In the villa's gym, after finishing his routine workout, Ryan stood shirtless facing George. For some time now, he had been learning some simple self-defense techniques from George.
Ryan moved, pouncing toward George like a juvenile cheetah. George turned to avoid the attack, grabbed the boy's arm, and performed a textbook over-the-shoulder throw, tossing him onto a thick foam mat.
"Again!" Ryan bounced up with a kip-up. There was a hint of abdominal muscles on his lower belly — clearly, he was on the path to becoming a hunk.
"That's enough, Ryan." George stopped him and advised, "Your body is still developing; too much training won't do you any good."
"Alright then." He reluctantly retracted his fists and ambled toward the locker room.
The reason he was learning self-defense wasn't because he wanted to go around fighting in the future, but rather to increase his chances of escape in case he ever encountered danger or was swarmed by paparazzi or obsessive fans. Being agile couldn't hurt, right? Besides, some roles he planned to take in the future would also require this kind of skill.
Besides, what he was learning from George were just some basic self-defense techniques taught in the Marine Corps.
After a thorough shower and changing into fresh clothes, Ryan headed to the front of the villa, where George was already waiting in the car. Their destination today was Disney.
Ryan had already instructed Kinsley to submit the script of The Lion King to Disney, along with a stack of concept art and sheet music. Following his direction, Kinsley had also presented a sky-high contract proposal during negotiations.
Animation production was the cornerstone of Disney's empire. Even if Ryan wanted to invest, they wouldn't allow anyone to meddle in their area of expertise.
So Ryan simply demanded a sky-high price — he wanted 10% of The Lion King's profits. And this wasn't just a share of the North American box office, but a cut from all revenue generated by The Lion King — including box office, merchandise, licensing, home video, and the original soundtrack. It was indeed a lion's share.
Think about it — in his previous life, the film alone grossed nearly $800 million at the box office. The soundtrack was wildly popular, second only to The Bodyguard, not to mention the toys, comics, animated series, T-shirts, and more.
Later, the film even made it to Broadway and caused a massive sensation.
All in all, the total revenue generated by The Lion King was astronomical.
Naturally, Disney wouldn't agree to that outright. But they understood that Ryan was intentionally quoting an outrageous price, and it was now their turn to negotiate.
The two sides negotiated for half a month. In the end, under the intervention of Michael Eisner, both parties compromised. Ryan settled for a 5% cut, but he would sing "Can You Feel the Love Tonight" or another song after his voice changed, and voice an important character in the film under certain conditions.
The Audi 90 quickly arrived in Burbank. After greeting the receptionist, Ryan headed straight for the animation studio. Today, he was here to discuss with the hand-drawn animators how to refine the animal character designs.
Although he had sketched more than ten major characters himself, his drawing skills were limited. Colored pencil sketches couldn't fully capture the appearance of these characters. Signing that contract didn't mean he could just wait to cash in — he had obligations to fulfill in return for his share of the profits.
But before he even entered the main hall of the animation studio, he heard a commotion inside — it was unusually lively. He quickly stepped in, looked up, and was so startled that he took three steps back.
George, who had been following closely behind, thought something had happened. He instinctively shielded Ryan behind him and reached toward his suit jacket.
"It's nothing!" Ryan calmed himself. Disney's hand-drawn animators were all a bunch of lunatics. If not for the rise of computer animation, 2D animation wouldn't have gradually declined with people like them around.
Unfortunately, Pixar's technology was advancing by the day…
Ryan shook his head, putting those thoughts aside. After all, technological progress wasn't something anyone could stop.
As for what in the hall had scared someone as bold as Ryan into stepping back — it was simple. There was an actual adult lion and a lion cub in there. And they weren't even locked in cages.
Of course, the two lions were separated by a considerable distance, and there seemed to be animal handlers standing nearby.
Even though iron chains were fastened around their necks and they appeared quite docile, who knew when their animal instincts might suddenly erupt?
The adult lion seemed to sense new observers joining the scene. It shook its head and fluffed its long mane, looking every bit the majestic king of beasts, then glanced over at where Ryan stood.
"Raaawr~"
The low growl made Ryan's teeth ache. Disney was going way overboard.
However, the lion cub looked pretty good — kind of like an oversized cat. Its silly and adorable demeanor was quite charming. If its appearance were a bit more cartoony, it could really resemble a young Simba.
"Um… George, what do you think about keeping a lion cub at the villa?" Ryan was clearly letting his imagination run wild.
"Ryan, are you sure Miss Kidman would approve?" George's one-liner immediately quashed his questionable idea.
Ryan scratched his head and thought, When I'm rich, I'll buy a private island in the Caribbean. Then I'll keep lions, tigers… hmm, maybe even hyenas and cheetahs. Let them fight for survival on the island — a real-life animal version of The Hunger Games…
"Hey, Ryan." The film's executive producer Don Hahn walked over, interrupting his daydream.
"Hey, Don." Ryan greeted him and pointed to the lions. "What's this all about?"
"The studio hired them from a circus," Don Hahn explained casually, clearly used to this kind of thing. "They're for the animators to get inspiration. Wanna take a closer look?"
Only the dead truly understand the value of life. Since his rebirth, Ryan had always steered clear of dangerous activities. He quickly waved his hands and said, "Watching from afar is fine."
He looked around and, indeed, many artists had set up their easels and were standing nearby. The sounds he had heard earlier came from their discussions.
Ryan understood well that this was an industry that relied heavily on imagination, and a relaxed working atmosphere was ideal.
"Ryan, interested in a trip to Africa?" Don Hahn joked. The team was about to leave for a research trip and would likely be there for a while.
"I'll pass. I've got school."
Ryan shook his head quickly. In his eyes, Africa was synonymous with disease, chaos, and war. He had no desire to go anywhere near that place.
He had to admit, though, that the animators possessed impressive professional dedication. Not only were they patiently observing every movement of the lions, but a few brave ones even approached the animals, interacting with them up close under the handlers' supervision.
Ryan knew he didn't have that level of commitment. As he often discussed with Natalie, in his eyes, art was more a means of achieving wealth and fame.
Perhaps no one understood this story better than he did, and no one grasped the characters' personalities more deeply. With the concept art he had drawn as reference, it hadn't taken the hand-drawn animators long to finalize the designs for Mufasa, Simba, Nala, Scar, and Zazu.
To Ryan's eyes, these characters were at least 90% identical to their counterparts in his past life — good enough for an animated film.
For hand-drawn animation, once the character designs and typical movements were finalized, production could move much faster. In his previous life, Disney had spent a great deal of time just working out the animal designs. Now, thanks to the trust placed in Ryan and Michael Eisner's forceful intervention, the animation department suspended other projects and diverted most of their resources to The Lion King.
The fact that Disney was willing to pause films like Aladdin and assign all the animators to The Lion King showed that Ryan's golden reputation was starting to shine — powerful enough to influence major film studios.
And that's a good thing, right?
All of Ryan's efforts had always been aimed at establishing a loose alliance of mutual interests — binding more powerhouses to his bandwagon to lay the foundation for his and Nicole's future, and using his influence to protect those he cared about in this early and vulnerable stage.
With the start of a new semester, Ryan officially entered the fifth grade. Technically, he was one of the oldest in the class. Most American kids began elementary school at age six. Due to his past circumstances, Ryan hadn't started school in London until he was seven.
Natalie was a year younger than him but in the same grade. She often teased him about this, but fortunately, all his grades were straight A's, giving her no excuse to gloat.
At school, most of Ryan's spare time was devoted to writing. He needed to finish Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire as soon as possible — the publisher's calls urging for the manuscript had nearly blown up Ms. Kinsley's cell phone.
To reach his current level of success, Ryan knew it wasn't just past life experience and present-day talent — hard work also played a crucial role. Ever since setting his goals, he had barely given himself any leisure time, apart from the occasional break.
He also understood that after he finished writing, the publisher would still need time to review, typeset, market, promote, and distribute the book — all time-consuming tasks.
With his fame skyrocketing and all his works published by Alienform Press — a small imprint under Alienform magazine — the company's market value had soared. Rumors had it that publishing giants like Scholastic, Random House, and the Hill Group had their eyes on it, and a bidding war might soon break out.
These major publishers had all tried to woo Ryan into switching over, but he knew full well the truth of "better to be the head of a chicken than the tail of a phoenix." He was the top star of Alienform, and they would channel all their resources toward him. Besides, his current contract and royalties were already at the top of the industry.
Would those big publishers offer him a better deal? Besides, Alienform had always been excellent at hype and promotion — that alone had made the current sales possible.
In short, no matter how chaotic the outside world became, Ryan buried himself in his school and villa life — tuning out the noise and focusing entirely on writing his magical tale.