Reborn in 1977

Chapter 571 Copyright Protection

In the main room, at the table for eight.

Chen Fan pressed down on a stack of manuscript paper and wrote a set of English words, "True Force."

Zhou Yali frowned, "The power of truth?"

Chen Fan looked up, "It could also be called True Force. I think using Dou Qi is more appropriate, but there isn't a suitable corresponding English term."

As he spoke, he wrote the two characters for Dou Qi on the paper.

In later generations, when domestic fantasy novels were translated into English, the specialized terms like Dou Qi, magic power, and mana were basically transliterated directly, and then foreigners were made to understand through conceptual explanations.

However, that was because everyone knew that these novels were translated from Chinese works, and they had already accepted it psychologically when reading.

Now, Chen Fan didn't dare to gamble on whether Western readers would accept a Western fantasy concept created by a Chinese person. After all, in the eyes of many of them, we still have queues and bound feet. It's hard to say how many people would actually read it, so he tried to use words they could understand and reduce the feeling of "foreign goods."

Zhou Yali still frowned, pondered for two seconds, and asked, "Have you seen 'Star Wars'?"

Chen Fan was taken aback, "A science fiction novel?"

Of course, he knew what "Star Wars" was, but he couldn't say it.

Seeing that he hadn't heard of it, Zhou Yali explained, "It's a science fiction movie. I won't go into the specific plot, but besides using the universe as the background of the story, I think it's a story a bit like our martial arts stories. It also has extraordinary power, but they call it 'The Force'."

She shook her head and smiled, "It's a bit like the name you came up with."

Chen Fan raised his eyebrows slightly, "This word can be translated as divine power, or it can be called motive power, or original power. If we follow our habits and choose a two-character name, it would be Yuan Li (Original Force)."

Zhou Yali snapped her fingers and smiled, "This name is good, it sounds better than 'Li (Force), Motive Power, Divine Power'."

Then she looked at the words on the paper and muttered twice, "True Force? True Force? Dou Qi?"

Immediately, she pursed her lips and said, "I think Dou Qi is better, it has more of that Western feel."

After speaking, she smiled wryly again, "But this word can only be shown to Easterners, Westerners can't understand it."

Chen Fan smiled and wrote another phrase, "Magic power".

Before he could speak, Zhou Yali clapped her hands and laughed, "I know this one, it should be magic power!"

Chen Fan gave a thumbs up in praise, "Clever."

Then he explained, "The core of martial arts novels is internal energy. If you write Western fantasy, you can use Dou Qi to replace it. In our culture, besides martial arts, there is also mana in mythological stories. Correspondingly, the West also has legends of alchemists, magicians, vampires, and werewolves, so you can refer to mana and create the concept of 'magic power'."

At this time, Zhou Yali was completely absorbed and quickly asked, "What else? What else? Is Dou Qi also expressed in terms of time like internal energy? Such as ten years of Dou Qi, a hundred years of Dou Qi? The magic power of magicians and vampires must be different, right? How should these be set up?"

Chen Fan smiled, but did not answer. Instead, he directly wrote a breakdown and explanation of the power system on the paper.

Zhou Yali leaned closer, and as more and more words appeared on the paper, her eyes became brighter and brighter.

So it can be played like this?

In martial arts novels, new martial arts writers have created different schools of internal energy cultivation systems such as Confucianism, Taoism, Buddhism, and Demonism.

The internal energy cultivated between different schools also has different additional effects. Confucianism is good at self-cultivation, Buddhist internal energy has a restraining effect on unorthodox paths, and Taoism is good at longevity and understanding the world, and also has an added bonus to the lethality of evil demons.

Mana is the same. In addition to the different school effects, it also has elemental attributes. For example, those who focus on water and wood attributes are good at healing, those who focus on earth attributes are good at defense, and those who focus on fire attributes are good at attack.

Now, Chen Fan has borrowed all of it, referring to this model and translating it into the Western fantasy power system.

It's just that it doesn't use the five elements of metal, wood, water, fire, and earth, or the set of wind, rain, thunder, and electricity, but the elemental attributes that are familiar in the West.

For example, the hexagram is composed of two opposite equilateral triangles.

Its six points represent fire, water, air, earth, life, and spirit respectively.

Then, decomposing the two triangles has other different meanings. The upright upward point represents light, and the inverted downward point represents darkness.

The other four points represent the four elements: earth, air, water, and fire.

Look, a set of hexagrams can play out many different tricks.

In addition to the well-known hexagram, the Western alchemy system, or rather the magic system, also has heptagrams, the sun, the earth, inverted triangles, wings, rings, and so on.

Chen Fan can set up an exclusive sect for each pattern.

In addition, the level of power is not directly applied to the time description mode of internal energy, such as ten years of skill, a hundred years of skill, which is not accurate enough.

He created a unified unit of measurement. As for whether to use π or Ω, he hasn't figured it out yet, but he will definitely make it up to look real.

With a standard unit, not only can the level of Dou Qi be expressed clearly, but also the effects of different Dou Qi cultivation methods can be shown intuitively.

There are too many things to write, so he simply listed a few examples and then explained them.

Even so, he wrote four large sheets of manuscript paper.

Seeing that he had put away the fountain pen, Zhou Yali was about to take it, and asked at the same time, "Are you done writing?"

But before her fingers touched the manuscript paper, Zhou Zhengdong grabbed the manuscript paper away.

It scared her a lot, "Daddy, Mommy, when did you come out?"

"We've been out for a while."

Zhao Wanru was still holding the photo album in her arms. She turned to look at Chen Fan and said softly, "Xiaofan, your uncle and aunt have a request."

After a pause, her face looked a little embarrassed, "It's just that our family doesn't have any later photos of your mother. Can we take two photos from this album?"

Chen Fan said without hesitation, "Yes, of course."

Then he smiled, "Anyway, we are all family. It doesn't matter where they are placed. My mother will definitely be happy to go home and have a look. You can take any one you like."

Zhou Zhengdong shifted his gaze from the manuscript paper and nodded with relief, "Good boy."

Chen Fan smiled and said nothing.

Zhou Zhengdong took a deep breath, gave his wife a look, and Zhao Wanru immediately turned around and went into the study to take out the photos in the album.

He then turned to look at Chen Fan, raised the manuscript paper in his hand, and asked curiously, "Are you planning to use what you wrote for creative work?"

Chen Fan nodded. Just as he was about to speak, his talkative cousin couldn't wait to pour out everything that had just happened, and then pointed to the manuscript paper in his father's hand and said, "This is the outline of the cultivation system written by my cousin. I like it very much just by looking at the outline. If it is written into a story, it will be very exciting."

Zhou Zhengdong also nodded in agreement, "Mysticism has always had a market in the West. Even people who don't understand mysticism are interested in things like magicians and vampires. It's just that very few stories can really write about these things well.

Even the classic fantasy novel "The Lord of the Rings" mostly uses a non-existent fantasy story to describe the social reality at that time from the side, without delving too deeply into the mystical aspects of things.

But it is already attractive enough.

If you can write a novel with Western mythology as the background,"

As he spoke, he looked at the manuscript in his hand again, his eyes full of amazement. "Adding this set of things inside, as long as the story isn't too bad, I'll only worry about one thing after the book is published."

Zhou Yali immediately widened her eyes and asked curiously, "What?"

Zhou Zhengdong sighed deeply, "This thing is written as if it's real."

He looked at the manuscript and read, "Through exercising the body, stimulating the power hidden deep within the flesh and blood, and then, according to the Dou Qi cultivation method, enhancing and strengthening this power, and using this power as a guide to break the barrier between the human body and the heavens and earth, absorbing the magic power between the heavens and earth…"

Reading to this point, Zhou Zhengdong couldn't help but shake his head in admiration, "It's written as if it's real. I strongly suspect that some people will follow this cultivation method to practice. If they can't cultivate Dou Qi, they might come to the publishing house and demand that the author come out and give them an explanation!"

Hearing this, Zhou Yali burst out laughing, "Hahahaha, that's too exaggerated."

Chen Fan's mouth twitched slightly, and he didn't think Zhou Zhengdong was exaggerating at all.

In fact, it's the same in China and foreign countries. When Jin Yong's novels were introduced to the mainland, many people searched everywhere for martial arts secrets to practice internal skills, adding fuel to the already booming Qigong craze.

Later, when Harry Potter became a global bestseller, countless people still learned the meditation methods in the book and practiced meditation.

These people are not all children, but a large number of adults who clamor every day to become wizards.

In the end, if they can't practice, they can only admit that they are Muggles, and they still refuse to believe that there is actually no magic in this world.

Of course, there are also some people who scold Rowling, holding up banners and shouting that Rowling is a liar, telling everyone not to believe her.

Well, if it's his turn to create a Western fantasy novel, then Rowling probably won't be the one to take the blame.

Zhou Zhengdong looked at the manuscript in his hand, thinking about how to "monetize" it.

Although his main profession is a lawyer, the Zhou family's industry is still under his control. It's just that it's usually managed by the descendants of the loyal servants who came with Mr. Zhou back then, and the final decision is still in his hands.

Publishing is not a prominent part of the Zhou family's industry. It was just that the old man specially invested money to build it in order to inherit Chinese culture in Chinatown, or to enhance his voice.

But fortunately, compared with many other Chinese publishing companies of the same type, this publishing company has been lucky. It has basically not lost money in recent years. Later, under his operation, it successfully entered the English publishing market and developed and grown, and even established a nationwide distribution network.

Although he doesn't pay much attention to this area, the current situation is different.

First of all, this thing was written by his nephew. If it can be published smoothly and win the market, it will be of great benefit to his nephew in terms of both fame and fortune.

For this reason alone, he decided that he must do it.

Another thing is that as a publishing company, if it can publish a super bestseller, it can eat dividends for a lifetime.

Most importantly, after the publishing house gains fame, it will definitely drive the development of other industries in the Zhou family.

That's how big companies are. Perhaps it's just a small opportunity that can produce a linkage effect and make the benefits grow like a snowball.

Not to mention, from Zhou Zhengdong's perspective, the opportunity in his hand is not small. For the entire Western publishing industry, it can be described as "earth-shattering."

This opportunity must be seized!

After pondering for two seconds, Zhou Zhengdong looked at Chen Fan and asked, "When do you plan to write this book?"

Chen Fan scratched his brow, thought for a while, and said, "This is just my whim today. If I want to create it, it will probably be a relatively slow process."

He shrugged, "I need to read some information about Western history and geography first, as well as some hero biography stories, and then I can start writing."

After a pause, he looked up and said, "So, I have two ideas. The first is that I write it myself, but the submission time will be longer, at least by the end of this year.

The second one is…"

He pointed to the manuscript in the other party's hand, "That is, using these ten days or so, I will try my best to improve the outline, and then write one or two story outlines.

When you return to the United States, you can take the outline away and find an author with a solid writing foundation in the United States, give him a reward, and write a novel based on the story outline and the setting of the cultivation system that I wrote, but it must be under my pen name."

He would be a fool to let go of this Western fantasy novel that can obviously lay golden eggs. But it is still possible to find a few tools to make money for him.

As for the pen name, American authors also use pen names, Mark Twain is one, his real name is Samuel Langhorne Clemens, and Charlotte, the author of "Jane Eyre", used the pen name Currer Bell when publishing this work.

He will also come up with an English pen name, Versailles Augustus.

The apprenticeship gift dagger given by Master Zhang was used by the ancient Roman Emperor Augustus, so it's normal to borrow the name, right?

After listening to Chen Fan's words, Zhou Zhengdong pondered for two seconds and was about to speak.

At this time, Zhao Wanru walked out of the study and said loudly, "My suggestion is to use the first one, let you write it yourself. It doesn't matter if it takes a long time, what's important is confidentiality."

Zhou Zhengdong nodded in agreement, and said solemnly, "This is also what I think."

He looked at Chen Fan and said in a deep voice, "You have been in the mainland and may not know much about the situation outside. First of all, you must understand that the novel cultivation system you designed is a huge treasure and the most core thing.

It can attract young people and even many people interested in mysticism at the first time. Attracting them means that the novel has readers and a basis for becoming a bestseller.

Therefore, before the book is published, this setting system must not be seen by anyone else. Otherwise, the designer of this system may become someone else, and others can use countless methods to circumvent the corresponding patent law with your things, making you suffer in silence, and even you will never be able to write novels of similar themes in the future."

After he finished speaking, Zhao Wanru walked closer and said, "The United States has strict intellectual property protection laws, including copyright, but these laws also have countless loopholes. Before determining that you are the copyright holder of this design, you can hire a professional copyright lawyer to take it for yourself.

But if you release it first, the effect will be completely different. Not only will all the fame belong to you, but your uncle and I will also design a complete set of copyright protection defenses for you to prevent your design from being plagiarized.

Even if someone wants to use your settings, even similar settings, they must pay copyright fees!"

Chen Fan's eyes turned slightly. Settings also have copyright protection?

But this is all beneficial to him, so he naturally nodded in agreement, "Okay."

Zhou Zhengdong smiled, looked at the manuscript in his hand again, pondered for two seconds, and decisively took out a lighter and lit it.

Then he looked at Chen Fan, "Where's the stove?"

Chen Fan was a little surprised. Hearing his question, he pointed to the back, "It's behind the house."

Zhou Zhengdong immediately turned around and walked out.

Zhao Wanru smiled at Chen Fan, "For safety's sake, it's better to burn it."