Revenge Five Years Later

Guo Yuan returned home, took out his phone, searched through it, and found Wang Qiu's number.

If he wanted to leak the news, it would be best to find another chance to meet Wang Qiu and see if he could get any useful information from him.

Guo Yuan decisively dialed Wang Qiu's number.

At that moment, Wang Qiu was lying in a hospital bed while Su Yurou massaged his shoulders.

When Wang Qiu's phone rang, Su Yurou stopped what she was doing, got up, and brought the phone over to him.

Wang Qiu glanced at the caller ID and saw that there was no saved contact name.

Su Yurou, standing beside him, remembered the number. She quietly reminded him, "Boss, this is Guo Yuan, the author of White Night Walk."

"White Night Walk? I remember that book's film and television rights were already sold to a production company under Tokyo Television. Why is he calling me now?" Wang Qiu asked with a frown.

"Then should you take the call, Boss?"

"Take it."

At once, Su Yurou pressed the answer button.

"Boss Wang, hello! This is Guo Yuan." Guo Yuan's voice came through the receiver.

"So it's Teacher Guo! What can I do for you?"

"Boss Wang, I wanted to ask whether you're still interested in the domestic film and television rights for White Night Walk."

After pondering for a moment, Wang Qiu replied, "Of course I'm interested. But Teacher Guo, I heard you already sold the film and television rights for White Night Walk to a production company under Tokyo Television!"

"That was for the overseas rights. The domestic rights haven't been sold yet."

"Teacher Guo, the price for domestic rights alone won't be very high. You should know that you don't have much of a name in China. You don't even have five hundred thousand followers combined on Douyin and Bilibili. Your influence is too limited.

"Still, I really like this work of yours, so we can talk.

"How about this? Come to my office at two o'clock Friday afternoon, and we'll have a proper discussion."

Guo Yuan immediately agreed.

"Alright, then I'll see you Friday, Teacher Guo." With that, Wang Qiu hung up.

"Boss, is a novel's domestic adaptation rights really worth negotiating in person?" Su Yurou asked with a puzzled expression.

"Heh! That depends on the novel. NHK's internal evaluation of this novel was extremely high. If they weren't trying to take advantage of Guo Yuan's lack of fame, they would have signed the deal long ago.

"A work that received such high praise from them can't possibly be a loss if we buy the domestic rights.

"If the adaptation in Japan becomes popular, we can either quickly produce a remake and ride the hype hard, or resell the rights for a tidy profit."

Over the next three days, Guo Yuan coded while keeping an eye on the changes in the stock market.

That afternoon, Longcheng Biology's stock suddenly jumped from 56 yuan to 60 yuan.

A four-yuan increase all at once made Guo Yuan feel that something was off.

Guo Yuan had originally wanted to take out his phone and ask Lin Yumo about it, but then he reconsidered. The narrator hadn't given any prompt, so there probably wasn't a problem.

Speaking of Lin Yumo, Guo Yuan had chatted with her every night over the past few days. Of course, most of the time, Lin Yumo had been the one to contact him first.

Through Lin Yumo's casual disclosures during their chats over the past few days, along with some hints from the narrator, Guo Yuan had basically figured out what Lin Yumo did at Longcheng Biology.

Based on Guo Yuan's speculation, Lin Yumo had recently been researching an African Swine Fever vaccine.

The project had been established in July 2021. It was the last research team organized by Lin Yumo's father, Lin Zhengnan, before his death.

The reason for establishing the team was that African Swine Fever had broken out in August 2018, and meat pigs suffered the most devastating disaster in history!

Africa's pig slaughter output dropped by 80 percent outright. In China, the virus's spread caused the deaths of massive numbers of pigs, severely affecting pork prices as well. By the end of the year, the market price of pork had soared to 20 yuan, doubling in price.

In 2019, pork prices continued to soar. In most areas, a jin of pork cost as much as 35 yuan, while in a very small number of places, pork was basically priced the same as mutton.

Second Brother's value also reached a historic high that year.

Before his death, Lin Zhengnan had been devoted to overcoming the virus and developing a corresponding vaccine.

Although the large-scale outbreak of African Swine Fever had now passed, small-scale outbreaks still occurred from time to time. No one could say when another large-scale outbreak might return. Once this vaccine was successfully developed, meat pigs both domestically and abroad would be vaccinated. The annual profits would definitely be substantial, and it would provide a long-term source of income.

After returning to China, Lin Yumo had taken over her father's work. She was currently pursuing research and breakthroughs through the technical approach of a "gene-deleted attenuated live vaccine."

The reason Lin Yumo had attended that business dinner earlier was to borrow an African Swine Fever virus isolate from a university.

Lin Yumo worked hard on this project partly to lull her uncles, and partly because she wanted to complete her father's final research project before his death.

"I wonder if Lin Yumo can actually develop this vaccine," Guo Yuan muttered to himself.

She could. Five years later, Lin Yumo obtained an African Swine Fever virus isolate from 2019 through her professor at Harvard University.

Using homologous recombination technology, Lin Yumo's research team constructed a series of recombinant viruses with different gene deletions based on that African Swine Fever virus isolate.

Through systematic tests of pathogenicity, immunogenicity, and immune protection in pigs, they ultimately selected a virus strain with twelve gene deletions.

After repeated experiments, Lin Yumo's research team determined that it fully met the safety standards for attenuated live vaccines and could provide 95 percent effective immune protection against lethal African Swine Fever challenges!

Moreover, the vaccine strain could be efficiently cultured in primary bone marrow cells from SPF pigs. The primary cells from a single healthy pig could produce at least one hundred thousand doses of vaccine, fully meeting the requirements for large-scale production.

This African Swine Fever vaccine brought enormous economic benefits to Longcheng Biology. Global orders for the vaccine alone amounted to nearly 200 million dollars every year.

Lin Yumo also used the opportunity to strike, driving her uncles out of Longcheng Biology's decision-making level and reclaiming the company.

After hearing the narrator's words, Guo Yuan confirmed one thing: if things had developed normally, Lin Yumo and Su Yurou probably hadn't been able to find that evidence.

That was why it had dragged on for five years, until Lin Yumo developed the swine fever vaccine and finally took the company back.

PS: I wonder how many readers here have read my previous book! Actually, I'd planned this swine fever vaccine storyline back when I was writing that one.

I'd originally wanted to wrap up my previous book with the medical system.

Unfortunately, for certain reasons, I wasn't able to continue writing it at the time. When outlining this book, I included the parts of the plot I hadn't been able to write back then.

The protagonist's future development will involve both technology and medicine.

His technological foundation began with acquiring the company, while his medical foundation began with Longcheng Biology.