Chapter 283: Far-Reaching Plans

The news of deaths on the set of “Reincarnation” spread across the globe. Now, not only Hollywood stars and news stories were of global concern, but Hong Kong too became a focal point of attention. Fortunately, Phantom had always been accustomed to insuring the crew, which prevented more serious problems from arising.

No matter what, Xiao Ran felt he had to be present for the filming of Phantom Part 1, a movie that had already resulted in deaths. He went to the home of the car-crash victim himself, comforted his family, and handed over a large sum of compensation.

This news instantly propelled the name of “Reincarnation” to the top, leaving Xiao Ran helpless. Deaths during filming were not unheard of; in Hong Kong cinema history, there had even been cases where directors carelessly left a deceased actor’s body in the mountains. Yet, for current Hong Kong films, this was indeed the first such incident.

The reason was simply that the scene in question was extremely difficult. Even while planning it, Xiao Ran’s heart raced—driving in reverse on a highway was, to anyone familiar with driving, a sure way to die. Without special effects like fake photography, he had no choice but to use this method. He had also made sure Infinite Vision calculated everything with extreme precision to avoid any accidents.

No matter when this matter settled, filming would have to continue. Producing “Reincarnation” would become a ordeal for Xiao Ran, as it presented the most difficulties. When it came to the action scene at the end—more of a chase scene—Xiao Ran discussed it with Yuan Banya. After confirming it was technically feasible, he called in the rest of the crew.

Gathering everyone together, Xiao Ran frowned in thought. Only after ensuring there were no technical issues did he tell Huang Yongheng, “Lao Huang, the next scene is really scary. I think the effect I want to achieve is quite unusual…”

Xiao Ran explained that this scene was the climax of the film—a five-minute chase sequence. He knew that it became difficult to innovate after a certain point in chase scenes. But he believed he could pull it off.

For the first five minutes of the chase, relying on his experience and mastery of action films, Xiao Ran managed to control everything perfectly. What troubled him was the scene after those five minutes. He wanted to create a sense of evenly matched opponents, which required a touch of romanticism.

Inspired by a sudden idea, he came up with a unique approach. Instead of a typical chase, he had the two cars take separate paths. When they reached an intersection, they would start driving simultaneously and collide.

The collision didn’t kill either driver; both were clever and lucky enough to escape from their cars, flying into the air. This was exactly the effect Xiao Ran wanted—both cars flying into the air due to the collision, with the two protagonists soaring even higher.

Liu Qingyun was called over, and Xiao Ran whispered a few words to him. The two then began to demonstrate how the scene should be acted out. First, they made aggressive gestures, and Xiao Ran added, “This is when they fly into the air, a bit higher than the cars. Just as they pull out their guns and start shooting at each other, the car explodes, and the shockwave pushes them apart at the same time—plus, they’re very close to each other!”
At the same time, Xiao Ran and Liu Qingyun both mimed shooting at each other, stepping back a few steps until they were close enough to touch hands. Then, both stamped their feet simultaneously and explained, “This is when they land! At that exact moment, both raise the guns!”
Xiao Ran and Liu Qingyun both pointed their fingers at each other’s heads as if they were guns. The series of actions left everyone in awe. Xiao Ran and Liu Qingyun let go of each other’s hands and walked over to them. Only then did Xiao Ran glance around and ask, “Can everyone understand this scene?”
With silent nods, Xiao Ran sat down relieved and said to Huang Yongheng, “For this scene, the camera must be in the right position. I want a three-dimensional effect. For the shot of the two protagonists flying into the air…”
Here, Xiao Ran’s voice seemed to cut off as if by scissors, and his expression became blank, as if lost in thought. He was extremely excited—just as he had envisioned that scene in his mind, he thought of a brilliant technique: bullet time!
If the two flew into the air, grabbed each other’s arms, and started shooting at each other using bullet time, it would definitely create an unparalleled effect. Xiao Ran quickly reached this conclusion after thinking it through.
Thinking of this, Xiao Ran sensed something wasn’t right. Bullet time was very flashy and might not suit the film. Still, he thought it was worth a try, at least to give it a shot. He quickly asked the special effects director, “I have a proposal. We can discuss it in detail later!”
Turning to Huang Yongheng, he continued what he had said earlier, indirectly giving instructions to the explosion team as well: “No explosions needed—none at all in the whole film. It looks too flashy. Old Huang, you need to get the angle right when the two fly up. I want them both to be facing away from the sun. I think you understand what I mean!”
Huang Yongheng thought for a moment and understood Xiao Ran’s intention. Truly, he was a worthy partner. Not only him but also Zhang Shuping and the others understood what Xiao Ran meant—he wanted to use the action of facing away from the light to convey a sense of downfall, which perfectly matched the theme of the scene.
“Okay, no need to give more instructions…” Seeing Xiao Ran look at him, Zhang Shuping waved his hands repeatedly. “I understand what you mean. No problem. I’ll definitely deliver the effect!”
Seeing that everyone understood his intention, Xiao Ran smiled in satisfaction. It wasn’t surprising that Xu Ke and Wu Yusen now often had their own teams—good understanding could save a lot of time and make the creative process more powerful.

While the filming was in progress, Murdoch, who was in the UK, became increasingly anxious. His News Group had not fared well over the past year or so. It had been repeatedly marginalized by MediaCorp, which had also thwarted his acquisition plans time and again, leaving his expansion efforts stalled. What troubled him most was that his acquisition attempts, constantly blocked by the powerful MediaCorp, not only failed to yield profits but also resulted in significant losses. Although bankers and financiers said nothing on the surface, Murdoch knew full well that the series of failures over the past two years had gradually eroded confidence. He knew he had to do something to turn things around—there had to be a victory. And he was currently planning an acquisition, a very large one. Its target was MediaCorp—not MediaCorp itself, but one of its subsidiaries. Given Murdoch’s current situation, it seemed as though even if there wasn’t any external support for MediaCorp, he still wouldn’t be able to achieve his goal. His target was the Southeast Asian television network controlled by ATV under MediaCorp. He had long planned for Hong Kong to be one of the four major media hubs in his vision. However, the rapid rise of MediaCorp gradually dashed his hopes—though sometimes one could describe it as a twist of fate. A few years ago, due to the merger between MediaCorp and ATV, MediaCorp became Asia’s largest television network, reducing its need for other stations. As a result, it first sold off many newspapers, earning around 20 billion in profits from that. A year ago, it began selling off television stations in smaller countries, again reaping substantial profits. Murdoch fully understood Shaw Ran’s strategy—after the merger, ATV itself became Asia’s largest television group, covering not only Asia but also Europe. Thus, the other stations that had previously served as a foundation for ATV lost their value to MediaCorp. Murdoch knew that Shaw Ran had acquired those stations only to gain local operating rights. Over the years, ATV had already achieved decisive success, so keeping those other stations would have been a waste of money. Therefore, Murdoch knew his chance had arrived. He knew Shaw Ran was wary of him and unwilling to give him a chance. But he also knew that Shaw Ran could never keep all those stations—last year’s sale of shares in those stations was a clear example. So, all he needed to do was raise funds for the acquisition. The only thing he didn’t understand was why MediaCorp would go to the extra effort and expense of merging other television networks into a single subsidiary. Yet, he had to admit that if he wanted to enter Asia, he needed this victory at all costs. This acquisition required 4 billion dollars, and Murdoch was very troubled by the funding issue. But he didn’t dare negotiate with those people now, fearing the news might leak. He even suspected that MediaCorp’s repeated success in thwarting News Group’s acquisitions was due to insiders within News Group.

This round of data collection was almost entirely done by him alone. As News Group’s most crucial endeavor in World War I, he would absolutely not allow failure. If he failed again, investors and bankers would likely lose confidence in him, and that would be a serious problem.

However, he couldn’t just do that. To build a global media group, Asia was indispensable. Without Asia, it simply couldn’t be called global. Moreover, he wasn’t the kind of person who liked failure. To undermine Shuxiang Media’s overseas market, he first had to strike at its foundation.

Xiao Ran swore there were no spies within News Group. All the information came from Lin Yongqiang, who gathered it bit by bit through his sophisticated intelligence system, while Xiao Ran’s role was to analyze the information.

Of course, for other types of intelligence, there would naturally be subordinates to handle it. But News Group was one of the opponents he had chosen to take on personally. He knew very well what kind of man Murdoch was in history. To prevent this old fox from playing dirty tricks, he had to act himself.

For example, since “Reincarnation” was in its final stages of production, Xiao Ran was now comfortably reviewing the information sent by Lin Yongqiang. There was also an interesting piece of news—more accurately, something that helped Xiao Ran relax.

The first piece of news was that Kinetic had successfully made an acquisition in the Middle East, taking control of a poorly managed oil company for $2 billion. Another piece of news was that Kinetic would still sell 30% of its shares in the oil company it controlled in Russia to Sinopec.

This was inevitable. After all, Xiao Ran didn’t want those assets to be seized once Putin came to power—after all, the methods they used to acquire them might not have been entirely legitimate. So, that company needed to be sold as soon as possible, at least before the year 2000. Selling it to Sinopec was clearly a great deal. Just by selling those 30% shares, Kinetic would earn $6 billion—an extremely profitable deal compared to its initial investment.

The acquisition in the Middle East was necessary. Xiao Ran didn’t want Kinetic to end up as a shell company after gradually giving up control of its Russian oil company, so it was essential to make a move in the Middle East or elsewhere. With this news, Xiao Ran felt much more at ease about Kinetic.

Investing, operating, selling—these were the strategies half of the seven flagship companies were using, including Kinetic, Mingxuan, and Hutchison. That was because those companies were mostly not involved in high-tech fields and didn’t need time to develop, so they adopted such strategies to expand their wealth. As for companies like Dongli, of course, they couldn’t do the same.

Finally, Xiao Ran began to review the intelligence. After a quick glance, he showed his usual mysterious smile. All the clues in this intelligence indicated that News Group was about to launch another round of acquisitions, and based on the information gathered from various sources, Murdoch’s target seemed to be a company in North America.

It clearly didn’t matter whether Xiao Ran believed it or not, as he was well aware of what Murdoch wanted to do. Entering Wei Dongling’s office, Xiao Ran handed over the information to him and said, “Take a look. What do you think?”
After observing carefully, a smile similar to Xiao Ran’s gradually appeared on Wei Dongling’s face. He stood up and stretched, saying, “That old guy is indeed quite cunning. I have to admit that company has a lot of cash flow. If he acquires it and then splits it up for sale, guess what would happen?”
Xiao Ran chuckled and leaned back comfortably in his chair. “An old fox is still an old fox—able to attack or defend. It’s amazing he could actually find such a perfect target. While others use feints, he tries to take advantage of both sides. Impressive!”
“I’m thinking that after two years of our constant…”, Wei Dongling didn’t know how to continue. Just in these two years, Xiao Ran had wasted a lot of working capital trying to block News Corp.’s acquisition, all in order to defeat them. It was unclear why he placed so much importance on Murdoch.
Xiao Ran clearly knew what Wei Dongling was thinking and smiled cheerfully as he continued, “After our relentless waste of funds to block their acquisition, investors’ confidence in him has dropped to its lowest point. Some shareholders even want to withdraw their investments. Although Murdoch is currently dominant, his funding problems have become unavoidable.”