Chapter 19

Having arrived in this parallel universe, it had been more than half a year. During this half year, Jin Xuntai and his daughter's life could hardly be described as stable.

However, now Jin Xuntai had taken the first step towards a stable life, beginning to live a peaceful and leisurely existence.

After moving into the new home, during the first few days, he continuously bought daily necessities and food from the supermarket to stock up.

It took about two days for him to end this phase and start dedicating himself to the great cause of piracy.

His daughter, in this timeline, was also eight months old, and had regrown her teeth, and was once again crawling around everywhere. This allowed Jin Xuntai to free up his hands a bit, no longer needing to carry or hold the little one all the time.

As a result, Jin Xuntai had more personal time, which he could fully utilize.

Although his daughter crawled around everywhere, she did not do anything dangerous, so Jin Xuntai did not have to worry about her at all, allowing him to focus all his energy on his piracy business.

The cheap second-hand laptop had been discarded by Jin Xuntai, replaced with a brand new, more powerful, and faster computer.

Due to the monthly rent and the fact that the landlord had not collected a deposit, Jin Xuntai had plenty of cash, which could easily satisfy his small material needs.

Two days later, Dave from California Cultural Publishing House informed Jin Xuntai that the novel would be published and on the market in two more days. The speed of this process left Jin Xuntai speechless.

However, Jin Xuntai was still happy, as the earlier the novel was published, the sooner he could receive his royalties.

Dave told him not to worry about the novel, as the publishing house would handle all the promotional activities. Jin Xuntai just needed to stay at home and wait for news, and then collect his royalties one month after the novel started selling.

Jin Xuntai was happy with this arrangement and thus did not worry about the publication of the novel, leaving it all to Dave to handle.

On this day, the scorching sun continued to radiate heat, bringing high temperatures to the entire Los Angeles area. Jin Xuntai was working on his piracy business in the backyard, while his daughter, Keke, was happily playing in the inflatable swimming pool he had bought.

The little one seemed to love playing in the water. Ever since Jin Xuntai bought the inflatable pool, filled it with water, and put the little one in, she had been playing joyfully, completely engrossed.

The water in the inflatable pool was not too cold, especially since Jin Xuntai had left it out for half a day, and the daytime temperature was high, so he was not worried about her catching a cold from playing in the water.

Moreover, the water level in the pool was not too high, only reaching Keke's belly when she sat down.

With his daughter happily playing, Jin Xuntai had some free time to focus on his piracy business without being disturbed.

His fingers flew over the keyboard of the laptop, quickly typing English characters into the open document.

Looking at the document's name, it was "The Lord of the Rings."

Yes, since he was pirating, Jin Xuntai definitely chose books that would sell well, such as "The Lord of the Rings," which was a good choice for piracy.

Furthermore, after pirating "The Lord of the Rings," Jin Xuntai planned to continue pirating "Harry Potter," "Twilight," "The Hobbit," and other books that were bestsellers and could be adapted into movies and TV series.

At the same time, he also registered with the American West Coast Screenwriters Guild in this timeline and uploaded the scripts of these novels to the website.

In addition to these novel scripts, Jin Xuntai also uploaded movie scripts that could have multiple sequels, such as "Bourne Identity," "Taken," "Resident Evil," "Transformers," and others. He was not interested in pirating books that could not have sequels.

Thanks to the time travel, influenced by the mysterious energy in the time tunnel, Jin Xuntai's memory was excellent, allowing him to clearly recall the movies and novels he had seen.

Moreover, due to his increased intelligence, he could learn any knowledge very quickly, absorbing it in a short time, so writing in English was not a problem for him at all.

Even more, in the past half year, he had become proficient in reading, writing, and speaking Spanish, French, and Italian, and had started learning Japanese, Russian, and German, achieving some small success.

However, the most noticeable change was not his language learning ability, but his ability to quickly learn and absorb any knowledge, which was truly extraordinary.

Unfortunately, Jin Xuntai was now using this ability and advantage to pirate novels, somewhat neglecting this point, which was a bit regrettable.

Jin Xuntai's typing speed was very fast, capable of typing 12,000 characters per hour without any pauses. Apart from the sound of his fingers hitting the keyboard, you would not hear anything else if you stood next to him.

Jin Xuntai had a good plan for his daily schedule.

In the morning, he dedicated his time to pirating novels, in the afternoon to pirating scripts, and in the evening, he spent time playing with his daughter to ensure she did not feel lonely because of him.

Days passed, and Jin Xuntai quickly completed one pirated novel and script after another. Before he knew it, half a month had passed, and it was early September.

During this half month, Jin Xuntai completed the piracy of "The Lord of the Rings" and had already pirated more than half of "The Hobbit."

In New York, Annie, through a hidden surveillance camera, fully understood what Jin Xuntai's life had been like over the past half month.

"This guy, he just writes and writes. Doesn't he know how to do anything else?" Annie couldn't help but complain in her heart after seeing Jin Xuntai writing non-stop on the computer every day for half a month.

Now, for Annie, besides handling the bank's business and the affairs of the various enterprises she controlled, watching the boy's daily life through the surveillance camera was her greatest pleasure.

Of course, this behavior was not to be encouraged, as it was very inappropriate.

But Annie didn't care at all, given her wealth and freedom.

The butler, Nord, was not around at the moment, as he had gone out to handle other matters, leaving Annie alone in the spacious luxury apartment.

Of course, the dozens of bodyguards at the door and the few maids in the apartment were not counted.

Annie took her eyes off the computer screen, having just finished handling some documents. Now that she was free, she thought for a moment, picked up the black wired phone next to her desk, and dialed a number.

The call was quickly connected.

"This is Annie Whiston. I would like to ask about the current sales situation of the novel 'A Song of Ice and Fire.'"

It turned out that Annie was calling Dave's private mobile phone.

On the other end of the phone, Dave looked stunned, clearly not expecting such a 'big shot' like Annie to personally call him to inquire about the sales of an author's novel.

However, Dave did not have time to think much and quickly responded, "Oh, Miss Annie, I'm sorry to trouble you with such a small matter. The sales of 'A Song of Ice and Fire' are quite good. So far, it has sold 800,000 copies, and the sales are steadily increasing. The publishing house expects the sales to exceed 1.5 million copies this month..."

Only 1.5 million copies?

Annie frowned, clearly unsatisfied with this number.

Annie had privately asked the butler, Nord, to buy a copy of "A Song of Ice and Fire." Although Jin Xuntai had only submitted three volumes, and the publishing house had only published the first volume, the second and third volumes had not yet been released.

However, after reading just the first volume, Annie herself was captivated by the grand and vast fantasy world and the intricate plots and schemes.

Therefore, in Annie's mind, the novel should have been even more popular.

"Is the promotion by the publishing house not strong enough? I bought a copy of the novel and found it very engaging and captivating. Logically, the sales should be even better. Why are they so low?"

Dave's lips twitched, feeling somewhat uncertain about Annie's questioning.

However, even though he felt this way, he could not say it to Annie.

"Miss Annie, this is already a bestseller. Publishing is different from other businesses. For a new author's first novel, selling 800,000 copies in half a month is already very impressive.

Moreover, the sales will continue to increase. As readers who have bought the novel form a positive word-of-mouth circle, and as the sales time extends, explosive sales will occur."

Dave tried to explain in simple and clear terms, hoping Annie would understand the significance of the data.

To be honest, the publishing house had already done its best to promote the novel.

However, no matter how much the publishing house promoted, Jin Xuntai could not escape the fact that he was a new author. Therefore, even with the publishing house's strong promotion, consumers needed time to recognize him.

Of course, the content of "A Song of Ice and Fire" was very engaging, so Dave was confident that the sales would eventually explode.

"Alright, I don't know much about the operations of publishing books. I'll follow your advice. I shouldn't give random suggestions that might disrupt your plans."

Annie readily agreed with Dave over the phone.

After casually asking about this matter, Annie was about to end the call. However, just before hanging up, she suddenly remembered something and put the phone back to her ear to instruct Dave, "By the way, remember to find a lawyer and an accountant for that boy. The copyright fees will be due in a month. If he forgets to file his taxes, it could be a problem. You need to remind him."

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