Chapter 529: One Green Tea Is Enough

"Huh? Has Meng Jie still not gotten beaten up?!"

The first to notice something was off was still the evil little cat with an exceptionally sharp sense of smell.

After all, she was also one of the parties involved, having been sour about Meng Jie for days~

Now she was even more sour!

Originally, she thought that although she'd gone to the bathroom and let Meng Jie take advantage of the opportunity, at least she could now hide behind Meng Jie.

If those two new Jiangs launched an online mob attack, Meng Jie would take the hit.

But now she looked back—and Meng Jie had taken all the benefits, yet none of the consequences?

If that's the case, Li Yitong thought, she could afford to be even bolder!

These two new Jiang beauties? That's it?

Maybe they've become too popular and are now holding back, afraid of trouble?

If that's true, then the evil little cat would go out of her way to cause trouble.

Thinking of this, Li Yitong couldn't help but narrow her eyes and curl her lips.

"Sis Tong, your expression is so evil," Dou Xiao Tian observed Li Yitong for a long while before finally blurting out softly.

"Huh?" Li Yitong cupped her face in both hands, sounding utterly incredulous: "How could that be?!"

But Dou Xiao Tian was still straightforward with her, and didn't think Li Yitong was pretending to be clueless—instead, she said seriously: "Really, just now when you narrowed your eyes and smirked, you looked especially evil."

Before she'd even finished speaking, Li Yitong's hands were already pinching Dou Xiao Tian's cheeks: "Little brat, how dare you make fun of your sister? Let me squeeze you to death~"

Dou Xiao Tian didn't resist this squeezing at all—she even kind of enjoyed it.

But she unconsciously compared it to the feeling of Bai Liang squeezing her face before.

Hmm. It still felt better when that rough, bigger hand did it.

After squishing Dou Xiao Tian's cheeks into a cute, plump little ball, Li Yitong internally screamed—she wanted to kiss her.

She quickly let go and tried to calm down.

At the same time, she shifted the topic, asking about Dou Xiao Tian: "How's that drama you aired the day before yesterday? You told me you were going to blow up, right~?"

This instantly made Dou Xiao Tian's face wrinkle—her drama, "Such Lovely Us," had received a lukewarm response; after only two days, there was no sign of it blowing up.

As for what Li Yitong had said, of course it was just Dou Xiao Tian bragging!

Before the drama aired, of course you had to show total confidence.

As long as it hadn't aired, it was still guaranteed to be a hit!

Now that it had aired, reality had to be faced.

And reality was: it truly had no buzz. Maybe Dou Xiao Tian was just unlucky—her drama "Such Lovely Us" was a low-budget youth romance.

But everyone knew that the "tax" on romance dramas had already been paid by Bai Liang, who'd carried the two new Jiang girls all the way to 2025.

One hit drama, one guaranteed drama king—this bombardment had directly raised the ceiling for the genre and expanded the market.

But it also spoiled the audience's taste—the standard was no longer the same!

Now, any drama tagged with "romance" had to be compared to Bai Liang's two.

Especially this year—those two dramas' influence still hadn't faded~

Even as "Youth in You" kept climbing at the box office, Bai Liang hadn't managed to replace Han Shangyan and Yu Tu with his character Xiao Bei.

On Weibo, under related topics, some fans still kept shouting those two names.

As for Xiao Bei? What Xiao Bei?

A street thug who brawled—how could he possibly match up to the godlike images from those two dramas?

Put bluntly, even Bai Liang himself couldn't yet outshine those two characters.

Under these circumstances, Dou Xiao Tian and her drama's equally new male lead had an extremely hard time breaking through this niche.

They could only hope for a late-stage reputation turnaround to boost the drama's data.

Because "Such Lovely Us" actually had decent reviews—it still had an 8-point rating, which was rare for a youth romance drama.

But for a short drama of only sixteen episodes, waiting for word-of-mouth to spread during its run seemed too slow.

At this moment, Li Yitong regretted bringing this up—after all, a low-budget youth short drama with a budget possibly under ten million flopping was perfectly normal.

Her evil little cat had plenty of flopping experience herself~

And most of them were as the female lead! Still flopped!

But Dou Xiao Tian had only been in the industry for a short time, acted in a few dramas, and had only been female lead once or twice.

So it was perfectly normal for her to feel down when the reception was quiet.

In fact, Dou Xiao Tian's frustration wasn't just because her drama seemed to be failing—it was mostly because she felt she might never get the chance to play the female lead opposite Bai Liang.

Even Li Yitong didn't know that Dou Xiao Tian actually had a "newbie gift pack" waiting for her from Bai Liang~

It was the day she finished filming her scenes in "The Son-in-Law" that she received the "Brave One's Reward."

A promise similar to the one given to Zhao Jinmai.

And because Dou Xiao Tian was truly bold, she even reached out herself and asked for a puppy talisman.

This story was too similar to Zhao Jinmai's!

But unlike Zhao Jinmai's no-strings-attached promise, Dou Xiao Tian had to meet a prerequisite to claim her "newbie gift pack."

That was: achieving the "Rising Star of the Jianghu" achievement and gaining minor fame in the industry.

This requirement wasn't unreasonable at all—if the standard were lowered further, Bai Liang would be playing the male lead with her today, and rumors about them would flood the internet tomorrow.

Their status gap was too enormous, and there was no "backstory" like Zhao Jinmai's.

To outsiders, if something like this happened, there'd surely be something fishy~

People in the entertainment industry always loved to imagine the worst.

Of course, this was an exaggeration—but it was highly likely to happen.

Maybe it's not even about Bai Liang's rumors—it could be about someone else, but at the very least, a "resource guy" label is about to come crashing down.

In short, achieving the "Rising Star of the Jianghu" achievement is basically the bare minimum standard for playing the lead couple with Bai Liang.

Xiao Tian herself felt she'd scored a huge bargain! Brother is so good!

But now, looking back, she realized the "Rising Star of the Jianghu" achievement wasn't that easy to attain.

Can we really just count on that show, "The Son-in-Law"?

By the time that drama airs, even if Xiao Tian does become popular, there's no guarantee we can book Bai Liang's schedule!

"The Son-in-Law" won't air until next year; even then, booking Bai Liang's schedule might require waiting another one or two years.

Xiao Tian: By then, I'll be "old"!

Luckily, Li Yitong doesn't know about all these wild fantasies Xiao Tian's mind is spinning—otherwise, black lines would be popping out of her forehead.

In a few years, you'll be old—then what am I?

She's seven years older than Xiao Tian.

Seeing Xiao Tian's gloomy expression, Li Yitong offered advice: "Go ask someone to promote you! My fanbase isn't big anyway. Hey~ Sister Tian Tian, have you asked her? What about Meng Jie and the others? I noticed you even added Zhao Liying's contact."

"No~"

"Why not ask them?" Li Yitong asked, puzzled.

Xiao Tian stayed silent, worried her sister would get angry.

Looking into those stubborn, innocent big eyes, Li Yitong instantly understood her meaning.

Oh my! Sister, give me a hug! So adorable!

Then the evil little kitten declared: If you don't use it, you're wasting it! Don't be polite with them!

At the premiere, Xiao Tian acted as their "enforcer"—now that she needs help, they're all pretending to be dead? Can't they lend a hand?

Thinking of this, Li Yitong grew angry. Xiao Tian was supposed to be her personal "enforcer," and now she's practically public property! After the premiere, Xiao Tian left exhausted, yawning nonstop—it broke Li Yitong's heart.

What have we turned our Xiao Tian into?

So—pay up for the Didi proxy-enforcer fees!

Of course, there's one person who can help the most.

"What about the Fox? Have you told him?"

"Brother Dou Xiao Bai's movie is still in theaters—he's busy promoting it. Isn't it inappropriate for me to approach him now?" Xiao Tian hesitated.

Li Yitong: Xiao Tian, are you even still Xiao Tian?

Where's the fearless general from before?

The evil little kitten thought: In our duo, only one of us needs to be a manipulative seductress—let me handle it, you just charge ahead!

Xiao Tian never had connections before.

Even now, she feels she has none—or at most, just Li Yitong.

But her Tongtong-jie isn't doing that well either.

She's still far behind the top-tier players.

As for herself, she's just a "little nobody"—how could she ever think she truly had connections?

What if those sisters were just being polite? If she actually climbed up the ladder and they ignored her, how embarrassing would that be?

Although Xiao Tian is cute, she's not a dumb, clueless cutie—on the contrary, she's a bit "dark"~

When they first met, Bai Liang thought she was a "dark little puppy."

But even Shuangzi could be "converted" by the indiscriminate charm of the capybara—how much more so a dark little puppy?

She went from secretly observing, mentally gossiping about Bai Liang, even jealous of his closeness with Li Yitong, to bowing like a little cat every time she saw him.

But when Bai Liang isn't around, she's still that dark little puppy.

Fortunately, Li Yitong's skin is truly thick—the evil little kitten doesn't care about your excuses!

Settle the score!

Pay up for our Xiao Tian's Didi proxy-enforcer fees!

When Meng Jie was "paid a visit," she was stunned—she'd been waiting for those two newcomers to come hammer her!

But wait as she might, the hammerers never came—instead, the bill collectors arrived.

Of course, she immediately agreed to help.

But after agreeing, Meng Jie worried she'd be hammered immediately afterward, dragging Xiao Tian into fan wars with "collective punishment"—a very normal occurrence.

Li Yitong said: Our Xiao Tian isn't afraid—just help!

Xiao Tian herself wanted to speak but held back—fine, I'm not afraid!

Later, she went to Li Xin, Jin Da Xi, and Sister Tian Tian—under the evil little kitten's goading and leadership, Xiao Tian went "door-to-door," naming each one like a debt collector.

At this moment, the producer and director of "Such Lovely Us" were scratching their heads.

Critically acclaimed but poorly attended—so frustrating!

Two days after airing, the reviews were still quite good—but high ratings alone are useless. If given a choice, they'd rather have low ratings, lots of criticism, and lots of viewers!

But the cast and budget were fixed—total investment was minimal, so they couldn't spend much on promotion.

Worse, this drama partnered with iQIYI under a revenue-sharing model.

It wasn't sold outright to the platform, so the platform wouldn't allocate much promotional resource—"good wine fears no alley" had become painfully literal.

"What if we stir up a rumor between Xiao Tian and Mingde?"

Hearing this, Director Mao Deshu sighed helplessly: "Do netizens even know who they are? How can you stir up a rumor?"

Whether Xiao Tian or the male lead Li Mingde, both are complete unknowns in the entertainment industry.

Stir up a rumor?

Even if they were actually dating, no paparazzi would bother filming them. If you paid for a trending rumor, netizens' first question would be: Who are they?

This is the helplessness of a low-budget production.

If the film were just average, that'd be fine, but the feedback has actually been quite good—it's just that few people are watching, and the promotion hasn't kept up.

This has left the producers scratching their heads.

We've got to think of a solution!

Just then, the producer suddenly received a phone call, and nearly fell out of his seat.

"Holy shit, is this real?"

"What's real?"

"Search on Weibo—lots of famous actresses are helping promote it. Did you arrange this?"

That's a good question—if this tiny, shabby crew had connections like that, they wouldn't have been worrying themselves sick before.

Among those helping promote, the biggest names are naturally Sister Tian Tian and Dou Xiao Tian, the top-tier female stars, but none of the others are unknowns.

In fact, at this moment, their presence is extremely strong.

After all, they just caused a stir at the premiere of "Youth of You." Many netizens are still "tracking and observing" them.

So when some of them suddenly started promoting a little web drama with little visibility, it naturally drew a lot of attention.

The promotional effect is excellent!

But for the "So Lovely Us" crew, this help came far too suddenly.

The producer and director were completely baffled, utterly clueless as to where this came from.

"Holy shit, Bai Liang is helping promote it too! The big one's here!"

Compared to the girls' routine Weibo reposts for promotion, Bai Liang went much further.

Today he happened to be on an online interview, and he directly urged viewers there to watch Dou Xiao Tian's drama.

He's currently the top actor in the sweet romance genre; recommending a similar TV drama has far more impact than posting a Weibo.

Many of his fans were curious: why on earth would he promote a little web drama with no visibility?

In fact, the web drama's production team were just as puzzled~

But they quickly realized: the two leads—coincidentally, the male lead Li Mingde really is "well-connected."

Because he played a role in "Love Me If You Dare," and during promotional tours for that drama, it happened to be near the end of its broadcast, so the director and producer knew about this.

From a reasonable standpoint, he probably knows Bai Liang~

Li Mingde: Huh? Me?

(End of Chapter)