Dum dee dum — drumroll!
This is your worn-out author, the “dead fish” who forces a smile and keeps pounding out words.

First off, thanks to every reader who made it this far and hasn’t abandoned the ship!

My supply of gags and jokes is running low, while my waistline keeps growing — so I feel the pressure. I’m going to focus more on the main plot and pick up the pace a bit.

If you suddenly saw “epilogue” on the last chapter and then ran into this “afterword,” don’t be surprised — I divide the book by month (which is why Volume 3 ended up way longer than the first two). The epilogue of Volume 3 also serves as a lead-in to Volume 4.

As for the first victim of the next volume — I mean, the next blessed target — it should be obvious: Lü Le, the cold, mask-wearing henchman/traitor with the pompadour hairstyle under Lei Laohu. If you want a reference image, think JoJo’s Josuke with a floral mask.

Lü Le’s cleft lip was foreshadowed back in Volume 1 — I’m just collecting it up a bit late. You can check Volume 1, Page 47; I mentioned surgery back then. He became Yuanyue’s inside man partly out of goodwill — hoping his big bro Lei Laohu would return to his family — but mostly for the money. Harsh, but true: he desperately needed cash for the cleft repair.

Then…

What did he do with that money? He founded Lei Meow Meow’s fan club and crowned himself president. That seed money printed the first supporter shirts, and most early members were Lei’s old crew. That’s also part of Lei Meow Meow’s charm. (Heh.)

The third-month quota, Huangfu Fei, and the bonus Li Changpu — their stories are mostly covered in the volume, so nothing major to add. But “Manga Cafe Kamehaha” and the Li family’s seven gourd kids still have side-story potential. They don’t tie directly to the main plot, but I want to write some spin-offs — more side stories mean more bishoujo appearances, right~?

That’s all for the announcements. The rest is my little confession — feel free to skip. Why did I start writing novels? Not for anything deep. After I quit a long, grindy mobile game, I wanted to do something meaningful with my time. That was it.

Half a year later, it’s become a habit: two to three hours each night, squeezing out about 2,500 characters per update. Is it meaningful to write a book that’s clumsy, melodramatic, with awkward jokes and zero depth? I thought about it, and yes — it probably is.

I expected the quality wouldn’t be great. I read lots of novels, so when I re-read my own work I see the gaps — skill-wise I can’t patch them overnight. But people still read, still comment, still rib the story in the thread — that’s the meaning right there.

Yeah, there are trolls too… I actually want to know what turned readers off. At first I just wrote what I wanted and tossed in memes. Now I want to write something more people will like — even if that’s hard for this “dead fish.” If you stick around, I’d love advice.

Thanks again, everyone. I’ll put down the pen here for now. See you in Volume Four.
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TL Note

Pretty much of my TL thoughts are summarized by how the author felt it themselves. Nothing much to add in here, as long as there are people reading, I will be continuing to translate this to the end, albeit how long it takes.