs?

[Wu Bao]: /scratching my head

[Wu Bao]: Er Shang said the same thing. That’s why I only posted one hundred of the two hundred Chapters I’d stockpiled.

[Gou of Gou Mao]: mind_blown.gif

At that moment, the middle-aged man on the bed was plunged into deep self-doubt and shock.

All told, Wu Bao’s book had only been out for a little over a month.

Rounding up, that was barely forty days. If you calculated two thousand words per Chapter, and added the 150,000 words from the free introductory period, two hundred stockpiled Chapters would be two hundred times two thousand... four hundred thousand words.

By that count, Wu Bao had written 550,000 words in forty days!

And that was calculating based on two thousand words per Chapter during the free period.

Qi Point had an unwritten rule: you weren’t supposed to update too quickly during the initial free period. Otherwise, the rapidly inflating word count could cause you to miss out on suitable recommendation slots.

But once a book went premium, the "tentacle monsters" were free to let loose.

Su Mao quickly subscribed to a few of the new premium Chapters. Without exception, they were all massive Chapters of at least six thousand words. There was even one super-Chapter that cost 100 Qi Points!

What the hell, was he some kind of human-shaped writing machine?

No... was this guy even human?!

"Whoa! The book club for my female-audience novels is starting to talk about Wu Bao’s book too!"

Wang Sujuan shoved her phone at Su Mao, her face a mask of astonishment. "This book’s quality is incredible! It’s got a style that appeals to everyone, and he dropped a hundred Chapters on the first day it went premium!"

"Forget the female-audience groups. Before long, the online forums will be blowing up about it too..." Su Mao said, his eyes wide with shock.

Any book that dropped a hundred Chapters on its premium launch day would become the talk of the web novel community.

A Chapter bomb was one of the few ways an ordinary author could defy the heavens and change their fate.

But Wu Bao’s Chapter bomb was even more terrifying. This was a book that was getting at least ten thousand first-day subscriptions!

With this, Wu Bao would dominate the top spot on the next day’s bestseller chart. The chart was calculated based on daily sales, and a hundred-Chapter drop from a ten-thousand-subscription novel was enough to temporarily punch above its weight and dethrone a blockbuster with a hundred thousand average subscribers.

He would also undoubtedly dominate the Power Rankings for a day, maybe even a week. Almost no author could compete with that kind of explosive release. And if Wu Bao could maintain a pace of ten thousand words per day afterward, he was guaranteed a top-three spot for the month.

He’d rank high on the Monthly Ticket chart as well. On Qi Point, Monthly Tickets were tied to subscriptions and reset every month. Since it was the beginning of the month, Wu Bao’s nuclear-level update was enough to make his dedicated readers cough up two or three tickets each.

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