After chatting with his parents for a while longer, Ye Lingchen hung up the call and lay quietly on the bed.

That meet-and-greet gave Ye Lingchen a taste of the sweetness that being a star entailed. Although his popularity surged, he had not announced Y to the public yet. Therefore, he could not strictly be regarded as a star, because he was in the dark—he had yet to experience the kind of feeling akin to having stars surround the moon.

That time, it was different. It was the first time that he appeared in the public's sphere, and the enthusiasm of his fans made him have a stronger desire to increase his popularity.

During that time, his exposure rate has been very high. Ever since the last basketball game, Ye Lingchen's popularity showed no signs of fading. Firstly, he caused a sensation by walking on the water to rescue lives, then the Y Group released a small cleaning robot named Little Cloud, which attracted a lot of discussion. At the time of the prize draw, his popularity value was slightly over 36,000, but it had already risen to 458,967.

It was nearly a 400,000 increase in popularity!

Although it was fast, it was still not enough!

Ye Lingchen summarized all methods of increasing his popularity. As far as the current situation was concerned, it seemed that many occasions were all passive shows of strength. Examples would be Superman Y, Singer Y, as well as Doctor Y and Actor Y. Such a manner greatly reduced the progress of gaining popularity.

In all reasonableness, those four Ys could gain popularity much more consistently if they were made public, but there was no way he could go through with it.

Taking basketball as an example, he could join various activities after making himself known, thus allowing his popularity to increase extremely quickly. That allowed the active and continuous increase in his popularity. In fact, his popularity would surely increase after participating in a basketball match.

He was previously worried that his performance would be too conspicuous, thus attracting the attention of interested parties. At that moment however, his physical strength was very good as a result of constant cultivation. Unless he received a headshot or was bombed with an atomic bomb, hardly anything could kill him. With the extreme speed of his parkour skills and the addition of Qi refinement toward all aspects of himself, the chance of getting a headshot was almost zero.

As for the atomic bomb... It was never in consideration at all.

Generally speaking, his misgivings were negligible. Even if his performance was a little too eye-catching, it would not pose too big a problem. As long as he gained popularity, his growth rate will continue to increase at lightning speed!

Ye Lingchen laid on his back on top of the bed and looked up at the ceiling. He started daydreaming.

He felt that he had entered a dead end, as he was continuously doing things on a small-scale. The identities of all those Ys were awesome, but they were extremely unstable, thereby leading to instability in his efforts to gain popularity. What he lacked was a sustainable development strategy.

Banging away clumsily in all directions, with no overall vision, was not a long-term solution. That kind of popularity would all be in vain eventually, as nothing would be left over time. That was not the result Ye Lingchen wanted to see. Occasionally boosting his popularity would firstly make him tired, and secondly, his popularity value could not grow fast.

Ye Lingchen felt that he lost the plot.

He really did lose the plot. He was obviously one person, yet he insisted on acting like a plethora of Ys. In turn, that was what held him back.

After all, that was not the way to go. He had to think of a breakthrough.

There were two methods, the first was to actively come out and admit that all Ys were him, but that method could be discounted for the time being as it was preposterous.

The second was to reduce Y's mystery and use the different Y identities to do other things more often, like how Singer Y participated in the Survival on Deserted Island variety show. However, that would undoubtedly cause various Ys to conflict, which was not practical.

Actor Y could only retreat behind the scenes, unable to appear on the screen. His popularity value could increase if he was just a screenwriter, but the effect paled in comparison to acting. The same was true for singing. How long would it take to accumulate popularity if he was simply creating lyrics? The public focused their attention on the singer, and Singer Y's lyrical skills had already caused a sensation. It would not help increase his popularity, even if he were to continue writing songs.

Writing novels was one way, but his novels were too insignificant and it spanned too long a duration. Writing a few million words to make a best-selling book was not as popular as being an internet celebrity, and it could no longer satisfy Ye Lingchen's tastes. Livestream Y was in just as awkward a situation as novel Y—relying on storytelling to increase popularity was never going to be as quick as playing basketball.

As for business, the main thing was to make money. The increase in popularity was extremely limited. Commercial brands with a large following were almost unheard of.

Transformation!

He must transform!

Other things can be set aside. He had to give due consideration to his popularity value, as his exposure rate was the most important thing.

After thinking about it, there was only one left—being a sports star. It was a fair and promising route.

How should he utilize his status as a sports star?

After much thought, basketball games were not very frequent too.

God had probably heard Ye Lingchen's heartfelt voice because his mobile phone rang all of a sudden.

It was an unfamiliar number with a female voice on the line. She has a nice voice and had the potential to be an announcer.

"Hello, is this Ye Lingchen?"

"Yes, I am. I wonder if you're..."

"Hello God Ye, let me introduce myself first. My name is Li Lihua. I'm the vice-chairman and producer of Apple TV. Our main focus is variety shows, which are currently at the top of the industry. You've probably heard of me. I'm definitely a lot older than you, so you can call me Miss Li or Old Li."

Was it suitable for a woman to be addressed as Old Li?

Ye Lingchen was sweating, but he ignored it and said, "I'll address you as Chairman Li. May I ask why Chairman Li is calling me?"

"I like sports very much, and I pay special attention to our country's sports. Also, our Apple TV often holds some sports-related activities, such as water obstacle courses and various other extreme challenges. We watched your basketball game not long ago."

Li Lihua's voice was filled with excitement. She smiled and said, "Your skills really attracted me. You're the best athlete in our country, and your physical fitness is excellent in every aspect, am I right?"

Ye Lingchen smiled modestly. "It's decent."

He could more or less discern that something was definitely up when the vice-chairman took the initiative to contact him. Moments ago, he had just fretted about how best to utilize his status as a sports star, so it was a surprise that business would come knocking on his door so soon.

His brilliance could not be concealed and he was always attracting endless attention.

Li Lihua continued, "Your achievements in sports are really amazing to me. You're just the kind of guest that's missing from Apple TV. I wonder if you're interested in participating in a variety show that we've just launched? We can discuss the appearance fee as well as the duration."

...