"Hello, I am Mr. Li Qiang's lawyer. Here is a will previously reserved by Mr. Li Qiang. All his property will be used to establish a charity foundation to provide funds for the education of more children!" Li Qiang, disguised as a lawyer, produced his hastily written will and handled all his property.
Afterward, Li Qiang stayed on Earth for another month, enjoying his last days. He also purchased a large quantity of daily necessities, close to 10 million yuan, including computers, laptops, game consoles, and a large number of batteries. After filling the Na Jie bracelet given to him by Fu Shan, Li Qiang finally let go of everything he had on Earth.
"Now we can go to Fengyuan Star!" Fu Shan said with a smile after seeing Li Qiang complete all this.
"Okay!" Li Qiang's face showed a bit of excitement and eagerness, along with some confusion. "How do we determine a planet? This place sounds incredibly far away in the universe. Even with a spaceship traveling at the speed of light, it would likely take hundreds or thousands of years to fly there. How can we get there?"
"We'll just make a teleportation array!" Fu Shan chuckled.
"Teleportation array?" Li Qiang was taken aback. Fu Shan took Li Qiang's hand and performed a spatial move. In the next second, Li Qiang found himself and Fu Shan appearing in an extremely cold place with a fierce wind. The air was also very thin, and Li Qiang had to breathe with great effort to get enough oxygen.
"Where is this?" Li Qiang asked.
"This is the highest peak on this planet. You should call it Mount Everest!" Fu Shan said. "Earth's ancient teleportation array is engraved on the summit of Mount Everest. However, Earth hasn't used this teleportation array for a long time. When I came before, I didn't come through the teleportation array; I came directly by immortal boat."
"You haven't cultivated to the Nascent Soul stage yet, so your body probably can't withstand the pressure of the immortal boat. Therefore, I must restore the ancient teleportation array on Earth and then jump from planet to planet to take you to Fengyuan Star! Just like my brother took me to Fengyuan Star back then. Speaking of which, this journey is quite nostalgic now!"
"Wait for me for a moment. This teleportation array is partially damaged and lacks spirit stones as energy. I need some time to repair it!"
"Alright!" Li Qiang responded and looked down from the mountaintop. He clearly saw more than a dozen people dressed in brightly colored mountaineering gear struggling to climb up the mountainside. These were clearly mountaineers attempting to scale Mount Everest.
"Brother, you need to hurry, or those climbers will discover us!" Li Qiang said with a smile.
"Very soon!" Fu Shan said, quickly forming a hand seal. All the surrounding stones floated up and began to move according to Fu Shan's will.
Even more magically, lines of shimmering golden light emerged from the ground, and several jade-like stones flew out of the ring on Fu Shan's finger.
These stones were first crushed and then turned into golden liquid, filling in some of the missing lines among the shimmering golden patterns, presumably repairing the teleportation array.
At this point, the ending theme music suddenly played, and the first episode concluded.
While this sequence of events sounds simple, it was visually spectacular when presented with special effects. It was completely different from the effects of various immortal cultivation 3D animations in later generations.
Those 3D animations, being animations themselves, rendered these effects as mere explosions of color, making them appear incredibly fake.
However, the effects here were different. Because they were mixed with special effects within live-action filming, these effects had to conform to reality, whether it was the floating stones or the faintly shimmering golden lines.
And most importantly, the effect of melting a jade stone into golden liquid was terrifyingly real, allowing the audience to fully appreciate the formidable power of cultivators.
However, this particular special effect was not the most expensive one in the first episode. The most expensive special effect was actually the one depicting Li Qiang's foundation building and the purification of his physical body. This effect was the most difficult to produce; after the New Year, seven versions of the special effect were made, but none met the director's requirements.
Especially the depiction of the black, oily skin from which substances seeped out was never done well. In short, it just looked fake.
Then, a prop master in the crew had a sudden inspiration. Since special effects made it look fake, why not use live-action filming to depict the seepage of oil from the skin?
He was experienced in making silicone props and knew of a type of silicone that looked identical to human skin but was highly absorbent. If this silicone was soaked in black oil for a day beforehand, and then shaped like Li Qiang's face when needed for filming, applying pressure to the silicone in areas not visible to the camera would allow the oil within the silicone to ooze out, a process known as oil seepage.
This idea was immediately tested, and the resulting effect was astonishing. Finally, the black cocoon was made by roasting a mannequin coated with special black oil in an oven, creating a genuine black silkworm cocoon.
Even Leng Zhiwen, when filming the scene of breaking out of the cocoon and being reborn, coated herself entirely in such black oil and then underwent a steam bath at around 60 degrees Celsius. After the black oil dried on her body, she was filmed.
The entire process was extremely arduous. Even Leng Zhiwen, a martial arts master, was nearly exhausted and fainted after the filming. Normal actors would be unable to endure such brutal filming conditions.
Besides these two special effects and special filming techniques, there were many other places in the first episode where the crew put in immense effort.
However, compared to the special effects and filming in later episodes, these were merely a drop in the ocean. According to Peter Jackson, the scenes in the Black Mine battle and the Star Palace in the final episodes were the real special effect powerhouses.
"Absolutely brilliant!" As the ending theme music of the first episode began, Huang He was jolted out of the drama, completely unaware that an hour had passed. He couldn't help but exclaim his admiration.
This television series had indeed exceeded his expectations; it was filmed to near perfection, representing the almost absolute limit of current technology.
At the same time, Boss Huang felt immensely proud. Unlike the classic television series he had copied and replicated from his original world, this television series version of "The Journey of the Spiritual Cultivation" was entirely filmed by him, something that did not exist in his original world.
Moreover, this television series was so wonderfully made, surpassing all the dramas he had ever seen. This was undoubtedly his own creation, his unique contribution to this world!
His transmigration had certainly been worthwhile!
"By the way, why do I feel that the plot of the first episode differs so much from the original novel?" After the shock and pride subsided, Boss Huang remembered this point and asked with a smile.
"It differs quite a bit. I reread the original novel and the script later and found that they almost completely rewrote the original here. I don't know which screenwriter did it! But the changes are very good. At least the beginning is much better than the original novel's opening, which was truly terrible!" Peter Jackson said, touching his forehead.
Indeed, although "The Journey of the Spiritual Cultivation" was undoubtedly a masterpiece, its beginning was somewhat poor.
Thus, the main storyline of the original opening was still Li Qiang being chosen by Fu Shan and then traveling to another star in the universe to cultivate.
However, the trigger for Li Qiang embarking on the path of cultivation was not, as depicted in the television series, fighting and dying while trying to rescue kidnapped children from criminals, nor was there the scene of chatting with Fu Shan at the Terracotta Army of the First Emperor's Mausoleum. They simply had a few casual conversations on a mountaintop, and then prepared to leave Earth.
In the original novel, Li Qiang actually discovered that his most trusted friend had betrayed him, emptied his company's savings, and was also involved with his girlfriend, cuckolding him.
Enraged, Li Qiang killed the unfaithful couple and, being pursued by the police and with no way out, then went to cultivate with Fu Shan.
To be frank, although this plot had its moments of intensity, it was not very "nice" and would surely draw furious criticism from readers on Qidian, causing them to abandon the book.
Of course, a movie is not a Qidian novel, but the principle is the same: starting with the feeling of being cuckolded is unpleasant. Boss Huang was well aware that he was creating a "cool" drama, and this uncool element should be removed.
An even more crucial reason was that giving the protagonist the identity of a murderer from the outset... would be difficult to get approved!
Conversely, sacrificing oneself heroically while saving others and fighting against criminals, bleeding and dying, was a standard heroic opening for a passionate hero, and it would be much easier to get approved.
As for the later addition of the chat at the Qin Shi Huang Mausoleum and the repair of the teleportation array on the summit of Mount Everest, it was purely for showing off skills and being ostentatious.
The main purpose was to captivate the audience from the very first episode. And what could be more interesting than showcasing the legendary Terracotta Army with the best special effects, and the act of repairing a teleportation array on the summit of Mount Everest with one's bare hands?
Furthermore, a major promotional point for this television series in the future would be that it was actually filmed on the summit of Mount Everest... That's right, to shoot this scene on the summit of Mount Everest, Leng Zhiwen, accompanied by an experienced mountaineering cinematographer, went directly to the summit of Mount Everest.
Leng Zhiwen even stripped off all her mountaineering gear and stood on the summit wearing only casual clothes to film... Therefore, only Leng Zhiwen, a martial arts master, could film this way, and only her related shots were taken.
Otherwise, no one could withstand such filming conditions, not even Wu Jing.
Yes, that's exactly right. Wu Jing was the one playing Fu Shan. When he learned that Leng Zhiwen was going to climb Mount Everest alone to film, he was terrified.
However, Wu Jing also mustered his courage and went mountaineering. There was no reason why he should be inferior to a woman! Unfortunately, he had a back injury and couldn't sustain the climb halfway. He ended up filming honestly in a special effects studio. Therefore, upon careful observation, one would notice that there are very few scenes in the Mount Everest segment where the two of them appear in the frame together.