The official website of Zhongdian Chinese, the game details page, and Tengda Games' official Weibo simultaneously updated their announcements, quickly drawing widespread attention from players.

"Huh? The official *Turn Back to the Shore* is actually collaborating with a novel website?"

"Isn't that the site serializing the official novel?"

"These event rewards are amazing! Not only is there unlimited reading on the website, but there's also a reward in the game."

"Transformation Pill? Can change the character model? Holy crap, nobody stop me, I'm getting that item!"

"And the accounts are already linked? That's great, saves me from having to register another account."

"I've been following this website for a while. The early books were trash, but recently some new ones have been pretty good, not worse than the premium books on Infinite Chinese. Can read them when I'm bored."

"For the Transformation Pill, charge!"

The players' reactions were quite enthusiastic.

Ultimately, it was because the rewards were well-chosen!

The character in *Turn Back to the Shore* is just a generic male. There hasn't been any character customization yet, as Pei Qian initially wanted to use this to discourage appearance-focused players as much as possible.

As a result, being able to change the model seemed pretty important!

There are some NPCs in the game with similar body types to the protagonist, especially some female NPCs.

When players heard that they could change their models to these girls, they immediately got excited!

Of course, female NPCs in this kind of worldview setting certainly aren't too attractive. Compared to small, explicitly sexual games, they're miles away.

But after all, the game's story background is like this. Having gotten used to these demons and monsters, even a random female NPC could achieve the effect of a sow surpassing Diao Chan in beauty.

Therefore, a large number of players ran to Zhongdian Chinese to complete tasks, waiting to get the Transformation Pill in seven days.

Such a good item doesn't cost money, and you can get it by logging in for seven days. Why not take it?

On the other hand, a batch of excellent novels also emerged on Zhongdian Chinese.

Under the editors' tireless guidance, some failed authors would eventually get the hang of it and happen to write some decent *shuangwen* (爽文, exhilarating novels).

Ma Yiqun would discover these good seedlings through data, use Pei Qian's subsidies to supplement the authors' royalties, allowing them to earn income no less than that of other major websites, greatly stimulating the authors' enthusiasm.

During the event, many authors began to release more chapters, further increasing readers' stickiness.

Thus, with works and readers, Zhongdian Chinese naturally embarked on a positive cycle!

Many players who were originally readers of Infinite Chinese were also happy to bookmark another webpage and simultaneously follow different novels on both sides.

With readers paying, the website no longer depended on Pei Qian's subsidies and could slowly become self-sufficient.

Watching the number of readers on the website surge, Ma Yiqun felt very gratified.

"Report this good news to President Pei!"

Ma Yiqun dialed President Pei's number with great pride.

"Hello...?"

President Pei on the other end of the phone spoke with a nasal tone.

Ma Yiqun was stunned for a moment. "President Pei, do you have a cold? Sorry, I shouldn't have bothered you at this time."

Every Tengda employee cares deeply about President Pei's health, after all, he is everyone's guiding light.

Pei Qian: "...It's nothing serious. Did the website encounter some difficulties? Tell me quickly."

Ma Yiqun wasn't sure if he had misheard or if it was just his imagination, but he felt like there was a little bit of anticipation in President Pei's tone?

Anticipating that the website would encounter difficulties?

That's impossible, it must be because President Pei's voice changed after he got sick, so it gave him that illusion.

Ma Yiqun couldn't help but smile. "President Pei, there's good news!"

"Starting next month, the subsidies for the website's authors won't need to be so much! Before the end of the month, I plan to return a portion of it. In another three or four months, Zhongdian Chinese might be completely self-sufficient!"

President Pei on the other end of the phone was silent for a long time, and then said, "Ah?"

Ma Yiqun continued, "President Pei, your referral of traffic to Zhongdian Chinese through *Turn Back to the Shore* can be considered very effective!"

"During this period, a large number of players have poured into Zhongdian Chinese, bringing a considerable amount of popularity to the website."

"So I thought about it and launched a collaboration with Li Yada, and so far the effect has been quite good!"

"Not only has the number of registered users and active users on the website increased, but the tracking data for some novels has also increased significantly. This shows that many players didn't just take a look at the official novel and leave, but actually stayed and became readers of our website!"

"With these paying readers, the website's recent income will definitely be greatly improved, so we won't need so much author subsidy funds."

"So I'm considering returning some of the funds to Tengda, so that the money can be spent on more meaningful things..."

Before Ma Yiqun could finish speaking, President Pei on the other end of the phone had already flatly refused.

"No need!"

"Absolutely not!"

Ma Yiqun: "Ah?"

Pei Qian coughed lightly, his tone returning to calm: "This money is not important."

"With *Turn Back to the Shore* selling so well, are you still worried that Tengda doesn't have money to do anything?"

"On the contrary, Zhongdian Chinese is the one that needs money more!"

"Where are we now? We've only just seen the hope of turning a profit, and we're still far from truly developing into a web novel behemoth like Infinite Chinese!"

"Keep this money, don't transfer it back."

"No matter what you do this month, you must spend it all for me!"

"New readers are coming, shouldn't we give them some benefits?"

"The authors have been working so hard to write books, and they've been doing it out of love all along, shouldn't we give them some compensation?"

"The employees have been working overtime so hard, shouldn't we have a team-building activity to increase cohesion?"

"Or, you could hire a few more programmers to improve the website and optimize the mobile app. So many readers have poured in all at once, are the original servers and bandwidth still sufficient? If not, buy more quickly."

"There are so many places to spend money, why are you thinking about being stingy and saving costs? It's not your money you're spending, why are you being so petty?"

"Spend it quickly, and come to me for more when you've spent it all!"

After listening to President Pei's words, Ma Yiqun felt a little ashamed.

He had completely misunderstood!

Ma Yiqun was thinking about making the website profitable as soon as possible and saving money for President Pei.

After all, the website has been burning money, including the editors' salaries, the website's operating expenses, and the authors' full attendance bonuses and subsidies, etc.

This made Ma Yiqun feel very uneasy, and he was always thinking about how to help President Pei earn this money back.

But today, President Pei's words awakened him.

Although profitability is important, what's more important is the website's development!

Zhongdian Chinese is a part of President Pei's overall plan, and it's still at a very small scale. Even if it turns a profit, it's just earning a little bit of money, and it can't be compared to giants like Infinite Chinese at all.

From this point of view, Tengda Games has already taken the lead, and Zhongdian Chinese is like a little brother following behind the big brother, following suit.

At this time, there's no need to think about sharing the burden for the big brother, the most important thing is to seize the time to grow.

Ma Yiqun was deeply moved, not only because President Pei had already planned out a bright future for Zhongdian Chinese, but also because President Pei trusted him so much!

"Okay, President Pei, I will definitely spend this money on website construction, so don't worry!"

...

After hanging up the phone, Pei Qian silently turned on his computer to check the situation of Zhongdian Chinese.

Although he couldn't see the website's backend data, there were still some ways to reflect its popularity from the side.

Just randomly click on a book on the homepage and take a look at its book review section.

Originally, the book review sections of these books were either deserted or full of scolding, which looked quite miserable.

But now, clicking on a few books on the homepage, the book review sections have actually become normal!

There are people urging for updates, writing serious book reviews, and discussing the plot.

The various website data of these books, such as recommendation tickets, collections, etc., have also all had significant increases.

It's not just one or two books like this, but all the books on the homepage are generally like this!

Pei Qian was very clear that Zhongdian Chinese currently doesn't have any fake data. Those books that maliciously brush data will have their recommendation spots removed as soon as they are discovered, and it's impossible for them to be hung on the homepage so blatantly.

In other words, the books on the homepage are all real data, and the number of readers is indeed increasing!

This is not the worst part.

Pei Qian was surprised to find that compared to before, the novels on the homepage seem to have made considerable progress in terms of subject matter, rhythm, and writing style!

Previously, Pei Qian had also read a few novels on Zhongdian Chinese, and they were basically the worst of the worst, incomprehensible throughout, the kind that you would resolutely abandon after reading one or two chapters.

But now, at least the books on the homepage look like something!

The titles and summaries are more attractive, the pace has obviously become faster, and the grasp of *shuangdian* (爽点, satisfying plot points) has also improved a lot.

In short, it has the flavor of web novels!

No wonder the data of these books has improved.

The influx of a large number of readers is only one aspect of the reason. The more fundamental reason is that the quality of these books has improved, so readers can stay.

Of course, the quality of these books can't be considered very high, maybe they're just premium level on Infinite Chinese at best, but they can already be considered readable.

"What's going on?"

Pei Qian frowned slightly, realizing the problem.

Ma Yiqun shouldn't understand web novels, right?

After all, he's also an old failed writer who has failed with every book he's written. He obviously has a huge misunderstanding of web novels.

If Ma Yiqun doesn't understand web novels, then the editors he taught must not understand either.

The entire editorial team doesn't understand web novels...

Then how were these seemingly decent web novels selected to be on the website's homepage?

Could it be based on data?

Well, that's also possible...

Pei Qian was originally a little suspicious, wondering if he had made some misjudgments about Ma Yiqun's true level?

But after thinking about it, readers are the biggest filter. Although Zhongdian Chinese doesn't have many readers at the moment, the filtering effect will not change.

Ma Yiqun doesn't actually need to read every book, he just needs to pick the books with better data and keep recommending them.

"Forget it, forget about these things."

"It's almost time for settlement, Zhongdian Chinese just needs to honestly spend all the money, there's no time to care about these trivial things."

Pei Qian threw his phone on the bedside table, planning to enter ostrich mode.

In short, he now hopes that no one will bother him, and that each department will quickly find a way to spend the extra money they've earned, so as not to create a burden for President Pei.

Just as he was about to take a nap, his phone rang again.

He picked up the phone and saw that it was Assistant Xin calling.

"President Pei, the government wants to do an exclusive interview with you, to interview you about your journey in making these games."

Pei Qian was silent for a moment: "...I'm very busy, can I not go?"