At the start, I tricked the school beauty, and ended up with twins?

He had joined the group several years ago.

He used to feel just like those authors that when those big shots said they were running out of ideas, it was just 'humblebrag.'

He had experienced that feeling himself and realized that there really was such a thing as hitting a bottleneck.

If he didn't break through this bottleneck, his achievements in writing novels might just stop at high-quality!

But his goal was to be an author with a monthly subscription of ten thousand, to be a web-novel god, and he was absolutely unwilling to settle for just this!

Right now, to use the terms from fantasy novels, what he was going through was akin to crossing a tribulation, and it was a tribulation of the heart.

The group chat continued, and some of the authors who had long surpassed an average of three thousand monthly subscriptions of high-quality works and were now heading toward an average of six thousand were also drawn into the conversation.

Ice and Fire Six Realms: "@Qin Shan Qin Shan the Great, this stage is a necessary path to ascend to a higher quality work, no one can help you."

"If you need some advice, however, feel free to ask! I'll tell you everything I know!"

Qin Shan was slightly startled when he saw the message from the author who posted it.

This author had been well-known for a long time, every one of his books easily hitting three thousand average monthly subscriptions of high-quality, but stuck around six thousand, not higher.

He belonged to the middle and upper tier of authors on the whole website.

However, authors of this level usually focused on writing and seldom engaged in idle chat in the group.

He didn't expect his issue to draw out this author.

Qin Shan quickly replied, "@Ice and Fire Six Realms Ice and Fire the Great, I wanted to ask if you encountered a situation like mine when you were about to hit high-quality?"

"I'm seriously stuck with my writing recently, completely unable to calm down and write!"

"Even if I force myself to write some content, I end up feeling it's not good and delete it."

"But at this rate, I might not even be able to write ten thousand words for today's update!"

He blurted out all his problems and current situation.

The group chat was still ongoing, and his message was quickly pushed up the chat history.

It was bustling with authors who had just signed a contract or whose performance had always been hovering around one or two hundred average subscriptions and were thus considered failures; this group was very lively every day, getting 99+ messages in less than two minutes.

Before his new book started producing results, he was the same, spending eight out of twelve hours of the day socializing in the group.

The actual time spent writing was very limited.

Mainly because the novel's performance was really poor at the time, with just two hundred average subscriptions, writing ten thousand words a day, earning two thousand a month.

Writing one thousand words a day, earning one thousand eight hundred a month.

Even if he worked hard, the end result in terms of income was more or less the same, so he had no motivation.

It was only when his new book started to do well that he no longer had the time to chat with everyone in the group.

Only then did he understand why so many authors disappeared from the group after achieving success.

It was because of the pressure.

Every day worrying that his updates weren't sufficient and readers would abandon his book, worrying that poor writing would lead to a loss of readers.

He spent more time thinking about the plot and working on his manuscript; there was no time left to mingle in the group.

The Ice and Fire Six Realms he was currently speaking with was a prime example.

During the period right after his previous book ended and before starting a new one, he would chat with everyone in the group almost every day.

Even when his new book was just released, he would ask everyone to click on some voting buttons and such. But as soon as it got on the shelves, he disappeared without a trace.

Reportedly, he was updating eight thousand to ten thousand words a day, and his new book's metrics were soaring, successfully breaking through from an average of three thousand subscriptions to six thousand!

He would only show up in the group each month when the royalties were released, to 'humblebrag' about his tens of thousands in earnings.

Qin Shan was extremely envious back then.

Ice and Fire Six Realms: "@Qin Shan Qin Shan the Great, based on my experience, aside from those authors who are extremely talented and can make a book popular with very little effort, nearly every author has encountered this issue."

"My suggestion at that time is not to panic, but to continue writing step by step according to your previous plan."

"Since you've reached an average of two thousand five hundred, that means there is no problem with your content, and since the book has just gone live, your true performance has not yet been reflected."

"What you need to do now is to stabilize your own pace and not to listen to the readers' thoughts and then change your writing."

"The writing method that suits you is the most important!"

Ice and Fire Six Realms typed out a lot of advice all at once, and the group chat's pace of scrolling momentarily paused.

When a big shot speaks, everyone knows better than to ridicule and generally takes the words seriously to ponder them.

"Should I continue with the previous pace?"

Qin Shan looked at the advice on his phone, feeling a bit uneasy. Stay connected through My Virtual Library Empire

Sure enough, it was an experienced old author who hit the nail on the head.

It was because he recently had many readers commenting on his chapter's comment section, sharing their views on the plot.

It seemed some readers didn't like the recent updates, and even cursed him and his book in the comment section.

He had never experienced anything like this before.

While he had been trashed before, it was just one or two people, and he didn't care at all.

But this time, the number of people trashing him was simply too much, at least a dozen or dozens every day.

At first, he also told himself not to mind those readers' opinions, to write patiently, but every day when he opened the author's backstage, seeing so many comments criticizing the plot, he would feel very anxious.

Having seen too much, he felt like he could collapse in his writing at any moment.

He was now so terrified that he hardly dared to write.

Every day he faced the readers' comments in the backstage, then tried to satisfy those readers' ideas and tastes.

The result was, the more he wrote, the more he felt it wasn't right.

The main storyline he had previously set up started to deviate.

Some plot points were also poorly written.

Ice and Fire Six Realms: "Of course you must write according to your previous pace!"

Mr. Tian from next door: "I used to be constantly criticized by readers, too. Later, I found out that most of those who scolded me were freeloaders reading pirated versions of my book, and then they had the nerve to come to Qidian and curse me!"

This Game is Full of Surprises: "That's right! Generally, the real readers don't say anything! Only for some particularly interesting plot points will some readers leave comments."

The group suddenly bubbled with excitement, with many authors having similar experiences.

For instance, some readers who checked in at every chapter, but once it came to the paid chapters, they would vanish without a trace.

Then there were readers who would curse from the first chapter to the last one, yet they kept reading.

On the other hand, most readers just read silently and would abandon the book when they got bored, without leaving a single comment.

Qin Shan watched as the authors in the group grew lively because of the readers' comments.

In a moment of clarity, he understood something.