Chapter 422: Without Desire, Without Want

After the two of them finished handling the paperwork, the basic matters were done; they just needed to visit relatives—Fang Hong's uncles, elder uncles, aunts, and so on.

There were also Xu Liyun's side of the family—her maternal grandparents had passed, so they visited relatives like her maternal uncle.

Of course, they brought gifts each time.

It all looked harmonious and everyone seemed warm and welcoming, but in truth the feelings weren't all that deep—after all, they hadn't seen each other in so many years.

Among them were some relatives who hadn't done well and wanted to be brought along; Fang Hong brushed them off with the excuse that business hadn't been going smoothly.

It wasn't that he was unwilling to bring them, but that it was hard to arrange—give them a good position and they couldn't handle it; give them a bad one and they'd call him an ungrateful wretch, saying he refused to offer good treatment.

Human greed can never be satisfied—no need to get into that.

When Fang Hong and Liu Tianxian returned to their hometown, there were indeed some rumors online—someone leaked news of the two of them being in their hometown, but the posts were deleted or suppressed.

All because Fang Hong paid fifty million a year in "protection fees," which went to Yatu artists, and incidentally helped suppress his personal information as well.

As long as the parties involved didn't choose to leak private news themselves, those media and social platforms would help throttle or delete the posts.

But if the people themselves chose to leak it, the platforms would let go and let public opinion ferment—for example, there's no longer any news about Fang Hong's mother online now, though there used to be.

It's been almost completely scrubbed clean.

Of course, when it can't stir up public opinion, the rumors still exist—some say Liu Tianxian went back to the hometown with Fang Hong, some say the two got married; it can't be completely hidden.

And these rumors only exist on niche platforms like QQ groups or Zhihu; on mainstream platforms there's still nothing.

And recently the entertainment circle had a big melon right at the start of the year—first, Da Mimi and Liu Kaiwei held their wedding in Bali and even produced their "crystallization."

It hung on the hot search rankings for several days.

After that, Chen Sicheng and Yaya were getting married on the 16th of this month, and they invited Fang Hong and Liu Tianxian, but the two didn't have time and politely declined—a gift would suffice.

Liu Tianxian wasn't close with them; if Fang Hong didn't go, she wouldn't go either.

Also, Ai Dajin successfully lost weight and divorced his wife 19 years his junior, posting that they respected each other; Kong Lingfei couldn't last 40 minutes as a "soft" man; Qi Qing became a dad.

This year is the year the Traffic Era begins—many big melons will come one after another, every year.

Apart from these, the film circle remained lively—every faction was still calling the others idiots, the audience was also calling the filmmakers idiots, and the Scholars were also calling the films idiots.

In any case, they were bad films, rotten enough to anger gods and men alike.

No matter how much people cursed, it couldn't stop the further prosperity of the film market.

After about a month in theaters, Beijing Love Story's total box office was 406 million.

Since this film had no China Film Group share, only Yatu and Tu Piaopiao needed to split it.

That is, out of 406 million, after deducting the theater chains and tax funds, 36.7% remained as share; Tu Piaopiao takes 5% distribution share, meaning Tu Piaopiao gets about 20 million.

The remaining 31.7% goes to Yatu—128 million—after deducting the 30 million production investment.

That leaves about 98.7 million in profit to distribute; director Chen Sicheng takes 5%, receiving 4.93 million in profit.

This is what he gets after tax; on top of that is the director's fee—in other words, he earned several million from one film.

That's equivalent to the income of a top-tier director.

Love Story was fully funded by Yatu, the production team was also Yatu's, and the Producer was also a Yatu Producer.

This film was his own screenplay, so Yatu's screenwriting team couldn't enjoy the profit share.

And the production team wasn't all that professional either; many people couldn't enjoy the profit share.

So the company had complaints, and even those who could get a share had complaints—they wanted to make films with quick returns, like Dad Where Are We Going.

They didn't want to produce something like Gravity, with a cycle of several years and no profit.

In any case, the profit-sharing method Fang Hong set up back then was extremely unreasonable, but recently there'd been rumors that the Principal was going to redistribute it.

That is, redistribute through an Option Pool—selling it to them at one yuan, letting everyone share in the company's overall earnings.

No matter who shoots what film, what show, who writes what script—as long as you buy the company's options, you get yearly earnings.

This method had its supporters and its opponents.

The supporters were those who hadn't gotten a share—equivalent to a redistribution; the opponents were those who already had a share—they felt uncertainty about the future.

In any case, there were pros and cons. Fang Hong had Chen Zhixi leak the news—not to hear their opinions, but to give them time to mentally prepare.

He didn't need to hear opinions; if something was unreasonable, he'd fix it—that's the benefit of being a dictator.

Other films—The Four 2 barely broke 130 million, about 40 million less than the previous life.

And this film also became a black mark on Liu Tianxian's record—the audience roasted her to death.

Those films—No Man's Land barely broke 200 million; Storm broke 250 million—both a bit less than the previous life; nothing to be done, in this life there's a troublemaker like Yatu.

The Dad Where Are We Going variety show's twelve episodes had finished airing, and the film had been in theaters for about 20 days, with total box office exceeding 680 million.

There's not much box office left now—at most a million or so a day; whether it breaks 700 million is up to fate.

And Personal Tailor wasn't bad either, at 520 million—sure, it was a money-grab, but at least it was a film, and it's still pulling in five or six million.

Damn, making this much money and Feng Kuzi still picks fights with Fang Hong, calling him a Nazi.

The "Nazi" label is basically stuck to Fang Hong's forehead now.

Who's the one labeling people, calling them "money-grabbing"?

But Fang Hong is different from Feng Kuzi—Fang Hong doesn't step onto the front stage, while Feng Kuzi has to be on the front stage.

Besides these, Moonlight, which had been screening in the United States for several months, was still playing and still pulling in several hundred thousand dollars a day—amazingly resilient.

Mainly because this film had applied for the Oscars and gotten nominated, becoming a hot Oscar contender.

All the major newspapers and national ideologies were promoting this film.

Of course Yu Xian didn't show his face—Fang Hong wouldn't let him appear, telling him not to get involved in this kind of ideological issue.

Even if it won an award, don't say much—his skin color was too sensitive, and Universal also helped keep him hidden.

This left Yu Xian very depressed—the Oscars were the Oscars, but it seemed to have nothing to do with him; he might as well not have shot it.

Fang Hong gave him another script—Birdman—telling him to slowly shoot this film, slowly mull it over, no rush.

And Moonlight's box office had already broken 60 million—in dollars. That is, 15 million for Zhong Jia, not counting costs.

Although this film's box office wasn't high, the copyright fee was extremely high—over a hundred million, in US dollars.

The Zhong family had been saving up for over half a year and had some money again. Their film "Get Out" had finished production, and "Don't Breathe" had also finished filming.

Both films were low-budget; just pick a date and release them.

"The Nun" was still in production, and it was being shot slowly because Fang Hong had drained the Zhong family dry—no money.

And with the copyright fees from multiple films coming in, they were alive again.

On January 10th, after ten busy days, Fang Hong and Liu Tianxian returned to Wuhan once more. Xu Liyun didn't come; she would stay home for two more days, handle some matters, then return to Beijing.

"Ahhhh, finally I can be in a warm room." Liu Tianxian spread her arms in the big suite, ran happily to the bed, and flopped down.

These past few days in the countryside had nearly frozen her to death, made her shiver all over—unforgettable for life.

Finally she could stay in a big hotel like this, in a room with heating.

Fang Hong took the opportunity to press down on top of her. The two faced each other, pouted, and kissed: "Now I can perform properly too."

"Perform what?" Liu Tianxian cupped his face, looking at him.

"Perform my abilities, of course. I think my first performance wasn't good because the weather was too cold." Fang Hong said it with complete seriousness.

"You really know how to make excuses." Liu Tianxian laughed.

"It's the truth. Haven't you heard of thermal expansion and contraction?" Fang Hong said.

"Hehehe!" Liu Tianxian swatted him, unable to hold back her laughter. Thermal expansion and contraction—what a way to shirk responsibility.

Fang Hong lay on his side beside her, one hand propping up his head, the other resting on Liu Tianxian's belly, stroking it: "Feifei, let's start a company together?"

"What kind of company?" Liu Tianxian asked.

"A tech company. We'll hold it jointly." Fang Hong said.

"Don't you already have Chang'e? Why open another tech company?" Liu Tianxian asked, looking at him in confusion.

"It's different. Chang'e is an internet company with internet thinking. The company we open will invest in cutting-edge tech—like advanced manufacturing, quantum computing, AI Big Data, robotics, that kind of thing." Fang Hong said.

It's about infrastructure. Filmmaking, the internet, high-tech—they all need infrastructure.

Liu Tianxian, hearing this would burn through money, shook her head: "Let's not."

"What's wrong? This is my last startup." Fang Hong said.

"Your Chang'e hasn't even gotten on track yet, and now you're doing all this." Liu Tianxian said.

She was content with the status quo, had no great ambitions, so she had zero interest in Fang Hong's messy schemes.

But if he did it, she'd help him; if he hadn't, she'd advise against it—get the current company in order first.

Fang Hong was silent, then got up, took a document from his briefcase, pressed one hand on it: "Feifei, sign this."

"What's this?" Liu Tianxian tilted her head to look, but couldn't see what was written—the words were covered by his hand.

"Don't ask, just sign it." Fang Hong took the pen off the document.

"No, I want to see what it is." Liu Tianxian pried his hand away.

But Fang Hong wouldn't move his hand, holding it down firmly.

"Hey, you want to arm-wrestle me?" Liu Tianxian sat up at once, grabbed his neck, and pinned him down on the bed.

"Holy shit." Fang Hong tried to get up and resist.

Liu Tianxian swung a leg over and straddled him at his chest, pinning him beneath her.

"Move again, I dare you." Liu Tianxian arrogantly smacked the hand covering the document, then picked up the document.

"You're a girl—have some decency, will you? Look at how you're behaving." Fang Hong tried to flip over.

"I've always been like this. Don't move." Liu Tianxian sat steady, tapped his head with the document, then began reading it.

This document was fifty percent of Chang'e's shares.

It was written clearly: Fang Hong voluntarily transferred this fifty percent to Liu Tianxian—it just hadn't taken effect yet, needing her signature.

This made Liu Tianxian pause involuntarily: "Why are you giving this to me?"

"This is my ballast stone. If one day something happens to me, if one day I'm done for, you'll be my last safeguard." Fang Hong's body relaxed.

He had originally wanted to keep it hidden, but since she'd seen it, so be it.

"Don't talk nonsense." Liu Tianxian read the document's contents again, her expression growing serious: "Do I really have to sign it?"

"I don't know if you have to sign it, but keeping it on me is definitely unsafe." Fang Hong said.

Any large company's shareholding structure is very complex—whether ByteDance, Alibaba, or Tencent—the managers all hold shares directly or indirectly through other channels.

Zhang Yiming holds his through a company in Xiamen; Alibaba's Jack Ma holds his through seven companies, directly or indirectly.

And there are too many lessons. How did Dong Ge lose control of JD. com? How did Sina's founder lose control? How did Vanke's Wang lose control?

There were too many examples; Fang Hong was just preparing for a rainy day.

He didn't know any complicated shareholding structures, but giving the shares in his hands to someone he trusted—as long as he and Liu Tianxian didn't speak up, no one outside would know who really owned Chang'e Technology.

This kind of arrangement provides privacy protection.

Everyone knows he's the leader of Chang'e Technology, but who knows who the real owner of Chang'e Technology actually is?

And who would think that Fang Hong gave Chang'e Technology to an actress bathed in the spotlight?

Even if they thought of it, so what? Liu Tianxian was desireless, content with the status quo—trying to fool her would be harder than fooling Fang Hong.

At least Fang Hong had desires and demands, his ambitions swelling!

The hardest people to deal with in this world are the desireless ones. For example, if you lie flat, no one can do anything to you.

(End of chapter)