Yang was also a producer of another Chinese fantasy blockbuster, Wu Ershan's Painted Skin: The Resurrection" the second installment of the Painted Skin series. The film grossed 702 million yuan and became the highest-grossing domestic film in China for a short time in 2012, until the record was beaten by Lost in Thailand later that year.

But Painted Skin: The Resurrection gave Yang and his fellow investors, including Ningxia Film Group chairman Yang Hongtao, a push to do something else rather than Painted Skin 3 – a much better fantasy based on Asian myth.

"We thought, if we just want to make some quick money, and if our film industry doesn't advance to another level, it will be no good for Chinese films," Yang said. This ambition led him and more than 20 investing companies to come together to build a fantasy world that would live up to international standards.