Chapter 0761: A Call from Brother Ma

Unaware of what he had inadvertently set in motion, Zhao Fusheng paid no attention to it. He had only come to record a demo; whether Li Jian would find a girlfriend because of this was entirely beyond his consideration.

Zhao Fusheng was no immortal; he could only discern hints of certain things, relying not on prophecy but on his decades of life experience.

It was like the so-called living gods at fortune-telling stalls. Most of them succeeded not because they possessed any extraordinary abilities, but because they had traveled many roads and met many people, learning to read expressions and tones.

From the moment the taciturn Li Jian eagerly sought out Ye Bei upon discovering a good song, Zhao Fusheng could tell that the guy probably had some feelings for the young woman.

Originally, Zhao Fusheng hadn't thought much of it—unrequited love wasn't uncommon. But unexpectedly, the way Ye Bei looked at Li Jian was also unusual.

That adoring gaze, Zhao Fusheng had seen in many people's eyes, and those people had all ended up as couples.

Clearly, Li Jian was no different.

So Zhao Fusheng simply went along with it. How far the two would go was their own business; Zhao Fusheng had a habit of starting things but not seeing them through.

"Back?"

When Zhao Fusheng returned home, Fan Baobao was sitting on the sofa watching TV. Seeing him enter, she asked curiously, "Where did you go?"

"Nothing much, I asked Li Jian to record a demo for you." Zhao Fusheng told the truth.

"So fast?"

Fan Baobao stood up at once, a look of surprise on her face.

"Yeah, a friend of Li Jian's helped record it. Here's the tape. You and Zhou Yun can practice at home." Zhao Fusheng handed the recorded demo to Fan Baobao and added, "By the way, don't lose the demo. I promised Li Jian that this song would be sung by his friend."

He paused, then blinked: "Girlfriend."

Such a juicy piece of gossip instantly piqued Fan Baobao's interest. Holding the demo, she leaned in close to Zhao Fusheng: "Who, who? Li Jian's girlfriend?"

After all, Li Jian was quite well-known among young people, especially college students. Campus-style songs were still popular in this era. As a famous campus singer, Li Jian having a girlfriend naturally intrigued Fan Baobao.

"His junior, named Ye Bei."

Zhao Fusheng said casually, "Remember to keep it secret. I think the two haven't broken the ice yet. It wouldn't be good if the news leaked from us."

"I know, I know. Just curious." Fan Baobao nodded repeatedly.

She wasn't the type to be indiscreet. Her inquiries were purely out of curiosity; blabbing around wasn't her style.

They chatted for a while, then Fan Baobao eagerly took the demo to find Zhou Yun. Their performance was coming up, and they needed to step up rehearsals.

As for whether Li Jian and Ye Bei would contact him, Zhao Fusheng wasn't worried. He was no longer a novice planner. As long as the other record company wasn't foolish, they wouldn't offend him.

The entertainment industry was a small world of beautiful appearances and shallow skins, a bed of splendid silk covering all kinds of falsehood, ugliness, and evil. It looked magnificent, but lift the cover, and it stank to high heaven.

But before the lid was lifted, everyone still had to follow some rules.

There is a line from Bei Dao that has become particularly popular: "Baseness is the passport of the base, nobility is the epitaph of the noble."

The first half is very true, universal across the world. But the second half has now been rewritten; nobility is not necessarily the epitaph of the noble, because with the media becoming more and more developed, who ascends to heaven and who descends to hell is still uncertain.

So, as long as Zhao Fusheng maintains his current position, he doesn't have to worry about anyone playing tricks like copyright infringement.

"Ring, ring, ring..."

The phone rang. Zhao Fusheng glanced at the number and was somewhat surprised.

"Ma, why did you think to call me?" Zhao Fusheng asked Ma Huateng on the other end, puzzled.

If he remembered correctly, Little Brother Ma should be riding the wave of success lately. Penguin's user base was growing rapidly, with more and more users, and more and more venture capital firms were showing interest in the company.

Zhao Fusheng really couldn't figure out why Little Brother Ma would need to contact him.

"It's like this: the company has been preparing a new project recently. I wonder if you're interested?" Ma Huateng hesitated for a moment, then said to Zhao Fusheng.

"New project?"

Zhao Fusheng was taken aback for a moment, then quickly realized that in Little Brother Ma's mind, he was someone who understood technology. Now that he was working on a new project, naturally he would want to involve him.

"I have things to deal with here, so it's not convenient for me to go to Shenzhen," Zhao Fusheng thought for a moment and said to Little Brother Ma. "How about this: for any progress on the project or places where I can help, we can communicate via email, what do you think?"

To be honest, Zhao Fusheng had only been to Penguin headquarters once, and most of his communication with Little Brother Ma was through email and phone.

"Hmm, alright then."

Little Brother Ma was startled, then nodded and had to agree.

After hanging up the phone, Zhao Fusheng opened his laptop and soon received an email from Little Brother Ma.

After spending half an hour reading the entire email, Zhao Fusheng blinked his eyes and suddenly felt that he had originally underestimated the heroes of the world.

Previously, with Zhao Fusheng's hints, Little Brother Ma and his technical team had successively launched chat rooms and group functions, which rapidly increased Tencent's users, now on the verge of breaking 100 million users.

Now, Tencent's R&D team proposed whether they could add gaming features to Penguin.

That's right, allowing users to log into games using their Penguin accounts.

Of course, the so-called games they referred to were just things like Snake, mostly from mobile phones, and then arcade-style fighting games.

Sitting in front of the computer with his chin in his hand, Zhao Fusheng was silent for a long time. After thinking for a while, he started typing on the computer to reply to Little Brother Ma's email.

After typing profusely for a full half hour, Zhao Fusheng finally looked at what he had written on the computer, gritted his teeth, and pressed the send button.

He was well aware that with the sending of this email, he might very well help Little Brother Ma establish the Penguin Empire earlier.

He just didn't know whether the result of this action would be good or bad for the development of the domestic internet.

"Why worry about so much? After I'm dead, let the floods rage!"

Zhao Fusheng gritted his teeth and thought to himself.