Chapter 1006: A Man Without Dreams Is Just a Salted Fish

A poet once said: Life is dear, love is dearer, but for the sake of freedom, both can be cast aside.

Zhao Fusheng felt that someone who could say such words must have a very high level of ideological awareness.

Or at least, such a person's inner self must be extremely strong, because he could give up life and love for freedom.

If it were him, he definitely couldn't do it.

He was just a small-time person, vulgar, terribly vulgar—liked money, liked enjoyment, liked looking at pretty girls around him.

Zhao Fusheng thought that if he joined the revolution, he would definitely tell his comrades: if you see me captured, remember to give me a quick bullet, otherwise I might not hold out under the enemy's torture.

Like now, Fan Baobao was clearly unhappy, and Zhao Fusheng felt it was his duty to cheer her up.

"Um, do you remember Tencent Technology?"

Looking cautiously at Fan Baobao, Zhao Fusheng tentatively said.

"Ah, that QQ company, you just said, back then their boss communicated with you online, and you gave him some advice, then invested some money, taking five percent non-dilutable shares, right?" Fan Baobao blinked and said quickly.

After speaking, she glanced triumphantly at Zhao Fusheng, as if to say, my memory is good, right? Come praise me.

Zhao Fusheng smiled bitterly and slowly said: "That's right, because at that time I was optimistic about Tencent and believed it would go public one day, so I only asked for five percent shares, but they were non-dilutable. In other words, I don't have to worry about things like financing and listing affecting me. Do you understand?"

Fan Baobao looked at Zhao Fusheng with partial understanding, thought for a moment, and said: "You mean, if they raise funds and go public, once the company issues new shares, shareholders need to subscribe. Without money, shares get diluted, right?"

Zhao Fusheng nodded: "That's roughly it. This is a method many big companies use to deal with small shareholders. After all, most small shareholders have less financial strength than big ones. With this operation, as long as you have money, it's a winner-takes-all situation."

As he spoke, he explained with a smile: "In short, in the stock market, having money can sometimes really let you do whatever you want."

Hearing this, Fan Baobao rolled her eyes, clearly unwilling to engage with Zhao Fusheng.

"What does this have to do with me?" Fan Baobao was silent for a while, then looked up at Zhao Fusheng: "You just said it—you have shares in Tencent Technology, now managed by Future Investment. Hmm, Sister Chenxi is in charge of this business."

She was quite familiar with Dong Chenxi; after all, when Dong Chenxi was at Future Advertising, Fan Baobao had dealt with her many times, and they had met before, getting along well as friends.

"It's like this: because I thought Tencent Technology would go public back then, and listed companies have rules that shareholders with more than five percent shares must disclose..." Zhao Fusheng blinked and said.

"So?" Fan Baobao was startled, looking at Zhao Fusheng strangely. She felt he seemed to be hesitating.

Could this guy have put the shares in her name?

Thinking that she might soon own shares in a listed company, Fan Baobao felt a little thrill inside.

......

"So I took out 0.1 percent of Tencent Technology shares and gave them to Beibei..."

The next moment, Zhao Fusheng's voice rang out, and the smile on Fan Baobao's face froze.

MDZZ!

At that instant, Fan Baobao felt terrible. She looked up at Zhao Fusheng: "What did you say?"

"Ahem, I gave 0.1 percent of the shares to Beibei." Although he sensed Fan Baobao's expression was a bit odd, Zhao Fusheng still answered her question honestly.

In his view, this was no big deal.

Most people running a company don't put all shares under one person's name; there are too many factors involved, and often shares are held in others' names.

"You!"

Fan Baobao wasn't jealous that her sister had become a shareholder in a listed company; she was just embarrassed by her own secret delight moments ago.

So, Zhao Fusheng inexplicably found himself grabbed by Fan Baobao and thoroughly roughed up.

"What's going on?"

Watching Fan Baobao vent on him and then stand up satisfied, Zhao Fusheng was dumbfounded.

"So satisfying!"

After dealing with Zhao Fusheng, Fan Baobao sighed refreshingly, then looked at him: "Giving it away is fine. Beibei is still young, and her guardian is my mom. Besides, how much money can 0.1 percent of shares be?"

Clearly, she had no concept of that number.

Zhao Fusheng looked at her, speechless inside. He wanted to complain but thought better of it. He wondered what Fan Baobao would think of that one-thousandth of Tencent shares when Tencent's market value exceeded a trillion Hong Kong dollars, reaching a peak of 4.5 trillion Hong Kong dollars.

But that was a long time away. For now, Zhao Fusheng didn't bother to explain.

"Alright, alright, Miss Fan treats money like dirt, okay?" Zhao Fusheng laughed, waved his hand, and pulled Fan Baobao: "Come on, let's go out, or else my mom and your mom will scold us again."

Thinking of the fear of being dominated by the two mothers, Fan Baobao felt a chill and quickly followed Zhao Fusheng out of the bedroom.

When they came out, the table was already set for making dumplings.

"Come, make dumplings," Li Yuan said to Fan Baobao.

"Okay, coming," Fan Baobao happily pulled Zhao Fusheng to join.

"I called you, not Fusheng." Li Yuan glared at her eldest daughter, then said kindly to Zhao Fusheng: "Fusheng, go sit and eat fruit. The few of us will handle it."

Such blatant preferential treatment was simply too much.

Zhao Fusheng happily sat on the sofa and watched TV with his father.

Zhao's father never made dumplings. That generation was like that—men outside, women inside; few men cooked.

Somewhat chauvinistic, but that was the reality.

Men of that generation would rather suffer outside to support the family, but at home they truly had everything served. In the eyes of many feminists, this was probably incomprehensible, but one had to admit that many feminists were like animal rights activists—just too idle.

"Brother, sister doesn't like the cartoons I watch," Fan Beibei came over and whispered in Zhao Fusheng's ear.

Clearly, the little girl was still bothered by the argument with her sister.

Zhao Fusheng laughed: "It's okay. In the future, I'll make a better one that Beibei will definitely like, okay?"

"Okay!"

Fan Beibei nodded vigorously, adorably cute.

But Zhao Fusheng's mind stirred. Originally just to appease the little girl, he suddenly realized that in this life, he hadn't seen many decent cartoons.

Not just cartoons—the comic market seemed blank too.

Holy crap!

This was an opportunity!

The thought flashed through Zhao Fusheng's mind.

He now knew that most of his industries were virtual ones related to the internet. Apart from Future Advertising, he hadn't ventured much into mature real economy.

Partly because Zhao Fusheng wasn't good at it, and partly because he hadn't found a suitable project. He couldn't just rush in foolishly to take over for the country.

Of course, Zhao Fusheng had a fallback: if all else failed, he could wait a few years and buy houses in major first-tier cities when prices were low, or simply buy a few thousand Bitcoins when the virtual currency came out.

To be honest, there were many ways to accumulate wealth, but not many that made him happy.

Zhao Fusheng didn't want to become a slave to money, so his plan was clear: he wanted to do something that made him happy.

"What are you thinking about?"

Zhao's father noticed his son was distracted and asked.

Zhao Fusheng smiled: "What do you think? If I go into the comic industry, would it have potential?"

"Comics?"

Zhao's father was taken aback, then shook his head: "I don't understand."

"My idea is to start with comics, have people draw them, publish them in Hong Kong and Japan, and then consider the domestic market," Zhao Fusheng thought for a moment and said to his father. "What do you think?"

Zhao's father frowned: "Why not publish domestically first?"

Clearly, his father felt that such things could be considered for the domestic market first.

Zhao Fusheng laughed: "Those places are more receptive to comics; our domestic market isn't mature yet."

Of course, he wouldn't tell his father that he was actually thinking of turning legendary anime like One Piece and Naruto into Chinese specialties.

Cultural export has never been limited by content or type; it's just that many people haven't realized this.

"Alright, as long as you know what you're doing," Zhao's father nodded and dropped the subject.

That was true. For his generation, cartoons were already avant-garde, let alone comics. Zhao's father's impression of cartoons was still stuck in the era of Havoc in Heaven and Black Cat Sheriff; he clearly didn't understand what Zhao Fusheng was talking about.

Zhao Fusheng smiled lightly and didn't bring it up again. Instead, he held Fan Beibei and began watching the long-winded evening gala.