A few hours later, the plane landed. Xie Yang emerged from the state of closed eyes and asked Long Shuyou. “How are my new songs?”
Long Shuyou looked extremely excited with a pent up desire to try it. “It’s very good. Unfortunately, your phone battery ran out halfway through and I couldn’t hear the last few half-finished products.”
“There’s no rush. Wait for my phone to be charged and I’ll send the songs to you.”
The two people chatted while getting up to prepare to leave. They had just taken a few steps when the female lead’s unmistakable voice was heard from behind them.
“Xie Yang?”
It was here. Xie Yang stopped and looked at Long Shuyou in front of him. Long Shuyou had also stopped and then slowly turned around. He looked past Xie Yang to behind Xie Yang, the familiar gleam with which he looked at Xie Yang in his eyes. This terrible golden finger.
Xie Yang turned to look at Mu Zhouyi approaching behind him as well as Xue Xian behind her. Then he nodded politely. “Hello.”
There was a touch of unexpected surprise and uneasiness on Mu Zhouyi’s face. She politely stopped a few steps away from Xie Yang and said, “What a coincidence. I didn’t expect to meet you on the plane.”
Xie Yang politely replied. “It is a coincidence.” Then he also greeted Xue Xian behind her.
Xue Xian raised his hand to meet Xie Yang’s greeting. His attitude was polite but not enthusiastic.
Mu Zhouyi didn’t notice Long Shuyou who was blocked by Xie Yang. Once she saw Xie Yang and Xue Xian greeting each other, she suggested, “Shall we go to the crew together?”
This invitation was too reasonable and refusal would seem abrupt. Xie Yang had to nod.
It wasn’t good to block the aisle and the group got off the plane first. As they were waiting in an empty space, Mu Zhouyi finally noticed Long Shuyou beside Xie Yang. She showed a surprised expression and took the initiative to approach Long Shuyou, extending her hand and introducing herself. “Hello Master Long, I am Mu Zhouyi, the actor of Ye Bing in Crazy Musician. I hadn’t expected you to be on this flight. It is nice to meet you.”
Xie Yang watched Long Shuyou reach out to shake hands with Mu Zhouyi politely. He raised a hand and pressed it to his brow.
“Hello.”
Xie Yang’s senses returned. He didn’t know when but Xue Xian had come to his side.
Xue Xian’s facial features were a bit handsome. His hair was carefully styled and his face was covered with makeup. Due to the beauty contacts, his eyes looked very special. At this moment, these eyes were staring at Xie Yang with false friendship in them. Xue Xian told him, “IUD is very good.”
According to the principle of courtesy and reciprocity, Xue Xian’s work should also be praised. It was a pity that Xie Yang had never heard any of Xue Xian’s songs. He could only respond politely, “Thank you for the compliment.”
Xue Xian seemed to take Xie Yang's response as disdain and provocation, causing the false friendship in his eyes to instantly change. He hurried to Mu Zhouyi and started talking to Mu Zhouyi.
Xie Yang successfully dropped this person and he walked along behind the three people. He glanced at Long Shuyou walking beside Mu Zhouyi and turned to Wu Shui behind him to ask for the time.
Wu Shui raised his wrist to look at the watch and replied, “It is 2:28 p.m.”
Xie Yang withdrew his gaze.
2:28 in the afternoon was approximately half past two. Assuming that Mu Zhouyi just used the good feelings skill on Long Shuyou and Mu Zhouyi’s system was still in the beginner state, Long Shuyou’s increased good will toward Mu Zhouyi would continue until 3 o’clock.
Three… it was unknown what impression Long Shuyou would have in his heart about Mu Zhouyi once he was no longer affected by the skill.
The group of people went out from the VIP channel to meet the life director sent by the crew. They exchanged courteous greetings while the assistants were in charge of picking up the luggage. Then they were led by the life director to the cars sent to pick them up.
Xie Yang was pleased to see that the cars sent by the crew were several SUVs instead of one bus. He picked a car to sit in and unexpectedly, Long Shuyou actually declined the invitation of the female lead and boarded Xie Yang’s car despite the fact that he was supposed to be influenced by the skill.
Xie Yang looked over. Hadn’t the female lead used the good will skill on Long Shuyou?
Long Shuyou closed the door and the calmness on his face disappeared. His tone was filled with a bit of doubting life, a bit of disbelief and a lot of excitement. “Xie Yang, I actually encountered another interesting voice!”
“……” Based on this tone, the female lead had indeed used the skill on Long Shuyou.
Xie Yang glanced at the driver sent by the crew in the driver’s seat and lowered his voice. “Do you mean Mu Zhouyi?”
Long Shuyou nodded with bright eyes. “Are you interested in working with her? The effect of your harmony will definitely be good.”
Xie Yang didn’t speak. He had Wu Shui hand him Wu Shui’s phone from the front passenger’s seat and searched for a clip when Mu Zhouyi was forced to sing in a variety show last year for Long Shuyou to listen to.
Long Shuyou was puzzled as he took the headphones.
Two minutes later, the excitement on Long Shuyou’s face faded away. His eyes seemed lost and he frowned. He repeatedly listened to the clip of Mu Zhouyi singing many times but it wasn’t enough. He also searched for some of Mu Zhouyi’s interview videos and listened.
Long Shuyou took off his headphones with a furrowed brow, his face completely full of confusion.
Xie Yang asked, “Do you still want me to work with her?
Long Shuyou was silent. He returned the phone to Xie Yang, took out his phone and searched for past videos of Mu Zhouyi. Then he plugged in headphones and listened to them one by one.
***
During the two hours’ drive from the airport to the crew, Long Shuyou kept holding his phone and watched Mu Zhouyi’s past videos with an expression that became stranger. Finally, once the figure of the hotel where the crew was staying appeared in front of them, Long Shuyou took off his headphones.
Xie Yang asked him, “What do you think?”
“It’s very strange.” Without the influence of the skill, Long Shuyou’s tone had calmed down a lot. “Her voice… it is like her voice suddenly had a facelift. Just half a month ago, her voice was quite ordinary during a media interview. Then when she participated in an event a few days ago, her voice changed.”
“Where did it change?”
Long Shuyou shook his head, indicating that he couldn’t say.
Xie Yang also guessed that Long Shuyou wouldn’t be able to say it. The golden finger of the female lead was very powerful and the transformation was based on magnifying the advantages of her original condition while weakening the shortcomings. It would only make people vaguely feel that something had changed but they couldn’t tell where.
Otherwise, based on the frequency at which the female lead beautified her appearance, there would already be rumours about her getting plastic surgery.
In the original novel, Long Shuyou had noticed the changes in the female lead’s voice but he had the good will skill used on him several times already and his favorability toward the female lead was quite high. In addition, he really couldn’t hear where her voice had changed so he quickly disregarded it.
Meanwhile, right now, Long Shuyou’s favorability with the female lead wasn’t so high.
The car stopped at the door of the hotel.
Xie Yang let Long Shuyou get out of the car first before following. After confirming that he was out of the driver’s hearing range, he told Long Shuyou, “I won’t cooperate with people who have this type of unstable sound conditions. In addition, Mu Zhouyi has an ambiguous relationship with a mentally disabled relative in my family so I have to avoid her.”
Long Shuyou felt uncomfortable suddenly hearing gossip and repeated, “Ambiguous?”
“Yes. Last time when my relative was sick, Mu Zhouyi hurried to take care of him and cooked soup for him. I think the two of them are almost at that point. I will give you one more reminder. Don’t say anything around outsiders in the future. Fortunately, you didn’t say Mu Zhouyi’s name when you got in the car and I also deliberately lowered my voice. Otherwise, tomorrow news will be flying all over the Internet that you appreciate Mu Zhouyi.”
Long Shuyou frowned. He looked back at the driver and it was unknown what he was thinking but his frown deepened even further.
Director Xu Heng was filming with the male lead and several supporting actors on the set. He wouldn’t be able to return until dinner. So after arriving at the hotel, the life director first arranged for everyone to return to their rooms to rest.
After arriving in his room, Xie Yang went to wash his face. Then he charged his phone and called Qiu Xing.
The other side picked up in seconds and Qiu Xing’s gloomy voice was heard. “Xie Yang, Wu Shui knows to report his safety after he got off the plane. How come you aren’t as sensible as Wu Shui?”
“My phone ran out of battery and I let Wu Shui report my safety to you. Didn’t he say it?”
The phone was silent.
Xie Yang continued. “Don’t deduct Wu Shui’s salary. He didn’t say it clearly because he was helping me with my luggage or was too busy with something.”
“…Who said I would deduct his salary?!”
Qiu Xing hung up the phone. A minute later, Qiu Xing called again. Xie Yang picked up.
“What’s going on with Mu Zhouyi? How did you accept a job related to her?”
Xie Yang explained, “It isn’t about Mu Zhouyi. It is about Xue Xian. I’m just here to grab Xue Xian’s work. Mu Zhouyi happened to be the female lead of this crew.”
Qiu Xing was silent.
“I promise to stay away from her.”
Qiu Xing hung up the phone again.
***
In the evening, Xu Heng brought the deputy director, screenwriter and several main actors of the movie to receive Xie Yang’s group.
Xie Yang finally saw the movie emperor Shen Yan who had a clear emotional entanglement with Mu Zhouyi in the original novel.
Shen Yan was 35 years old and was already the three-time golden movie emperor. His achievements were superior to his peers and his divinity was established early.
Originally, Mu Zhouyi could only be considered as a popular little flower. She didn’t have a heavyweight award in her hand and it was impossible for her to join Xu Heng’s crew as the heroine and play opposite Shen Yan.
However, the female lead was the female lead after all. She had a golden finger. It was mentioned in detail in the original novel that in order to get this opportunity, the female lead first obtained the audition opportunity for Crazy Musician from a high-level movie emperor using her good will skill. Then she used her golden finger to increase her acting skills during the audition. She suppressed the crowd during her audition and attracted Xu Heng’s attention. Then for the sake of insurance, she took the opportunity while shaking hands to increase favorability with Xu Heng and the producer respectively. Such an opportunity allowed her to squeeze out other heavyweight movie queens to get this chance.
Xie Yang had to admit that in terms of stealing resources, the female lead was really hard-working and inspirational.