Chapter 25 Gratitude of an Ungrateful Female Lead 25 Dedicated to This Book

Wen Lihua was a seasoned webnovel addict. Her online handle was Pear Blossom is Not Illiterate, and she had been hanging around major literature sites for years, though the one she frequented most was still the Little Green Website.

Last year, she followed a novel by a new author named He Sheng called “Gifted to Me”.

{TN: It seems the Author changed the Book name from “Qingjia All the Way” to “Gifted to Me”}

From the writing alone, it was obvious that the author, He Sheng, was truly a newcomer who did not know much about webnovels. Compared to other stories that had a twist every three chapters and a climax every five, “Gifted to Me” was remarkably plain.

The author had actually started writing from the male and female leads’ childhood, and devoted a huge amount of space to it too. It was even the childhood sweethearts trope¹, the kind that had long since fallen out of fashion.

After adding it to her bookmarks on a whim, Wen Lihua left it untouched. By the time she dug it out during a reading slump, “Gifted to Me” had already built up seventy to eighty thousand words. The moment she started, she could not stop.

The author wrote tirelessly, and so she kept following the updates all the way to the end.

A reader once commented that He Sheng’s words were flowers blooming out of love.

Wen Lihua wholeheartedly agreed.

What drew her in was the female lead’s stubbornness, the male lead’s sincerity, the village’s morning light and evening glow, the lightly sketched suffering, and the hatred and grievances that were never spoken aloud…

He Sheng wrote about the daily life of the male and female leads, but readers could piece together the grievances and hardships of the female lead’s upbringing. Yet the author never lingered on them, as if the vicious words and actions of those awful family members were not as important as a single milk candy the female lead handed over.

That restrained style was like a knife made of sugar, stabbing readers in the heart again and again. Perhaps that very contrast, that contradiction, was what made it so captivating.

Some readers even pieced together a chronological chart of the female lead’s major childhood sufferings from the author’s scattered hints… It was so tragic that people wanted to mail the author razor blades², yet also wanted her to write more.

Wen Lihua kept reading until the second part was finished, and only then did she see in the author’s afterword that both parts of “Gifted to Me” were records of the author’s own romance. It ended because she was about to give birth and did not have time to keep updating, so she wrapped it up, went off to have the baby, and would come back afterward to start a child-raising story.

Readers: “…”

They regretted all those things they had once said about mailing razor blades.

Under the final chapter, the comments were basically all readers suffering, repenting, hugging the author, and saying they were looking forward to the child-raising novel, a thoroughly split and chaotic mix of reactions.

“Gifted to Me” was Wen Lihua’s favorite webnovel from last year, bar none. She had been waiting for the author to start a new story, and during that wait she had already reread “Gifted to Me” twice.

Every time she wanted to leave a comment urging the author to open a new project, she would count the days on her fingers and realize the author’s maternity leave was not even over yet. Dragging someone back to work already just felt a little too heartless.

During her reading drought, she searched everywhere for something good to read.

On the KuaiDou platform, one of the bloggers Wen Lihua followed, named Eucalyptus Leaf, was one of her sources for new material.

After getting off work on Friday, Eucalyptus Leaf uploaded a new video. It was actually about the bouquet girlfriend at the high-speed rail station, someone who had once made Wen Lihua smile too.

But after watching it, her face twisted with conflict. She was a little lost, and a little excited too.

The new update about the Bouquet Girlfriend was exactly the same as the ending of “Gifted to Me”, except that in the novel the female lead had not given birth yet, while the Bouquet Girlfriend already had a chubby little dumpling of a child.

So, was it possible that the Bouquet Girlfriend was actually He Sheng?

She checked the comments and found no related discussion, which was normal enough. After all, there was a wall between the 2D and 3D worlds.

Feeling uneasy, Wen Lihua posted a comment expressing her doubts. Her original intention was to confirm whether the Bouquet Girlfriend really was He Sheng, but after her comment went up, replies piled on almost immediately. Yet they were not discussing what she had meant to bring up at all, and instead the whole thing veered toward plagiarism accusations.

[Blue Fatty Dora: It’s obvious. This is scripted.]

[Don’t Wash Underwear: My filter shattered. So is this Bouquet Girlfriend called Miaomiao trying to debut? If they’re already paying to make short videos, why not hire someone to write an original script?]

[Crescent Moon replying to @Don’t Wash Underwear: I pinched my fingers and calculated it. The truth is probably this: after Miaomiao and her husband went viral from that last high-speed rail station video, they realized they had influencer potential, so they found a script and planned this video. Most likely both of them want to become internet celebrities. Too bad it backfired.]

[My One Hundred Husbands: Handsome guy, pretty girl, where’s the debut account? @Eucalyptus Leaf point me in the right direction.]

[Internet Civil Affairs Bureau: Huh? Short videos accused of plagiarizing webnovels? What kind of crossover event is this? I won’t say anything yet, just squatting here for updates.]

[Salted Fish with Peanuts: How come I went to eat and came back to find the whole comments section changed? Is nobody concerned about Miaomiao’s sister-in-law’s illness?]

[Feng Xixi Is a Great Beauty replying to @Salted Fish with Peanuts: Are you stupid? It’s all scripted. What sister-in-law?]

Wen Lihua realized the public opinion had already slipped out of control. She had also left comments explaining what she originally meant, but they were quickly drowned beneath countless replies, and no one saw them at all. She sent a private message to Eucalyptus Leaf too, but got no response.

Wen Lihua then opened the Little Green Website app and went to the comments section for “Gifted to Me”.

He Sheng had not left any social media account information, so the only place Wen Lihua could leave a message was under the novel itself. If Miaomiao really was He Sheng, then this whole mess becoming what it was now was absolutely not her intention. Wen Lihua had come to apologize.

As a result, when she looked through the comments, she saw lots of people posting warnings to the author, saying someone had plagiarized her original plot in a short video. They were telling her to use legal means to defend her rights.

Only a very small number of people were still tangled up in whether the two were actually the same person.

There really did seem to be a dimensional wall between the 2D and 3D worlds.

–

When little Xie Yu reached his hundredth day³, Xie Qingjia booked a family portrait session. But the waiting list stretched for more than a month, so only now was he bringing mother and son to the photo studio.

Before coming, Zhou He had worried that having a baby take photos would be troublesome. But her little Nianhua doll was incredibly cooperative. Not only was he not afraid of the camera, he even knew how to find the lens on his own. He had an especially strong camera sense.

The moment he looked at the lens, he would drool and grin.

The photographer’s smile never dropped the entire shoot.

Originally, some of the planned shots were supposed to be candid, not looking at the camera, for a more natural feeling. But little Xie Yu did not care about that at all. With his tiny head lifted, he followed the lens wherever it moved. They ended up taking lots of close-up shots of the chubby little darling.

Even after the shoot was done, the little guy still had not had enough. His dad had no choice but to take out his phone and pretend to photograph him, otherwise the little one would have clung to the photographer’s leg and refused to let go.

The moment the little guy saw the phone, he grabbed for it, and the moment he caught it, he shoved it into his mouth.

Xie Qingjia had no choice but to keep snatching his phone back from his son every so often. The little guy probably thought teasing Dad this way was fun, and never got tired of it.

Xie Qingjia: “…”

So tired.

Only after changing clothes and retrieving her phone from the storage locker did Zhou He realize Xie Lingge had called her many times.

Startled, she was just about to call back when Xie Lingge’s video call came through.

“Sister-in-law, you finally answered.”

On the screen, Xie Lingge had a miserable expression. The moment she saw Zhou He, she launched into a torrent of complaints.

The reason Xie Lingge had agreed to, and even hoped, that You Jia would film this video was because she wanted people to know what an amazing sister-in-law she had. After the video was posted, she had been holding her phone and scrolling through the comments the whole time, just because she loved watching netizens praise her sister-in-law in every possible way.

Things had clearly been going great, but then some heretics suddenly showed up and not only claimed the video’s content was fabricated, they even started talking about plagiarism and some webnovel.

She was furious.

After hearing it all, even Zhou He found it bizarre.

“What’s the name of the webnovel they’re saying we plagiarized?”

Xie Lingge said, “I think it’s called something like “Gifted to Me”. That weird author came up with some weird title, then says we plagiarized them. If you ask me, she’s the one trying to latch onto us and ride our popularity.”

“Gifted to Me”?

Zhou He: “…”

What kind of colossal misunderstanding of the century was this?

Zhou He actually had no intention of responding at all. If she responded, she would blow her cover, and that would be way too socially mortifying.

As for her publishing her work on Little Green Website, aside from Xie Qingjia, who was with her day in and day out, the only other person she hadn’t hidden it from was little Xie Yu, who couldn’t even read. Among the people she knew in real life, no one knew that she was “He Sheng.”

But the public uproar only grew worse, and You Jia was getting dragged terribly too.

Even the review section was full of sweet, well-meaning readers anxiously beside themselves.

After another day passed, Zhou He really couldn’t keep playing dead any longer.

She posted an announcement in the review section of “Gifted to Me”, roughly explaining that the Miaomiao in the short video was her in person, that there was no script, and no plagiarism.

She also sent a screenshot of the announcement to You Jia and told him to post a video response.

Xiping Hospital’s official account also showed up in the comments to confirm that Xie Lingge was indeed their patient.

The official account of Xie Lingge’s school also came to confirm that she was their student, wishing her a speedy recovery, and adding that if online rumors affected one of their students’ treatment and recovery, their law department was ready to act at any time.

Well now, that changed everything.

Her identity got exposed twice over. Readers found out she was Miaomiao, the Bouquet Girlfriend. Her relatives and friends in real life also found out that she wrote novels on Little Green Website.

Fang Ya and Xie Lingge sent her the exact same question: You’re writing on Little Green Website and you didn’t even tell me, a premium Little Green Website user?

Zhou He: “…”

Other than saying every nice thing she could think of, what else could she do?

Zhou He’s response prompted major bloggers everywhere to make videos recapping this whole farce, and even some official online media outlets began reposting it, praising it as a positive, uplifting story of the new era.

The original video posted by You Jia shot up to nearly two million likes, becoming the most popular video he had ever posted. His follower count grew exponentially. When he called Zhou He, his voice was trembling with excitement.

The traffic brought in by that breakout video turned directly into profits. A good number of the viewers were already web novel readers, and they flooded onto Little Green Website to find the novel “Gifted to Me”. Not only did the bookmarks soar, the subscription count was changing every single time the page refreshed.

And not all of those subscriptions came from regular web novel readers. Some kindhearted netizens, after seeing Eucalyptus Leaf clearly reply that donations were not needed, chose to show a bit of support by purchasing the novel instead.

The proof was that the blessing-filled comments in the comment section could barely even be displayed, because many of them were from newly registered accounts.

This outcome was something Zhou He had never imagined.

The ever-resourceful netizens even tracked down Xie Qingjia’s studio. Orders came pouring in like snowflakes, filling the schedule all the way into next year, and those sweet commenters were all astonishingly generous, leaving messages like: Just put whatever date you want for the cutoff, no rush.

The buzz refused to die down.

Zhou He received a call from her editor, saying that several companies had extended offers for “Gifted to Me”. Some were publishers, and some were interested in purchasing adaptation rights.

It was all money.

Without the slightest hesitation, Zhou He picked the platform offering the highest price in each category.

Her heart was pounding, her hands were shaking.

When Zhou He signed the contracts, she deliberately counted the zeros on each one, over and over again.

She used a calculator and scratch paper and checked the numbers several times.

And when she realized she really hadn’t miscalculated, it hit her that she had exchanged the various rights to “Gifted to Me” for a huge amount of money!

How much?

Zhou He grabbed Xie Qingjia. “Not even counting the website subscription income, just adding up all the rights fees, not only can we pay off our debts, we can even buy a home outright and still have money left over!”

She couldn’t stop herself from hugging Xie Qingjia and crying.

She never said it out loud, but these past days had truly been unbearably hard. To save on Xie Lingge’s hospital expenses, the whole family had cut back everywhere they could except for little Xie Yu’s food.

Even most of Xie Yu’s clothes were hand-me-downs from cousin Meng Qiu’s child.

And when she said in the video that they didn’t need donations, she genuinely meant it. She truly felt their family could still get by, and there were far too many families in the hospital facing tragedies worse than theirs, families more deserving of sympathy.

But now that these days of scraping by were finally about to end, she still couldn’t help feeling wronged and overwhelmed.

Holding her in his arms, Xie Qingjia kept apologizing again and again.

She touched the face of the man who was just as tear-streaked as she was, forced out a smile, and spoke in a firm voice.

“We made it through.”

Yes, they had made it through.

May everything ahead be an open road.

Once, Xie Qingjia asked Zhou He,

“I’ve always wanted to ask you, when you wrote this book, why did you name it “Gifted to Me”? What does it mean?”

At the time, Zhou He was holding her son and tossing him up in the air for fun.

“You guess. I’m not telling you.”

The sunlight was just right, spilling across the mother and son, making the fine soft fuzz on their faces visible, as though they were glowing.

A few months later.

Xie Qingjia received the printed physical copy of “Gifted to Me”.

At the beginning of the book, it read:

I dedicate this book to my beloved Mr. Xie.

It was he who gifted me deep affection, gifted me tenderness, and gifted me the rest of my life.

Translator’s Notes