Chapter 43

On August 31, 1961, there was just one day left before school started.

Kathleen arrived at school early.

As soon as she returned to the dormitory, she saw a few of her friends gathered around the table, with Jenny holding a book and doing some calculations.

"Lily, you dealt 17 points of damage to the troll, it still has 33 points of health left."

They were actually playing her war game?

"Look, here comes our magical girl, Miss Kathleen~"

Lily laughed and pounced on Kathleen.

"Forget it, Lily."

Kathleen seemed exhausted.

"Kath, do you want to join us?" Lily invited.

"No thanks."

The war game had not been released yet, and what they were playing was the complete version she had given them—of course, this was the mass-market version.

The rules of the mass-market version were relatively simple, not very rigorous but absolutely fun. The professional version was more suitable for game enthusiasts and tabletop role-playing game fans.

"Aida, how is your father... uh... doing?"

"He's fine now. Jenny got my dad a psychologist, much better than that quack... Oh, Jenny, thank you so much... I really don't know what I would have done without you..."

Aida said, looking at Jenny with deep gratitude.

"My mom is a doctor too. That so-called prefrontal lobotomy was just for the doctors' benefit. They never thought about the patients, just their own reputation or making their work easier. Besides, I didn't do much."

"Good to hear."

Kathleen said, flopping onto her bed.

"What's wrong, Kath?"

Lily asked with concern.

Although her war game had been taken seriously, Kathleen couldn't bring herself to smile.

The reason was simple.

—She had been rejected!

"I got rejected."

"What?"

Lily thought she hadn't heard clearly.

"I got rejected!"

Kathleen rolled around on the bed, feeling dejected. She had thought she was already a "successful person," but she never expected to encounter such a thing!

"What happened?"

Kathleen took out the bound manuscript from her backpack and handed it to Lily.

The book was called—*Fallout*.

This novel was Kathleen's "pen name," in other words, she wrote it under a pseudonym.

The pen name was "Black Islander."

The story was set in 2077, when a nuclear war broke out, and the war between China and the US was the cause—due to the times, Kathleen had changed China to the Soviet Union. The protagonist was a resident of Vault 13 in Southern California. In 2161, a crucial computer chip in the water purification system broke, putting the vault in danger. The leader decided to send the protagonist out to find a new chip to save the vault. At the end of the story, when the protagonist finally brought back the chip from another vault to save his own, the residents lost trust in him and expelled him from the vault forever.

The protagonist's name was Bruce Edison, her stepfather.

In the original history, *Fallout* was supposed to be a computer game, but the story was very classic.

Kathleen remembered that the first time she played the game, it was *Fallout 3*.

In the Tenpenny Tower, there was a mission where she had to choose whether to convince the residents to allow a group of zombies to move in—zombies in the game were mutated humans who retained their intelligence and lived with humans but were discriminated against.

Most of the residents had no aversion to the zombies, and in the end, Kathleen convinced everyone to agree. The zombies moved in.

Kathleen thought the mission was a success.

But when she returned, she found that all the residents had been slaughtered by the zombies, and the bodies were placed in the basement.

Playing this game was the first time Kathleen experienced the feeling of doing good and causing harm.

Of course, since the original *Fallout* was only a game, Kathleen made significant changes to it.

One of the features of the story was its rich side quests, and Kathleen connected all these storylines to form a complete narrative.

After all, after finishing *Harry Potter*, Kathleen was already well-versed in writing, and this wasn't difficult to solve.

*Fallout*, whether in terms of plot or world-building, was a step up from *Harry Potter*, and Kathleen was very confident.

But...

She was rejected!

Others might not know, but Kathleen knew that next year would be the peak of the Cold War.

Especially after the Cuban Crisis, the confrontation between the US and the Soviet Union reached its peak.

If her theory was correct, a story about the world after a US-Soviet nuclear war, *Fallout*, would definitely be popular!

Not only that, but Kathleen even considered the Vietnam War. Within two years, the US would see a wave of anti-war sentiment, and *Fallout* would be a perfect fit for this theme.

Of course, one reason for the success of the *Fallout* series was that it was set in the 90s but had a 50s style.

But Kathleen had taken the opposite approach, making the tone of *Fallout* more postmodern—exactly the opposite of the original.

Now, people were most interested in talking about the future, technology, and so on.

Especially after Gagarin entered outer space.

Surveys showed that during that time, American technology was developing at an unprecedented rate.

At that time, freedom-loving and democratic Americans, upon discovering that they had been surpassed by the Soviet Union in technology, sparked a nationwide craze—ironically, after the Soviet Union's collapse, more than half of Americans lost interest in democracy and freedom.

Regardless, Kathleen had high hopes for her book.

But... not everyone had Kathleen's foresight.

"Your novel is excellent, but we regret to inform you that it does not align with the mission of our Paperback Publishing..."

Your mission is profit!

Or... don't want to touch the Cold War red line?

Hey! Who is this person?!

Isn't it popular to talk about the Cold War these days? How can there still be such people?

Kathleen felt increasingly angry.

"Actually, I think this novel is well-written, at least it looks good."

Lily shrugged.

"But it's not very suitable for girls to read."

Jenny added.

"Ah."

Kathleen sighed, but she didn't want to just throw away her novel, after all, it was her hard work.

Moreover, no one knew the future better than she did.

Change publishers?

Would other publishers publish it?

Do I have to publish it myself?

...

By the way, it seems that most people prefer flat-chested girls...

[Page Flip AD Start]

[Page Flip AD End]