ccnovels Chapter 742 - 741: Value Without Limits
Chapter 742 - 741: Value Without Limits
The simple drama filmed in the street square of St. Soniel was playing on Gawain’s desk, repeating for the second time.
Amber blinked as she watched the farcical drama projected from the crystals, her amber eyes filled with interest.
Throughout the entire playback, spanning over ten minutes, Gawain hadn’t uttered a word—the gaze from his eyes never left the ancient magical device on the desk.
The silence of His Majesty the Emperor and the solemn atmosphere around made the young playwright from Balon extremely nervous. He had long stopped narrating his own story, now only nervously waiting in silence, as if not presenting his proud creation, but awaiting a judgment.
The turbulent thoughts in Gawain’s heart gradually calmed down at this moment.
This was a film adapted to the Magic Web Terminal, the prototype of a movie, something he had once envisioned but hadn’t had the chance to realize until now.
What does the establishment of the Magic Web broadcast system mean? Probably, no scholar or philosopher of the current era can accurately calculate and summarize everything it represents. Even Gawain himself can only vaguely say, "It will change the entire world"—but one thing is without doubt, as a carrier capable of rapidly disseminating massive amounts of information, its role is not merely limited to everyday communication, the publication of Administrative Office information, or merchants’ advertising.
It can bear the responsibility of fulfilling the spiritual needs of the new era—when the Cecil Clan can eat and dress well, when basic literacy is no longer a privilege of the aristocrats and merchants, when people are no longer satisfied with basic survival and monotonous entertainment, they will certainly pursue something more advanced.
And as someone who has "been there," Gawain knows deeply how significant these "spiritual needs" are.
But human energy is ultimately limited, and so is that of Gawain, the satellite spirit. The projects that the Administrative Office can simultaneously push forward are equally limited—since the emergence of the Magic Web broadcast, it has been developing rapidly. Now there are several extremely popular programs and some entertainment content being broadcast, but film and TV dramas have yet to appear. They exist only in Gawain’s mind, as a plan not yet prepared in detail. But before Gawain could take action, a young man from the north had already thought of it.
"Is this your idea?" Gawain finally broke the silence, looking at the blond young man named Philem, "Got the inspiration from the holographic projection at the coronation ceremony?"
"Yes... Yes, Your Majesty," Philem responded hastily, bowing his head hurriedly, "Those Magic Projections were very surprising to me... Previously, I’d only seen the simple illusions created on stage by Illusionists—great nobles liked to use magic light and shadow to decorate their beloved drama, but nothing could ever produce such large-scale, long-lasting, and particularly stable images as those Magic Web Terminals. And I even heard they could record images, so... some ideas were born."
"These are invaluable ideas... Kode didn’t let me miss this treasure," Gawain sincerely praised, glancing again at the drama unfolding in mid-air—
The simplistic farcical drama continued playing. As the prototype of a film and TV drama, it seemed really primitive to Gawain. It retained many theater-style performance features, such as overly cumbersome recitative lines, unrealistic character costumes, and exaggerated physical performances. And although he could see that the actors on screen were performing diligently, equipped with solid stage skills, Gawain could still notice their discomfort in the environment under the "photographic device." They appeared stiff and exhibited the kind of nervousness professional actors shouldn’t have, all significantly affecting the quality of this segment.
At most, it could only be called a draft for demonstration purposes.
Yet Amber next to him kept her eyes firmly on those images. Even after watching them two or three times, she remained as enthusiastic as ever.
Amber’s reaction perhaps represented the response of most ordinary people when they saw these dramas—drama performances had always been the domain of upper-class citizens or nobles. What ordinary civilians could access were at most the clumsy recitations of bards and the juggling farces during festivals. Although things like the Magic Web Terminal, newspapers, and magazines were continuously filling the dull spiritual lives of ordinary people, in the realm of "stage," dramas with interesting plots were still something everyone lacked.
Even a crude and farcical drama segment should seem quite interesting to those who have never set foot in a theater.
But Gawain wasn’t satisfied with such things.
"Do you have a good script?" He looked at Philem, asking warmly.
"I... I’m not a true playwright yet; I don’t qualify to write scripts myself," Philem said nervously, "I only excerpted and adapted a script segment from my father’s work. However, I am trying to write some of my own stories..."
In his nervousness, Philem revealed that he was attempting to write his own stories in private. Upon uttering these words, he immediately regretted it—he really lost his head, why did he flaunt those immature and ridiculous stories before His Majesty the King? What if His Majesty demanded to see those stories? What if those stories offended His Majesty?
Visibly, beads of sweat appeared on Philem’s forehead, which Rebecca immediately noticed. She quickly ran to open the window—the cold winter wind whistled into the room, and the next second, the window closed again under a casual wave of Gawain’s hand.
"Go read a book for a bit," Gawain glanced at Rebecca, then looked at Philem, saying the words the latter most dreaded to hear now, "Let me see what you’ve written."
Philem swayed for a moment, feeling like he was falling backward, but a hand discreetly supported his lower back.
Fendil’s voice reached his ears: "Friend, your stories are interesting."
By now, Philem couldn’t care less about Fendil’s status—in this place, everyone was someone he could only look up to. He decided to go for broke, drawing some courage from Fendil’s encouragement. He reached into the inside pocket of his coat and pulled out a slightly worn notebook.
"Your Majesty... this is my story," he handed over the notebook, "It’s very immature. If there’s anything inappropriate, please forgive me..."
"No worries, it’s just a story," Gawain said casually, taking Philem’s notebook and flipping through it at random.
The front featured some disorganized, broken narratives, revolving around elements like Knights, Princesses, Gods, and Transcendents. Although some novel ideas from the young man were visible, it was, in essence, just some tweaks on prior works. But the latter part caught Gawain’s attention.
"Is this... your experience on the Highlanders?" He lifted his eyelids, pointing to the content on the last few pages of the notebook.
"Uh... actually... not entirely," Philem struggled to find the right words, "Some of it is what I saw on that mechanical ship, but the stories behind the passengers, their backgrounds before departure, and all sorts of experiences after arriving at the southern borders, these have elements of exaggeration and imagination, especially the passages describing their experiences after reaching the southern borders... all imaginations on my part. After all, we each went our separate ways after disembarking, so I could only guess what they might go through based on my own observations."
As Philem spoke, he couldn’t help but feel a sense of shame, aware that his depiction of immigrants’ "vulgar" stories aboard the ship was rather unrefined in such a setting. There were no noble knights, no heroic battles, no wise admonitions from gods and sages, and not even heroic monologues or poetic asides. Such a story would seem crude even if performed on a street stage during the Harvest Festival, let alone here in the palace...
Yet, he saw the emperor in front of him smiling and nodding: "That’s interesting..."
Gawain closed the notebook, casting a glance at a rather astonished Philem.
"Very few playwrights write such ’realistic’ and ’logical’ things, very few focus on an interesting story rather than an elegant heroic facade, and you even eliminated the poetic asides and formulaic monologues that serve no purpose to the plot... Does this story have a name?"
Still in a daze, Philem almost instinctively blurted out without much thought: "It’s called ’Heading South’..."
Gawain paused for a moment, then couldn’t help but laugh: "... That’s a simple and straightforward name, also interesting."
Philem immediately lowered his head: "Your Majesty, I’m very ashamed..."
"No, no need for shame, the name is good, the story is good too, although it is not yet a script," Gawain shook his head, then looked into Philem’s eyes and asked, "You’ve recorded a segment of a Magic Shadow Drama using the Magic Web Terminal, did you notice any differences between the performance under the photography crystal and stage performances?"
Philem hadn’t expected the emperor to suddenly ask such detailed and professional questions, but he had indeed noticed some things in this regard, so he quickly replied: "Traditional stages are open and fixed, where actors and settings are directly presented to everyone, but the Magic Web Terminal acts like an ’eye’, its ’stage’ depends on its ’range of observation’..."
Gawain’s questions, however, weren’t limited to just one; he continued to inquire:
"Have you thought about how to transition scenes under the photography crystal?"
"Have you considered the differences in script format between Magic Shadow Dramas and stage plays?"
"Have you realized the difference in pacing between Magic Shadow Dramas and stage plays?"
"In the photography crystal, illusion magic can produce better effects than on stage, do you have any thoughts in this regard?"
"Let’s conceive a story to be presented in the form of a Magic Shadow Drama..."
Gawain threw his questions one after another, growing more and more enthusiastic, the emergence of new things making him feel the passionate progress of the times right before his eyes once again. His conversation with Philem became increasingly in-depth and extensive, quickly reaching a level where almost no one else could understand—Rebecca was left dumbstruck.
She couldn’t help but approach Amber, carefully poking the latter’s arm: "Hey, hey, what’s Ancestor talking about here?"
"How would I know?" Amber pouted, "I’m telling you, once he suddenly starts talking to others about a bunch of topics you can’t understand, it’s best not to force yourself to listen intently, otherwise you’ll definitely get a headache, I have a lot of experience with this..."
"...Wow."
Having hardly spoken since entering the room, Elywen, just like Rebecca and Amber, also fell into confusion, while Fendil, standing behind Philem, because he often discussed Magic Shadow Dramas with him during travels, vaguely understood some matters.
As such, he quickly developed the same, peculiar thought as Philem—
His Majesty Gawain Cecil, when facing such a novel thing, could extend the topic so thoroughly and specifically, even relating it to the future development of such a thing, as if he had long foreseen such things, and even anticipated their future!!
Philem’s forehead soon broke out in a fine sweat, as Gawain’s questions were not easy for him to answer—even though he was the inventor of the Magic Shadow Drama, he hadn’t thought about so many things, hadn’t had time to discover so many issues. After struggling with a string of questions, when Gawain finally gave him a moment to breathe, this young man from Balon couldn’t contain himself any longer, and cautiously, hesitantly said: "Your Majesty, did you... actually think of something like the Magic Shadow Drama long ago?"
As soon as he said this, the more he thought, the more likely it seemed—after all, it was said that the Magic Web Broadcast was originally proposed by His Majesty Gawain Cecil...
Upon hearing Philem’s words, Gawain immediately realized.
He might have asked too many questions and said too much.
So much that it made this interesting young man in front of him start doubting life.
"No, I am just good at discovering the qualities of new things," Gawain laughed, shaking his head, his gaze falling on the young man from Balon, "Mr. Philem, the Magic Shadow Drama was created by you, that is a fact, never doubt it."