I created the myth of the Great Old Ones.

Lu Ban's reflection in the mirror showed him a crack in his skin near his throat, resembling the gills of a shark. The crack slowly opened and closed, gradually smoothing out and disappearing as he left the water.

"I can be the champion at holding my breath from now on!"

Lu Ban excitedly said to Lu Ban in the mirror.

Chapter 081 Tens of Millions of Viewers

After taking a shower in the bathroom, Lu Ban checked the empty drain, changed his clothes, and lay down on the bed.

Although the metallic odor had not left any residue, it still lingered.

Lu Ban turned on the music player and fell into a deep sleep to the music from the Spring Festival Gala playlist.

It was four o'clock in the afternoon.

Lu Ban woke up in the sunset. Since encountering the Silent Land, Lu Ban felt that the biggest change in his daily routine was his sleep schedule.

Lu Ban used to go to bed before midnight every night, not leaving fatigue and stress for the next day, and the doctor said he was perfectly normal.

Lu Ban now often goes to another world at night to chat with the ghost bride, and he can never get enough sleep. The doctor has even diagnosed him as a mental patient.

"That's terrible!"

Lu Ban sat up. The room, with the curtains drawn, was dimly lit, making him want to go back to sleep.

But Lu Ban, being as self-disciplined as he is, has already gotten up and turned on his computer.

"Today is Haijie's online concert, I can't be late!"

He clicked on a singer's/virtual streamer's live stream and heard indistinct singing.

"...The sound of gongs and drums echoed through several streets, and then the opera began at the alley entrance..."

The joyous music of gongs and drums reached Lu Ban's ears.

However, this music quickly merged with the wedding music that Lu Ban had heard in the dry town.

The tune started to sound strange, and the sound coming from the speakers became eerie and ethereal.

"...May you...live as long as the Eight Immortals...and live to be over a hundred years old...and be in good health..."

It's like the funeral music played in those old Hong Kong horror movies.

Even the little figures dancing on the screen glowed green, giving them an eerie, underworld-like appearance.

"?"

Lu Ban frowned and patted the computer case.

"...Wishing everyone joy and happiness. Let's bid farewell to the old year and welcome the new, taking big strides forward."

The singing and visuals have returned to normal.

"The computer is getting old..."

Lu Ban was thinking that once the price of graphics cards dropped, he would try to get a new one. He still had an investment in Jiangcheng Industry, so how could he not properly equip himself with the necessary equipment?

After watching the concert, a satisfied Lu Ban flicked his mouse, and the webpage turned into the cold text of the system.

[Career Development Tasks]

How long has it been since your last update? Are you content with the status quo? It's time to satisfy your viewers who are eagerly awaiting your return!

[Task Requirement: Create a video that receives tens of millions of views]

[Number of viewers: 0/10000000]

"Congratulations on discovering the station's prized possession!"

[Remaining Time: 710:34:12]

"Tens of millions of views?"

Lu Ban noticed the discrepancy in the system's description.

Previously, the system used metrics such as clicks, but now it uses the number of viewers.

This description implies that the conditions can be met by playing the film directly on the big screen without using video websites, and with tens of millions of viewers.

Is it time to make a movie?

Great!

But Lu Ban did the math carefully.

With tens of millions of viewers, and each person paying 30 yuan for a movie ticket, that's 300 million yuan in box office revenue.

Can a movie without any big stars really attract so many people to the cinema?

Lu Ban remembered a sci-fi blockbuster with several stars and an investment of 300 million yuan, which only grossed a little over 100 million yuan at the box office.

In today's domestic market, movies that reach 300 million yuan in box office revenue all have some kind of backstory.

However, if it's made into a video, a video with millions of views can be considered a historical milestone, something that can be achieved simply by being in the right place at the right time.

However, videos with tens of millions of views are basically the treasures of the site. Both content and popularity are indispensable, and most of them are videos that people can still talk about years later.

There are no shortcuts when it comes to video creation tasks. You can't create multiple short videos to artificially inflate clicks. Lu Ban's first uploaded video was exactly what the task required, so she had to be careful.

Moreover, and more importantly, this mission has a time limit.

More than 700 hours, which is almost a month, means that Lu Ban's video must be viewed by tens of millions of people within a month.

"It might be too late to make it into a movie."

Although film censorship in this world is not so strict, and even bloody films can be shown on the big screen with a rating system, they still need to be screened. Even if Lu Ban closes his eyes and edits a proper movie, it may only take two or three days for the audience to see it in theaters.

Achieving a viewership of tens of millions is extremely difficult.

"Is continuing down the path of video production the only option?"

Lu Ban thought that he had obtained three days' worth of video footage this time, including footage from the fog, the beach in Kushui Town, the Hai family mansion at night, and the wedding day. He put it into one video, and it became incredibly long.

Although many viewers had previously commented that Lu Ban's videos were short and they could finish watching them in a short time, Lu Ban knew very well that these viewers were hypocritical. They said they were short, but if the videos actually became longer, they would think they were too long and ask for summaries instead of watching them.

According to statistics from Jiuri Video Network, when a video exceeds 20 minutes in length, its click-through rate drops by 30%, and when the video exceeds 40 minutes, the drop rate drops by 70%.

However, this number will rebound after an hour, meaning that videos that are more than an hour old will actually get more views.

Some students might ask, why is that?

Because most videos longer than an hour are not amateur entertainment videos, but rather movies, science videos, documentaries, etc. For example, an e-sports competition can last for more than an hour, and the number of people watching online at the same time can be tens of thousands.

However, it is still very difficult for long videos to reach tens of millions of views.

Lu Ban glanced at the rankings on his main battlefield, Old Days Video Network, and found that videos with over ten million views in an hour could be counted on one hand.

It's either a fast-paced explanation of a long animated series, a gameplay video by a popular streamer, or an interactive video that claims to have hundreds of endings.

"Ok?"

Interactive video?

Lu Ban clicked on the video.

This type of video is different from the previous linear playback videos. Instead, it has various options, allowing you to watch the video while making choices. Different choices lead to different developments, just like a text adventure game.

Essentially, it's a series of video clips strung together.

Lu Ban played the video and made choices as it unfolded. After more than ten minutes, seeing the bad end on the screen, Lu Ban refreshed the video in frustration and started over from the beginning.

Each time the video is replayed, the number of views increases slightly. If someone completes all of those hundreds of endings, it's equivalent to playing the game hundreds of times.

It wasn't until nightfall that Lu Ban finally achieved his first good ending with the help of the walkthrough.

"This stuff is definitely a bit intoxicating."

Seeing the ten million views, he quickly came up with an idea.

Chapter 082 Interactive Video

September, school starts.

Xu Duzhong, a sophomore at the School of Automation at Jiangcheng University, did not appear happy.

I was too carefree when I first started college, which resulted in me failing three subjects in the final exams in June. I was in serious trouble, and I couldn't even have a peaceful summer vacation.

Fortunately, he barely passed the makeup exam. As for his GPA, he doesn't want to talk about it now.

On Friday night, the dormitory lights were left on, and all three roommates went to an internet cafe to play games and deliver Apex Express packages. Xu Duzhong didn't go, mainly because the counselor was keeping an eye on him. If he went to internet cafes frequently, his parents might be notified.

Of course, another reason is that there are only three of them playing together, so if there's one more person, they can only stand on the sidelines and watch the show.

Xu Duzhong would never do something as outrageous as studying in his dorm. He originally wanted to watch a movie, but then he browsed video sites and watched others squeezing blackheads for thirty minutes.

At this moment, Xu Duzhong refreshed the page and came across a video.

[[Interactive Video][Happy Day] Random options + multiple endings + Easter eggs, giving you a completely different immersive experience]

"What's so interesting about interactive videos?"

He had seen some of these types of videos when they first appeared, such as how to appease an angry girlfriend, a cat's day, and who the murderer was.

Honestly, most of these videos are very bland and uninteresting; they're basically just filler videos. He only paused for about three minutes while watching the big, fair-skinned female content creator on the screen.

Xu Duzhong was about to scroll past the next one when he saw the content creator's name again.

[Still motionless]

"Goodness."

Xu Duzhong exclaimed, "Wow!"

He had followed this content creator before, starting with his videos of the Jiangcheng Grand Theater. The reason, of course, was that he himself lived in Jiangcheng.

When Xu Duzhong first entered university, he heard many legends about Jiangcheng.

Rumors circulated that Jiangcheng University's dormitory buildings were originally ruins of an ancient battlefield, and that too many spirits were needed to suppress them with the yang energy of male students; that female students had committed suicide by love in the school's back lake, and that a woman in red could often be seen in the lakeside pavilion at night; and that the unique design of Building No. 1 led to rumors of students jumping off the building every graduation season.

It seems like they're all from Jiangcheng University, how strange.

Anyway, Xu Duzhong was very interested in these kinds of supernatural events, which is why he paid attention to Lu Ban.

"Since it's free, I'll click in and take a look."