Chapter 427: Recreating a Successful Work from His Previous Life!

Chapter 427: Recreating a Successful Work from His Previous Life!

What Wu Chen was actually writing was a screenplay.

He had learned how during the thousand-year loop: the format, the conventions, how to put things on the page. But in all those thousand years, he had never written a complete one.

Because there was no way to find out if it was any good.

Film or television, writing the script was only part of preproduction. Shooting took time. Marketing and distribution took time. Even at top speed, skipping publicity entirely and releasing straight online, it would take a month at the very least.

Wu Chen had been trapped in an endless loop of July 7.

So he had never had any way to see whether a script he wrote would turn out well once it was filmed.

And no reason to wear himself out crafting a great one.

There were plenty of ways to pass the empty hours of the loop. There was no end to what could be learned, and Wu Chen had never fixated on this one.

So the screenplay he was writing now wasn’t something he had created during the loop.

It was from his previous life.

This was the first time since transmigrating that Wu Chen had taken a successful work from his previous life and used it for himself.

He felt no qualms about it whatsoever. Wu Chen had no obsession with moral purity.

For him now, the best choice was simply to live each day happily, enjoy life, and do the things he found “interesting.”

The keys clattered without pause.

He was writing a film script.

To recreate the success he remembered from his previous life, he even included things that had no business being in a screenplay.

For one, he told every character exactly how to perform.

It looked “wildly unprofessional.”

Every actor had their own strengths and style, and directing actors was the director’s job, not the screenwriter’s.

But Wu Chen had no intention of becoming a director. He would hand over the script and not ask much about what came after.

How the actors were supposed to perform, though?

That was his call.

Before he knew it, it was past eight.

“Mr. Wu? Mr. Wu?” Zhuang Xiaodie’s voice came suddenly from outside.

She had woken and come out of the bedroom looking for him. Hearing faint sounds from the study, she came over.

Wu Chen paused and looked toward the doorway.

She stood there with nothing but a blanket draped around her shoulders, not even pulled closed in front.

Naturally, she had nothing on underneath.

She stood there in the doorway, lovely as a picture.

“Morning.” Wu Chen smiled.

“Good morning, Mr. Wu.” She smiled too, very sweetly.

He glanced at the time on the screen, then smiled at her. “Go shower and do your makeup. Boss Mao will be here soon. When he comes, go downstairs with him and meet everyone at the company.”

“Mm-hm. Okay, Mr. Wu.” She nodded.

She was somewhat nervous about it, but she kept the nerves well in check. She had been through a full year of intensive training, after all. She could handle pressure.

She went off.

Wu Chen went back to typing.

Half an hour later, around eight-forty.

Knock, knock, knock!

Someone at the door.

The study door was open, so Wu Chen heard it, but he didn’t get up. Zhuang Xiaodie, already dressed and doing her makeup in the bedroom, hurried out to answer.

“Boss Mao, you’re here.”

“Hahaha, Miss Zhuang! Sleep well? You’re positively glowing!”

“Pretty well.”

“Good, good. Hm? Where’s Mr. Wu?”

“Busy in the study.”

From the study, Wu Chen could hear the two of them trading pleasantries.

Come to think of it, Mao Rusong had groomed Zhuang Xiaodie himself. He had treated her well before, but he would never have spoken to her this flatteringly.

Now every word he said carried a note of deference.

Because of Wu Chen, of course.

At dinner the night before, even Gu Ruibo had been somewhat deferential toward her. That had made Mao Rusong understand his own place all the more clearly.

“Busy, Mr. Wu?” Mao Rusong soon appeared in the study doorway, smiling.

“Mm. Writing something.” Wu Chen looked up from behind the screen and smiled. “You two go ahead and talk. Don’t mind me.”

“Of course! You carry on!” Mao Rusong said quickly.

He had no idea what Wu Chen was working on. Writing something? He didn’t dare ask.

He and Zhuang Xiaodie went to talk in the living room, where she asked his advice on a few things to watch out for.

Wu Chen kept typing.

A little over ten minutes later.

Zhuang Xiaodie appeared at the study door again.

“Mr. Wu, I’ll head down, then?” she said.

“Go on. Relax. You’ve got this.” Wu Chen smiled.

“Mm-hm!” She nodded earnestly.

She summoned every ounce of courage she had and resolved to use every bit of acting ability in her. Even if she had to act the part, she would play a convincing “second-largest shareholder.”

She couldn’t show weakness.

If she wanted to be worthy of Mr. Wu, she had to take this step perfectly today.

She and Mao Rusong went downstairs.

She formally made her debut at Chenghai Entertainment.

With Mao Rusong leading her around, she was introduced one by one to the company’s key people. After that, they all held a meeting.

At the meeting, Mao Rusong announced an important decision.

Effective immediately, Zhuang Xiaodie would serve as chairwoman of Chenghai Entertainment.

Mao Rusong, the majority shareholder with fifty-five percent, was choosing to “step back to the second line,” keeping only his seat as a director.

The company had just two shareholders. As long as the two of them agreed, either could be chair.

The decision cost Mao Rusong nothing.

Chenghai Entertainment was only one business among the dozens of companies he owned. He had never managed it closely in the first place, leaving it to professional managers. For a man worth several billion yuan, even handing the whole company to Wu Chen’s… woman wouldn’t have been a big deal.

It just couldn’t be done that way.

If he wanted the best possible relationship with Mr. Wu, shared interests were the strongest bond there was.

While Zhuang Xiaodie was in her meeting, Wu Chen was still typing.

He wasn’t done yet.

Not until around ten-thirty did he finally start wrapping up.

In a little over three hours he had typed tens of thousands of characters, even faster than the top online novelists, the ones nicknamed “typing monsters.”

The screenplay itself wasn’t that long. The whole script ran to only about twenty thousand characters.

He had added a mass of notes and instructions. He wanted to recreate a success from his previous life, but he had no desire to actually make the film himself, so he had no choice but to put a bit more into the script.

It wasn’t much trouble.

Done.

He went back to the bedroom for the USB drive he carried with him, returned to the study, encrypted the script, copied it onto the drive, and wiped every trace of it from the computer.

Finished.

Around eleven.

Wu Chen sat fully dressed on the living-room sofa, scrolling through his phone to check on public opinion. Just as he had predicted, the whole internet had exploded. From last night until now, it had only grown fiercer, fermenting to fever pitch.

Five of the top ten trending searches were about “Genius Superstar.”

And both the twenty-four-hour and hourly Weibo rankings were overrun with posts from musicians. One after another, they had all stepped forward to speak.

Click.

The suite door opened.

Zhuang Xiaodie was back.

Wu Chen turned, put away his phone, and smiled. “How’d it feel?”

“Good. Really good!” She nodded several times.

Out there she had held herself tight, playing the rich woman, playing the boss. The moment she came back and saw him, she couldn’t quite keep it up.

A hint of excitement showed in her face, even something almost girlish.

She was practically bouncing.

She was only twenty, after all.

“Let’s go eat. You can tell me on the way…” Wu Chen stood and walked out with her.

Half an hour later.

Iris Western Restaurant, Yanjiang Road, Dongpu District.

At a window table on the first floor, Wu Chen and Zhuang Xiaodie ate and talked.

“…Oh, right. Keep this safe.” Wu Chen suddenly set down his knife and fork, took out the USB drive, and handed it to her with a smile. “There’s a film script on it. The file password is your birthday. Keep it confidential. For now, don’t let anyone see what’s in it except Boss Mao.”

“A script?” She looked at the silver drive in her hand, then blinked at him. “You wrote it, Mr. Wu?”

Naturally, she remembered him typing away all morning.

“That’s right.” He smiled.

“Mr. Wu, you can even write—”

She never finished.

“Oh! Well, if it isn’t Campus Beauty Zhuang!” A young man’s voice rang out from not far away.

It sounded like an ordinary greeting, yet something in it was plainly ill-intentioned.

Wu Chen turned his head.