Even though he said that, Zhuang Hongyi still motioned for the young assistant beside him to come closer. He whispered a few words in her ear, and then the young assistant nodded before turning and leaving.
The somewhat empty restaurant once again fell into an eerie silence.
Xiao He wasn't very comfortable with such overly serious occasions, so he could only continue pretending to be calm while looking straight ahead.
Fortunately, the young assistant returned quickly.
"Here."
The young assistant handed over... a comic book?
Xiao He looked quite surprised at the brightly colored comic book cover in the assistant's hand. While maintaining a neutral expression, he accepted the comic book with curiosity in his heart.
He never expected it to be a comic book!
And the one in his hand was only the first volume.
Xiao He glanced at Sister Liu and noticed that she was also examining the book's cover from front to back.
"This is a new project I invested in recently," Zhuang Hongyi said softly. "Just like 'The Phantom Thief Alliance,' if the broadcast performance is good, I plan to make it into a series. However, this one is a drama adaptation of a comic."
A comic adaptation drama?
Xiao He's mind instinctively flashed through several comic adaptation dramas he remembered that had failed spectacularly.
Although there had been some good quality ones recently, their reputation and revenue weren't proportional, ultimately resulting in losses.
Because of these consecutive failures, many people in the industry were now taking a wait-and-see attitude toward comic adaptation dramas.
Of course, with novel IP adaptations for TV dramas and movies already becoming extremely popular, and original scripts being scarce domestically, regardless of whether original fans were willing to accept it, the market situation was clear. Almost all capital was rushing to pursue IP adaptations, and for actors to receive scripts for such major IP adaptations was considered a reflection of their capability.
Although comic adaptation dramas were currently in a low development period, it was only a matter of time before capital moved toward comic adaptation dramas... The question was just who would accurately take the first bite of this cake.
Xiao He's gaze fell on the name of the comic book—
"Yu Ye"
Yu Ye? What a strange name—it was impossible to imagine the specific content and theme.
Xiao He didn't usually read comics and wasn't very familiar with this particular one. However, Liu Rulan seemed to have some impression after seeing the comic's name: "So it's 'Yu Ye'! I'd heard before that 'Yu Ye's' copyright was bought at a high price—turns out it was you, Director Zhuang."
Zhuang Hongyi cleared his throat lightly: "I think this comic has quite a bit of potential. If it can be filmed, it would definitely be a good investment."
Although Zhuang Hongyi was currently working as a director, he was also a well-known investor in the industry—the kind who had capital backing and didn't lack money, as evidenced by this villa.
Usually, Zhuang Hongyi worked both as a director and participated in investments and supervision of many other works. This was also why he dared to attempt series films—because he himself was the capital and had the ability to cover his own losses. Even if the first "The Phantom Thief Alliance" wasn't ideal, he could continue pushing forward with new installments on his own—that's how capricious having money could be.
Of course, as a businessman, he also had his own considerations.
For newcomers like Xiao He, Zhuang Hongyi had already seen Xiao He's potential in advance and was quite willing to establish ties with such newcomers early.
After all, he planned to work on series projects that would take a long time with extended spans. It was possible that Xiao He, who was currently just a newcomer with a few minutes of screen time in a cameo, might become the male lead of other works in a few years.
By then, inviting Xiao He to play these roles would require much greater costs.
Establishing ties with Xiao He in advance, even if contracts needed to be changed later, would definitely be more convenient than signing separate contracts down the line.
Otherwise, Zhuang Hongyi wouldn't have agreed to other investors submitting Xiao He's resume, especially since he himself was one of the investors.
Liu Rulan nodded in agreement with Zhuang Hongyi's words: "It's quite good. 'Yu Ye' has generated a lot of discussion over the years. If it can be adapted for screen, it will definitely attract significant traffic."
But similarly, there were high risks if the adaptation wasn't done well.
Nine out of ten such scripts failed, with the tenth one failing spectacularly.
To be honest, if actors took on such roles, it would be quite hot to handle.
Meanwhile, Xiao He wasn't considering so many problems. He looked at the obviously well-read comic book in his hand, secretly observed Zhuang Hongyi for a moment, and seemed thoughtful.
Then Xiao He lowered his head, covering his mouth with his fist while lightly coughing to conceal his smile.
He vaguely guessed one thing—
Perhaps Director Zhuang genuinely liked this comic and that's why he bought the screen adaptation rights.
First Computer collections, now true love for comics... Xiao He felt that if his guess wasn't wrong—
Could this Director Zhuang be an otaku?
Zhuang Hongyi didn't know that his "hidden" attribute had been discovered and was still talking with Liu Rulan: "I think Xiao He would be very suitable for the villain role in this. However, I'm only serving as the supervisor for this drama. Casting matters still need to go through the director's confirmation. If you're interested, I can help recommend you."
Such recommendations were practically equivalent to internal confirmation.
Liu Rulan immediately nodded: "Is that so? Then we're really grateful to Director Zhuang!"
Xiao He collected his thoughts and began roughly flipping through the comic book in his hand.
The comic had a classic black-and-white art style. Xiao He couldn't really distinguish the differences in drawing forms and techniques, only feeling that the character and background lines were quite clean, making it very comfortable to look at.
The story took place in a fictional modern setting, but it opened in ancient times during a certain dynasty. The emperor, pursuing immortality, dispatched a group of alchemists to sea to search for the legendary secret method of eternal life.
These alchemists were ordered to set sail and spent over forty years at sea, eventually actually bringing back a treasure—a meteorite from beyond the sky that emitted a strange fragrance.
It was said that consuming elixirs refined from its fragments could grant immortality.
However, the alchemists returned at an inopportune time. The emperor who had sent them had already passed away, and the new emperor despised these alchemical arts, paying no attention to the alchemists and directly drove them out.
Being able to persist in searching for the immortality treasure for over forty years indicated that these alchemists weren't normal people either. They themselves were obsessed with immortality techniques. Even after being driven out by the new emperor, they didn't give up their research on immortality. So these madmen secretly captured a group of test subjects and began continuing their immortality research deep in the mountains.
But what these alchemists didn't expect was that the meteorite could also cause physical mutations in people, granting them special abilities beyond ordinary humans.
After the test subjects acquired these abilities, they suddenly rose up collectively one day, killing all the alchemists in retaliation and successfully escaping.
Later events proved that these surviving test subjects did indeed possess the ability to slow aging, but this didn't mean they wouldn't age at all. In fact, from a certain perspective, their aging period would be dozens of times longer than that of ordinary people.
At the same time, their superhuman abilities would gradually disappear over time until they eventually became completely ordinary elderly people—
This also meant that their later years would be extremely painful, transitioning from powerful individuals with special abilities to completely ordinary people, then continuing to live for the next hundred years in a frail elderly state until finally reaching natural death—due to their body's uniqueness, ordinary injuries couldn't harm them, and they couldn't easily die either.
Thus time passed, seas changed into mulberry fields...
By the time modern society arrived, the remaining surviving test subjects had all become frail elderly people, becoming completely ordinary old folks calmly awaiting death. But simultaneously, with technological advancement, some people began uncovering the secrets of the test subjects' longevity, and among the remaining survivors, a life-and-death struggle testing human nature began...