Old Huang looked at Old Zhou: “What do you think?”
Old Zhou considered for a moment: “I think it has potential.”
The others also nodded in agreement.
Old Huang thought about it: “Alright, we’ll take this job! Since the client is paying anyway, let’s treat it as an experiment.”
“If this style isn’t popular, the client will be the one losing money, and it’ll help you give up this style sooner.”
“If this style catches on, we might be able to establish our studio right after graduation. Once we build a reputation, everything else will fall into place!”
Ruan Guangjian nodded: “Yes, that’s exactly what I was thinking!”
“Now we’re essentially using the client’s requirements to build our reputation, and the client is paying well, too. For the next three weeks, everyone will need to work hard. Let’s do this at the highest standard, use all our skills, and complete this job beautifully!”
“If this set of original artwork becomes widely popular, we can seize this opportunity to make a name for ourselves, and our future will be bright!”
Having finally reached a consensus, everyone got down to work.
Ruan Guangjian would create concept drafts for each character, Old Huang would do the line art, and the others, who were slightly less skilled or less familiar with this style, would only be responsible for adding details and coloring.
Following normal procedure, after Ruan Guangjian completed the line art, he should have shown it to Pei Qian for approval, letting the client determine whether the line art met the requirements before continuing to refine it.
But Pei Qian couldn’t be bothered with these details, so this step was skipped.
The entire dormitory began bustling with activity.
……
……
Handong University, dormitory.
In the blink of an eye, two weeks had passed.
Pei Qian pulled up the system to check.
【Wealth Conversion System】
【Host: Pei Qian】
【Profit conversion ratio 100:1, Loss conversion ratio 1:1】
【Next settlement time: 16 days later】
【Note: If there are unreleased products one week before the settlement, the settlement date will be postponed. The postponement time will be determined by the system.】
【System funds: 8792 (↓291208)】
【Personal assets: 1607.6】
Pei Qian had already spent 290,000 of the system funds, leaving less than 10,000 yuan.
Besides purchasing art resources, music, and sound effects, and renting cloud servers, Pei Qian had also spent money on a set of card game skill templates.
He hadn’t planned to buy it initially, but after finding that he hadn’t spent all the system funds, Pei Qian felt there was no reason to keep it.
Unspent system funds couldn’t be converted into personal assets, which would be a huge loss for Pei Qian, and he couldn’t tolerate that.
Pei Qian had already configured this skill system into the game.
For example, Guan Yu’s skill was Green Dragon Crescent Blade Consecutive Strikes, Zhou Yu’s skill was Burning Red Cliff that dealt damage across the entire screen, and Xiahou Dun’s Unyielding provided temporary control immunity and damage reduction, and so on.
After all, card skills were variations of the same things. Most card games copied “Q Cute Three Kingdoms,” with similar skill mechanisms, so the template skills were also quite standard.
Pei Qian assigned these skills to the game characters with minimal effort, making use of everything available.
Of course, during this process, any work Pei Qian found troublesome was dumped onto Ma Yang.
Pei Qian didn’t even expect him to match all the skills correctly; it would have been better if some values were misconfigured or some bugs appeared.
However, Ma Yang turned out to be quite meticulous. After the entire skill system was configured, Pei Qian checked it and, surprisingly, found no issues.
But thinking about it, since the focus of losing money wasn’t here anyway, Pei Qian didn’t care much.
Of the remaining 8,000 yuan, 3,000 was set aside for Ma Yang’s salary, to be paid at the end of the month.
For the remaining 5,000, Pei Qian planned to spend it all in a rush before settlement, buying whatever he could find on the resource site. All system funds had to be spent completely, down to the last cent.
As for why his assets had increased…
His family had sent him living expenses, one thousand yuan.
Pei Qian couldn’t help but sigh. As someone with a system, he still needed living expenses from home—how embarrassing!
Absolutely a disgrace to all system hosts!
Previously, he had intended to lose 50,000 yuan, but accidentally earned 70,000 instead.
That only converted to seven hundred yuan, even less than his original living expenses.
Too shameful!
But this time was different.
300,000 yuan—as long as the game failed, it could all be converted into personal assets. In one word: awesome!
Thinking about the imminent arrival of 300,000 yuan, Pei Qian felt a sense of happiness welling up, so much so that he was even willing to attend classes.
Now everything was ready. All they needed was for the art resources to be in place, integrated into the game, then release the game and watch it fail spectacularly—and the mission would be accomplished!
……
One week later.
Magic City, the financial university’s art department dormitory.
Ruan Guangjian, with two huge dark circles under his eyes, tossed his pressure-sensitive pen onto the desk: “OK! Mission accomplished!”
Looking around at the others, some had fallen asleep at their computers, some were sleeping in bed; only he was still awake.
Under the desk were piles of instant noodle boxes and snack bags, while on the desk were many empty energy drink cans. The whole dormitory looked like a mess.
“Phew, completed on schedule.”
Ruan Guangjian felt a bit regretful that no one was there to share this historic moment with him.
But there was nothing he could do; the others didn’t have his abundant energy and couldn’t hold up under such intense work with disrupted day-night cycles.
Fortunately, the work was completed on time.
Actually, it could have been finished even faster, but Ruan Guangjian had high standards for this entire set of original artwork. Many unsatisfactory areas were revised several times, so even with everyone working overtime, they only just met the deadline.
Quickly browse through this batch of artwork.
Ruan Guangjian felt very proud.
Works of art!
Perfect masterpieces!
Each character was carefully designed by him, each with unique characteristics and distinct personalities, perfectly combining historical images, fantastical adaptations, and traditional elements.
Each piece was guaranteed to leave a strong impression!
However, Ruan Guangjian wasn’t sure whether these artworks would become popular.
Aesthetics was a very subjective thing.
Even world-famous paintings would have many people who thought they weren’t beautiful.
This was even more true for game artwork. Sometimes, no matter how exquisite your technique or how outstanding your design, players might not appreciate it. They might instinctively dislike it simply because the visuals were a bit dark.
Why did many low-quality games like Shiny Golden Wings? Was it because their lead artists liked them? Not necessarily.
It was because wealthy players liked shiny golden wings and would pay for them!
So, if it were other companies, they would probably dislike this set of original artwork.
But after all, this Tenda Network Technology Co., Ltd.’s CEO, Pei, had already said they could create freely and design as they wished. Drawing it this way should be fine, right?
Ruan Guangjian forced himself to stay alert, logged into the ESRO resource site, and sent this batch of original artwork to Pei Qian.
“A total of 50 sets, 200 original paintings, please check.”
After sending it, there was no reply from the other side, probably because they weren’t online.
Ruan Guangjian looked at the time; outside, daylight was gradually appearing. It was just after 7 AM.
He reached for a sausage from beside him, peeled it open, and filled his stomach a bit before climbing into his bed to rest.
At last, the task was done. At noon, he would call his brothers for a big feast!
Ruan Guangjian felt relieved and fell into a deep sleep on his bed.