Reincarnated as the Elder's son: My Infinite Shop Points System-Chapter 51: Fear of disappointment.

{Flashback}

"Wake up, come on man, you’re going to be late for your debut."

The young man cried out, yanking the sleeping author who had been writing all night.

Slowly raising his head, James first stared at the computer before him, the glowing light reflecting on his face.

"I slept... off."

His face was still swollen, having just woken up from a deep sleep.

"Dude, the debut is today, isn’t it? It’s already 9 in the morning, man, you should go submit your work to the company already," said the young man.

His name was Elliot, and he was one of James’s friends.

Clearing his eyes, James took one more look at the screen, and there it was, his finished work of over 500,000 words.

*The Rising Star Looms Over the Broken World.*

A novel he had worked extremely hard on, his first ever novel as an author.

"It’s tomorrow, still, I need to hand it over to my editor so she can—"

Before he could fully stand to his feet, James tripped, his grip on the table stopping him from slamming hard on the ground.

"Yo, man, you good? You don’t look too well." Elliot carried him back to the chair. "Maybe you should take it easy a bit. You told me you had everything edited, right? It’s practically done, so all that’s left is for your editor to submit it tomorrow, right?"

With sagging eyes and a pale face, James replied,

"Yeah."

"Then it’s simple, man, you stay home and rest, I’ll help you submit it."

"..."

"..."

"What? You don’t trust that I can do it?"

"No, that’s not it." James averted his gaze, as if thinking about what to say next. "Do you know where the main headquarters is?"

"Of course, been there a couple of times with you. Dude, just hand the book over, I got it." Elliot tapped his chest with confidence.

Sigh!

"Alright, please be careful with it. It will be a drag having to copy everything from the system to another USB drive," said James as he handed the blue USB drive to his friend.

Elliot took it, his smile widening even more.

"Alright then! Leave it to me, you can just rest, I’ll let you know when it’s there. Oh man, you’re gonna be a professional author if this works out, don’t you feel excited too?"

"Well... I did work months on it. I absolutely need this to work. Having to wait another 7 years for an opportunity like this... will be killing," James replied.

"I feel ya. Anyway, I should be heading out now. Be sure to get some rest, no excuses, I mean it."

With that, Elliot walked out of the room.

’He’s right, I should get some rest. I can barely make out what’s in front of me.’ James stood up from the chair and slowly walked towards the bed, where he then collapsed on it.

It didn’t take him long for his eyes to close shut, sleep fully taking control.

It goes to show how exhausted he was; his entire body had been drained from the excessive work he did.

*The next day*

Ring! Ring!

His phone rang.

James’s eyes snapped open; how he managed to sleep till the next day was beyond shocking.

Jerking up from the bed, he headed towards his worktable and took the smartphone to his ear.

"Hello? Mr. Shu?"

It was his editor.

『Oh thank God, you finally picked up. I have been trying to get to you since yesterday! What happened?』

"Sorry, I got drained out and slept the whole day. Did something happen?"

『What do you mean, ’Did something happen?’ Where the hell is your work?! Other editors have begun submitting, and the officials are about to leave! You were supposed to bring it to me yesterday, but sleeping?!』

James was so confused that he had to take a minute to understand what was happening.

"Didn’t... Elliot submit it to you yesterday?" His voice shook a bit.

『Elliot? Who is that? No one came to the company to submit anything to me.』

Fear.

James’s heart raced at the realization of his predicament.

"P-please give me a minute!"

He hung up the call, immediately opening up the group chat where he, Elliot, and one other girl were in.

Calling would have been faster for sure, but at the time, James’s mind was being clouded by different doubts.

What if he doesn’t get to submit his work? Was he going to wait another 7 years? He worked so hard; he can’t possibly throw everything away, just like that.

『Elliot! What’s going on? My editor is saying something about you not submitting the drive to her.』

Elliot is Typing...

『Uh? That can’t be right, something came up last minute, and I had to take care of my sister. But I gave the drive to Annabelle to submit. @Annabelle, girl, where is the drive?』

James’s heart raced even more.

Annabelle is typing...

『Hold on, I was supposed to submit it? I thought you said I should hold on to it.』

『What? You didn’t submit it to the editor like I told you to?』

『Omg! I didn’t know that’s what you meant! Wait? Is that James’s book he wanted to submit for the audition?』

’They... didn’t submit my work? Is this some kind of joke? This has to be a joke, right?’

He fell to his knees.

’Tell me it’s a joke.’

...

Jared sat down under the tree, in his hand, a cup of tea one of the villagers had made for him.

From where he was, he could clearly see all the workers doing an almost perfect job on the building designs while also following the blueprint.

They were doing so well, probably even more than he expected them to. He could probably leave them alone, and they’d manage the whole thing.

And yet—

Something this important, Jared couldn’t bring himself to just leave it to them.

They could forget to nail a piece of wood to the wall.

They could make a mistake and bring the whole thing down.

Unlike the farmland that he left to Ria, constructing a building, especially one that’s meant to last years, was an even bigger ordeal.

His mind just wouldn’t let him.

’Pathetic. I thought I had gotten over this.’ Jared stared into his tea, quickly drifting into thoughts.

Two pairs of shoes made their way into his range of sight.

"Lord Jared, I have a question to ask you."

It was a female.

Jared raised his head to see who it was.

The woman before him was the daughter of an old man in the village. Her name was Jessica.

She was the girl Jared claimed was able to learn about construction as quickly as he taught her.

Actually, it wasn’t only constructing; even farming, she was faster than the rest to figure out how it’s done.

Having long, beautiful black hair and a dark skin tone, she wore a small cloth that covered her chest, her golden eyes just as captivating.

"Jessica..." Jared called out, "What question exactly?"

She turned a piece of paper towards him; it was the blueprint for the bathhouse he already wanted to build.

"It’s too open. I don’t know how we are supposed to move the whole thing, boss. I think I’m misunderstanding something here. Please explain."

Jared stared at her for a while.

’No one else has shown as much dedication as she has. It might seem like I’m ignorant about the others’ hard work, but it’s just plain fact. They are working to get the job done; she is working to learn and improve. Those are two entirely different things.’

[You are currently using the God of Information’s blessing.]

[Character profile:

Name: Jessica Valdez.

Abilities: Learning, knowledge, building, calculations, tactical advancement, etc.

Special abilities: None.

Rank: 3 Star.

Occupation: Member of the village.

Current mood: Admiring, curious, serious.]

Jared couldn’t help but give out a nervous chuckle after seeing her stats.

If she was in his former world, no doubt she would be one of those people having excellent scores on a test but still complaining if they missed a single question.

’After we are done, it would be quite unfair of me if I don’t upgrade her to a five star. Honestly, with how smart she is, I’m hoping she can make some changes around here.’

Srr!

Jared grabbed the paper from her grasp.

"You are not supposed to move the entire building in a single go to begin with. That’s the whole point of building it separately—"

He began to show her everything she needed to know on the paper, and as always, Jessica listened, as if her life depended on it.

"Thank you, Lord Jared, I’ll go inform the rest."

She bowed her head and walked away.

[Jessica’s loyalty has increased to 87%]

[You have gained 400 coins.]

’Speaking of coins, I need to purchase something; it will be quite useful when—’

Jared’s eyes widened when he suddenly spotted something hiding in the bush.

"Shit!" He jerked up, "Everyone, move away from the bushes!!!".

....

[A\N: https://discord.gg/aCv3dUmYRe.]