Start by Spending One Billion [Entertainment Industry]-Chapter 54

When Tan Hongguang flew to the Demon City, it already meant he had made his choice.

Sheng Quan wasn’t surprised by his refined, middle-aged appearance. She had seen his interview videos before. Perhaps because this world was obsessed with entertainment, most people took care of their looks.

Whether men or women, everyone paid attention to maintaining their appearance—even someone like Tan Hongguang, who worked in IT, had a sharp sense of style. Right now, he was wearing a black double-breasted overcoat with a scarf, looking tall and poised.

He wasn’t drop-dead gorgeous, but his presence was undeniably pleasant.

Sheng Quan’s gaze flickered upward for a second before she quickly looked away.

How bizarre.

Gu Zhao having a full head of hair was one thing—after all, he kept a healthy sleep schedule. But Tan Hongguang worked in an industry that demanded constant late nights, yet his hair was still thick and lush.

Though he had avoided baldness, he hadn’t escaped gray hairs.

Strangely enough, his scholarly, refined face paired with those streaks of silver in his dark hair gave off an oddly fashionable vibe.

It was a small but pleasant surprise. After all, having a clean-cut, handsome middle-aged man as a subordinate was far better than a sloppy one.

Especially since Tan Hongguang dove straight into work the moment he landed.

Perhaps all exceptional people shared one trait—they never wasted energy on hesitation. Once they set a goal, they poured everything into it without looking back.

When faced with the offer Sheng Quan gave him—far exceeding industry standards—he only asked one question: “Can I have a reason?”

“I’ve reviewed all of Mirage’s records.”

His future employer, young and smiling, extended her hand to him.

“You’ve already stumbled into every pitfall this industry has to offer, haven’t you? I think if I give you enough funding, you’ll return it to me with substantial profits.”

After Mirage collapsed, Tan Hongguang had heard countless opinions.

Even competitors rarely spoke ill of it. In an industry with no clear path forward, facing Tan Hongguang—now a failure—people did their best to console him.

Anyone could see how much effort he had poured into Mirage, how he had kept it alive for seven years before its inevitable collapse.

“It’s a shame, but the outcome was inevitable. Just accept it.”

“You did your best. It’s not your fault.”

“Everyone can see how much heart you put into it, Old Tan. This isn’t on you.”

No one blamed him. Yet his heart remained heavy.

For the first time, someone gave him a different response.

No consolation, no sympathy. She didn’t even praise him for holding on for seven years like others had.

Instead, Sheng Quan looked at him with expectation and said, “You’ve already had one experience. You failed, but you’ve seen every factor that led to that failure.”

“So, let’s try again.”

Tan Hongguang stared blankly for a moment before lifting his gaze. Looking at the smiling young woman before him, the gloom that had long clouded his expression slowly gave way to a smile of his own.

He reached out and shook Sheng Quan’s hand.

“Alright.”

In that moment, his smile carried the same bold confidence of his youth.

“Let’s… try again.”

Yu Miao had struggled hard to snag a ticket to the Ten Great Immortal Palaces.

And she meant struggled.

The Ten Great Immortal Palaces were already popular, but after The Cultivator hit theaters, their fame exploded globally. Domestic moviegoers and xianxia fans were already fighting for tickets—then the film’s international release brought in hordes of foreign fans.

Since The Cultivator’s breathtaking landscapes were all real-life locations, they also attracted swarms of tourists from abroad. Most of them had seen the movie—maybe they weren’t die-hard fans, but as the saying went:

“Since we’re here…”

The fair-skinned foreign tourist ahead of Yu Miao in line was chatting with his Chinese friend in heavily accented Mandarin: “Of course we have to see it. Heard it’s… very impressive.”

Impressive it was—but the tickets were a nightmare to get.

With the influx of foreign visitors, securing a spot had become even harder. The Cultivator had single-handedly introduced the world to Chinese xianxia, and the exposure was massive. Even people who hadn’t seen the film could quote its iconic lines.

Domestic fans took it in stride, but apparently, some foreign fans had even started keeping pet turtles after watching—since turtle-shaped yaoxiu (demon cultivators) in the movie were universally beloved.

Fans worldwide reacted the same way to a beloved work: rewatching it endlessly, scouring the internet for behind-the-scenes details, speculating about sequels, dissecting actor interviews.

Merchandise? Instant buy. Then came the deep dives into hidden details.

Oh! This scene actually foreshadowed that plot twist!

Look, in this shot, XXX is rolling their eyes in the background—such a subtle touch, LOL!

The creative ones wrote fanfiction, the artists drew fan art, the editors made AMVs, and musicians composed fan songs. And after all that?

Of course, they had to visit the filming locations!

No matter the country, the allure of stepping into the world of a favorite film was irresistible.

So, the Ten Great Immortal Palaces being booked solid was no surprise.

To ​​‌‌​‌‌​​​‌‌​‌‌‌​‌‌​​‌‌​​‌‌​​‌‌​​​‌‌​​‌​​​‌‌​‌​‌​​‌‌​‌‌​​​‌‌‌​​‌​​‌‌​​‌‌​​‌‌​‌​‌​‌‌​​​‌‌​​‌‌​​​​​​‌‌​​​​​‌‌​​​‌​​‌‌​​​​‌​​‌‌​‌‌‌​​‌‌​​‌‌​‌‌​​​​‌​‌‌​​​‌‌​‌‌​​​‌‌​‌‌​​‌​‌​‌‌​​​​‌​​‌‌​​‌‌​​‌‌​​​‌‍make matters worse, the Palaces had a visitor cap to ensure everyone could enjoy the sights without being packed like sardines in front of the stunning architecture.

Which meant tickets were even harder to get!!

Yu Miao had no idea how long she’d been trying before finally scoring one. Sure, people said once the hype died down, tickets would be easy to grab.

But she didn’t want to wait—she wanted to see it now!

As she stood in line, aside from the foreign guy ahead of her (whose Mandarin had a distinct northeastern twang, probably picked up from a Dongbei friend), a quick glance behind revealed at least twenty more foreign tourists.

Unable to resist, she pulled out her phone to share the moment with her group chat.

Her friends replied instantly.

[AHHHHH! SO JEALOUS!! I heard Wednesdays are the easiest for tickets, but us working folks can’t skip shifts to go T_T]

[No surprise there. You seen the TikToks? The Palaces are swarmed with foreigners—some flew for hours just to see them. There was one guy who burst into tears in front of the Dragon Pillar, and even the locals were stunned.]

[If I went, I’d cry too! They say the dragon looks real, and it’s massive—just imagining the sheer awe of seeing it in person makes me emotional!!!]

[Know why tickets keep getting harder to get? Because these tourists go home and rave about it online!! I just saw a compilation of foreigner reactions, and the likes were insane.]

【No wonder!! I was wondering why there are more and more foreign tourists. Ahhh, when is the off-season for the Ten Great Immortal Palaces? I really want to go inside and see!! Yu Miao, remember to take lots of photos and share them in the group!!】

Yu Miao watched as her group chat friends wailed with envy and jealousy. Her originally calm mood while waiting in line suddenly felt like chugging an ice-cold soda on a scorching summer day.

It was absolutely exhilarating!!!

This must be the joy of friendship, bahahahaha!

The line moved quickly, and before she knew it, Yu Miao had passed through the ticket checkpoint.

Then, she got stuck at the entrance.

A staff member, clearly used to this, shouted through a megaphone:

"Keep moving forward! Don’t block the people behind you! Hey, tall guy up front—keep going! Move! Hurry up, don’t stand there!"

Yu Miao nearly burst out laughing at the accent. Surprisingly, the foreign man with equally clumsy Mandarin seemed to understand and quickly stepped aside, rushing forward.

With the path cleared, she finally entered—only to freeze in awe at the sight before her.

Now she understood why so many visitors had stopped in their tracks earlier.

The sheer grandeur of the scene was so otherworldly, so unimaginably vast, that anyone would instinctively be stunned into stillness.

She muttered under her breath, "Holy moly!"

"Calling for your mom won’t help you stand here!" The staff member gestured impatiently. "Move inside! Don’t block the way, hurry up!"

Like the foreign man before her, Yu Miao turned back in a daze, nodded hastily, and then found her gaze irresistibly drawn back to the spectacle ahead.

She walked forward mechanically, her soul seemingly sucked away, unable to tear her eyes from the unbelievably lifelike "creatures" and colossal structures.

It took her several minutes to barely compose herself—and then she started snapping photos like crazy.

This was mind-blowing!!!

She cursed her limited vocabulary—there were no words to describe what she was seeing!!!

While furiously typing praises about the Ten Great Immortal Palaces in the group chat, Yu Miao suddenly noticed a peculiar group of people near the coiled dragon pillar up ahead.

They seemed to be filming a video.

A man and a woman leaned against the pillar at first, but when the dragon’s head slowly descended, they panicked and bolted, glancing back as they ran.

Other tourists noticed and chuckled, spotting the camera crew but dismissing it as no big deal.

The Ten Great Immortal Palaces were a hotspot, after all—plenty of influencers came to shoot content and ride the trend. As long as they didn’t go overboard, the management usually ignored them.

Yu Miao thought nothing more of it and soon forgot the scene, diving back into her exploration of the palaces. The only regret? Her phone could never capture the true grandeur of the experience.

Take her, for example. She’d watched videos beforehand and been impressed, but seeing it in person was a whole different level of awe.

It was like the first time she’d seen a beluga whale—no video or photo could ever replicate the thrill of standing before such a magnificent creature.

Yu Miao raved about the Ten Great Immortal Palaces and, like rewatching a favorite movie, immediately started planning her next ticket hunt.

Then, she stumbled upon a video.

The familiar scene and high engagement made her click.

This chapter is updat𝙚d by freeweɓnovel.cøm.

The footage showed the same couple she’d seen at the palaces, sitting beneath the coiled dragon pillar.

So they really were influencers? And with this many likes?

Just as Yu Miao was about to scroll past, the dragon in the video slowly descended, its pupils shifting until its gaze locked onto the pair.

She frowned. "Wait, when I visited, did the dragon’s eyes look this real?"

The next second, with an earth-shaking roar, chains—each link taller than a person—crashed to the ground, cracking the stone beneath.

The once-bound dragon surged into the sky, its scales glinting unnervingly lifelike as it soared overhead, suddenly alive and terrifyingly majestic.

The couple screamed and fled, but the dragon’s massive form gave chase, its movements reducing towering structures to rubble. Tiny fairies in the sky frantically sounded alarms.

When Yu Miao had visited, those fairies could fly, but they hadn’t been nearly this animated.

Then, as screams echoed and distant figures—cultivators on swords—streaked toward the chaos, the screen cut to black.

Two lines of text appeared:

【Legendary creatures may revive at random~】

【Ten Great Immortal Palaces: Enter at your own risk】

Yu Miao blinked, dazed, as if she’d just watched a blockbuster movie.

What… was this?

Special effects?!

She’d seen those people filming in person—since when did domestic short videos have CGI this insane?!

This was just…

Too. Freaking. Cool!!!