Chapter 0140: Arrogant and Overbearing

The older generation often teaches the younger: 'The heart that harms others must not exist,' meaning we should mind our own business and not scheme to harm others. But over time, everyone forgets that there is another line after this one.

The heart that guards against others must not be absent!

In fact, Zhao Fusheng hadn't expected at first that Mu Qingwan would play such a trick on him.

It was just composing a song; he didn't really care, after all, it wasn't much money, and Zhao Fusheng had agreed to it purely out of consideration for Mu Qingqing's face. Since they were classmates and Mu Qingqing had humbled herself several times to ask, Zhao Fusheng had originally planned to take this opportunity to visit Beijing, so he simply went along with it.

But Mu Qingwan and that General Manager He Yunzhi actually performed a duet right in front of Zhao Fusheng, and in the end, he caught them at it.

This made things awkward.

Zhao Fusheng didn't mind the money, but he minded being treated like a fool.

So, for the past few days, Zhao Fusheng simply ignored Mu Qingqing. No matter how many pages she sent him, he didn't reply.

He was waiting for Li Jian to finish recomposing the song 'The Prose Poem Written by Father.'

In fact, Zhao Fusheng knew very well that 'The Prose Poem Written by Father' was not a popular or mainstream song. To be more precise, it was actually quite niche. To use a future trendy phrase, the song had high 'style,' but if released into the market, it might not necessarily provoke any particular reaction.

But after all, it was 1999. In Zhao Fusheng's view, at the tail end of the record market, Li Jian's album shouldn't sell too poorly.

If it were three years later, Zhao Fusheng was sure Li Jian's album would flop.

The reason was simple: with the rise of the internet, the record industry would face its most terrible winter.

This was beyond doubt. After all, people have inertia and a habit of seeking bargains. Besides die-hard fans, if you could find songs to listen to on the internet, how many people would be willing to buy records?

Not only domestically, but abroad as well. Top singers who once sold millions or even tens of millions of records no longer had that kind of market appeal with the rise of the internet. So celebrities became closer to the public, and singers' ways of making money gradually shifted to concerts and various endorsement ads.

The songs themselves were no longer tools for making money, but methods to enhance fame and expand recognition.

After all, fame brings popularity, and recognition brings advertisers knocking.

Zhao Fusheng remembered clearly that ten years later, many celebrities had no representative works at all—whether in singing or acting—yet they were incredibly popular, with endless endorsement deals, raking in money hand over fist.

In short, it was by constantly showing up on platforms like WeChat and Weibo to increase public recognition, thereby gaining popularity.

The most obvious example was the so-called traffic stars.

What are traffic stars? Understand that celebrities themselves are products of the attention economy. The more fans they have, the higher their commercial value. Celebrity effect is equivalent to internet product traffic. And the internet, from its inception, has been labeled with the attention economy tag. 'Traffic is king' and celebrity effect are similar in essence.

Simply put, a star might have no acting skills, but if they have many fans, even something as trivial as them dating becomes big news.

Such stars might not exist in 1999, but ten years later, they were common.

Although they might all be trying to transform, in Zhao Fusheng's view, this kind of traffic star, while able to be popular for a while, cannot withstand the test of time.

Fans grow up. When fans stop idolizing and stars are no longer young, all that's left is probably just nostalgia.

But nostalgia can't be eaten. Especially for stars without acting skills or talent, the market doesn't lie. Zhao Fusheng remembered clearly that by 2017, movies starring many traffic stars almost universally flopped, sparking a discussion about traffic stars transforming.

But that was later. For now, what he needed to consider was not whether Li Jian's album would sell well, but how to teach Mu Qingwan and He Yunzhi a lesson.

'Reply quickly.'

The next morning, Zhao Fusheng finally got the answer he wanted.

Li Jian's page came through. A smile appeared at the corner of Zhao Fusheng's mouth. It seemed the time was ripe.

He guessed right. When Li Jian played the demo of the song he had created under Zhao Fusheng's guidance for Mu Qingwan and He Yunzhi, both were stunned.

'Zhao Fusheng composed this?' Mu Qingwan stared at Li Jian in shock.

Li Jian nodded: 'The main melody and ideas, including the arrangement, were all proposed by him. I mainly just cooperated with him.'

He Yunzhi frowned slightly: 'What do you think?'

Li Jian smiled: 'General Manager He, do you want me to tell the truth or a lie?'

He Yunzhi paused, then said without thinking: 'Tell the truth.'

Hearing these words, Li Jian shrugged: 'To be fair, he's not a professional musician. He can't even read staff notation. But I have to admit, precisely because of that, he can better understand what kind of songs ordinary people want to hear. We all know this song is niche. Fortunately, I'm not a pop singer myself, and most of my fans are students and white-collar workers. These people should have a strong resonance with this song.'

Sighing, Li Jian looked at Zhou Yuandong, who sat there pale-faced, and said seriously: 'Teacher Zhou, to be blunt, your skill is really not as good as Zhao Fusheng's.'

Zhou Yuandong smiled bitterly: 'Yeah, that guy is a genius. Who can compare?'

He was now convinced. A young man who had never been exposed to music could actually write such a song, and even make the arrangement so grand. Zhou Yuandong asked himself that at Zhao Fusheng's age, he couldn't have done it, and more importantly, even now, he couldn't.

'Alright, since that's the case, let's discuss how to handle this matter.' He Yunzhi let out a long breath and looked at Mu Qingwan: 'According to Qingqing, Zhao Fusheng had already agreed to help recompose the song before. Did we make a mess of things?'

Mu Qingwan nodded: 'Yes, Qingqing said Zhao Fusheng had agreed to help, but at the time I thought he was trying to raise the price. Unexpectedly...'

The rest went without saying. She and He Yunzhi had set a trap to lure Zhao Fusheng into action, but it backfired. Now the problem was, if Zhao Fusheng really demanded to buy back the song's copyright according to the contract, what should they do?

'It seems we misjudged this matter.' He Yunzhi smiled wryly and said to Mu Qingwan: 'Do you think we can negotiate with him again?'

Mu Qingwan thought for a moment and gently shook her head: 'Probably difficult. Qingqing said this person has a certain pride. This time we were indeed in the wrong, and he will likely be very angry.'

'What's there to be angry about? We did it for the sake of this album.' He Yunzhi said nonchalantly. She had studied in the UK and always felt that domestic handling of certain matters was too emotional.

In He Yunzhi's words, if Zhao Fusheng didn't sell the song to them, they could just scrap Li Jian's album and later blacklist Zhao Fusheng, making it impossible for him to survive in the entertainment circle.

'Let's not worry about that for now. Li Jian, contact Zhao Fusheng and ask him to come to the company for a talk.' Mu Qingwan glanced at He Yunzhi, shook her head helplessly, and said to Li Jian.

Li Jian nodded, turned and left the office, sending that page to Zhao Fusheng.

After receiving the page, Zhao Fusheng tidied up, took a taxi, and headed toward Qingcheng Culture.

He didn't know that in the company, He Yunzhi was eagerly waiting for him.

And He Yunzhi didn't know that Zhao Fusheng was never one to be threatened.