Rekindling the Youthful Era

Chapter 786 I would repay you by being your servant in my next life.

On Wednesday morning, Li Luo accompanied Ying Chanxi to her elective class.

As usual, the two chose the corner of the classroom and held a company meeting there, exchanging information about the past two days.

"I hired an administrative staff member yesterday to help me keep track of the daily progress of the renovation," Ying Chanxi whispered to Li Luo. "And for the agent assistant position, I asked Director Wang to recommend someone who used to run errands on set."

"Xiaowen had been working with Aunt Yuan before, and was more involved in things related to singing, so she had less experience in acting."

"So hiring an assistant who is familiar with the film set can be considered as making up for this deficiency."

"Hmm." Li Luo listened to her talk and, after confirming that there were no problems, nodded.

"As for Douyin, they've been inviting some popular bloggers from Douyin to come and film collaborative videos with Aunt Yuan these past few days," Ying Chanxi continued. "This Saturday is when you officially join the platform."

"Before that, these bloggers would release videos of their interactions with Aunt Yuan one after another, starting to generate buzz on the Douyin platform."

"Douyin is actually quite interested in you and Zhusheng. They also have some bloggers with student backgrounds that they've been promoting recently."

"What Miao Yifeng's side is saying is, if possible, could you also collaborate with some suitable bloggers to shoot some joint videos?"

"It just so happens that you asked me to ask if we could bring Huanhuan and the others in, right? This is perfect timing."

“Okay, that works.” Li Luo naturally agreed, nodding in agreement. “However, neither Zhu Sheng nor I are particularly popular individually, so let’s not film separate collaborations. Let Douyin arrange for bloggers to film with us.”

“Yes, yes, that’s what I meant too.” Ying Chanxi nodded repeatedly.

If a blogger becomes a sensation on Douyin and is still a student, they are either abstract enough and good at creating engaging content, or they have outstanding looks and modeling skills.

Regardless, Ying Chanxi certainly wouldn't want any outstanding men to be alone with Li Luo.

She's incredibly possessive and vigilant.

Li Luo's thoughts were actually the same as Ying Chanxi's.

If a separate collaborative video were to be filmed, and a male blogger were to film a video with Yan Zhusheng alone, and their fans were to stir up rumors or something, even if it was fake, Li Luo would not want that to happen.

"Any other questions?" Li Luo asked.

“That’s all for now.” Ying Chanxi shook her head. “Douyin has been creating hype these past few days. Besides Aunt Yuan joining Douyin, there are also some rumors about her starting a live stream. Some of these rumors are true, some are false.”

Li Luo stroked his chin thoughtfully, feeling that Douyin was indeed powerful.

At this time in my previous life, not many people actually believed that Douyin could make its live streaming section a success.

After all, the live streaming industry has already gone through a whole round of bloody battles, leaving only Douyu and Huya.

TikTok is entering the market much later than it has now, which is really too late.

However, being a latecomer also has its advantages.

No one could have imagined that, years later, Douyin's live streaming would become mainstream, and even drive the rise of a new track: live commerce.

"Oh, right, there's one more thing." Ying Chanxi suddenly remembered something and turned to Li Luo, saying, "Didn't Douyin only allow 15-second short videos before?"

"Hmm." Li Luo nodded. "And then?"

"Your new song, which you're collaborating with Aunt Yuan on this time, is going to be released on Douyin, right?" Ying Chanxi reminded her. "A song is three or four minutes long, and Douyin has officially decided to allow slightly longer videos."

"Do you want to release a video that's three or four minutes long?"

“No, that’s not it.” Ying Chanxi shook her head. “Aunt Yuan’s new song is an exception. Apart from that, we should only release 60 seconds of the video.”

"Okay, I understand." Li Luo stroked his chin and thought for a moment. "As Douyin develops, this restriction will definitely be gradually lifted."

"Then why not just open it up from the beginning?" Ying Chanxi asked, puzzled.

“It’s just like going to school,” Li Luo said with a smile. “Users are like students; they need to be trained.”

“If you open up all video formats right from the start, they won’t know how to shoot videos.”

"But all you have to do at the beginning is tell them to press this button, start filming, record only 15 seconds, then just pick a currently popular background music, upload it, and that's it."

"Then users will be happy to post videos because the process is very simple and mindless."

"Once users gradually get used to this method, we can slowly add new features and let users learn little by little."

"That's precisely where his brilliance lies."

After discussing work with Ying Chanxi, Li Luo brought up the topic of moving that she had talked about with Xu Youyu the day before.

“We’re moving on the 20th. Remember to tell Uncle Ying and the others that we can all come over for dinner that night,” Li Luo said. “Then, on the 21st, it’s my birthday. Sister Yu said that the four of us should celebrate alone, so we won’t invite Mom and Dad.”

"Hmm..." Ying Chanxi felt a little guilty when Li Luo brought this up. She secretly glanced at him and breathed a sigh of relief when she saw that his expression was normal. "Senior sister told me before, so it's arranged like this."

After finalizing the matter, the two continued attending class, their hands clasped together under the table, caressing and rubbing each other.

Ying Chanxi enjoyed the warm moment, but after class, she rushed off to get busy again.

She now has to deal with school classes, the trivial matters of the Zhuyuan Student Union Secretariat, and the various businesses of Reignit Culture. She is a very busy person.

Fortunately, the teachers at the school were very humane. After learning about Ying Chanxi's specific situation, they relaxed their academic requirements for her.

It's okay to skip class, as long as you keep up with the learning progress. You can take your homework a little longer, just don't mess up the final exam.

Fortunately, a young woman was hired for an administrative position, who took on many trivial tasks for Ying Chanxi, finally freeing her from her busy schedule and allowing her to focus more on the more important matters.

Meanwhile, Li Luo accompanied Xu Youyu to another online literature elective class after Thursday arrived.

I also brought a document with me.

"How much do you earn in royalties each month?"

After choosing a seat in the corner, Li Luo casually asked Xu Youyu a question.

"What? Are your creditors starting to care about my income? Are they worried I can't pay it back?" Xu Youyu joked with a grin. "I can pay off my debts in other ways~"

"Stop being silly." Li Luo rolled her eyes at her. "We're talking about serious matters."

"A little over 100,000 yuan," Xu Youyu said, twirling a strand of hair between his fingers. "The main site should give me around 70,000 yuan, and other channels around 30,000 yuan. But if you include the royalties from the previous book, I should be able to make around 110,000 to 120,000 yuan a month."

Xu Youyu's current novel, "Gu Dao Chang Qing," has over 20,000 average subscriptions. With a daily update of 4,000 words, this income is considered normal.

These days, channel revenue hasn't been cut yet, so the royalties are still quite considerable. If Xu Youyu works hard for another six months or so, paying off Li Luo's 800,000 yuan debt should be a breeze.

However, Li Luo wasn't in a hurry for her to repay the money. He estimated that the royalties from the subsequent installments of "Gu Dao Chang Qing" would be enough for her to renovate the villa she bought, and that would be about it.

"How much longer until you finish this book?" Li Luo asked again. "It's almost two million words by now, isn't it?"

"I guess it'll be soon," Xu Youyu estimated. "After the Chinese New Year, I should be able to finish writing in another month or two."

"That means next March or April?"

"Almost~"

“That’s the same as me.” Li Luo stroked his chin thoughtfully. “My novel, ‘The Great Qian Night Patrol Division,’ should have been finished around that time as well, with about three or four million words.”

"You're not human..." Xu Youyu couldn't help but twitch her lips when she heard those words.

After all, she started writing her new book last September, and if she continues until April of next year, it will have taken her more than a year and a half to write, and she has only written about two million words.

As a result, Li Luo's new book, which started in April of this year and will be completed in April of next year, has only been written for a full year, yet it has already reached four million words.

Is this still a human being?

"Don't you know whether I'm human or not?" Li Luo chuckled.

"Heh." Xu Youyu rolled her eyes and retorted, "You're pretty inhuman in bed too."

"what is that?"

"Beast."

"It's better than being worse than an animal."

"Humph."

"Speaking of which," Li Luo said, getting back to the topic after the banter ended, and asked Xu Youyu, "Did the editors mention any copyright issues with your book, 'Gu Dao Chang Qing'?"

“It was mentioned,” Xu Youyu recalled. “They asked me to write a copyright recommendation form, but nothing came of it after that.”

"You wrote this too?" Li Luo raised an eyebrow and took out his phone to ask Qianzhou.

As Qianzhou's top general, Li Luo received special attention from him.

The message arrived instantly in Qianzhou.

[Qianzhou]: What's wrong?
[Reignition]: What's the situation regarding the copyright of the book "Early to Bed" in your area?
[Qianzhou]: This... I think it was just a very basic recommendation. If no one wants it, it will sink to the bottom.

[Reignition]: Didn't have a chance to give it a special recommendation?
【Qianzhou】: The spiritual revival in the urban setting already puts a lot of pressure on the review process. In addition, her grades are mediocre but not outstanding, so she is stuck in this situation.

[Qianzhou]: The copyright department generally uses two models.

[Qianzhou]: The first type is something like going to bed early. If you meet the requirements, you write a copyright recommendation form.

[Qianzhou]: When dealing with some film and television companies, these forms are all handed to them at once. If the other party is interested and likes them, then we can discuss them in detail; if not, then that's it.

【Qianzhou】: Another type is similar to your "Da Qian Patrol Division". No forms need to be filled out, and a lot of people are eager to buy it. In the end, it's just a matter of price and other conditions. There is no question of whether it can be sold or not.

[Reignition]: What if I can find a suitable buyer?
[Qianzhou]: We would definitely welcome that with open arms... After all, it's a 50/50 split, and we'd be reaping the benefits without lifting a finger.

[Qianzhou]: However, the price cannot be lower than the minimum valuation set by the copyright department, otherwise it will definitely not pass.

Li Luo understood this point.

Is it really true that the copyrights of books written by authors on Qidian (a Chinese online literature platform) for male-oriented content cannot be sold?

If I sell a book with 10,000 subscriptions, I can sell the film and television rights for 500,000. As long as the quality isn't bad, I'm sure a lot of companies would be willing to buy it.

But Wenyue Group immediately offered five million. Would you buy it?

Not buying? Then I'll just leave it there; the valuation is what it is anyway.

I have a thousand books with 10,000 subscriptions in my library. My company is worth 5 billion just from those thousand books with 10,000 subscriptions.

Of course, the specifics are definitely not that simple, but that's roughly the idea.

For the author, copyrights that can't be sold are worthless.

Therefore, even selling it for only 500,000 would be acceptable.

But for Wenyue Group, selling the copyright of a book for 500,000 yuan is a drop in the ocean. Selling more would actually lower the valuation of its other books.

So it's better to hold back and only sell the copyrights of the most high-end best-selling books, since scarcity drives up the price.

Li Luo couldn't say whether this was good or bad.

Because if everyone's copyrights are sold cheaply, and if they are actually adapted into a wildly successful TV series, wouldn't it mean that buying the copyrights of those bestselling books that cost millions or tens of millions of yuan is not as good as just buying the copyrights of ordinary books with tens of thousands of subscriptions through a lottery?
After all, the copyrights of bestselling books are worth tens of millions of yuan. If you only buy the copyrights of books with 10,000 subscriptions worth 500,000 yuan, you can buy dozens of copies at once.

Since film and television adaptations are inherently a gamble, why not gamble multiple times with the same amount of money?
In the end, perhaps copyright prices will never go up.

Now that Li Luo is in a position of immediate benefit, he naturally has little motivation to make any criticisms.

It's true that your perspective is determined by your position.

Li Luo sighed, then made up his mind. He took out a document from his backpack and handed it to Xu Youyu next to him: "Take a look at this."

"What's this?" Xu Youyu looked down curiously. "A letter of recommendation for a key cultural project, a key support project?"

“It’s a project from the provincial writers’ association. Once selected, the government can provide some support,” Li Luo said simply. “It’s basically just adding prestige. The same work, but with a different title, will naturally be viewed differently.”

"what do you mean……"

"I'll help you with the copyright," Li Luo winked at her and said with a smile. "Otherwise, if someone takes out a loan to buy a villa, are they really planning to take on a thirty-year mortgage?"

Looking at the document in front of her, Xu Youyu finally realized Li Luo's plan and said with emotion, "...Young master, you are so kind. In my next life, I will definitely be your servant to repay your kindness."

"Why not repay him with your body in this life?"

“Because she already belongs to you completely,” Xu Youyu whispered in Li Luo’s ear. “Then I have no choice but to repay her with a promise for a lifetime.”

(End of this chapter)