I Will Never Submit to Miss Grim Reaper - Chapter 16

?Is your camera broken? Both front and back??

?Facial recognition doesn’t require high clarity, as long as you have a functioning camera, it’s fine.?

On the screen, less than ten seconds after I sent the message, “Editor, my phone camera is broken and I can’t use facial recognition,” the editor replied:

?Or you can borrow someone else’s phone, from your parents or friends, just for the authentication.?

With the development of the times, traditional paper contracts have gradually become online agreements. For example, the apartment I’m renting now, there isn’t even a paper contract. After you decide on an apartment, the property management will send you a website link for online signing. There, you can review the proposed contract. If everything looks good, you can sign it with your smartphone.

If you ever want to review the contract or need a paper copy, you can ask them to send the signed documents to your email, and then you can print it at a document printing shop.

Novel contracts used to be signed on paper as well, a long time ago. The general process was this: once an editor is interested in your novel and you agree to the contract, the editorial department prints all the contracts that need to be signed in a given week, and then they send them to the authors. Two copies of each contract are made. The authors sign both copies, keep one for themselves, print their ID on both sides, and send the other signed copy back to the editorial department. Once the editorial department receives the signed contract, they change the status of the work to “contracted.”

The paper contract signing process has two major drawbacks. Firstly, it’s expensive. Major websites sign around 50-60 authors in a week, which means they have to print 50-60 thick contract documents. Using printers or document printing shops costs money. In addition, for security reasons, expensive express shipping is often used to prevent contract loss, which adds up to significant costs.

The second problem is that it’s very time-consuming. After the editorial department sends the contract, when it reaches the author’s side, the author must print their ID, which requires additional costs, and then send it back through express mail. The whole process can take up to half a month if there are any delays, and if a document gets lost, the author needs to sign a new contract.

So, at the time, I believed that online agreements would inevitably replace physical contracts sent through express mail in the future, but I didn’t expect there would be a facial recognition component.

?I live alone and rent a place outside. My parents are far away.?

Staring at the editor’s words on the screen for a while, I sighed and typed into the chat window: ?My phone is very old, and both of the cameras are broken, so I can’t use facial recognition.?

Then, I added: ?Can we use another electronic signature method that doesn’t require facial recognition? Or send a paper contract with payment on delivery, perhaps??

To be honest, I didn’t really want to do payment on delivery because I was quite low on money these days.

?We are currently exclusive partners with this signing website, and we can’t switch. But how about this, I will speak with the chief editor tomorrow during work hours. We could send you a separate paper contract. However, the signing time for your book may be delayed.?

Seeing the editor finally agreed to send the paper contract, I breathed a sigh of relief.

?It’s alright, it’s alright, a few days delay is not a problem, this month has just begun.?

I have experience in signing contracts, as long as it’s not stuck at the end of the month, there’s no need to rush.

The income from novels is calculated on a monthly basis. You only start earning after signing the contract. In other words, if you release a book this month and readers find it interesting and give you monthly votes, but you haven’t signed the contract or linked your bank account this month, once the time comes for the next month, all earnings except tips will be cleared.

For example, if an author releases a book on April 29th and receives 10 monthly votes from readers, according to the rules, each monthly vote earns the author 0.5 yuan. If there are more monthly votes, there can be additional earnings. But in this case, the author didn’t sign the contract until May 1st, so all the earnings for April, except for tips, become invalid.

But my situation is different. Today is only May 2nd, and tomorrow is Friday, the last day of the week. The editorial department can only send contracts on Fridays and won’t delay it until the next week. Even if the express delivery is slow, it will definitely arrive here next week. I will sign and send it back as soon as possible, and the final signing date will not exceed half a month.

As long as I can sign the contract in May, when it’s settled in June, I’ll be able to receive all the earnings from May.

?Thank you, Editor.?

Seeing the contract crisis resolved, I sent a grateful message to the editor with trembling hands.

The editor didn’t say much, they just replied with an image of an orange cat with the text “Just get by, it’ll be fine.jpg.”

“Whew…”

I took a deep breath in my computer chair and glanced at the time in the bottom right corner.

7:50 p.m.

Although I had been energetic all day, I had just had dinner, so I decided to do some light exercises in the living room.

With that in mind, I moved the small dining table away from the center of the living room and started some warm-up exercises on the cushion.

Stretching, jumping jacks, leg stretches…

I continued until I felt warm all over and then lay down on the cushion. Following a few sets of exercises I vaguely remembered from a long time ago for “toning the lower abdomen,” I started to work on my stomach and lower body.

Even though my current body was very delicate with beautiful curves and fair skin, it really felt like it had been “just created.”

No matter where I touch, my muscles feel soft and lacking strength or elasticity. It’s like I’m a blank slate.

I used to do these exercises a long time ago when I wasn’t as busy with work, to prevent my body from deforming from spending too much time at home. Over time, I became lazy and stopped working out, and now I’m revisiting these exercises like a girl revising for an exam.

After finishing all the warm-up and toning exercises at home, I tidied up my long hair in the back, pushed the door open, and stepped out.

I jogged around the apartment complex for two laps, and about ten minutes later, I returned to my rented apartment, massaged the muscles in my calves and thighs, stretched my energized body, wiped off the sweat with a new towel I had bought, and returned to the computer desk.

Time to start writing!

After exercising, not only was my body invigorated, but my mind was also very active. I loved to create in such a state – my thoughts were clear, and my typing speed was fast.

“Clack, clack, clack…”

In the quiet rented apartment, my old mechanical keyboard resonated with the crisp sound of its keys as I typed away.

Of course, I’m still not used to typing with these small hands, and I can’t match the speed I had with the large hands from before.

In the past, I could write 2,000 to 3,000 words in an hour. Now, I probably can only manage around 1,500 words in an hour, and if it’s a complex piece, I might not even reach 1,000 words in an hour.

But that’s okay. I’ll take it slow. If I can’t compete with others, I’ll just spend more time on it. Diligence can compensate for a lack of skill.

With this mindset, I sat in front of the computer for over an hour, then took a ten-minute break by the window, listening to music and gazing at the night view outside. I returned to continue writing.

Following the rhythm of writing for an hour and resting for ten minutes, I wrote until I couldn’t continue anymore, which happened around 10 o’clock at night.

The reason was that I was tired.

I was genuinely tired, incredibly tired, the kind of tired where you can’t sit still for a moment and just want to sleep.

Even though the time in the bottom right corner of the computer pointed to 10 PM, for the old me during my “uncle” days, I’d either be working on a deadline or playing games at this time. I wouldn’t feel sleepy until well past midnight or 1 AM. However, at this moment, I had absolutely no desire to write, and my mind was foggy.

Ah… a little girl’s biological clock is indeed super punctual.

But it’s for the best. Early to bed, early to rise for better health.

After roughly checking all my drafts and ensuring there were no grammatical errors or typos, I closed the computer, yawned, grabbed a fresh pair of underwear, and headed to the bathroom.

The next step was to take a shower and then go to bed.

Wait a minute…

As I started to take off my clothes, I suddenly realized something significant.

Shower… shower?

“……”