Money wasn't for spending.
It was for leverage.
I sat in a sleek, modern cafe in downtown Warsaw, my new laptop open. No one looked twice at a kid with a computer. The magic of anonymity.
My first purchase was visual.
I found a freelance digital artist on a global platform. Their portfolio was full of epic fantasy scenes that made my heart race. I sent a direct commission request.
The brief was simple: "Chronos Imperium." The fallen god Chronos on a throne of shattered timelines.
The price was high. Four thousand dollars.
I transferred it without blinking from my offshore account.
The artist responded in minutes. "This is a dream project. You'll have sketches in 48 hours."
Leverage.
Next, marketing.
I terminated the basic social media booster. Went upstream. I contacted a small but respected agency that specialized in genre fiction launches. Their retainer was ten thousand a month.
I paid for three months upfront.
The agency lead, a woman named Elara, got on a video call with me. She thought she was talking to a young, pseudonymous author with serious backing.
She wasn'tt wrong.
"We'll create a content wave," she said, her eyes sharp. "TikTok lore videos. Twitter thread breakdowns of your magic system. Reddit AMA setup. The works."
"Make it happen," I said, mimicking a tone I'd heard in movies.
Leverage.
Then, I went back to Fistoria. To the Contract Center.
A new offer had appeared.
BONUS CHAPTER SPONSORSHIP CONTRACT.
Readers could pool power stones to unlock a special, non-canon side chapter. Fistoria would match the stone value. A micro-contract.
It was tiny. Probably the smallest deal on the platform.
I didn't care about the money. I cared about the System ping.
I clicked 'Review.'
The blue hologram materialized beside my cafe latte.
[TENSEI SYSTEM: CONTRACT DETECTED]
[CONTRACT: FISTORIA BONUS CHAPTER SPONSORSHIP - TIER: BRONZE (MINOR)]
[ANALYSIS: NEUTRAL. SIGNATURE WILL INITIATE REWARD PROTOCOL 1-C.]
[SIGN TO ACCEPT? Y/N]
Y.
[CONTRACT TIER: BRONZE (MINOR) - SIGNED.]
[PROCESSING REWARD…]
The progress bar was simpler this time.
[REWARD 1: CAPITAL INJECTION - $5,000.00 USD]
A pittance. It landed in my account. The number ticked up. It was becoming background noise.
The real reward followed.
[REWARD 2: RANDOM SKILL ROLL INITIATED…]
[ROLLING…]
The mental slot machine spun. It landed on an icon of an eye with a chart in its pupil.
[SKILL UNLOCKED: READER'S INSIGHT (ANALYTICAL)]
[DESCRIPTION: Access deepened, anonymized analytics. See aggregate data on where readers stop reading (drop-off points), which paragraphs have the highest highlight density, and sentiment flux across a chapter.]
My grin was savage.
This wasn't a weapon. It was a scalpel.
I immediately pulled up my latest chapter on Fistoria's backend. I activated the skill.
A heatmap overlay appeared on the text. Green for high engagement. Yellow for medium. Red for drop-offs.
Most of the chapter was a deep, vibrant green.
But there was a red patch. A three-paragraph description of a side character's backstory.
Too much infodump. Slows the pace.
I could fix that. Immediately.
I opened my writing doc and edited the section on the spot, tightening the prose, weaving the details into action.
I republished the chapter.
The green expanded. The red vanished.
Leverage.
I spent the afternoon like this. Writing new chapters. Using Reader's Insight to polish them to a lethal shine before they even went live.
The rank climbed.
#31.
Then, I checked the comments on Chapter 30.
Most were praise. But one stuck out.
User: TruthTeller9000
Comment: Overhyped garbage. The prose is purple, the characters are cardboard. Can't believe people are falling for this. Stopping here. 1-star.
A classic hater. A Silent Reader with a loud mouth.
The Cringe Induction skill description flickered in my memory.
...will experience a random, intense wave of social cringe within 24 hours.
I felt nothing. No drain. No activation. It was passive.
I just smiled.
I bookmarked the comment.
The next morning, before school, I checked again.
A new reply was under TruthTeller9000's comment. From the same account.
User: TruthTeller9000
Reply: Okay, weirdest thing. Last night I was making dinner and out of NOWHERE I remembered the time in 7th grade I called the teacher "mom" in front of the whole class. I literally dropped a plate. WTF brain. Anyway, this story is still mid.
I laughed so hard I snorted coffee.
It worked. It actually worked.
The cringe was specific. Vivid. And beautifully timed.
The System was my silent, petty partner in crime.
I checked my ranking.
"Chronos Imperium" - Ranking: #19.
The climb was accelerating. The cover art sketches arrived. They were breathtaking. I approved them immediately.
Elara from the agency messaged. "The first TikTok lore video is trending in the #BookTok niche. Driving significant traffic."
I looked at the Compulsion cooldown.
[COMPULSION COOLDOWN: 28D 06H]
Time was moving.
So was I.
I closed the laptop. School was a tedious formality. My real classroom was here. In the data. In the leverage.
I had the tools. The money. The skills.
Now, I just needed the crown.
#1.
And then, her.
//-\\
To my fellow authors in the trenches:
They told us we weren't good enough. They sent the cold, automated emails. "Not a fit for our current line-up." "Lacks marketability."
Every time you see Alex Thorn crush an editor in this story, remember: this isn't just fiction.
This is the scream of every writer who stayed up until 3:00 AM pouring their soul into a document that the world ignored. It is for everyone who has ever struggled with low reads, low reviews, low comments, and those painful, stagnant low collections that make you want to quit.
The gatekeepers are human. They are flawed. And in the digital age, they are becoming obsolete.
They sit in their comfortable chairs judging worlds they could never even imagine, let alone build. They look at spreadsheets while we look at the stars.
We don't write for the approval of a corporate board in a glass office. We write for the person scrolling on their phone at a bus stop, looking for a world better than their own.
We write for the ones who need an escape from a life that feels like a dead end.
If you have a manuscript sitting in a folder named "Draft 1" that you're too afraid to post—post it right now.
Stop waiting for permission to exist. If you've been rejected ten times, go for the eleventh. Use their "No" as fuel for your fire.
Alex Thorn had to die to get his second chance. You don't. You just have to keep typing until your fingers bleed and your vision blurs. The industry thinks they hold the keys. They forgot that we are the ones who build the doors in the first place.
Let them call us "cringe." Let them call us "amateurs." While they talk, we build. While they judge, we evolve into something they can't control.
Current Motivation Level: 8%
Next Level: +1%
If this chapter resonated with you, drop a comment. Tell me about the time a gatekeeper told you "No."
ALL HELL FROM WEBNOVEL STARTS FROM YOU!
— A.T.