I Forged the Myth of the Ancient Overlords-Chapter 82 - 081. Tens of millions of viewers_1

Chapter 82: 081. Tens of millions of viewers_1

Chapter 82: 081. Tens of millions of viewers_1

After showering in the bathroom, Lu Ban checked the empty drain and, having changed into fresh clothes, lay down on the bed.

The metallic stench had not lingered, but it still clung to his nostrils resolutely.

Lu Ban turned on his music player and, enveloped by the tunes of the Spring Festival Gala playlist, drifted off into a deep sleep.

Afternoon, four o’clock.

Lu Ban woke to the setting sun. Since encountering the Silent Lands, he felt his biggest change was his sleeping schedule.

The old Lu Ban would be in bed by midnight every day, not letting fatigue and stress carry over to the next day, which doctors said was perfectly healthy.

The current Lu Ban often had late-night chats with the Ghost Bride in Another World and never got enough sleep, which led doctors to diagnose him as mentally ill.

“This is tragic!”

Lu Ban sat up. The room, with its curtains drawn, was dim, beckoning him to continue sleeping.

But with the self-discipline of Lu Ban, he was already getting up and turning on his computer.

“Today is Sister Hai’s online concert. I can’t be late!”

He clicked open the livestream of a singer and virtual host, only to hear a muffled singing voice.

“… drum beats whirl around the streets, weave past the alley, where the theater troupe raises its stage…”

The jubilant music of clanging gongs and drums filled Lu Ban’s ears.

But the music soon merged with the wedding procession beats he had heard in Dried Water Town.

The melody began to warp, and the sounds from the speakers became eerily ethereal.

“… may you… enjoy fortune and longevity… surpassing… the Eight Immortals… live… past a century… in healthy… vigor…”

It was like the funeral music that played in old Hong Kong horror films.

Even the little figures dancing on the screen emitted a green light, looking like something straight from the Netherworld.

“?”

Lu Ban frowned and slapped the computer case.

“… with my best wishes for joy and laughter. As we bid farewell to the old and welcome the new, stride boldly into the beginning.”

The singing and the picture returned to normal.

“The computer’s getting a bit old…”

Lu Ban pondered that when the price of graphics cards dropped, he would find a way to get a new one; after all, he still had investments from Jiangcheng Industries, so it was only proper to invest in good equipment.

Having watched the concert to his satisfaction, Lu Ban swiped his mouse, and the webpage shifted to the System’s cold text.

[Career Development Task]

Read 𝓁atest chapters at fгeewёbnoѵel.cσm Only.

[How long has it been since you last updated? Are you really content with the status quo? It’s time to give your audience the satisfaction they’ve been waiting for!]

[Task Requirement: Produce a video with tens of millions of views]

[Viewer count: 0/10,000,000]

[“Congratulations on discovering a treasure of our site!”]

[Time remaining: 710:34:12]

“Tens of millions of views?”

Lu Ban noticed a difference in the System description.

Previously, the System always measured progress based on click counts, but now it had shifted to individual viewer counts.

Did this imply that he could meet the criteria simply by showing a film on the big screen to millions of viewers without using video websites?

Could he make a movie now?

Awesome!

But after careful consideration, Lu Ban did the math.

Tens of millions of views, with a cinema ticket priced at thirty yuan per person, would equate to a box office revenue of three hundred million yuan.

A film with no stars like his own, could it really draw that many people to the cinema?

Lu Ban remembered a previous sci-fi blockbuster that had several stars and an investment of three hundred million, which only managed to chalk up just over a hundred million at the box office in the end.

In the current domestic market, reaching a box office of three hundred million required some connections.

However, for a video, reaching a million views could be seen as the product of historical progress—just being in the right place at the right time could achieve that.

But for videos surpassing ten million views, most were treasures of the site, where content and popularity were indispensable; the majority could still be proudly discussed years later.

There was no shortcut for tasks involving video production; it wasn’t possible to rack up clicks with several short videos. The first video Lu Ban uploaded had to meet the task requirements, so he needed to be careful.

Moreover, what was more critical was that this task came with a time limit.

Over seven hundred hours, roughly a month, within which Lu Ban’s video had to secure tens of millions of views.

“A movie might not be feasible in time.”

Although the movie censorship in this world wasn’t overly strict, and even plasma films could be rated and displayed on the big screen, there still had to be scheduling. Even if Lu Ban edited a proper film with his eyes closed, by the time it was scheduled to premiere, he might have only two or three days for the audience to go to the cinema.

Achieving tens of millions of views was a high hurdle.

“So I have to continue on the path of videos, huh.”

Lu Ban thought about how he had collected three days’ worth of video material, which included the foggy scenes by the seaside in Dried Water Town, the night at the Hai Family Mansion, as well as the wedding day. Piecing these into a single video would result in an absurdly long duration.

Although many viewers had commented that Lu Ban’s videos were too short, leaving them wanting more after a brief watch, Lu Ban knew these viewers were hypocritical; they said his videos were too short, but if they really became longer, then they would complain about the length and ask for summaries.

According to the statistics of the old video sites, when the length of a video exceeded twenty minutes, the number of views would decrease by 30%, and if the video went over forty minutes, the number would drop by 70%.

Yet, this figure rebounded for videos exceeding an hour. In other words, the number of views for videos over an hour in length actually increased.

One may wonder why. Well, videos that last more than an hour were generally not amateur entertainment clips but films, educational content, documentaries, etc. For example, an eSports match would last over an hour and could attract tens of thousands of simultaneous online viewers.

Still, it was quite difficult for a long video to reach ten million views.

Lu Ban checked the rankings on his main platform, the old video site, and the hour-plus videos that had surpassed ten million views could almost be counted on one hand.

They were either long animations with sped-up explanations, popular livestreams from famous gamers, or an interactive video claimed to have hundreds of endings.

“Hmm?”

Interactive video?

Lu Ban clicked on that video.

Unlike the linear videos of before, this one offered various options; viewers could make choices while watching, and depending on those choices, they would see different outcomes, just like in a text adventure game.

It essentially was a series of connected video segments.

Lu Ban started the video and made choices following its progress. After about fifteen minutes, and after facing a BAD END on the screen, Lu Ban refreshed the video obstinately and started over from the beginning.

Each replay added to the view count, and if someone tried for all those hundreds of endings, it was akin to refreshing the page hundreds of times.

It was only in the evening, with the help of a guide, that Lu Ban finally reached a good ending.

“This thing is indeed quite addictive.”

Seeing the ten million view count, an idea quickly formed in his mind.

*

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