Translator: Ink Hub

Editor: Yoog

As the director of Qinglan TV, Hua Tai had always maintained good relationships with screenwriters. He wasn’t intentionally pestering Lin Ji to the point of annoyance; rather, he was facing a harsh reality. Qinglan TV hadn’t produced a hit drama in a very long time.

The entire staff of Qinglan TV had already accepted that they couldn’t compete with Dajiang TV in terms of viewership. Dajiang TV enjoyed a double explosion of critical acclaim and ratings, and their eye for selecting scripts was indeed a cut above Qinglan’s.

However, losing to Dajiang TV didn’t mean Qinglan TV could afford to lose to Records of the Bai’s Return, a drama broadcast simultaneously across three stations—especially since that very show had once been rejected by Qinglan TV.

During the period when Records of the Bai’s Return swept the top three spots on the ratings charts, Hua Tai felt embarrassed just going out for meetings. At that time, even his own employees were questioning the station’s taste in scripts.

In any given year, there might be many dramas with high viewership, but only a few could truly be called hits.

In the past two years, whenever a massive hit was mentioned, the audience inevitably thought of Code 11. Records of the Bai’s Return was the most recent explosion and had even higher popularity, but neither of these shows had anything to do with Qinglan TV.

“How can you say there’s no connection? The screenwriter for both shows is Lin Ji, and Qinglan TV collaborated with Lin Ji on Snow in Early May!”

Qinglan TV: “…”

Like hell they did.

Therefore, Qinglan TV desperately needed a hit to prove itself. And whether Lin Ji admitted it or not, he was already the screenwriter most closely linked to the word “hit” in the industry.

When Hua Tai placed yet another “caring” phone call, Lin Ji finally surrendered. “Stop calling. I’ll decide the subject matter, and the station is not allowed to interfere with what I write.”

This was exactly the sentence Hua Tai had been waiting for. He naturally agreed to Lin Ji’s demands without hesitation.

It was common knowledge that the scripts for Code 11 and Records of the Bai’s Return had both been completed without interference. Aside from his occasional eccentricities, Lin Ji’s ability in script creation was universally recognized. Directors who had worked with him had revealed some details of their collaboration. For instance, Lin Ji wasn’t the type of screenwriter who stubbornly refused to change a single word. He was very flexible and would make timely adjustments based on filming requirements.

The moment Lin Ji agreed, Qinglan TV couldn’t wait to invite him over to sign the contract. Maple Leaf TV’s previous move of intercepting Qin Yi had left a deep impression on all the satellite stations. Without black and white ink on paper, Qinglan TV worried Lin Ji might jump ship at any moment.

Mainly, they felt other stations were too good at deceiving people, unlike their own “simple and pure” Qinglan TV. Lin Ji looked like the type who wasn’t shrewd enough and could easily be tricked.

“Screenwriter Lin, if you have time, come visit our station. We’ve partnered with the library to set up a reading corner, and there’s a dedicated gym downstairs.”

Lin Ji was indeed quite free. After signing the contract, he took a stroll around Qinglan TV.

Among the major satellite stations, he was most familiar with Sunrise TV. He had to admit that in terms of financial strength, a top-tier station like Qinglan TV was significantly more powerful than Sunrise TV. While audiences appreciated different works in every era, Qinglan TV always managed to produce several representative masterpieces. Their honors room was filled with displays of trophies.

Even if Qinglan TV’s modern idol dramas had been more prominent in recent years and their reputation was inferior to Dajiang TV’s, Lin Ji believed there was no hierarchy in genres. If an idol drama could become popular, it was because a large audience supported it.

Relatively speaking, it was easier for idol dramas to go overseas.

Tian Yao had mentioned to Lin Ji that Secretly in Love with You had already been sold to six overseas countries. The crew and Qike Video had both received significant dividends, and of course, Lin Ji had his share.

While Code 11 and Records of the Bai’s Return were recognized hits, they faced natural cultural barriers in overseas markets. Foreign audiences weren’t as likely to favor those types of themes.

In terms of overseas marketing, Qinglan TV did more work than Dajiang TV. Consequently, even though Qinglan TV didn’t have as many hits or as good a reputation as Dajiang TV, their profits remained very stable.

Lin Ji silently wandered to the library corner on the second floor and flipped through a book. Since it was a library corner built by the station, there were many books about the film and television industry, most of which Lin Ji hadn’t read.

He became engrossed as he read. These books weren’t actually meant for screenwriters; the content had nothing to do with creative techniques and was more educational in nature. However, Lin Ji was interested in these introductions because the industry was constantly changing, and audience preferences were equally prone to shifts. The books summarized the development of the industry during certain stages, saving Lin Ji the time of doing the research himself.

Lin Ji borrowed a card and took several books home.

When he reached the first-floor lobby, he unexpectedly ran into a familiar face. Back when he was with the Snow in Early May crew, this person had been responsible for liaising with the screenwriters.

Upon seeing Lin Ji, the man looked astonished, then quickly greeted him with a forced smile, “Screenwriter Lin, long time no see. What wind blew you here today?”

In truth, Lin Ji didn’t have much of an impression of the man, but the moment he saw that smile, a haughty, arrogant face suddenly flashed through his mind.

Lin Ji nodded. “Hua Tai invited me to write a script, so I came to sign the contract today. And you are?”

The man’s smile faltered for a moment. “We… collaborated once, in the… production crew.”

He wanted to say the words “Snow in Early May crew,” but to him, that drama was the waterloo of his career. Originally, he had been highly regarded by his superiors at the station, but now he had been relegated to managing documents and wasting his time in the archives.

Whenever others mentioned Snow in Early May to him, he couldn’t help but feel a surge of anger. Yet, if he wanted to strike up a connection with Lin Ji, he had to mention the very show that made his teeth itch with hatred.

Lin Ji merely gave a perfunctory nod at the man’s explanation.

Seeing Lin Ji’s nonchalant expression, the man secretly gritted his teeth.

When Xiao Cheng and the others had tried to shift the blame onto Lin Ji, he had actually been in the know. When the drama flopped and the station’s upper management wanted to understand the situation, he naturally had to push the responsibility onto outsiders. Whether Xiao Cheng took the blame or the other screenwriters did, it didn’t matter as long as the pot wasn’t dumped on his head.

He had a good relationship with Xiao Cheng and had even helped Xiao Cheng assemble the screenwriting team. If the station investigated thoroughly, they would likely find some of his connections with Xiao Cheng.

What he hadn’t expected was that Lin Ji would bounce back so quickly.

Given the disastrous failure of Snow in Early May, everyone on that screenwriting team should have been blacklisted by Qinglan TV. Yet, Lin Ji had not only succeeded in turning his career around with Code 11 and Records of the Bai’s Return, but he had also become Hua Tai’s honored guest.

Hua Tai wasn’t an easy person to get along with. For him to personally invite someone, Lin Ji’s strength must have been recognized.

As he watched Lin Ji walk out of the Qinglan TV building, the man didn’t think much of it at first. But as he walked away, he suddenly began to worry.

What if Lin Ji badmouths me in front of Hua Tai?

What if the matter of the Snow in Early May screenwriting team is brought up again?

He was just a document manager now, and it would be too easy for Hua Tai to crush him. What if he was called out by name during a general meeting for the Snow in Early May failure?

He truly regretted it now. He should have been friendlier to Lin Ji back then. Now was exactly when Qinglan TV needed Lin Ji. If Lin Ji were willing to put in a good word for him…

One couldn’t think too much about such things. The more one thought, the easier it was to feel remorse.

* * *

After returning home, Lin Ji put the man he had met at Qinglan TV out of his mind. As for filing a complaint, he hadn’t even considered it, as he wasn’t aware that the man and Hua Tai were in a superior-subordinate relationship.

Lin Ji spent two days reading TV Drama Notes. It was a book of drama reviews critiquing over twenty famous series. Lin Ji had seen more than half of them. He had his own thoughts after watching them, so reading others’ reviews was quite interesting.

There was another book called Art of Makeup, with content similar to Decorating the Dream of the Red Chamber, which Lin Ji had read in his previous life. It was a summary of experiences from the stylist of a classic drama.

Lin Ji planned to write a palace intrigue drama next, the kind without transmigration elements. It was necessary to research the styling in advance.

When writing the script for Records of the Bai’s Return, Lin Ji had studied character styling, but that was based on the original work. The original author had already written the content, so he only had to follow the original steps.

Art of Makeup was quite comprehensive. In addition to that book, Lin Ji found several others on etiquette, customs, and court life, gradually sketching out an outline.

In a palace intrigue drama, characters were the core. If he wanted to write the drama well, he first had to create flesh-and-blood characters.

Qinglan TV wasn’t rushing him, so Lin Ji took his time to deliberate at his own pace.

If he were writing a webnovel, it would be best for the protagonist to sweep through everything while the supporting characters automatically lost their intelligence upon meeting them. However, if it were made into a drama, having the supporting characters lose their intelligence while the protagonist was pampered would only make the characters seem too flat. If audiences wanted that kind of palace intrigue, they might as well watch a sweet pet drama.

Therefore, the first step was that the characters had to be well-rounded.

Lin Ji collected stories of court women from ancient times to the present and began conceiving the first character. He thought about the dynasty the character lived in, the connection between the inner palace and the outer court, the character’s personality, hobbies, experiences…

Unlike writing the script for Records of the Bai’s Return, the new script was a creation from scratch. Everything had to be created by Lin Ji himself.

He spent an entire month just writing the protagonist’s character design. In his view, this persona was even harder to write than Bai Mei. After all, she was the ultimate winner of the palace struggle, while others had their own ways of dying or losing.

Screenwriters who frequently killed off characters knew that dead people were easy to write, but writing about a person who struggled and survived was difficult. In a palace intrigue drama, the way of survival couldn’t be too brain-dead. Anyone who treated the audience as brain-dead would naturally become brain-dead in the eyes of the audience.

* * *

News that Lin Ji’s next drama would be a collaboration with Qinglan TV was subtly leaked.

The one who leaked the news was Qinglan TV, mainly to remind its peers: “For the coming period, Screenwriter Lin belongs to us at Qinglan TV. Don’t you dare harass him.”

[How did you trick him?] Chu Tianzhou was the first to post in the satellite station directors’ group chat.

[Screenwriter Lin is young and thin-skinned. He must have been tricked by a certain thick-skinned person. That person probably threw a tantrum and threatened to end it all, and the poor guy got scared and had to give in.]

[The world is going to the dogs. People aren’t what they used to be.]

[Indeed, the world is going to the dogs.]

[The world is going to the dogs +1.]

Hua Tai appeared with his golden, shining avatar. [How are you guys talking? Do you not understand the concept of a sincere invitation?]

[The people selling health supplements to the elderly are even more sincere than you.]

[I’ve worked with Screenwriter Lin; he’s too pure. He believes whatever people tell him.]

[I can tell. Otherwise, he wouldn’t have boarded your pirate ship.]

Hua Tai: […Fellow colleagues, please keep your sourness to yourselves.]

He had made Lin Ji’s “ownership” public precisely because he was afraid this group of people would target him.

Everyone would indeed joke around in the group, but when it came to poaching talent, they were swift, accurate, and ruthless. Their main goal was to catch their opponents off guard.

In particular, the director of Dajiang TV, who usually didn’t like to talk, seemed cold and aloof. But when encountering a screenwriter like Lin Ji, Hua Tai didn’t believe for a second that he wouldn’t be tempted.

Now that it was confirmed Lin Ji was collaborating with Qinglan TV, the other stations couldn’t poach him for the time being. They could only ask Hua Tai in the group what the palace intrigue theme was about, which actors they planned to cast, and what time slot it was set for.

Hua Tai gave a unified answer: [I don’t know.]

He truly didn’t know anything. When Lin Ji said he wanted to film a palace intrigue drama, Hua Tai only wanted to tell him that he might as well film the transmigration drama he had mentioned too; Qinglan TV could handle both.

Hua Tai had specifically looked up the concepts of “palace intrigue” and “transmigration,” but let alone a finished product, he didn’t even know what content Lin Ji was going to film.

However, even if Hua Tai did know, there was no way he would reveal it to his competitors.

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