Among all of Yu Mian’s works so far, “Rebirth Of The Interstellar Soldier King” was undoubtedly a uniquely long progression-style novel.
Yu Mian and editor Shaxs had planned for a total of ten volumes. Since the first four had already been published, the serialization continued at a steady pace, with the story now progressing to about the seventh volume.
The protagonist, Lin Mu, advanced through different maps, starting from Garbage Star and leveling up along the way. With countless fortuitous encounters, treasure hunts, acts of kindness, and connections with several big shots, the refreshing plot, though no longer as sensational as when it first debuted, had cultivated a large and silent but loyal reader base across the vast interstellar space.
This fanbase even included many middle-aged readers. They rarely used social media on the star network, but whenever a new physical book was released in offline bookstores, they would be the first to buy and collect it.
One could say that as a classic and long-standing upgrade novel, “Rebirth Of The Interstellar Soldier King” had quietly provided Yu Mian with a steady stream of manuscript royalties.
However, compared to “Reborn”, which skyrocketed in popularity thanks to the variety show adaptation “Heavenly Voice: Rising Star”, and “God of Cooking”, which was even more popular due to its live-broadcast Easter eggs, “Rebirth Of The Interstellar Soldier King” seemed to receive relatively little public attention.
At first, when “Reborn” started to be updated rapidly, the Soldier King fans didn’t bother competing with the younger audience drawn to romance novels. After all, their favorite long-form novel emphasized deep and steady progress, accumulating over time before breaking through.
Then, when Fish Soup Noodles launched another book called “God of Cooking” and started updating it rapidly, Soldier King fans grew a little anxious. However, since they could at least see Fish Soup Noodles appear in live broadcasts, they endured.
But surely, now it was their turn to enjoy rapid updates for “Rebirth Of The Interstellar Soldier King”, right?
For example, two volumes a month, and the entire novel is completed in two months!
With that hopeful mindset, they eagerly awaited their turn.
Yet, what they got instead was “God of Cooking” continuing its rapid updates and news that its game adaptation, “Taoyuan Restaurant”, was about to be officially released.
In fact, “Taoyuan Tavern” was quite a rare type of life-simulation game in the interstellar era. It had almost none of the high-energy, competitive, and mecha-battle elements that were universally popular among young gamers.
Because of this, even though it was based on a popular novel by Fish Soup Noodles, the game’s copyright was not initially favored by the industry.
Most professionals in the game industry believed that the game’s hype was largely due to fan enthusiasm and that once it was formally released into the market, it might not be very profitable. As a result, copyright quotes remained conservative.
Some even outright stated at the licensing conference held by Huanyu that Fish Soup Noodles’ works were more suitable for film and television adaptations, and that there was still a lack of market foundation for making them into games. They argued that even if the copyrights were sold, the price shouldn’t be set at the usual rate.
Huanyu’s copyright department found itself in a tense standoff as multiple major gaming companies attempted to drive the price down.
[Crispy Shark: Those price offers were purely insulting! They even said that since your manuscript royalties were already substantial, and there would also be a film adaptation, they should be able to acquire the game copyrights at a low price. But the early beta version was already wildly popular! They’re just refusing to admit it!]
Editor Shaxs even vented his frustration to Yu Mian for a long time.
Thankfully, Fish Soup Noodles had been too busy preparing a script to attend in person. Otherwise, those major gaming companies would have infuriated him.
But Yu Mian wasn’t surprised.
After all, when he looked at the primary games these major companies promoted, they were all fast-paced, adrenaline-pumping, and highly competitive. The rankings were all about combat power and skill levels. To them, a farming simulation game like “Taoyuan Restaurant” was probably something people could fall asleep playing.
Of course, they would prefer to acquire the copyrights at a minimal cost to reduce risk.
[Fish: But the price isn’t even the main issue. My concern is that since these companies don’t recognize this game style, even if they buy the copyrights, they won’t allocate their best teams to develop it seriously.]
[Crispy Shark: That’s true… sigh…]
Just when Huanyu was beginning to question whether they should continue to promote the incubation of the game copyright, several programmers from the company’s tech department, unwilling to let the project stall, decided to take a chance.
They sent an email to the mysterious developer who had previously provided them with the packed source code and game framework.
Surprisingly, after a long silence, the person replied.
He directly asked if he could personally buy the copyrights, assemble a development team, and produce the game.
He admitted that he couldn’t offer a particularly high price but was willing to take only half of the profits, with the rest distributed among the other contributors.
With Yu Mian’s support, Huanyu eventually approved this bold and unconventional copyright plan.
As a result, those large gaming companies, who had expected to acquire the copyright of “Taoyuan Restaurant” at a low price, were shocked that Huanyu would find other buyers besides them. For a time, all kinds of skepticism and negative news came out.
However, upon hearing that “Taoyuan Restaurant” was facing development difficulties, many of Yu Mian’s old friends stepped up to help.
An helped connect them with professional artists and designers, while Noel, a gaming expert, personally invested a sum of startup capital.
Even Yu Mian himself also contributed a portion of his royalties to fund the project.
With all these efforts combined, the newly established game company was quickly up and running, and development on “Taoyuan Restaurant” officially began.
As the game’s production progressed rapidly, various new features and game content were exposed and triggered heated discussions and expectations among fans.
Yu Mian also gradually became convinced that this mysterious genius developer seemed to have an almost obsessive passion for “God of Cooking”.
The other party was also the first person so far to refuse an offline meeting with him, and his way of speaking was unusually distant and aloof.
[Derqin: You don’t have to worry. Since I agreed to make this game, I will definitely do it well. I am very bad at communicating with people in person, so meeting offline to discuss might end up disappointing you.]
[Derqin: Several rounds of testing are almost complete, and the official version is already rich in content. Of course, the full outline of the book that you sent me in advance will be integrated into the game’s post-release updates.]
Looking at the seemingly cold and distant message he had just sent, Derqin felt inexplicably frustrated for several minutes.
Clearly, he was very excited that Fish Soup Noodles had personally checked in on the progress, so why did his reply make it seem like he was annoyed?
Would he be disliked for this?
When he first asked if he could personally acquire the copyright, Derqin had been a little worried about whether he would be laughed at.
But to his surprise, Teacher Fish Soup Noodles actually abandoned those large monopolistic gaming companies and chose him instead. Not only that, but he even invested his own money into this newly founded startup game company.
Wasn’t this the equivalent of getting funding from his favorite author while also creating a game adaptation of his favorite novel?
This was simply too blissful!
However, every time he personally discussed the game with Fish Soup Noodles, the more nervous Derqin became, the more he felt like he was saying the wrong things, to the point where he barely knew how to organize his words.
Yu Mian, on the other hand, didn’t think as much as Derqin did. He simply assumed this was just the arrogance and confidence of a reclusive god, obviously someone who could carry the whole project alone.
[Fish: Oh, alright. I’m not questioning your progress, I’m just worried that you might need something but feel too embarrassed to ask. If you run into any financial shortfalls during development, please feel free to contact me anytime.]
Fortunately, “Taoyuan Restaurant” wasn’t some AAA game masterpiece, or else Yu Mian felt like his royalties wouldn’t be enough to sustain this genius producer’s burn rate.
Seeing the message, Derqin’s pointed elf ears turned red once again.
Was it his imagination?
The way Fish Soup Noodles phrased his message oddly made him imagine what it would sound like if the other party read it out loud in his live broadcast voice.
If he weren’t an elf, he might have really wanted to meet Fish Soup Noodles in person.
But ever since arriving at the Federation Star, he had experienced too many disastrous offline meetings.
More often than not, once they met face-to-face, originally natural friendships would become overly enthusiastic and full of forced flattery, making Derqin feel that it was best to avoid meeting offline altogether.
He couldn’t imagine Fish Soup Noodles becoming like that.
At this moment, the beta version of the game was launched. Derqin sat on the swing in the backyard of “Taoyuan Restaurant” within the holographic scene, silently soaking in the tranquility and harmony of the world from the novel.
He wanted to bring Fish Soup Noodles’ vision of this Peach Blossom Paradise into the most perfect game and introduce it to the vast interstellar world.
When this game is finally released in his homeland, he believed that the descendants of the elf race would surely fall in love with it too.
Maybe then, they would finally understand his career choice.
Meanwhile, in the ongoing serialization of “God of Cooking,” the plot of this system-driven farming and gourmet novel was becoming increasingly exciting.
The chili specialties brought back by the inspection team had indeed sparked a heated discussion on the Central Star.
When Zheng Duozhi returned home and placed a jar of chili sauce on the table, everyone in his family who tasted it was deeply shocked by the extraordinary taste.
After finishing it in a scramble, they even urged Zheng Duozhi to return to Taoyuan Mountain to buy more, which worked out just as he had hoped…because he was indeed curious about the young owner of the restaurant.
Thus, Lu Zhen gradually became acquainted with this mysterious, generous customer from the Central Star. He would even occasionally set aside some new products specifically for Zheng Duozhi to take back.
Today, Lu Zhen’s Taoyuan Restaurant wasn’t just famous for its spicy feasts, hot pot delicacies, and vanilla desserts…its system-guided live broadcast sales were also booming.
[[“This copper hotpot is quite affordable. If you bring one home, the whole family can gather around and enjoy a meal together. It creates a very lively and heartwarming atmosphere, and it’s very suitable during holidays…”
On screen, Lu Zhen smiled as he chatted with fans from all over the universe in his live broadcast.
What was once an obscure food live broadcast had now gained widespread popularity.
After all, the local specialties and various delicacies displayed in Lu Zhen’s live broadcast room were simply too mouthwatering and unique!
Any random passerby who stumbled into the live broadcast room and caught a whiff of the delicious food would immediately find themselves unable to leave, and their wallets would be emptied in just a few persuasive words and Lu Zhen’s smile.
[ I come straight to Boss Lu’s live broadcast room every month as soon as I get my paycheck. This is a paycheck recovery live broadcast! But seriously, this food looks too delicious!]
[Whenever Boss Lu introduces a product, my salary card gets wiped out. I really want to visit Taoyuan Mountain in person now. Is Boss Lu as good-looking as he is in the live broadcast? =w=]
[Wait, what? Buying food specialties comes with a free Boss Lu? Hehe, I better buy more then!]
Lu Zhen’s cheerful and handsome appearance, combined with his engaging way of introducing food, made him incredibly appealing.
With each system-assigned live broadcast task, Lu Zhen successfully completed them and earned all sorts of fun and interesting rewards, making his broadcasts increasingly rich in content.
“Everyone is welcome to visit Taoyuan Mountain for a vacation. The atmosphere here is completely different from Central Star, and it’s a great place to relax during the holidays.”
Responding to the fans’ curiosity and enthusiasm, Lu Zhen took the opportunity to showcase the endless sea of blooming peach blossoms and the shimmering clear river in the mountain’s back valley.
The natural beauty without any trace of technological artificiality instantly made the fans in the live broadcast room exclaim in amazement.
[Oh my god, does this place actually exist? It looks like a virtual game background! It’s so beautiful it doesn’t seem real!]
[Sesame is here! Boss, go pet Sesame! We want to see Sesame~]
And just as Lu Zhen was showing the scenery, a sharp-eyed viewer immediately spotted the panda, Sesame, among the bamboo groves.
