Chapter 649: She

"No romance subplot? Really?!"

"True! Why would I lie to you? Today's already shooting day, and I've got the latest script—definitely no romantic plot between the leads."

The evil little kitten was thrilled upon hearing this over the phone!

She had been down for a long while after failing to snatch this drama, but now that she saw the details, she realized Bai Lu wasn't getting any advantage either!

She lost, sure—but the other side didn't win either!

Plus, she had a drama lined up with Bai Liang as co-lead—by that standard, she'd already won big time!

"The Servant" vs. "Cops' Honor"—lots of lead couple chemistry versus zero romance—what right did Bai Lu have to compare herself to her?

Overjoyed, the evil little kitten immediately declared that shared joy is double joy.

She instantly shared this news with her "good sister" Li Xin!

Though they'd recently been on the verge of a falling-out, and their teams had even clashed, in the end everyone lost—so as fellow "failures," they no longer cared about past petty grudges.

Women's emotions work like this: they come fast, go fast, and reconcile fast.

"Really~?" Li Xin's tone on the other end of the line was flat, almost floaty, giving away no emotion.

"Totally true, sis!" the evil little kitten swore, "The fox himself told me~"

Li Xin chuckled. You're trying to stir the pot, huh? He told you personally? What are you showing off for?

But she knew the evil little kitten's nature well—they'd known each other this long, and the "Sassy Chick Sisters" nickname still circulated.

So when that stinking cat lifted its butt, Li Xin already knew what shit it was about to drop.

So sneaky!

Then Li Xin fired back with her own eye-dropping: "So do you know how much authority the fox has on set?"

Li Yitong didn't mind the use of her personal pet name, but frowned: "What do you mean?"

"It means if he wants to, he can add a romance subplot anytime—turning this drama into a sweet, fluffy romance isn't even impossible."

"Really?!"

In this moment, their roles seemed to have swapped.

Li Xin smiled: "Totally true, sis~ Didn't you know?"

Li Yitong knew, of course—she'd shot several dramas with Bai Liang; how could she not?

At this very moment, she even pictured it: that shameless Bai Lu pouting and whimpering in front of Bai Liang, begging him to add or rewrite scenes.

The worst part? Bai Liang was soft-hearted!

In the past, Li Yitong had liked this trait—whenever she pouted or coaxed him, he never refused.

Of course, she considered herself "well-behaved" and never asked him for anything unreasonable.

But she was well-behaved—others weren't necessarily!

The original purpose of this call with Li Xin was for Li Yitong to share some joy and drop a little eye-dropping in return.

But now she felt vaguely unsettled, and couldn't think of any effective "scheme" to counter it.

In the end, she could only sigh: Dammit, Li Xin has gone bad too!

Still, the other side wasn't flawless.

Li Xin's tone and attitude when answering the phone had revealed something—when they were all fighting over roles, she hadn't been this calm! Something was up.

The evil little kitten's big eyes darted around, and she immediately sent someone to dig up Li Xin's recent situation.

And she actually got something!

A major revolutionary, espionage, historical drama: "The Wind Chaser"!

Even like "Cops' Honor," it was a joint production by CCTV and iQIYI.

Of course, she couldn't get many details—only that Li Xin was already deeply involved; hard to interfere now.

But one important piece of info: the male lead in this drama is a young role.

Knowing this, the evil little kitten didn't need to think—she knew Bai Liang was the top candidate for the male lead.

For this kind of resource, if the actor's age and character fit even slightly, the script would be sent to Bai Liang first—and he was almost always the first choice.

Only if Bai Liang declined, or the producer couldn't wait, would others even get a shot.

That was Bai Liang's terrifying dominance among young male actors—absolutely in a league of his own.

So now the question was: had he accepted it?

The evil little kitten could've asked Bai Liang directly, but since she learned the drama wouldn't start shooting for a while—not until next year at the earliest—she wasn't in a rush. Besides, rushing wouldn't help.

Her resources were indeed strong, but CCTV dramas… sometimes, strong resources still couldn't get you in.

Like this "Cops' Honor"—same CCTV and iQIYI joint production—she used every ounce of effort and still failed to snatch it.

She could only sigh: Li Xin truly deserved to be her "Sassy Chick Sisters" partner—after being knocked out early, she'd immediately found a new target.

After much thought, the evil little kitten gave up on causing trouble.

She'd been too active lately—her "North Motion Date Encounter" with Bai Liang was still trending.

At a time like this, doing nothing was better than making a mistake.

Besides, they'd still have to shoot "The Innkeeper's Story 2" together—she didn't want to fully break with Li Xin and leave Bai Liang caught in the middle.

Thus, the evil little kitten entered a temporary "hibernation phase"—everything would wait until "The Servant" aired!

But about Li Xin's comment on set authority—there was still plenty to discuss.

After receiving the evil little kitten's hint, Li Xin said she had no objections.

Her current mindset was actually quite good—she felt she'd fully escaped her bad luck streak.

Under these circumstances, it was time to give those who'd made her suffer some trouble.

After some discussion, the two quickly devised a fairly effective "bad idea."

Thus, the Sassy Chick Sisters duo returned to the stage.

—

What Li Xin said wasn't wrong at all—Bai Liang really did have a lot of authority in the production crew.

Every updated version of the script before filming started had to be sent over for him to look at.

He wasn't a scene-stealer now, but he might as well have been; if he wanted, he could even delete or alter some plot points on a whim.

Generally speaking, though, he wouldn't do something like that—he wasn't a screenwriter, and he had no intention of holding multiple jobs on set.

But plenty of people always figured he would.

Because the entertainment circle really did have those kinds of energy monsters—writing, directing, and acting all by themselves, handling everything single-handedly.

There were also plenty of examples of actors who, excelling at their craft, moved on to directing—Deng Chao, Huang Bo, even Shen Teng had done it—so a lot of people thought Bai Liang would eventually do the same.

As luck would have it, last year he had gone off to participate in that show "The Actor," genuinely making a cameo as a director.

It was while filming "The Battle at Lake Changjin" that, whether it was Wu Jing or Chen Kaige, they all knew exactly what his so-called directing was about, and they were fairly familiar with his temperament—otherwise, they probably would have treated him like the "Glory of the Police" crew did. Those people just straight-up regarded him as a second director.

Even the actual director of this drama, Ding Hei, during earlier script discussions, had several times—overtly and covertly—asked him what "guidance" he had to offer.

However, Bai Lu didn't seem to have realized this yet.

The scene that the evil little kitty had imagined—of her shamelessly going "nghnghngh" over there—didn't happen.

After going back and forth through the latest complete script several times, Bai Lu realized that she and Bai Liang really didn't have a romantic line—it was all freaking "comrade-in-arms affection"—and she was completely dumbfounded!

No way.

The role was a good role, but it wasn't quite what she'd expected—like someone who hates cilantro being force-fed a cilantro-stuffed flatbread.

Eat the flatbread or not?

So, the whole of her was visibly a bit deflated.