Chapter Fifty-Six: The Power of the Naval Forces

Something was definitely wrong. In his previous life, his parents had only been laid off at the end of this year. Now, after being reborn, he had changed the course of his own college entrance exam, affected the development of the Stone Age plug-in, and to some extent, altered the trajectories of Chen Wan and Zhao Kang. But as far as he could recall, he hadn’t done anything that would have influenced his parents’ positions at the Xiling Coal Mine.

Yet the fact that the Xiling Coal Mine leadership had suddenly decided to lay off his parents at this point in time was suspicious, and the problem was undoubtedly connected to him. But how, exactly, had he managed to affect the mine’s leadership?

Could it be that word had gotten out about him helping Zhao Kang make money, and someone at the mine had grown envious?

After a moment’s thought, Li Mu dismissed this idea; the likelihood was slim, almost nonexistent. Zhao Kang’s parents weren’t fools—everyone knows to keep quiet when making money. His parents wouldn’t be careless enough to blab everywhere about how much their son had earned with Li Mu’s help.

If it wasn’t that, then what was the cause?

Though the outcome was what Li Mu had hoped for, he couldn’t shake the feeling that something was off. He wanted to understand what had altered his parents’ original path.

Suddenly, the slick, oily face of a man flashed through his mind.

Guo Yuhang!

Other than him, Li Mu couldn’t think of any explanation that satisfied him.

With this realization, Li Mu’s expression grew dark and foreboding. Guo Yuhang, in order to take revenge on him, had targeted his parents as a way to get to him. This infuriated Li Mu.

Guo Yuhang, from this day forward, our feud is truly sealed. From now on, nothing from Xiling Coal Mine will ever be able to interfere with my family again. I’d like to see just how much you’re capable of!

For now, his parents were taking him to visit his grandparents in the countryside, so Li Mu suppressed his anger, deciding to wait until they returned to confront Guo Yuhang.

He figured that, with summer approaching, he’d have plenty of opportunities to run into Guo Yuhang at the driving school.

…

After lunch, Li Mu went out with his parents, withdrew some cash, bought some gifts, and then headed to the bus station. They took a long-distance bus to his grandparents’ home, nearly a hundred kilometers from Haizhou.

Unlike the tension and underlying discord in his mother’s family, his father’s side was refreshingly simple. There was no sense of competition among relatives; the affection was genuine and uncomplicated. His grandparents, uncles, and aunts all gathered together, filling the house with lively cheer. His parents switched off their phones and spent two carefree days in the countryside.

The day before they returned from the village, Li Mu received a notice from Metersbonwe’s headquarters: his application for cooperation had passed review. What he needed to do next was to go to the main office in person, sign the contract, and after paying a small deposit and procedural fee, he could begin renovations.

All franchise store renovations in South Su Province were handled by a company appointed by the provincial agent—a form of disguised monopoly. However, this arrangement had its advantages: the designated renovation company was trustworthy, familiar with headquarters’ standards, and capable of fast, high-quality work.

That same day, Zhao Kang called Li Mu. He was still in Beijing, but over the past two days, through various connections and efforts at networking, he’d managed to befriend quite a few content editors from major web portals—some even at the chief editor level.

On the phone, Zhao Kang said he’d spent over ten thousand yuan on public relations, buying more than a dozen MP3 players, each costing around a thousand yuan, as gifts for the media people.

Li Mu was curious and asked, “What made you think to give out MP3s?”

Zhao Kang replied honestly, “I figured these are all internet people, so they’re bound to be interested in electronics. They all have phones, but MP3s cost about the same as a phone and most probably wouldn’t have splurged on one for themselves. So I decided to give those out.”

He added, “They all really liked them—basically can’t put them down.”

Li Mu appreciated Zhao Kang’s insight and said with a laugh, “Great choice. Just make sure they actually follow through after accepting the gifts.”

“Don’t worry,” Zhao Kang replied. “I know what I’m doing. I won’t drop the ball.”

“Okay,” Li Mu asked, “When are you coming back?”

“Tomorrow!” Zhao Kang said. “Morning flight. By the way, I forgot to mention, flying feels fucking amazing!”

“In the future, you’ll get to fly so much you’ll be sick of it!”

While Zhao Kang was in Beijing these two days, his hired internet promoters had already started hyping up Simple Plan band on all the major provincial websites.

Photos of Zhang Kexuan were being frantically circulated through every major forum in Jinling, especially at Jinling University. At the preliminary round, Zhang Kexuan had captured the hearts of many female students in the audience, and when his handsome photos appeared on the university’s forum, the response was explosive.

Someone even leaked Zhang Kexuan’s identity and the rehearsal address of Simple Plan’s band. As a result, Zhang Kexuan got a real taste of what it felt like to be a celebrity.

He called Li Mu, sounding as if he was complaining, “Brother Mu, could you please rein in your team? If this keeps up, I really can’t take it anymore!”

Li Mu, savoring a freshly picked, sweet, sand-fleshed watermelon at his grandparents’ house, asked between bites, “What’s going on?”

Zhang Kexuan sighed, “Every day there’s a bunch of female college students crowding outside our rehearsal room, asking for autographs and photos whenever I step out. Even when I walk down the street, people recognize me. It’s driving me crazy.”

Li Mu nodded. It seemed Zhao Kang’s online promoters were indeed formidable—or perhaps, netizens of this era were just highly susceptible to hype.

Li Mu asked, “Has the TV station aired the show yet?”

“Not yet,” Zhang Kexuan replied. “They have to edit it first. There were over fifty bands in the preliminaries, but only eight made it through. I heard from an inside source that the provincial station leadership doesn’t want to allocate too much airtime to a program like this, so they’re limiting it to an hour and a half. That means only about a dozen bands will make it into the broadcast.”

“When exactly will it air?” Li Mu asked.

“Tomorrow night.”

Li Mu chuckled, “Once it airs, you’ll be even more famous. By the way, make sure you find someone to help get the station to edit together the full performance of your band. With the four of you, I’m sure that’s no problem, right?”

“No problem at all!” Zhang Kexuan agreed readily.

Li Mu laughed, “I don’t think you’re worried at all. You’re probably thrilled about all this, aren’t you?”

“Hey, I am not!” Zhang Kexuan blurted.

“Liar!” Li Mu scoffed. “We’ll need to spend more on publicity going forward. I’ve already sent someone to Beijing to help you guys with networking. Once the show airs, I’ll have people help with the promotion, and once YiTing goes live, we’ll upload your videos there. The only issue is, I’m still short on technical staff…”

Zhang Kexuan quickly said, “Didn’t you ask Tianming to find you an office space? It’s all set—just waiting for you to check it out. Also, we’ve been collecting resumes just like you asked. We’ve got a good pile already, just waiting for you to review them! We should strike while the iron’s hot—whatever money or resources you need, just say the word!”

Li Mu was delighted. “Alright, I’ll be heading to Wencheng in a couple of days. When I’m back, I’ll stop by Jinling to see you all first!”

After hanging up, Li Mu felt deeply satisfied. With office space and technical staff, the launch of YiTing was just around the corner. By leveraging the buzz he’d helped Simple Plan build up, once YiTing launched, he’d have Zhang Kexuan and the band record official versions of “Li Bai” and “Sunflower,” upload them to YiTing, and have the internet promoters tie YiTing and Simple Plan together in their publicity. That way, YiTing would have a guaranteed source of initial traffic.

The sugary watermelon juice was already making his cheeks sticky, but Li Mu had no time to care. His mind was awash with plans, and to his delight, everything was progressing at a rapid and steady pace—exactly as he’d hoped.

——

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