Kobe Bryant has been writing his life story for more than two decades, a tale of a young phenom who reaches NBA glory through victories, controversy, injuries and thousands of fadeaway jumpers. It’s a narrative he has constructed on courts from Los Angeles to Beijing, and recently told in a feature video called “Muse.”

As his career comes to a celebrated end, Bryant, a 17-time All-Star, five-time NBA champion and future Hall of Famer, now is looking to create more narratives closer to home. But they won’t be about him.

And that’s the point Bryant wants to make moving forward. It’s not about him anymore. Bryant told The Orange County Register he has founded Kobe Studios, an arm of Kobe Inc., in an effort to bring others’ stories to life in a variety of media.

Kobe Inc. is a multi-level business headquartered in Newport Beach and something of a creative factory for Bryant. He spends long hours coming up with ideas for his new venture.

“What my passion is now is creating the story,” Bryant told the Register. “Creating the story and finding the best possible way, the medium which that story can live.”

Bryant said those stories will be told through movies, books and “any area in which content is distributed and created.”

“Some stories will be created. Some stories will be fantasy in nature, others reality-based,” he said. “But we will look for content that inspires a generation of people.”

At the tender age of 21, Bryant began plotting his basketball afterlife and instead of meeting with financial planners, he met with influential business leaders. First stop was a meeting with Giorgio Armani about the fashion designer’s ability to build a global brand after he turned 40 years old. Fifteen years later, Kobe Inc. was born.

Through Kobe Inc., Bryant said he wants to grow brands that challenge and redefine the sports industry, an opportunity he will dive in full time once his playing career comes to a close in April.

“The hardest part was finding what the passion was for me,” Bryant said. “It took me a long time to do that, searching for years. I was searching and asking questions of what I wanted to do since I was 21 years old. It’s taken me 15 years to crystallize it.”

Bryant told HBO’s “Real Sports” that he knew this day was coming at an early age. He said he wrote many of the commercials he did for Nike.

“So I started reading … started trying different things out, things I was interested in. I was always gravitating around story,” he said in the “Real Sports” episode that debuts Tuesday.

He added that creating stories will be a large part of his post-basketball career, consuming much of his basketball afterlife. He told “Real Sports” that there are times when he can’t sleep because he has so many ideas and goes into his office, which bears pictures of Walt Disney, Steve Jobs and J.K. Rowling.

“I have a lot, a lot of energy. A lot, and I’m very fortunate to have that,” Bryant told HBO. “I mean, it’s nonstop.”

Bryant isn’t the first athlete to plan for his athletic afterlife before leaving the arena. Several athletes have ventured into business before aging legs and worn-out arms forced them into retirement. Bryant, however, might be one of the more forward-thinking athletes, planning his post-basketball future four years after it began.

Bryant’s first investment with Kobe Inc. was in 2014 with BodyArmor, a relatively new sports coconut water-based drink founded by Mike Repole and Lance Collins. Bryant, who sits on the board, owns more than 10 percent of the company, according to Forbes.

Bryant has invested millions of his own money in Body Armor, which reportedly had earnings of roughly $10 million in sales in 2013.

“I’ll be ready to do something else, take on that challenge and try to show that athletes are more than this,” Bryant said last summer. “That’s the challenge I’m ready to take on, too.”

Still, don’t expect the Lakers star to spend his free time reading ledger books. Bryant, who has made more than $300 million in salary over the course of his 20-year career, has added an estimated $350 million more through endorsements.

Bryant has endorsement deals with Hublot watches, the Italian memorabilia company Panini and Chinese tech company Lenovo. Bryant also has partnered with Turkish Airlines and Alibaba, an online Chinese marketplace, furthering his global reach.

Adding to his portfolio is a stake in Derek Jeter’s digital media platform, The Players Tribune. Bryant, who announced his decision to retire via the website, invested an undisclosed amount of money in the venture.

David Carter, principal owner of The Sports Business Group, said it’s a good idea for athletes to begin building a credible post-athletic business while still playing.

“By working with a select team of professionals, athletes are in a position to not only learn the ropes pre-retirement but can also hit the ground running,” Carter said in an email.

“Diversifying their personal brands by adding a business component to it toward the end of their careers can help accelerate their ventures once they retire from the field of play.”

Unlike former Lakers star Magic Johnson, who also began building his business empire before he retired, Bryant said he wants to be more hands-on.

“We can do more than simply sit here and be puppets for brands and for an industry and build our own (stuff),” Bryant said.

Long before his Achilles’ tore, his left knee gave out and his right shoulder needed repair, Bryant reached out to highly successful business people. He met with Arianna Huffington and emailed Oprah Winfrey, Nike CEO Mark Parker and Jony Ive of Apple, according to Bloomberg News.

“The one thing that is the common denominator among them all are that they all have the ability to understand people, to communicate properly, to have vision, to have guts and to have this kind of patient persistence in the process,” Bryant told ESPN.com.

Contact the writer: jcarr@ocregister.com