Chapter 93

Important things first: the book goes on sale tomorrow! This is my second book, so logically speaking, I can barely be considered an old author, but to be honest, I'm still a bit clueless during the new book period.

After all, the overall journey of my last book, *Sword Cultivator*, was a bit bumpy; it was published directly, went on a one-round tour during the new book period, and I wrote blindly for four months before it went on sale. This *Mage* book is the first time I've properly gone through the new book process.

Overall, I have many thoughts and a lot I want to say.

An author, even if just a web novel author, should have a relatively strong desire for expression.

However, I also know that you brothers are here to read the novel and aren't interested in my rambling nonsense, so I generally lower my own presence.

The "on-sale announcement" is one of the few reasonable opportunities for an author to talk to themselves, so let me take this chance to ramble a bit more:

1. *Above the Mage! * will be an excellent story.

The performance isn't great, and what I'm writing is a pile of trash, so how dare I say that?

Nothing else.

Because I really like this story.

So to me, it is an excellent story.

No other reason, just because I like it.

Likewise, because I like it, I will do my best to write this story well to the end.

2. The title.

The title originally shouldn't have had this "!", it was just *Above the Mage*.

But *Above the Mage* was already taken, so I had to add an "!".

I was very annoyed at first, but after thinking about it carefully, without it, I couldn't use this title.

So after a while, I wasn't annoyed anymore.

3. Regarding the style of the book: first, although the background is Western fantasy, this is because mages and Western fantasy backgrounds are a natural pair; changing to another background would be too mismatched.

But when writing, I didn't deliberately make the phrasing fit Western fantasy, nor did I deliberately avoid Chinese-style words.

The reason is simple: because it's written for Chinese readers, there's no need to increase the reading barrier.

And this world was created by me; I legally enjoy the right of final interpretation.

In fact, I even tried my best to lower the reading barrier that might arise from the Western fantasy background; for example, for character names, I very cunningly adopted "Chinese-style" foreign names: Gao De, Amy, Pierre—important characters later on will also be like this.

To tell the truth: the background of *Mage* is Western fantasy, but the foundation is still "mysterious fantasy."

After all, I categorized it as mysterious fantasy/Otherworld Continent, not Fantasy.

However, this doesn't affect it being a very pure mage novel; there won't be any things like Battle Qi warriors.

Hmm, and it will still be a "cliché" book; like *Sword Cultivator*, it will have many "cliché" plots and an extremely "cliché" ending.

Of course, it is very different from *Sword Cultivator*.

After all, sword cultivators and mages are very different.

4. Prices and the economic system.

Everyone should be able to see that prices are an extremely important part of this book.

I stitched together the price systems of medieval Europe and 19th-century Europe.

Why stitch them together like this?

Because this is a supernatural world where the wealth gap is too large; the lower classes still live medieval lives, but the upper classes can already enjoy many alchemy creations similar to modern technology.

In addition, the prices of ordinary items in the text can mostly be found by searching for fragmented information, so this part of the pricing should be roughly similar to actual prices.

For example, 4 pounds of rye bread for 6 copper coins.

But for a small portion of items, even after searching through data and Baidu, I couldn't find specific figures, only rough descriptions, so I had to rely on common sense and calculate based on the prices of known items.

For example, for the price of wheat bread, I found this sentence: "Historical records show that the price of wheat bread can be several to over ten times that of rye bread."

Blind spots in thinking definitely exist, so if any good brother finds a problem with the pricing in any area, feel free to leave a comment and let me know.

If there's a problem, I'll change it, but you can't just say "I think there's a problem"—you have to show me your evidence!

The prices of ordinary items have traces to follow, but the prices of supernatural items can only be set by myself.

For price increases between ranks, I used a rank-increase formula with a multiplier of 4.64.

The pricing of different types of supernatural items roughly follows one principle: the price of a repairable item of the same rank is about ten times the price of a disposable item, and the same applies to repair costs.

Following these two principles, the pricing should be reasonable in most cases.

But there will definitely be oversights; if any good brother finds a bug, feel free to point it out.

A reasonably logical worldview needs everyone to perfect it together.

5. Regarding D&D: most of the spells in the book are taken from D&D.

Because in terms of spell settings, the D&D spell system is undoubtedly the most complete and rigorous.

But I didn't copy it entirely; there will be some "magic modifications," so don't completely apply D&D when reading, and definitely don't use D&D settings to diss me.

Besides, only the spell entries are taken from D&D; other background settings are still created by me.

Also, before writing this book, I had never been in contact with D&D at all; my understanding of D&D is entirely based on memorizing information from research.

So if there are any interesting spell usages that I, as a half-baked amateur, don't know about, and readers do, feel free to let me know in the comments. Thanks!

—Finally, if you have any interesting ideas for "adding points" to certain spells, feel free to post them in the comments section; if I think they're good, I'll use them!

6. Updates: In the eyes of most readers and even authors, the performance of *Mage* so far is very average.

In plain language, this is a performance where the author might run away at any time.

But actually, for me, I am quite satisfied with the current performance.

After all, my last book, *Sword Cultivator*, took a full four months to go on sale, and the total collection at the time of sale was less than 1,500.

But in the end, *Sword Cultivator*, which went on sale with 1,500 collections and 50-60 first-chapter subscriptions, was written to over three million words, and the average subscription is now 5,000+.

And when *Mage* reached fifteen days, the collection exceeded 1,500; now it's at 11,500 collections.

What more could I ask for? Having a beginning and an end is an author's conscience, and I will continue to maintain that conscience.

So don't worry about me running away. Let's strive for power in the later stages.

If there are good brothers who followed from *Sword Cultivator*, you should know that my biggest shortcoming isn't my writing style or the plot (disclaimer: that doesn't mean those two are good), but the updates.

My updates are indeed trash; I admit it.

So, for updates, it's "one effort, one guarantee."

I will try my best to maintain stable updates.

I guarantee I will finish the book.

7. Regarding the protagonist: The protagonist I write belongs to the lawful neutral leaning towards good; in any case, I won't write a protagonist with a particularly vicious temperament.

—I can't write that either.

So in some plot situations, the decisions made by the protagonist might not meet the wishes of some readers.

I'll use what I said during my last book, *Sword Cultivator*: this is a typical difference in thinking; you can dislike or disagree, but you can't spray or think this choice is wrong because of it (righteous face).

Setting Gao De's identity as a student in the Department of Mathematics at Jing University is mainly because I feel that "spells" and "mathematics" are actually very similar in temperament and have commonalities.

And in my view, the reason the protagonist can become the protagonist, besides the golden finger, is that personal ability is also very important.

Being a student in the Department of Mathematics at Jing University is Gao De's "personal ability."

In addition, I did graduate from the Department of Mathematics as an undergraduate and am currently working in statistics, but I am not a top student from Peking University, and I graduated three or four years ago.

So whenever content related to mathematics appears in the book, it's mostly researched on the spot; if I've made a fool of myself, please forgive me and don't be too serious.

After all, I'm writing a novel, not an academic paper.

7. A bit of miscellaneous talk.

Miscellaneous talk 1: If there are good brothers who followed from the last book, you might remember I said when writing *Sword Cultivator* that if there were a next book, I definitely wouldn't write a system.

I have always kept my word, so "Feng Ling Yue Ying" is really not a system! It really isn't! Miscellaneous talk 2: During the first round of the new book, I asked for follow-up readings for two days and found that asking for follow-up readings is really a troublesome thing, and nine out of ten good brothers don't like to see this, so I just ignored it later and let it be.

The same applies after going on sale; unless it's a volume-end summary, I will try my best not to include any content other than the story text to lower the author's own presence.

Miscellaneous talk 3: I just saw a comment from a reader in the comment section today who couldn't understand why constructing spell models requires taking potions.

I can understand the reader's lack of understanding; after all, I haven't written it yet.

Even if I had written it, I could still understand if they couldn't understand; after all, everyone has different ideas.

And because they can't understand, spraying a few words is fine; I don't care.

If I didn't have this much stress resistance as a web novel author, I wouldn't need to write web novels.

It's just that I found someone commenting below: "Copying the settings from *Lord of the Mysteries*."

When I saw this, I couldn't help but sigh deeply.

This is reality being more like a novel than a novel; a small author is just like this, having no human rights and being suppressed by passersby.

For example, in my last book, *Sword Cultivator*, many readers said I was riding the popularity of *Steady Senior Brother*, but in fact, it wasn't a "steady" style at all; I couldn't even ride it right, and being caught on this point made me, whose stress resistance hadn't been trained up yet, feel a bit depressed.

And the fact is, when I confirmed the title and created the book, I hadn't even heard of any "steady style," let alone writing towards it, and at that time, *Steady Senior Brother* hadn't even gone on sale and hadn't gained popularity, so how could I be riding it? And to avoid suspicion, I still haven't read *Steady Senior Brother* to this day, fearing that some similar plot might appear and I'd be accused of riding it again.

As for this book, I haven't even written what a potion is, and I've already been accused of copying *Lord of the Mysteries* settings because of the name "potion" (sighs again).

Miscellaneous talk 4: *Above the Mage! * might seem a bit cliché, a bit plain, or even a bit "poisonous" in the eyes of those who don't like it, but at least I can boldly say one thing: it is a quite unique story.

Because I didn't follow any book or genre trend; I just purely wrote the story I wanted to write.

Cliché: Regarding "padding."

Since you've reached the on-sale announcement, you good brothers should have felt the style of this book; it's meticulous and writes a lot of details.

Of course, this is my own way of saying it; many readers will directly and crudely define it as "padding."

But regardless, one thing is that I worked hard to research a bunch of materials, and the background I set must be depicted bit by bit to increase the texture of the world.

The simplest example is prices; if there isn't enough description of daily life details, in everyone's eyes, 300 gold coins and 30,000 gold coins definitely wouldn't have any difference—it would just be a difference in numbers, with no real sense of reality.

Another is that web novel plots need logic, and logic needs foreshadowing.

For example.

For instance, in reality, I need 500,000, and I, who never buy scratch-offs, bought one today when I went out and won 500,000. Is it logical? No, but this kind of thing happens.

But can a web novel be written like this?

No, if I dared to write it like this, you brothers would definitely spray me to death.

So how should I write it? I have to foreshadow that "I" have a habit of buying scratch-offs before the need for 500,000 arises.

It would be best to set up a small plot where, because scratch-offs have been selling poorly recently, the merchant decides to put in more prize tickets to increase the winning rate and boost the public's motivation to buy them.

At least after such double foreshadowing, it can be more logically led to the plot where "I" buy a scratch-off and win 500,000 to solve the current problem.

That's what I mean.

8. Going on sale: My first goal in writing is to finish the novel I like and want to write seriously, regardless of whether the performance is good or bad; if I can also make money, that would be great.

My job is okay, relatively stable, and barely enough to feed myself, so I won't sell misery.

In addition, I actually saw many good brothers who followed from the last book, *Sword Cultivator*; to be honest, I am very moved.

But I still have to say one thing: *Mage* and *Sword Cultivator* are two completely different styles of books; if you like them, of course, you are welcome.

But if you don't like them, that's fine too; you can wait for the next one.

Maybe I'll go back to Xianxia in the next one.

Please don't choose to subscribe just because you like *Sword Cultivator* even if you don't like *Mage*; I would be ashamed! After all, it's not easy for everyone to earn money.

I hope the good brothers who subscribe to *Mage* do so because they really like this story, not because of anything else.

Finally, in a part-time state and with extremely slow writing speed, 4,000 to 5,000 words a day is indeed a bit of an effort, sacrificing most of my private time.

Therefore, I will work hard to write.

If you good brothers like it, please support the genuine subscription.

No problem, right!

(End of chapter)