Sweeping the Golden Rooster and Hundred Flowers! Part One Hundred

It really was Qidian, how could someone like Wu Xiang possibly let go of such a massive business opportunity?

Actually, it was not just a matter of a single website, but the entire colossal market of online literature!

By the year 2001, online literature already had quite a few websites operating in this sector, such as the early 163, Tianya, and Xici Hutong, along with many new sites that appeared later. However, their common characteristic was that none of them were making any money.

That is right, completely free of charge. What were they living on then? It was actually the internet bubble.

Do not look down upon this bubble just because it burst; that happened overseas. Many domestic websites were still hanging on because a large portion of them were personal web pages. This was a rather bizarre phenomenon in the early days of China's internet: individuals creating personal pages on the web. What did they rely on to survive? They relied on advertisements from large foreign websites.

Back then, clicking on ads could actually make money, and you could even recruit downlines, somewhat like that Ponzi scheme or multi-level marketing. But the bubble had already burst abroad, funds were getting tighter and tighter, and the payouts were shrinking. Yet the domestic scene was bizarre; due to exchange rates, domestic websites actually managed to hold out longer.

If you wanted specifics, Wu Xiang did not quite understand them either, but he knew that this situation could not last much longer. Soon, China's internet would enter a phase of reshuffling, and right at this moment, the transition from free to paid services presented a crucial opportunity.

If everyone refused to figure out how to make money, they would simply go under. This was forcing China's internet to enter a paid era. By seizing this opportunity and surviving brilliantly, Qidian became the most successful among all online literature websites!

Why did it succeed? There was actually only one reason: it had the most books!

Why did it have the most books? Because right from the start, it was formed as an association. The website did not belong to a single person; it was not something a single individual could build alone.

Since it was not something one person could pull off, Wu Xiang naturally had no way to undertake such a business by himself, and frankly, he had no time.

When Deng Chao and Wang Yuning had previously brought up that theater play to him, the moment Wu Xiang saw the names of Yu Baimei and Ning Caishen, he thought of a brilliant solution. That was to utilize these three individuals—leveraging their current fame—to take over the Qidian coalition. That way, the business would fall right into his lap!

Yu Baimei and Ning Caishen were quite famous right now, holding a certain degree of influence on the internet. If they joined the Qidian alliance, coupled with his own capital injection, it would undoubtedly trigger a magnificent chemical reaction. Not only would the website revolve around these three as its leaders, but their fame would also attract even more writers.

Wu Xiang had considered this plan repeatedly and thoroughly. In fact, he had been waiting for Yu Baimei and others to sue him so that he could legitimately bring these three under his wing.

Could he not just approach them proactively?

Wu Xiang had calculated: for one thing, since there were three of them, going to them himself meant approaching them one by one, which was terribly inefficient. Besides, people could be quite peculiar sometimes. Transactions initiated by uninvited salesmen never go well; if you take the initiative, they will inevitably suspect you have some hidden agenda.

Therefore, this scenario was ideal: you come knocking on my door, and I will seal this business deal while everyone still ends up in a win-win situation.

Wang Yuning and Deng Chao never dreamed in a million years that a single meeting with Wu Xiang would make this lawsuit vanish into thin air. It was simply too mind-blowing.

If Chen Sicheng had been present at that moment, he would definitely have understood that this was undoubtedly Wu Xiang's formidable and peerless gift for sweet-talking bullshit. But Wang Yuning and Deng Chao had no idea. At that moment, the depth of their admiration for Wu Xiang was so profound that they practically felt like kneeling before him.

It was truly like the endless rolling waves of a great river, or the overwhelming floods of the Yellow River, completely unstoppable!

After settling Yu Baimei and the other two—though it did not take much time—it was already October 19th. Wu Xiang had to get moving; let us not forget that this year's Golden Rooster and Hundred Flowers Film Festival had already begun.

The Golden Rooster and Hundred Flowers Film Festival had opened on the 18th, and the closing ceremony was on the 20th. So if he did not go now, it would be a terrible snub. Although Wu Xiang's film had a relatively late theatrical release, it did not disqualify it from participating in the festival, and the organizers had quite enthusiastically invited Wu Xiang.

Wu Xiang had no choice but to lead his crew and hurry towards Ningbo, as the Golden Rooster and Hundred Flowers Film Festival had been relocated to Ningbo this year.

Does this mean Wu Xiang was winning an award? Indeed it did. Wu Xiang had gotten wind of this long ago—there were awards coming his way, and quite a few of it seemed. So, rounding up his cast members took quite a while.

Everyone was busy, and many people could not make it. The most resolute among them was Zhang Jingchu, who was genuinely furious with "Brother Xiang." How could you cast me as nothing more than a vase? Isn't that wrong? That is not what was agreed upon in the beginning!

In truth, she was indeed playing a vase. If you talk about Wei Zifu, telling her story alone could easily fill an entire movie. If I were to intricately weave her character arc together with Emperor Wu of Han's story, then our film would not just be two and a half hours long; even ten hours would not be enough to finish it.

Sometimes, once a storyline begins to unfold, it is not something you can rein in just because you want to.

Fortunately, after a thorough explanation from Wu Xiang, Zhang Jingchu finally agreed to come. In fact, Wu Xiang's ultimate winning argument was simple: you won an award.

Did Zhang Jingchu actually win an award, though?

"...The 24th Hundred Flowers Awards for大众电影, Best Actress, Gong Li! For *Breaking the Silence*!"

When the master of ceremonies read out the name for Best Actress, Zhang Jingchu, dressed in magnificent attire, shot a glare at Wu Xiang that felt like a sharp blade, as if she wanted to pierce right through him!

Wu Xiang broke out in a sweat as profuse as taking a sauna. Fortunately, however, the Hundred Flowers Awards had not forgotten about Wu Xiang.

"...The 24th Hundred Flowers Awards, Best Feature Film, *A Life-and-Death Decision*, *Breaking the Silence*, *Emperor Wu of Han*!"

Yahoo! He had finally won a weighty award, seeing as Wu Xiang had spent most of his time previously just playing bit parts and making cameo appearances.

"Yeah!"

"Hahaha..."

You had to laugh, whether you wanted to or not. Zhang Jingchu even gave Wu Xiang a brief hug, and Wu Xiang happily went up to accept the award.

Logically speaking, the Hundred Flowers Awards are determined by popular public voting. Seeing *A Life-and-Death Decision* makes it clear that the voting cycle for this was quite long, as it was a film that survived last year's Golden Rooster Awards. In other words, the Hundred Flowers and Golden Rooster awards sometimes overlapped, along with that film *Breaking the Silence*. For this reason, the Golden Rooster and Hundred Flowers Film Festivals were subsequently reformed to alternate: one year for the Golden Roosters, the next for the Hundred Flowers. Anyway, they made the rules.

From this perspective, the fact that Wu Xiang's *Emperor Wu of Han* was released so recently and managed to achieve such high honors in this kind of voting spoke volumes.

You must remember that at this time, the Best Feature Film award at the Hundred Flowers was voted on via mail-in ballots. To us young folks, that sounds a bit antiquated, yet *Emperor Wu of Han* still won!

On one hand, it was because the film was genuinely popular. On the other hand, it was because the Hundred Flowers Award for Best Feature Film had three slots, and while the first two held an overwhelming advantage—namely *A Life-and-Death Decision* and *Breaking the Silence*—the films following them received very few votes. Therefore, Wu Xiang's ability to stand out this time was also related to the lack of fierce competition.

Even so, this proved that Wu Xiang's film possessed considerable quality. As for whether there was any possibility that Wu Xiang and Yu Dong had bought votes and stuffed the ballot boxes just for the box office... well, that is a secret, a secret...

What many people did not expect, however, was that this award was merely the beginning of *Emperor Wu of Han*'s triumph!

"...The 21st Golden Rooster Awards, Best Screenwriter, Wu Xiang, for *Emperor Wu of Han*!"

"...The 21st Golden Rooster Awards, Best Film Editing, Zhou Xingxia, for *Emperor Wu of Han*!"

"...The 21st Golden Rooster Awards, Best Cinematography, Feng Xiaoning for *Purple Sunset*, and Ning Hao for *Emperor Wu of Han*!"

"...The 21st Golden Rooster Awards, Best Original Score, Wu Tong, for *Emperor Wu of Han*!"

"...The 21st Golden Rooster Awards, Best Art Direction, Hao Yi, for *Emperor Wu of Han*!"

Before the Golden Rooster Awards ceremony, no one could have anticipated that Wu Xiang's *Emperor Wu of Han* would sweep five awards all at once. You have to understand that the Golden Rooster was truly deserving of its name as a "Golden Rooster"—normally, it would never show such favoritism toward a single film. These were evaluated by professional judges, and given the difficult state of the domestic film industry at the time, you were supposed to spread the awards around a bit to encourage everyone, right?

Regardless of what others thought, the *Emperor Wu of Han* crew kept taking the stage one after another. Wu Xiang went up twice, and when Ning Hao went up, he was practically beside himself with excitement, stammering that he could hardly believe it, as it was his first time directing such a major production.

Consequently, Ning Hao was profoundly grateful to Wu Xiang, openly declaring that the guy was both his mentor and a dear friend. Meanwhile, Hao Yi, who had grown quite familiar with Wu Xiang, jokingly complained right on the spot that his wages for shooting promotional commercials still had not been paid!

It was all in good fun, but it also reflected Wu Xiang's characteristic cheapskate nature. There was no help for it; the budget had already been heavily exceeded.

Teacher Zhou lavished him with high praise, declaring that the Best Editing award ought to have gone to Wu Xiang because the kid had not even gone home for the New Year due to editing the film, repeatedly slamming his own head against the door in exhaustion.

Wu Tong expressed heartfelt gratitude to his mentor. As for Wu Xiang, he was naturally grateful too, though it seemed the promotional push for ancient instruments of the motherland still lacked sufficient momentum. That was another joke, shared for everyone's amusement.

Having already bagged five awards consecutively—none of them major, but carrying substantial weight—the performance categories followed next: Best Actor, Best Actress, and so on. As a result, Zhang Jingchu once again cast a gaze at Wu Xiang that felt as though she intended to commit murder!

There was no Best Actress award for her, nor was there a Best Supporting Actress award for Li Bingbing. However, Li Bingbing's attitude was much better; she simply sat there, responding with a smile.

The reason Wu Xiang invited Zhang Jingchu was truly not to toy with her; it was mainly because there were too many men and too few women in his crew, making things look rather unbalanced visually. Besides, this was a renowned domestic film festival, and showing one's face was always a good thing.

In truth, Wu Xiang also wanted to make it up to Zhang Jingchu, whether in her acting career or anything else. In his heart, he always remembered that version of Zhang Jingchu in Inner Mongolia, sitting beside the campfire... (To be continued.)