Chapter 217: You want her to go keep the clients company?

The wrap scene of *Across Time and Space* was actually the very scene Miss Jing Tian had never been able to nail — the one she couldn't get right no matter how hard she was pushed, even to the point of sticking her tongue out.

Of course, Su Lun's verdict was that her tongue-sticking was actually quite excellent.

The kiss itself felt pretty convincing.

It was just that the way her body went limp afterward looked a little unconvincing.

It might also be that Bai Liang's kissing technique was just too good~

After that, this scene was actually filmed a few more times. On the second take, Miss Jing Tian stuck her tongue out again, and the result was the same.

She got kissed so soft she couldn't even get her lines out.

So Su Lun started forbidding her from doing that, saying we are filming here — if you've got an addiction, off-camera you can kiss however you want.

Damn it — does kissing in front of the camera give this girl some kind of weird buff?

That remark made Miss Jing Tian's face go bright red on the spot.

Bai Liang's take was: the camera gave the young lady a courage buff.

In front of the camera, it's acting — acting and life have to be kept separate, right?

As for kissing off-camera?

Forget kissing — he hadn't even held her hand.

By now Miss Jing Tian's retreat-step was getting more and more practiced; if she kept going, it felt like she could play in the CBA.

Still, on this day that was about to wrap, Miss Jing Tian was actually feeling quite wistful.

Even though she hadn't been short on retreat-steps with Bai Liang, she actually still liked just being around him.

How could it be wrapping already?

For the director Su Lun, this was good news — looking at Miss Jing Tian's state today, she could tell at a glance that today's "wrap" might be done within a week.

That's right — because Bai Liang had once again helped save time, Su Lun was planning to spend a whole week carefully polishing this scene!

But, strangely, no one knew what Bai Liang had quietly whispered to Miss Jing Tian.

All they saw was her staring with wide eyes, looking pitiful and woebegone, but then making an effort to pull her expression back in — and she really did lose that vibe of looking like she was acting cute the moment she tried to look pitiful.

She actually had a touch of that broken, fragile feeling.

In the end, this scene somehow passed in a single take.

The moment Miss Jing Tian finished acting, she found a spot to squat down and wail her eyes out.

Su Lun:???

"Dou Xiao Bai, you've had a trick this whole time and you didn't use it earlier?!"

Hearing that, Bai Liang, who had just stepped out of the emotion of the scene, instinctively did a little bear shrug. "Use it too early and it stops working."

"What did you say to her?"

"I didn't really say anything."

Seeing Bai Liang's "this is a secret" expression, Su Lun didn't press further.

It was the "young couple's" business — she didn't need to know the details.

In truth, Bai Liang himself hadn't expected it to work this well.

He'd only leaned close to Miss Jing Tian's ear and called out "Jiejie," that's all.

That form of address was probably just the trigger.

The specifics — only Miss Jing Tian herself, a girl who looks cute and gentle on the outside but is a little sensitive on the inside, would know.

When Miss Jing Tian had recovered a little and went running to Su Lun with red-rimmed eyes, wanting to say a few words of thanks.

She overheard the other party on the phone — damn it, they were only just now booking the wrap-party hotel for tonight.

Miss Jing Tian's eyes went wide; learning that the other side had set aside about a week to polish this scene, only for her to accidentally over-deliver.

She cried even harder!

This young lady really is fun to play with! Not far off, Bai Liang couldn't help but grin.

Being around her felt a bit like teasing a kitten.

In a certain sense, the way Miss Jing Tian behaves at her age is actually quite a contrast.

At the tail end of the wrap party, Miss Jing Tian finally stopped doing retreat-steps with Bai Liang, gave him a generous hug, and even boldly pecked him on the cheek.

That move naturally drew a round of heckling, though everyone figured it was fine.

After all, these two had been all over each other in the scenes every day — this level of intimacy was nothing compared to publicly swapping saliva, just a drop in the bucket.

They've already wrapped — surely the girl is allowed to be a little reluctant to let go~

"See you again during the promo later~"

Hm?

Hearing that, Bai Liang felt something seemed a little off.

But Xu Zheng had already pulled him off for drinks, so he just smiled and nodded at Miss Jing Tian without saying anything.

Miss Jing Tian, who had also had a little to drink today, seemed a bit woozy now — both hands propping up her chin, her big eyes blinking as she stared at Bai Liang.

Ten minutes or so later, her assistant and the others came to pick her up.

Before leaving, she didn't forget to take one last long look at Bai Liang.

Next up — the "pulling away."

"The movie won't be out until next year, so there might be almost a year where I don't see him — that's actually pretty good."

In the car, hearing Miss Jing Tian's muttering, her manager couldn't help but remind her: "Sister Tian Tian, did you forget something?"

"Huh? I don't think so~"

"Then let me ask you — what major schedules do you have for the second half of this year?"

"Isn't it just filming and variety shows."

"What drama are you filming?"

"《Fire King》, of course."

Just thinking about this made Jing Tian's little face puff up into a bun — what kind of resources were these~ If she didn't turn things around soon, she really was going to become a small-time nobody.

Recently Yang Mi, Liu Yifei, and Zhao Liying had been tearing it up online, and the commotion was so loud that even Jing Tian felt a tiny bit envious watching it.

In the past, she had always taken the high-end route, the ultimate film actress.

But now... she really couldn't compare to them anymore.

At this moment, Jing Tian's manager was also a bit dumbfounded — hold on, is your brain fried?

"Tian Tian, did you really lose part of your memory, or are you deliberately ignoring the fact that there's a drama called《Great Ming Style》?"

The manager suspected that when she was sticking her tongue out, she really had been kissed silly by Bai Liang.

"Huh?!" Jing Tian froze on the spot, "Ah, yes, yes!"

At this point the manager didn't say anything more, and instead calmly said: "Tian Tian, how about you start dating someone?"

"With who? You going to introduce me to a boyfriend?"

"I actually do know some outstanding young men, but I'm afraid you can't be bothered now~ After all, you've just met a treasure male god, that's what they call him online, right?"

"It's not like that... he and I actually..."

"I didn't even say a name, look — you went and placed yourself right in the seat yourself."

Faced with her own manager's such hooligan behavior, Jing Tian got "angry": "You already said it like that, how is that not placing myself in the seat?"

"Fine, fine, my bad, but won't you really consider it? I think he's pretty great — handsome and steady..."

Obviously, Jing Tian had long passed that stage where her team didn't want her dating for fear of affecting her career.

Affect, my ass! Anyway, if she didn't perk up she was going to fade into obscurity. If even Bai Liang couldn't pull Big Sister Tian Tian up, then she'd just go with the flow and be happy every day.

So when it came to dating, the manager was especially open-minded about it.

Want to date, then date~ The team could even ship them together for sweetness.

Their team's situation was completely different from Tang Ren's side, who complained all day long that their top actress had a love-struck brain.

At this point the manager even deliberately added: "I remember you used to say you liked guys with muscles, right? I'm guessing you haven't gone to the gym to watch Bai Liang work out — that gorgeous set of sinewy muscles on him, I almost drooled."

"Please, I watch TV, you know. He took his shirt off in《A Smile is Beautiful》." Jing Tian said, exasperated.

She had photos saved on her phone — how could she not have seen them?

"Fair enough. So, what do you think? Give it a try?"

Then Jing Tian pulled up a picture on her phone that she had found from who-knows-where. It was probably put together by some busybody or marketing account online.

It was densely packed with all sorts of scandals and CP pairings involving Bai Liang since his debut these past two years.

Oh right, one of Bai Liang's nicknames was "Octopus."

Some anti-fans even called him "Durian," saying he was covered in dicks~

"Holy shit! That many?!"

You don't know until you look, and once you do, you get a shock. Jing Tian's manager's eyes went wide, and after reading through it carefully, she found it really was a bit ridiculous.

He's only been in the industry a little over two years! And he's already built up such a "fearsome reputation"?

Honestly, even that famous domestic entertainment scandal-magnet Feng Shaofeng couldn't compete with Bai Liang in this area.

Other people get one scandal per drama, but Bai Liang?

He even almost pulled off the move of packaging all the female artists from Tang Ren Pictures together.

To this day, their top actress Gulnazar still has that "devoted to the death" look, "incompatible as fire and water" with her little hometown girl.

Every word is correct, every chapter is first-release, all content is in one place to read!

Is she out of her mind~ deliberately going out of her way to get scolded?

It would be strange if there weren't some stories behind all this.

Actually, these "messy" bits of gossip had long been circulating.

It's just that thanks to Sister Yanzi's efforts plus some other objective factors, it never blew up into any real storm.

But for people in the industry who wanted to dig, it really wasn't hard.

At least Jing Tian had dug some up. Wow! This guy is ridiculously over the top!

Can you blame her for being on guard?

Still, she could understand it now. It wasn't that those girls were unsophisticated, never having seen a handsome guy before.

He really was... quite something.

The manager stopped pushing Jing Tian to date and closed her mouth.

If she kept egging her on, and Jing Tian actually listened, eagerly went and confessed her love, and then got cheated on — wouldn't that be her fault?

Still, she felt this matter was hard to say.

Girls are sometimes just like moths.

Even knowing there's fire ahead, they still get drawn to it and throw themselves in without a care.

—

《How Long Will I Love U》had already wrapped, but the "proxy war" between those three 85-flowers online still hadn't ended.

Little Sister Zhao was the one least wanting it to end, because《Princess Agents》hadn't finished airing yet.

This catfighting kept endlessly providing heat!

Of course, the other side hadn't let her off easy either — a pile of negative stuff about《Princess Agents》was now flying everywhere.

Including the usual "plagiarism" complaints common with IP adaptations.

This was a pretty universal point of attack. In recent years, accusations of plagiarism against various novel adaptations had surged like rising winds and clouds — almost eighty percent had some "plagiarism" suspicion attached.

Anyway, in the end it all just fizzled out.

Speaking of which, the moment "Princess Agents" got exposed for this and its popularity shot up, "Eternal Love" wasn't spared either right after.

The older sisters were tearing into each other something fierce.

Fans from all three sides dug up each other's old dirt, and all sorts of real and fake scandals made their grand entrances.

Fortunately, as time went on, things would eventually settle back down.

Because no matter how much they fought, nothing would come of it.

Instead, all the pressure landed on that fairy sister Liu Yifei.

The TV version of "Eternal Love" finished airing long ago — regardless of how much water the numbers had, its influence and traffic across the board were real, and everyone along the entire profit chain benefited; it was absolutely a hugely successful TV drama project.

"Princess Agents" was pretty much the same in this regard — all that messy negativity didn't affect the drama's broadcast, and its momentum was high.

Its influence was so strong that even Wang Yanlin's fourth male lead Yu Huai broke out of the show — everyone cursed that his performance was truly freaking perverted.

In this situation, the only one under the most pressure was the not-yet-released movie version of "Eternal Love."

That's freaking unfair!

Liu Yifei probably figured it out by now — even if movie box office had its share of shady tricks, pulling them off was way harder than with TV dramas.

Too many eyes were watching.

How did the "Monster Hunt" IP crack open? Wasn't it precisely because the box office was rumored to be a bit dirty?

So, she's going to use movie box office to go head-to-head with Yang Mi, whose numbers can be inflated?

Honestly, if "Eternal Love" doesn't hit a billion at the box office, it really can't hold up.

Luckily, according to industry estimates, the same window's competitors don't have anything truly terrifying; the only ones with a bit of threat are two main-melody films.

Though it feels like "The Founding of an Army" might be a bigger threat than "Wolf Warrior 2."

"Wolf Warrior 2" only has one top-tier idol, Bai Liang, but "The Founding of an Army" has a whole pile of fresh-faced pretty boys — that traffic alone is enough to suppress Bai Liang, no matter how well he can fight.

Forget Bai Liang — even Lu Han before his official announcement couldn't pull it off.

Oh right, Lu Han is in "The Founding of an Army," and so is Li Yifeng, another of the Four Top-Tier Idols.

Add in the all-star lineup — if the subject matter weren't still somewhat serious, it would absolutely be a billion-level film.

Luckily, it really is that main-melody.

In short, this window's intensity isn't that scary, and "Eternal Love" is very competitive.

Peek a bit further ahead — oh hey, Yang Mi really is everywhere.

Just ten-plus days before "Eternal Love" and "Wolf Warrior 2" locked their release dates, there's also "Brotherhood of Blades 2," which Yang Mi stars in.

Truly a model worker — here's another reason for "Workhorse Lady" to be jumping around so frantically.

So, Liu Shishi should probably enter the fray too, because the female lead of the first "Brotherhood of Blades" was her.

Original and sequel, two of the 85 Flowers, with quite a fateful grudge — this topic doesn't even need to be stirred up to heat up on its own.

"She's really amazing!" Miss Little Zhao sighed thus.

Honestly, she genuinely admires Yang Mi a bit — this woman has really taken marketing to an art form.

Miss Little Zhao herself only does the freeloading-marketing thing, yet under Yang Mi's copycat approach, she actually dragged out such a lineup.

Is she trying to solo the "entire world"?

Why not try harder and drag Tiffany Tang in too while she's at it.

In this situation, Miss Little Zhao called Bai Liang several times in a row.

With only one purpose: to warn him to absolutely not get mixed up in it.

She knew Yang Mi and Bai Liang were on good terms, and feared this guy would be led astray by the "bad woman."

Bai Liang: Yang Mi's business, let's talk about it later.

There's a Miss Xinjiang who has already prepared to flip all of them!

Part of the preview for "Divas Hit the Road" is about to drop — the official Weibo account has already started pushing promo materials.

And classmate Nazha has long been ready for the Northern Expedition!

She couldn't care less about some 85 Flowers free-for-all.

From start to finish, Nazha only had one person in her eyes — her little hometown girl, Reba.

She saw Li Xin's charge earlier too, but still didn't take her too seriously; her target remained that steadfast.

Sure enough, no surprise — Li Xin wasn't much good either, perked up a bit, but still couldn't shake the rock-solid Dilireba and Bai Liang CP.

Sure enough, she had to come herself!

This time, no matter what, she has to flip her little hometown girl!

To that end, she didn't hesitate to "take out" every single person blocking her way to grab hot searches and traffic.

Of course, she actually didn't have that much confidence in herself, but she had confidence in Bai Liang.

To the point of blind faith.

What clowns and old aunties! My Bai Liang would be afraid of you lot?

Bai Liang: "Huh? Me?"

And you know what, it actually sounds kind of exciting! —

Third watch, fourteen thousand characters, see you tomorrow, muah.

Begging for monthly tickets!

(End of chapter)