Establishing a Cinematic Universe

"Does the product of Harmony Island require contact with the Wa Island Grand Shrine?"

If Lu Ban had known he needed this earlier, he should have asked Momiji for one no matter what.

However, since it's a talisman or something similar, you should be able to get it just by going to the Harmony Island, making the material much easier to obtain.

Lu Ban originally thought that with the increase in the quality of the [Last Words], the difficulty of obtaining materials would also increase, but now it seems that this is not the case?

He looked at the second piece of material.

The Crane's Song Ascension Chronicle

[Adapted from the script of the legendary ascension of the Daoist He Ming Cry in broad daylight]

[Having performed multiple times at the Grand Theater in the Ruined City, receiving countless accolades]

The reason for the interruption of the performance remains unknown.

"It's Daoist He Ming again. This guy has a very high presence."

Lu Ban had seen traces of Daoist He Ming in the descriptions of many items in the Ruined City. This Daoist who sought immortality seemed to have glimpsed the truth of the world through meditation, and eventually attained enlightenment and ascended to heaven. He also left behind many notes for future generations to refer to. If it weren't for the fact that most of these notes contained knowledge that could cause pollution, this Daoist would have been quite kind.

This material appears to be a script, and it used to be a very popular play. In the previous mission, Lu Ban could choose the theater in the Ruined City capital. It seems that a certain theater troupe in the theater encountered trouble. I wonder if it is related to the script of "The Crane's Song Ascension Chronicle".

"Since it's a script about his ascension, the plot itself might be corrupted."

Lu Ban pondered for a moment, then looked at the third piece of material.

The Winter Wolf's Pale Heart

[The third of the twelve Demon Tide in the Black Forest, the instigator of the frost is Winter Wolf]

[The earth is frozen, and amidst the Pale, falling snow, the silhouette of a wolf emerges.]

That howl is the death knell.

Goodness.

Lu Ban exclaimed, "Wow!"

The first two looked pretty normal, but the third one was completely different.

"The Black Forest of the Night Country is home to many monsters. The Demon Tide is probably a monster invasion? I think there was some mention of Blood Moon before. It's possible that when a red Moon rises in the sky, monsters will emerge from the Black Forest in large numbers and attack nearby villages and towns, and even cities."

The Grey Tower therefore established the Proxy, a type of mage who walks along the border of the Black Forest to monitor the condition of the forest.

Xiya is one of them.

"If it were just an ordinary monster, it would be fine, but this winter wolf looks like a minor leader. We'll have to wait for the Demon Tide; it might require a trigger."

Lu Ban deeply felt how difficult it was to produce such a masterpiece.

He searched through these materials and quickly found the [Lucky Charm] worth 200,000 Silence Points and the [Crane's Song Ascension Chronicle] worth 250,000 Silence Points. However, he couldn't find the [Winter Wolf's Pale Heart] anywhere, which meant that it was a higher-level material and its price was definitely over 500,000.

"I can't afford it."

Lu Ban felt that he was really too poor.

Based on an income of over 10,000 per attempt, even if Lu Ban frantically completed the [Erosion] difficulty missions, it would still take him hundreds of attempts.

He set his sights on "alienation".

After his trip to the Harmony Island, Lu Ban had already unlocked the [Alienation] difficulty level for missions. However, the mission at Nanhua Private Renji Hospital was locked at a certain difficulty, and there was no [Alienation] option available in [Nameless City], so he had not yet experienced this higher difficulty level.

According to the previous pattern, the point reward for the [Alienation] difficulty should be four times that of the [Mortal] difficulty. However, seeing the expensive items in these shops, Lu Ban felt that the Silent Land was not so reasonable. The multiplier for [Alienation] might be even higher. Otherwise, who could afford to buy items that require dozens of high-difficulty missions?

"Next time, we'll choose the [Alienation] difficulty. That's settled."

Even if it's just out of curiosity, Lu Ban plans to choose the [Alienation] difficulty level later.

Bringing his thoughts back, he looked at his Career Development Task.

With his previous films winning awards and making a good box office, Lu Ban was already considered a somewhat well-known director.

Not to mention that "The Crying" will be released in theaters nationwide at the end of the year, and the movie may be able to reach 100 million yuan at the box office, which is already a very good result for the horror and thriller genre.

Therefore, Lu Ban was somewhat curious about what other tricks he could pull off.

[Career Development Task]

Those who stick to the old ways and remain unchanged do not deserve success. Try new fields and respond to doubts with diverse creations. The door to a new world is opening for you.

[Task Requirements: Build your own cinematic universe and gain millions of followers]

[Establishing a cinematic universe: 0/1]

[Number of followers: 0/10,000,000]

"A new century money-grabbing plan, launched!"

"?"

Lu Ban was stunned when he saw the task requirements.

"Building a cinematic universe?"

As we all know, movies used to be standalone films. A small number of big hits would have sequels, but the quality of the sequels was usually not as good as the first one. There were also those that, because they had made too many sequels, had nothing left to explore in the story, so they simply resurrected the characters who died before and continued making the film.

Later on, the film company also realized that they couldn't just keep targeting one person to exploit. If they always made movies with the same one or two main characters, they would eventually exhaust the value of the characters, leading to the collapse of their character designs and the plot retconning the source material.

Therefore, some film companies have learned to explore the stories of supporting characters and create sequels for popular supporting characters. This allows them to capitalize on the popularity of the original work without wasting the characters too quickly. Sometimes, the spin-offs are even more popular than the main series, and the supporting characters become the main characters.

Later on, many production companies simply produced individual films for each member of the main cast, or even released individual films first, followed by films featuring the entire cast, which led to the concept of a cinematic universe.

The advantage is that different roles cater to different audiences, and the addition of a solo film also helps in character development. Compared to adding more screen time to a hodgepodge of characters, a full solo film is obviously more appropriate.

"However, even though I acted in all my videos and movies, the supporting actors either died or are nowhere to be found."

Lu Ban pondered.

Moreover, the Ruined City, wastelands, Night Country all have different appearances and customs, so it would be a stretch to say they belong to the same world.

Moreover, it seems that the number of followers does not include Lu Ban's own account, meaning he has to create a new account?

Lu Ban glanced at it; the mission's deadline was three months.

That is, by February next year, after the Chinese New Year, Lu Ban's new account will reach ten million followers.

"That's a bit difficult."

He thought about it and decided to search for relevant information online first.

Thank you to "Erebus" for the 1500 coins, thank you to "Sweet Sweets" for the 300 coins, thank you to "Cold Water with Sugar Cubes" for the 200 coins, and thank you to "Poor Daoist Priest Xuxuan", "Uncle Selling Ramen", and "Ye Zhi" for the 100 coins!