Superstars of Tomorrow

The next day, many entertainment media outlets reported on Fang Zhao’s concert.

Yanzhou’s most authoritative music media, "Voice of Yanzhou," and the global authoritative periodical "Worldwide Music" had lengthy features introducing Fang Zhao, the young composer who had finally taken his first step.

When people like Xue Jing and Lin Xun wrote their reviews, those reviews would appear in "Worldwide Music." As for reviews written by Ming Cang and others, those would be shared on "Voice of Yanzhou."

Other entertainment media outlets had commercial objectives, but "Worldwide Music" and "Voice of Yanzhou" focused more on artistic aspects. Many artists within the industry, both new and old, paid attention to them.

"Voice of Yanzhou" and "Worldwide Music" were not really in touch with the needs of the masses. Most audiences naturally preferred reading reports that were more interesting and understandable—reports with a larger focus on entertainment.

Whether it was the matter of all 10 of Fang Zhao’s songs being sold off within an hour of the end of the concert or the identities of the buyers, these became topics that were discussed by everyone.

"Sss—this Fang Zhao really seems like a capable person!"

"To be able to get those parties to fancy his pieces, surely the quality is decent."

"He’s rich, he’s rich! Fang Zhao is earning big bucks this time!"

This was what many people were thinking.

High-quality professional undertakings like the Huangzhou Geography Channel and Huangzhou Life Sciences Research Institute, which sounded like prestigious scientific branches, gave people a stronger sense of novelty regardless of how much had been spent. Commercial companies were a dime a dozen, so these sorts of organizations interested the masses much more.

For these sorts of high-level professional organizations and research institutions, even if someone was a great master, these organizations still might not approach that person. Even if the works were of an excellent quality, the works still had be in line with their intentions. Furthermore, it was only through recommendations and combining various factors that these organizations would consider purchasing something.

Thus this was the reason why Duan Qianji had said that Fang Zhao was very lucky this time. Normally, these sorts of chances were hard to come by, but Fang Zhao had gotten two in one go.

After the concert ended and Fang Zhao returned home, he made time to contact Fan Lin, who was still cultivating arrow sunflowers at Outpost 23’s experimental plot on planet Baiji, to thank Fan Lin for recommending his song to Huangzhou’s Life Sciences Research Institute.

"They really bought it? I only mentioned it once to get them to take a look at the quality of your work. Getting them to select it is all thanks to your own ability."

Fan Lin did not feel that he had done a lot. When he had been watching the concert online with the other people in the outpost, he had felt thought that the song "The Power of Life" was not bad and that the inspiration was from when the arrow sunflowers he had been cultivating germinated. Coincidentally, he had been invited by Huangzhou Life Sciences Research Institute to participate in the end-of-year celebrations for their 400-year anniversary, so he had mentioned it to them.

Every 100 years, the Huangzhou Life Sciences Research Institute would produce a large-scale documentary to be saved in the archives as a record of the important achievements and research results of the last 100 years. It was a grand affair, and they wanted to find a great master to compose an accompaniment piece for them.

As this song had been selected, Fan Lin was also delighted. Although it had been composed by Fang Zhao, the inspiration behind this had been his arrow sunflowers! How glorious!

The documentary would surely not just contain one song, but Fang Zhao’s song being picked was a stroke of luck.

Fan Lin chuckled. "My experiments here are concluding soon. I’ll return back at the end of the year and won’t be leaving Earth for the next couple of years. When the time comes, let’s have a good chat!"

Without Fang Zhao at the outpost, Fan Lin had felt like he had lost a good listening ear. Although Fang Zhao had not spoken much, his words had always pointed out the important parts. Furthermore, Fang Zhao’s insights weren’t narrow-minded, and Fan Lin was very happy discussing matters with him.

Since Fang Zhao had been discharged, Fan Lin had felt rather lonely.

After ending the call, Fang Zhao looked through a few reviews from various authoritative music e-magazines and browsed a few of the comments online. Fang Zhao could roughly tell what sort of evaluations he would get from within the industry just from his conversations with those old people Xue Jing had brought along. As for others, Silver Wing teams would steer the direction of online audiences. Currently, the overall evaluations were not too bad.

After disconnecting from the internet, Fang Zhao received a call from Duan Qianji’s top secretary, Zhu Zhen.

"You can take a nice little break now. Contracts have already been signed for the song copyrights and the buyers have paid up already. Currently, it’s all being processing internally. It’ll be transferred to your account next month together with your wages. Oh, right, will you be attending Fiery Bird’s event on the 18th of August?"

While Fang Zhao had been undergoing military service, Duan Qianji had assigned Zhu Zhen to the virtual projects department to handle things. Now that Zu Wen had been promoted to take over the virtual projects department, Zhu Zhen had been transferred back to Duan Qianji’s side to manage other matters.

"Jinro told me that Fiery Bird’s Yanzhou branch has sent me an invitation letter. At that time, I will be attending as a special invitee," Fang Zhao replied.

Zhu Zhen had wanted to let Fang Zhao attend it alongside the gaming team, but she had not expected that Fiery Bird would send out a special invitation just to Fang Zhao. But after considering matters, it made sense. Fang Zhao endorsed an entire series of products and had collaborated with them in the past. Receiving a special invitation was perfectly reasonable.

"All right, that’s good. I don’t have to inform you about the details then." Zhu Zhen’s objective had been to remind Fang Zhao about Fiery Bird’s event on the 18th and inform him of the progress of the copyright sales. Now that she had said her piece, Zhu Zhen did not have anything else to bring up.

Actually, in Fang Zhao’s composing notebook, there were still two completed songs that had not been taken out. The first was "Peach Blossom Garden," and the other was "Ark." The sources of inspiration had been obtained when he had been sent on assignment to planet Wai, which could not be publicly announced. It would be hard to explain why he had been to planet Wai during his military service duration. Thus, those two songs had been not featured in the concert. Duan Qianji’s intention was for the company to purchase them and use them for serials shot in Wai’s film entertainment complex.

Although it was an internal purchase, pricewise, not only were they not cheaper, they were actually slightly more expensive to compensate for "Expedition" being sold at a lower price. These two would be settled together with other works that were sold.

After finding out that all of Fang Zhao’s copyrights this time around had been sold and he was going to earn a fortune, the members of the virtual projects department and gaming team and a few close friends and family members were going to let Fang Zhao treat them.

Fang Zhao continued to reply to messages from friends and family before resting.

As for the virtual projects department, Fang Zhao had decided not to hold any position there, as he had other plans and did not wish to just occupy the post and collect wages. He also did not want to deny those youngsters with the capability the chance of getting promoted. Zu Wen had grasped this opportunity for himself.

He believed they would bring the virtual projects to even greater heights.

Early in the morning of the second day, Fang Zhao had just finished breakfast when he received a personal message.

The sender’s information was "The World’s Most Authoritative Pet Magazine, ’PET’." It was a corporate account.

The contents of the personal message mentioned establishing a record in the archives for the pet that Fang Zhao had reared, Curly Hair.

"PET" had its own pet archives set up by their specialized teams. Pets that could establish a record in the PET archives were considered special.

Some people would think up all sorts of methods to get a record in the PET archives, because any pet in the PET archives would not have a low price and its reputation would increase. However, to reduce commercial hyping, PET had very strict requirements when selecting pets for their archives.

But while there were people willing to establish records in the archives for their pets, there were also people who were unwilling to do so. For example, people like Fang Zhao.

Previously, PET had contacted Fang Zhao numerous times. Not mentioning the contact they had made two years ago, just this April, when Fang Zhao had just returned, he had been contacted by them. However, then, Fang Zhao had given the excuse that he was preparing for his concert and had rejected them. Now, the moment after the concert had ended, PET had immediately sent their request.

Fang Zhao could also choose to reject them once again, but Curly Hair still had some reputation in the pet circles. Furthermore, the competitions in Muzhou had increased his status considerably. Continuing to hide and conceal it might have negative consequences. Looking at PET’s modus operandi, if Fang Zhao continued to drag it on, they would persist in sending request after request.

Continued rejections would cause people to suspect that Fang Zhao was hiding something.

However, Fang Zhao did not agree to it immediately. He instead asked, "Are blood samples required for the archive records?"

Previously, Fang Zhao had asked some people and found out from that when a record was established for PET’s archives, the PET staff would come and run some tests on the pets. However, Curly Hair was too special, and Fang Zhao needed to be somewhat prudent here.

The other party apparently seemed to have been waiting. After Fang Zhao sent the message out, he received an immediate reply.

"No, no, no! Please believe me, we have the reputation of being the world’s most authoritative pet magazine. We wouldn’t secretly take blood samples of any pet without their owner’s permission! We won’t even touch a strand of hair without explicit permission!"

Blood samples, hair, and other such things might contain too much information, and many pet owners were unwilling to let this information be divulged, especially certain high-value pets with gene defects. Owners absolutely did not want this information to be known to outsiders.

Even if the pet was healthy, owners were still unwilling to allow such samples. Therefore, when Fang Zhao had asked this question, the person over at PET had hurriedly guaranteed that they never ever did such things that infringed on the owner and pet’s privacy and secrets. The checkups they did on pets were just for better records and an estimation of the value of the pet.

That’s right, PET would make an estimation of a pet’s value for its archives. These records would not remained unchanged either. Every year, PET would provide at most three free inspections for pets in the archives and then update a new record in the archives based on the pet’s condition. A pet’s value might also see changes.

When Curly Hair had won the championship in Muzhou for the first time, PET had already wanted to make a record, but Fang Zhao had been difficult to contact. When they had finally managed to reach out to Fang Zhao, he had rejected them. During that time, Fang Zhao had been investigating the videos taken from the black street and had discovered the strange circumstances surrounding their rebirth. He had not wanted Curly Hair’s abnormalities to be known by even more people. Su Hou and the team could be considered insiders, but it would be difficult to say the same for PET. If PET investigated and found some issues, Fang Zhao would not be able to hide it.

When PET asked again in the second year, Fang Zhao had rejected them using military service as an excuse.

This year, PET still had not given up. This time, having gotten Fang Zhao’s approval, people at PET were extremely excited.

"All right! Mr. Fang, thank you so much for giving us such an opportunity. During the checkup, you can supervise from the sides. May I ask when you will have time?"

"Today and the next two days are fine," Fang Zhao replied.

"You can choose a place to conduct the checkup, it can be at your home or you can bring your pet over to our Yanzhou branch. It’s not too far away, just in Qi’an City."

"At home." Fang Zhao did not wish to send Curly Hair to PET’s Yanzhou branch. They had to be more passive in another’s domain, so choosing his own place would be better.

"Great. May I trouble you for your address? We will send someone down today. Please do not worry; PET was established 200 years ago and we have an excellent reputation. Under no circumstances will we take your pet’s genetic information without permission."

After arranging matters, Fang Zhao was preparing to disconnect when he heard the other person say, "Please wait! Mr. Fang, we still want to ask you something. For your other pet, is it possible to establish a record for it in our PET archives?"

"The sea slug?" Fang Zhao asked.

"Yes, yes! That hybrid sea slug that you brought back from a foreign planet. May I ask whether you would permit our staff to make a record? Don’t worry, our evaluating staff were transferred over from headquarters and are very professional. They have veterinary backgrounds and definitely will not harm it!"

In the past, these sorts of creatures carrying extraterrestrial genes could only be brought back to Earth after obtaining approval from research institutions. In recent years, these restrictions had been relaxed, but all sorts of certifications were required and there were many procedures that had to be cleared. Thus, even with the lessened restrictions, there were still very few people that raised pets with extraterrestrial genes.

PET also had their eyes on it because it was special due to its extraterrestrial genes.

Fang Zhao mulled it over and then replied, "Sure."

"Thank you so much for your trust in us! Our evaluating team will be immediately dispatched towards Yanzhou’s Qi’an City. I will forward his information to you in a bit."

Two minutes later.

PET had decided on the team to be dispatched to Yanzhou.

Five people.

Two veterinarians, one specializing in handling dogs and the other in sea slugs, two professional archivists, and a cameraman. To guard against imposters, PET sent images of the five members, along with their work IDs and their contact details, to Fang Zhao.

PET headquarters were in MaErsizhou. The five of them boarded a flying transport in Mazhou and headed straight over.

Knowing that people would be coming over in the afternoon to make a record for Curly Hair, Zuo Yu and Yan Biao were very curious. They did not really know much about this field. Searching the internet, they had expected that Curly Hair’s value would also be placed in the top three. However, when they saw the PET charts, the top 10 most valuable pets on the list had values above 100 million.

Placed first was a lion. It was rumored that, way back when, a laboratory had been trying to resurrect animals from the Old Era, this was among the five lions that had been successfully bred. The other four were all in a zoo over at Huangzhou. Only this one had been bought as a pet.

A person who could own a lion as a pet would definitely not be ordinary.

"Estimated value... 300 million? Just an Old Era lion is worth 300 million?!" Yan Biao found this inconceivable. Curly Hair could still take part in competitions, and his value was genuinely a result of his efforts in Muzhou. What about this first place? What could it do? How could it be worth 300 million just like that?

On the contrary, Zuo Yu did not find it hard to accept. "The rarer something is, the greater its value. There are only five in the entire world. Furthermore, there are regulations regarding the resurrection of Old Era animals, and there are quantity restrictions on these sorts of large wild beasts. Furthermore, from a commercial perspective, in order for it not to devalue, after the estimation, it can’t undergo more appraisals. Meanwhile, Curly Hair is a dog. Regardless of how many championships he has won, he is still a dog, and dogs are not uncommon at all."

Yan Biao pointed at the water tank in Fang Zhao’s study. "Then what about that? The ’rabbit’ inside carries extraterrestrial genes, and its the only one of its kind in the entire world! According to your criteria for evaluation, shouldn’t it be five times that 300 million?"

Zuo Yu choked up. "This, I have no idea. These evaluators have their own criteria. How would I know how much they will estimate its worth?