I'm a sophomore in college, what the heck is this "male god cultivation system"?

Chapter 140 Aunt's Troubles

The Western restaurant that Shen Shulan chose was very nice. It was decorated in a grand style, brightly lit, and had soothing light music playing in the room.

Chen Yan does like eating steak, but he usually eats it medium-rare, occasionally tries medium-well, and can't stand it if it's any rarer.

This time, he ordered a medium-rare Australian sirloin steak, while Shen Shulan ordered a medium-rare Angus filet mignon.

In addition to the two main courses, there are side dishes such as Caesar salad, cream of mushroom soup, pan-fried French chicken leg, Musang King durian pizza, garlic mashed potatoes, and French fries.

The restaurant served the food quite quickly, bringing out the dishes one by one in no time.

Chen Yan's first focus was naturally on the Australian sirloin steak placed in front of him. The brown steak was coated with classic black pepper sauce and emitted a hot, fragrant aroma.

Chen Yan was a person with a strong appetite, and he was really hungry at the moment. As soon as the aroma entered his nostrils, he could no longer suppress the feeling of hunger.

Soon, he picked up his knife and fork and eagerly cut the steak into small pieces.

Of course, neither he nor Shen Shulan were the kind of people who believed in "not talking while eating," and they maintained a conversational attitude while eating.

Chen Yan mostly remained a listener, offering timely responses and occasionally expanding on Shen Shulan's topics.

The atmosphere during the meal was quite harmonious.

However, a sudden phone call slightly disrupted this harmonious atmosphere.

"Excuse me, I need to take this call." Shen Shulan gestured to pause the conversation and said softly, "I need to take this call."

After saying that, she answered the phone.

With the blessing of the Pure Yang Body, Chen Yan's five senses became much more acute, and as he listened attentively, the voice on the other end of the phone clearly reached his ears.

As the voice on the other end of the phone rang, Shen Shulan's relaxed expression gradually turned serious, and her brows furrowed tightly.

When she spoke, Chen Yan could even sense the dissatisfaction and anger hidden beneath her seemingly calm tone.

"Okay, I understand the situation."

"For now, we should try our best to maintain contact with her, find a way to keep her calm, and delay her cooperation with the competitor as much as possible."

"Then we'll find new partners as quickly as possible, and we can increase the budget a little."

"Too late? Then act as fast as you can, it's better than watching the other side get there first!"

……

Through their conversation, Chen Yan gained a fairly good understanding of the whole situation.

To summarize briefly, Shen Shulan's Jinxiu Clothing recently launched a new outfit and hired a second or third-tier celebrity to promote it.

Originally, after several rounds of negotiations with the other party's agency, although there were some setbacks along the way, the overall direction was going smoothly.

Just when the negotiation process was over and all that was left was to sign the contract, the other party's brokerage company suddenly started to give the cold shoulder and then began to flirt with a competing company.

Shen Shulan was now fully aware that she was being used as a "horse while riding a donkey" by the other party. To be fair, the conditions she offered were already quite good, even higher than the market price.

She tried to win people's hearts with sincerity, but ended up being tricked like this. Shen Shulan was in a bad mood, but after so much experience in the business world, her professionalism was still quite good.

She immediately suppressed her emotions and quickly came up with several solutions.

However, as things stand, she is more than a step behind her competitors. Having lost the initiative, even if she moves quickly afterward, she can only try to minimize unnecessary losses.

At the same time, Chen Yan suddenly felt a stirring in his heart...

Perhaps this could be considered a good opportunity?

Perhaps sensing Chen Yan's thoughts, the system also sounded at just the right moment.

[Faced with a beautiful older woman who is losing in a business battle, do you see this as a good opportunity for yourself? What would you choose?]

Option 1: Take decisive action and strive for a successful business partnership with Shen Shulan.

[Reward: Video Peak Popularity Card (Special Item)]

Option Two: Forget about business, but you feel you can use this opportunity to comfort the other person and strengthen your relationship.

[Reward: Charisma (Pretty Boy)]

[Option 3: What does her troubles have to do with me? You choose to pretend nothing happened and let everything proceed as planned.]

[Reward: Random Master-level Common Skill]

……

Without much thought, Chen Yan subconsciously eliminated options two and three.

On the one hand, he already had the idea of ​​engaging in business cooperation; on the other hand, the rewards of the remaining two options were simply not enough to tempt him.

What good is a pretty boy's charm? Maybe it's effective at attracting some rich women, but Chen Yan doesn't think he needs something like that right now, which is clearly more harmful than beneficial.

As for the Master-level skill reward in option three, it is indeed very tempting, but the probability of drawing a weak ability is just too high.

If I were to draw a Master-level helicopter pilot skill, what use would that skill be in everyday life?

We can't exactly fly a plane for the jailer, can we?

After confirming his thoughts, Chen Yan decisively took action.

After mentally organizing his thoughts, Chen Yan looked at Shen Shulan's calm yet slightly grave expression and said:

"Sister Shulan, did your business partner stand you up?"

Shen Shulan wasn't in a very good mood at the moment, but she had long since developed the ability to control her emotions, and looking at Chen Yan's face, she really couldn't get angry.

She nodded and said frankly, "I was taken advantage of by my business partner who was using me as a stepping stone. I was careless this time, and I'll just consider it a lesson learned."

At first, Shen Shulan thought the other person was just trying to comfort her, but when Chen Yan said his second sentence, she immediately realized that something was wrong.

“I think if Sister Shulan wants to find a new partner, there’s no need to choose a celebrity.” Chen Yan looked at Shen Shulan and said seriously, “Internet celebrities are actually a good choice. With the development of music, they also have a considerable influence among young people, and Jinxiu Clothing’s target market should also be young people.”

Shen Shulan looked at Chen Yan and could clearly feel the courage of a "newborn calf not afraid of tigers" and the determination and ambition to seize the opportunity.

But she still misunderstood...

'Could it be that Xiaoyan is an internet celebrity and you'd like to try collaborating with her?'

Although she had a good feeling about Chen Yan, Shen Shulan's rationality told her that the success rate of doing so was not high. Just as she was about to refuse, she saw Chen Yan take out a piece of noodles from his pocket and hand it to her.

"Hello Ms. Shen, let me reintroduce myself. I am Chen Yan, Chairman of Hengxing Media." Chen Yan handed over his business card and introduced himself, "Our agency has many internet celebrities with over a million followers. Chocolate, who recently became a sensation with his hip-shaking dance, was also personally cultivated and sponsored by our agency."

Shen Shulan was taken aback, and subconsciously took the business card.

She hadn't heard of [Hengxing Media] before, but she had seen the viral twerking dance trend from a while back and numerous fan-made videos of it. If they could cultivate an internet celebrity like Chocolate in such a short time and provide this kind of phenomenal marketing, then perhaps a collaboration was worth considering.

Shen Shulan was already very tempted, but what hadn't made her make a final decision was that there were very few cases of internet celebrities helping with promotion.

At this point in time, very few apparel companies would choose to collaborate with online influencers, and those that do often fail to achieve sufficient results.

Just then, the system notification sounded in Chen Yan's mind again.

[Congratulations, host, for completing option one. Rewards are being distributed.]

Chen Yan was taken aback. He hadn't even reached a cooperation agreement with Shen Shulan yet, so how did the system show that the option was completed?

Could it be a bug?
With this question in mind, Chen Yan looked at option one again before he realized what was going on.

The option only requires Chen Yan to try his best to seek cooperation, not to achieve cooperation... In other words, the system does not value the results, but only the attitude.

Honestly, all I want is your attitude.

"What a wonderful system!" Chen Yan exclaimed inwardly, then quickly began to examine the specific functions of this item.

【Name: Video Peak Popularity Card】

[Category: Special Item]

[Introduction: Using this card allows any video you create to achieve the same level of popularity as a random video from an influencer within the organization.]

[Category: This is a card that can make any video go viral.]

Looking at the system's description of the [Video Peak Popularity Card], Chen Yan felt a surge of excitement, and his confidence grew even stronger.

Using this card, he can make any video achieve the same level of popularity as the twerking dance...

This is enough for him to cultivate another phenomenal internet celebrity.

Moreover, Chen Yan already had a very good idea, but he hadn't been confident enough about it before.

Now that he has this prop, he feels more confident.

……

Seeing that Shen Shulan still had some hesitation on her face, Chen Yan decided to deliver another heavy blow.

“I know Sister Shulan isn’t entirely sure about our organization’s capabilities, so how about this…” Chen Yan paused for a moment, then said, “We can sign a performance-based agreement.”

"A performance-based agreement? Please explain in detail."

"If the video gets less than 1 million likes, I won't charge a penny. But if it gets more than 1 million likes, I'll charge 500,000 for filming and 100,000 for the influencer appearance fee... and then for every additional 1 million likes, the filming fee and appearance fee will increase proportionally."

"Once the number of likes exceeds five million, the filming fee will increase by one million for every additional one million likes."

Shen Shulan had always thought she had developed a resistance to Chen Yan's words, but when he said those words, an uncontrollable look of surprise appeared on Shen Shulan's face.

The fee only starts after a million likes... and for a video to reach a million likes, it needs at least several million or even tens of millions of views.

When Shen Shulan asked that second-tier celebrity to shoot a promotional video, she quoted 250 million yuan, but at most she could only hope that the video would get more than a million likes.

Now they're asking for millions of likes and then starting to charge...

Shen Shulan didn't even need to calculate to know that she was definitely making a profit... Even if Chen Yan was just exaggerating, she wouldn't suffer any loss.

Guaranteed minimum profit or loss, maximum profit or loss uncertain...

"Do you know that this kind of performance-based contract could very well leave you with absolutely nothing?"

She looked at Chen Yan and said seriously.

"I know." Chen Yan nodded, his face still bearing that spirited smile, "but I have enough confidence in my abilities."

"Okay, can we come to Jinxiu Clothing at 10 a.m. tomorrow?"

"it is good."

……

Back at the photo studio, Chen Yan quickly browsed the list of signed online celebrities and soon found the one he was looking for.

That's right, this time he doesn't plan to have Chocolate film it again.

The first reason is that he had seen the outfits for this photoshoot—a white shirt and an office lady skirt suit—which did not fit his current image of chocolate.

Secondly, the popularity of the "hip-shaking dance" and "duro dance" hasn't been fully digested by Chocolate yet, so there's really no need to give her another viral video at this point.

In a cultivation novel, this would mean that the protagonist hasn't fully digested two top-tier pills before receiving another top-tier pill. Although this would greatly enhance his strength, it would undoubtedly be a waste.

Thirdly, Chen Yan has always believed in "not putting all your eggs in one basket." While Chocolate now idolizes him and will carry out his orders without hesitation,

However, simply throwing all sorts of resources at the other party will only make them more and more arrogant, and eventually they may even think, "I can do it myself."

This cannot be considered a moral issue; it simply reflects human nature.

Looking at the photo of the beautiful woman with an oval face on the list, Chen Yan breathed a sigh of relief and then sent her a message.

[Chen Yan: Come to the photo studio at nine o'clock tomorrow morning. I've prepared a shooting plan for you.]

Chen Yan received a reply less than three seconds after the message was sent.

……

Chen Yan had already prepared for the new filming plan.

In the "Dream Inspiration" series, Daigula K's hip-shaking dance is undoubtedly a phenomenal video, but there are others who are even more popular.

Although Chen Yan still doesn't understand why that video became so popular, that doesn't stop him from being a "plagiarist" and stealing the idea.

As for the object of plagiarism, it was naturally the biggest dark horse of 18 – hand gesture dance.

With this video, internet celebrity Wen Wan went from an ordinary person to a multi-millionaire in just seven days, with a single video receiving over 2600 million likes.

After becoming an overnight sensation, the other party received an advertising endorsement offer of 300 million yuan.

If it weren't for the rapid exposure of her various scandals after she became famous, resulting in her account being permanently banned, she probably could have made enough money to last several lifetimes in those two years.

Even so, after she registered a new account and transformed into a fashion blogger on Weibo, her number of followers stabilized at the million level, which is enough to show how popular the hand gesture dance was back then.

(I'm still not feeling well, so I'll take one more day off. I won't be taking any more days off this month, and I'll be working at least 8 hours a day.)

(End of this chapter)