Chapter 74: Carefree and Short-sighted

Sure enough, upon hearing Xu Heng say that he and her daughter were high school classmates, Liu Yiyan's mother's expression relaxed quite a bit.

Because looking at Xu Heng's appearance, he was indeed the same age as her daughter; if he were a wealthy and powerful boyfriend her daughter had found, that would be too fortunate. Previously, Liu Yiyan's mother had assumed her daughter had sacrificed herself to some wealthy boss somewhere to get the medical fees.

But in other words, this was also because Liu Yiyan was clumsy with her words; if she were even slightly better at deceiving people, telling a lie, or making up a reasonable source for the money, her mother wouldn't have been so worried about her.

"Little Xu, why buy so many things just for a visit? Sit, sit quickly." Liu Yiyan's mother lay on the bed and gestured with her hand.

Xu Heng sat by her bedside and said with a smile that Yanyan was his girlfriend, and it was only right to bring some gifts when visiting her.

Liu Yiyan's mother's eyes welled up with tears as she gripped his hand tightly, sighing, "I, as a mother, am useless; I haven't provided you juniors with any help, and instead, I've become a burden. Back then, for my medical fees, Yanyan ran to all our relatives and friends, and didn't close her eyes for several days."

Xu Heng comforted her, saying it was fine, that everything was in his hands now, and as the saying goes, a loss is a blessing; as long as you, Auntie, can rest easy and recover your health, that is the greatest joy for us.

Hearing him say this, Liu Yiyan's mother thought this child was truly a kind-hearted person, upright in appearance, considerate to others, and both gentle and sensible. She then said, "Our Yanyan being able to find a fine person like you is a blessing she cultivated over three lifetimes," and then glared at Liu Yiyan, who was still eating an orange on the windowsill: "Look at this child, compared to you, Little Xu, she is far behind. She doesn't understand social graces at all. Why don't you come over here yet?"

Liu Yiyan was stunned. She thought to herself, what does this have to do with me? I was already consciously keeping my mouth shut to let Xu Heng handle it alone; why do you have to drag me into this, Mother? If I open my mouth, won't I expose the lie Xu Heng just made up in seconds?

"Come here."

Liu Yiyan's mother urged her again. Only then did Liu Yiyan let out an "oh" and slowly shuffled to her mother's bedside.

"Yanyan, you aren't young anymore this year."

"Mom, I'm only twenty."

"So what if you're twenty? When I was twenty, I was already married."

"That was your generation..."

After being glared at by her mother again, Liu Yiyan shut her mouth in frustration and didn't continue to argue with her.

Liu Yiyan's mother earnestly said, "Yanyan, you are twenty this year, a grown young woman. I think Little Xu is quite good. If you both don't mind, once my health improves, our two families should meet up and get you engaged. It won't be too late to get married after you graduate from university."

"Ah?"

"What are you 'ah-ing' about? You're not happy about it, are you?"

No, my dear mother, the key is that this marriage isn't something we can just decide on our own!

Liu Yiyan subconsciously glanced at Xu Heng. Xu Heng still had that same smiling expression on his face, without any change.

"No problem, Auntie. After you are discharged from the hospital, I will have my parents meet with you, and we can discuss this matter then."

With Xu Heng saying this, Liu Yiyan's mother felt very relieved, thinking this child was truly excellent, much more capable of handling things than her own daughter.

After leaving the hospital, Liu Yiyan still asked in confusion, "Hubby, why didn't you refuse my mom just now? Her request was too unreasonable. Who gets engaged at twenty? And this relationship between us..."

Xu Heng shook his head and said, "The elderly person hasn't fully recovered yet and shouldn't be agitated or anxious. At the very least, on the surface, we must give her peace of mind to keep her stable. We can talk about later things later. Who knows, maybe we'll 'break up' after she recovers her health? It's the twenty-first century; who dictates that dating must lead to marriage, right?"

"Oh." Liu Yiyan felt that what Xu Heng said made some sense, but hearing that even the engagement was a lie to her mother, she couldn't help but feel a bit disappointed. After all, she wasn't really Xu Heng's girlfriend, and she wasn't qualified to interfere with him too much.

"Hungry, right? We've been running around all morning. I'll take you to eat." Xu Heng patted her little head and said with a smile.

Although a girl's thoughts are hard to guess, Liu Yiyan was relatively simple-minded, especially in front of him; she wore every emotion on her face, which allowed Xu Heng to guess what she was thinking just by looking at her facial changes.

It was nothing more than her having developed a bit of affection for him and wanting to make it official, but that was impossible. Xu Heng had never considered marriage in this life.

Being a single, wealthy bachelor and keeping a few little lovers—isn't that much more free and easy than being tied down by marriage?

Xinhua Chuang is not yet called Xinhua Chuang, but Huali Technology; currently, Xinhua Chuang is just a branch under the Huali Technology Group.

It wasn't until a few years later, when it became independent, that it changed its name to Xinhua Chuang Culture.

The main responsibility of this department within Huali was to introduce globally famous IP characters to the mainland. Relying on the copyright of Tiga, it did indeed have a glorious period at Huali Technology. Unfortunately, Xinhua Chuang had no idea how to use the Ultraman IP to make money. Its leaders never thought about how to monetize the Ultraman IP, merely imitating the methods of the Ancient Island Country, holding some suit-actor performances and selling some figurines.

But the Ancient side was currently mired in a serious financial crisis, reaching the point of bankruptcy. How much money could Xinhua Chuang make by imitating the path of this bankrupt predecessor?

Fortunately, Xinhua Chuang had the Huali Technology mountain to lean on, which allowed it to barely keep operating. Once the Ancient side was acquired by Tsuburaya and began producing the New Generation series, the Ultraman IP finally regained some vitality, giving Xinhua Chuang a chance to rise again.

Unfortunately, this year is 2007, and the Xinhua Chuang branch is already spending more than it earns, desperate to profit from its licensed IP, even if it means selling at a loss, otherwise Huali Technology might very well have cut this department this year.

Xu Heng's arrival at this moment was like a divine soldier descending from heaven, a benefactor sent by the Jade Emperor to save them.

For an Ultraman IP copyright that everyone at Xinhua Chuang considered to be in its twilight years, Xu Heng was actually willing to pay one million to buy the sub-licensing rights.

Sub-licensing refers to obtaining the formal rights to sell Ultraman merchandise and other profit-making methods, and most crucially, Xinhua Chuang's own copyright for Ultraman only had a dozen or so years left.

Spending one million to buy a sub-license for an IP that couldn't make money at all—this person must have something wrong with his brain!

You have to know, although Ultraman was the childhood of a generation, in the eyes of many people now, it had become synonymous with being childish. In the country, the only Ultraman people cared about were Tiga and a few others; they didn't believe that this kind of children's IP could make money.

In the eyes of this group of people, children's pockets were pitifully empty, and their spending power was far inferior to that of adult men and women.

To this, Xu Heng could only sneer with disdain.

In later generations, if you picked a passerby off the street, they would know how terrifying children's spending power was. Examples of people giving large tips to streamers or being obsessed with spending hundreds of thousands on game top-ups were countless.

Of course, one couldn't blame the short-sightedness of these few people at Xinhua Chuang; after all, Xu Heng was a reborn person who knew the world's changes over the next decade or more, and ordinary people could hardly possess his powerful ability to foresee the future.