The Rise of Otaku

Chapter 94 A Chain Reaction

After a long discussion on the significance of the movie on the domestic economy, Zhou Yu felt like he had returned to school to study the dull economics and marketing. He felt very dizzy, and he almost could not remember what year it was. Although he knew last year that the girl was a genuine member of society and they were totally different people, he still didn’t expect that after she went into university, it became even worse.

“Stop, stop, stop... that’s enough, please don’t educate me anymore. If you really insist it. Then let’s do it like you said, you make a promotional trailer for me first, and see if there is any company interested in the movie.”

Zhou Yu raised his hands and surrendered, then he ran out of the outdoor cinema as if he was running for his life. Before, when he argued with Zhou Shuyu, he would have 70 or 80 percent chances of winning, but after she got into the university and learned all those knowledge, she was no longer a newbie that he could defeat easily.

Zhou Shuyu could only sigh with disappointment. To change the character of a strange otaku, who was only interested in his hobby, but could not care less about making money, was too difficult. Although every person’s lifestyle was different, it was still very rare to see someone, who wanted to avoid the world to this extreme.

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Penguin Manga valued highly of the cooperation with Zhou Yu this “geek”. Although he had a lot of strange requirements, his works were indeed extremely great. “Assassin” manga series had also been highly praised by the readers, but there were also some undesirable features. Mainly, the content was too dark to be able to be adopted into an anime. What they could do now was to see if they could establish cooperation with the studios from foreign countries.

But this was not something that made Liu Gongcai feel headache the most. Up to now, Assassin had won several awards with absolute advantages, which was an unprecedented honor. However, when Liu Gongcai contacted Zhou Yu to come out to accept the awards, he was refused by Zhou Yu instantly.

There would be no manga signing events, no fan meeting events, no TV interviews, no journalists interviews, and now there was one more condition, he did not even want to come out to accept the awards. As if he wanted to spend the rest of his life in his house. So far, he had not found out a way to get this master out of his house.

Whenever he received an award invitation, Liu Gongcai would have a headache. Because every time, he would need to explain to the organizers why Zhou Yu was not coming. It now made him even scared of winning an award, which was hilarious to other people.

Today, Liu Gongcai was still working as usual in his office. Suddenly, his assistant knocked on the door and said hurriedly, “editor Liu, does Zhou Yu, the main artist of Assassin, live in Luhua Village?”

Even in Penguin Manga, only Liu Gongcai and some people from the top knew about Zhou Yu’s identity. This assistant often sent Zhou Yu something like the peripheral products of anime and manga, so he knew the address.

“Yes, Xiao Yan. But don’t think about contacting him. This fellow has a very strange temper. Who knows what will happen if he gets annoyed?”

“Not that editor Liu, But... there won’t be another Zhou Yu in Luhua Village, will there?”

Xiao Yan’s question made Liu Gongcai feel very strange, then Xiao Yan took out a tablet and played a video for Liu Gongcai. This video was “The animated movie – Fruit Pirates behind-the-scenes footage”.

There was a strange young man in the video. And according to the video, he was shooting a movie. However, no one knew what was wrong with him, he burned so many beautiful and delicate ship models. Either the young man had too much money to burn or it was just a publicity stunt to gain popularity. Young people nowadays always liked to do such things.

“Xiao Yan, this material should be given to the newsgroup. Why did you show me this?”

Liu Gongcai despised those people who became famous using such a method, but for the sake of the ship models, it was no problem to give the newsgroup. However, what Xiao Yan said next, almost made him spit out the tea in his mouth because of the shock.

“I checked the comments. The young man in the video called Zhou Yu, and the location is Luhua Village!”

Liu Gongcai was shocked. Indeed, Zhou Yu lived in Luhua Village. Was it a similar name, or was Zhou Yu tired of drawing comics, and started making animations? No one could guess exactly what he was thinking and what he would do next with his eccentric temperament.

Liu Gongcai immediately contacted Zhou Yu. If the weirdo really wanted to switch to making animations, he would have to go to Luhua Village in person, even if it meant that he would violate the agreement.

Unfortunately, Zhou Yu was not always online, and the waiting time was always the most painful.

Liu Gongcai anxiously walked left and right in front of the computer, quietly urging Zhou Yu to respond to his message as soon as possible in his mind. But he was also afraid to see the message “I don’t want to draw comics anymore” showing up in his chat window.

In the time of anxious waiting, Xiao Yan came again. This time, his expression was even more shocked, as if he had seen a ghost. Liu Gongcai’s heart instantly sank. ‘Is it even worse news?’

“Editor Liu, I just checked the animated movie “Fruit Pirate” on the Internet, and I got this thing! This is so bizarre!”

What Xiao Yan said was the trailer of “Fruit Pirates” that Zhou Shuyu uploaded after she returned to school, and edited together with He Yuanyuan.

When He Yuanyuan saw this movie, Her expression was even more exaggerated than Xiao Yan’s. Her mouth was wide at that time, that she almost needed another person to help her to push her jaw back to the original place.

‘Zhou Yu?’

‘The weirdo who likes carpentry?’

‘He can make animated movies?’

A series of questions hovered in Ho Yuanyuan’s mind, and then they were smashed into pieces by the ridiculously beautiful movie in front of her.

“Shocked, right? I tell you that when I watched it at the outdoor cinema, it almost scared the shit out of me. Zhou Yu indeed took part in the shooting, but he only filmed the real-world videos and did not participate in animation production. Remember “The Myth of Luhua Village”? The CG part was also completed with the help of his otaku friends.”

Zhou Shuyu was still a little dizzy, let alone He Yuanyuan, who just saw the movie. This weirdo was so unwary of other people. How could he just give away the original movie just like this? Was he not afraid that people would leak it out? Oh, right... Almost forgot that he was thinking about releasing it for free at the beginning. So naturally, he would not care.

He Yuanyuan’s eyes were still reluctant to move away from the computer screen, “It’s so beautiful. It’s a miracle of the domestic animation. Can we even make a great trailer to match this movie? What does Zhou Yu think? Maybe we should ask our teacher to help us.”

This proposal was rejected by Zhou Shuyu resolutely, “No! This movie is very precious. The more people know about this, the more dangerous it is. Zhou Yu trusts us. But we can’t increase the risk of leaking this movie out. After the trailer is completed, I will delete the original movie.”

Zhou Shuyu, who was full of economic mindset, was not very confident when she said this. Because she knew that Zhou Yu did not really care about the movie. It was not that he trusted them. Actually, she also had her own little plan. After all, she was also listed in the closing credits. Moreover, the regular movies that were shown in the cinema had completely different meaning, compared to the self-made movies that were circulated on the Internet.

If someone intentionally leaked it out, it would ruin her future career.

He Yuanyuan also thought that it was very reasonable, so they spent half a day to edit out a movie trailer and then deleted the whole movie before they uploaded the trailer to the internet.

Then Liu Gongcai saw it.