Printing and selling books were indeed Chen Xu's desire.

In the inn's room, Chen Xu directly signed the book sale agreement with the Cui family and the Ning family.

The Cui family's printing workshop was the largest, possessing the most advanced movable type printing technology of the time.

The movable type in the workshop was soaked in a secret potion, unlike ordinary printing workshops, solving many problems such as blurring, cracking, and deforming of the movable type.

Printing efficiency was extremely high, far surpassing peers.

But Cui Yunqi said, "Brother Chen's poems and essays, I must have them made into carved plates.

Print a thousand copies today, and ten thousand copies tomorrow. With ten or a hundred carved plates printed simultaneously, in the future, not just a thousand or ten thousand copies, even a hundred thousand copies won't be a problem!"

This essentially disregards cost.

Seeing Cui Yunqi looking feverish, the Ning family's eldest son, Ning Xing, said, "It's really unnecessary to be so extravagant, it's likely not what Brother Chen likes.

In my opinion, making a dozen or twenty sets of carved plates should be enough.

Our Ning family has twenty-nine bookstores throughout the Seven Prefectures of the South, though our teahouses haven't ventured beyond Yunjiang Prefecture, but there's at least one in each county.

Brother Cui, instead of spending a lot of effort and cost on carved plates, why not open more bookstores?"

Here they go again, pressing against each other.

Chen Xu was truly at a loss whether to cry or laugh.

He actively participated in the discussion, quickly resolving the chaos, finally deciding that the Cui family only needed to carve five sets of plates.

It may seem like abruptly cutting from dozens of sets to five, but in fact, the majority of books nowadays at the same printing workshop had at most only one set of carved plates.

Imagine a single book starting at a hundred pages, with each page requiring a carved plate to form a set, how many carved plates must a book possess?

Carved plates are heavy, having several more sets poses significant problems whether in carving or preservation.

The Cui family's workshop still primarily uses movable type printing, many books don't even have a single carved plate.

Chen Xu merged these two little stories into a single "Knight's Journey", fortunately, it wasn't thickly bound, totaling just over fifty pages, more carved plates weren't a hassle.

Eventually, the three parties agreed, the new book would first be printed in three thousand copies, priced at 200 wen each, with Chen Xu receiving thirty percent as a royalty.

As for the Ning family buying and selling books from the Cui family's workshop, how the pricing and division should be done was a matter between the Ning and the Cui families.

Chen Xu received thirty percent of the selling price as a royalty, actually due to Cui Yunqi's repeated concessions.

Because only the selling price was considered here, not the cost of the Cui family's printing.

Yet Chen Xu could still accept this level of goodwill.

Cui Yunqi said optimistically, "Three thousand copies are just the beginning. Brother Chen, not to mention others, just this one "Knight's Journey", this book will surely be a sensation in Yunjiang!"

He was so enamored with "Knight's Journey" he was even obsessed, feeling every word and sentence of this poem completely struck his soul.

Having read this poem, countless poems and essays from before turned into wooden fluff and wax ashes, leaving him coldly uninterested.

Chen Xu smiled silently. Given enough time, how could "Knight's Journey" merely be a sensation in Yunjiang?

With this momentum, the two small stories about Artificial Beast should gradually spread across the land.

Meanwhile, the spreading of the Artificial Beast story would not only fulfill Chen Xu's promise to the little ghost, but the Food Cauldron Celestial Book would also respond noticeably.

[You cooked the Human Demon with raging fire; the world calls it splendid.]

This "cooking the Human Demon with raging fire" has a long-tail effect.

Now, the Knight's deeds are being spread and discussed by the people before him, admired and appreciated, Chen Xu here received twenty to thirty scattered likes.

Once the stories of Artificial Beast and Knight spread wider, surely these likes will continue to flow, coming in droves.

Thus, Chen Xu finally paved his first pathway for "guaranteed likes".

However, "guaranteed likes" ultimately have limitations.

Chen Xu divided a sliver of his heart and spirit to carefully inspect the Food Cauldron Celestial Book, discovering such "guaranteed likes" had a distance limitation.

For example, when Chen Xu was in Yunjiang Prefecture City, he could receive likes only within the Yunjiang Prefecture City range.

When he was in Jichuan, he could receive likes from most of Jichuan County's range.

Generally speaking, likes within about fifty miles radius of Chen Xu as the center could be received instantly.

As for farther ones, it wasn't that they couldn't be received, but his current cultivation wasn't enough, his title level was low hence couldn't receive them.

When can the receiving range be expanded?

The Celestial Book also provides a hint; first, Chen Xu's cultivation must make a significant leap in realm, second, his title level must upgrade from Firework Apprentice to Spiritual Cuisine Apprentice.

Additionally, the daily reception limit for likes on the same splendid event exists.

With Chen Xu's current cultivation and title, the single-day reception limit for [Cooking the Human Demon] is 1000 points.

If Chen Xu wants to quickly accumulate more likes, he must either accelerate his cultivation improvement or initiate more similar [Cooking] events.

Of course, relying on gourmet food to acquire likes is the basic strategy, which cannot be discarded.

Chen Xu also learned through feedback from the Food Cauldron Celestial Book that for a Firework Apprentice to advance to a Spiritual Cuisine Apprentice, there are no shortcuts, only one way: unlocking and creating more Spiritual Food.

Both the variety and quantity must accumulate to a certain extent.

At present, Chen Xu's data status is—

[Gourmet Recipes: 15]

[Hint: Unlock a hundred kinds of Gourmet Recipes, accumulate and produce Spiritual Food varieties up to 100 kinds, cultivation advances to Core Formation Realm, apprentice level can be upgraded.]

The road ahead is long yet promising, at this moment Chen Xu possesses a heart full of ambition, constantly reminding himself to stay calm, never to be restless.

He's not in a rush; he believes as long as he doesn't halt his steps, someday he will climb mountains and cross seas, truly reaching the pinnacle.

Afterward, Chen Xu signed a second agreement with the Ning family's teahouse.

The Ning family owned a total of thirty-six teahouses, after buying books, storytellers in the teahouses would narrate the two small stories about Artificial Beast, while the Ning family would pay Chen Xu a monthly writing fee of one hundred taels of silver.

For the first three months, they would discuss further afterward.

This amount was also due to the Ning family's concessions, only because the recipient was Chen Xu; if it were an ordinary impoverished scholar earning with story scripts, it wouldn't be this amount.

One must not overestimate the copyright awareness of this era.

Moreover, considering the current mood, first, there's a love for poems and essays, second, the literary fame and recognition, story scripts inevitably fall at the lowest rung of the literary disdain chain.

Unless it's writing top classics or the writer himself has another identity, then it would be different.

There isn't much to elaborate on trivial matters, Chen Xu accepted the pre-payment of one hundred taels writing fee from Ning Xing, as well as the pre-payment of a hundred eighty taels royalty from Cui Yunqi.

At once, his silver stash surpassed five hundred taels.

With the current purchasing power of silver, one could buy about a hundred acres of medium land—

It really seems like a huge sum, but when it comes to spending, shortages appear everywhere.

Relying on writing short and medium-length story scripts to get rich quick is apparently impossible in the short term.

Speaking of which, all those tokens of appreciation given to Chen Xu by various families, collectively, they are worth far more.

However, aristocratic families have rules for gifting, they usually don't give silver directly.

Given to Chen Xu as a scholar, most were superior pens, ink, paper, inkstones, jade artifacts, cherished toys, tea leaves, fine wines, etc.

Such items have high purchase prices but aren't convenient to liquidate.

Chen Xu accepted what he should, refused what he shouldn't.

If he accepted nothing, it would actually accrue more social debt, which is intentionally offending, inviting resentment.

A great favor becomes a great enmity, this has been known since ancient times.

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