Chapter 29: What Is a Workaholic King? (Request Monthly Votes)

“Panda, this is great—do they make panda movies in Hollywood too?”

When Qi Hao heard the movie’s title, he already leaned toward it—he wanted to do the voice work for Kung Fu Panda.

“Actually, I personally suggest taking both. Iron Man needs to be finished by mid-March, but Kung Fu Panda can be pushed to April. Boss, you’ll be joining Immortal Love III in a few days, and your scenes won’t be daily. With all that free time, aren’t you going to do something?”

What is a workaholic king?

It means not only pushing yourself to the limit, but dragging your boss along with you.

“That’s a bit exaggerated.”

Qi Hao, with no connections, managed to reach where he is today over ten years—he’s certainly no lazybones.

But compared to Zhang Nan, he’s still far behind.

This guy has no distractions—only work fills his mind.

“Voice acting hones your line delivery, Boss. If you need time to date, I won’t tell you to prioritize work—but right now, you don’t seem to have anything else going on.”

Zhang Nan sincerely hoped his boss would put the bigger picture first.

“My situation… isn’t great. It’s hard to practice at home during the holidays…” He quickly made excuses—how could a boss work overtime?

“Boss, just give me an address—I’ll arrange a nearby recording studio for you. No one will disturb you. You can practice properly, even do the official recording if you want.”

After earnest persuasion, Qi Hao was slightly convinced.

He felt a pang of shame.

The agent doesn’t get much from him anymore, especially now that he’s started his own studio.

Everyone in the studio works hard.

Even the slick old legal guy, Yao Weihong, often works past ten to sort out his legal disputes from the past few years.

He realized he had to work harder.

So his team, who rely on him for their livelihood, wouldn’t suddenly lose their jobs.

At noon, Zhang Nan arrived in Jinmen.

Clearly, this workaholic wouldn’t just pick any random place for Qi Hao to practice recording.

He brought recording materials and took Qi Hao to a studio.

The studio was inside a cultural creative park, very close to Qi Hao’s home—just a ten-minute walk, easy to reach after dinner.

Qi Hao’s house was old, but its downtown location made it incredibly convenient.

“The equipment’s okay, right?” Zhang Nan didn’t understand this stuff.

His principle for choosing studios was simple: close to Qi Hao’s home, and advanced equipment.

“Pretty good—all top-tier.”

Qi Hao had acted in many films and TV dramas, but live sound recording was rare—most required post-production dubbing.

His line delivery was solid; he rarely let others dub his roles.

“Alright, they’ve assigned staff for you during the holiday—you practice here. In a couple days, the production team will send a dubbing director. If it fits, we’ll record officially. Boss, don’t worry—you won’t miss family time. Max eight hours a day.”

Zhang Nan watched his boss’s mood—if anything seemed off, he’d cut it to six hours, or even four.

Luckily, Qi Hao had always taken work seriously.

Once he took it on, he’d do it well—after all, it was three Santana 2000s.

Tongzi was still not human enough.

Now that he’d taken on two dubbing jobs, why couldn’t he count it as completing double the tasks?

Reward him two system-version Santana 2000s.

Or change 3/3 to 6/6.

Most people, even if they spent all day in a car, wouldn’t reach that in a lifetime.

After practicing for hours, Qi Hao strolled home leisurely.

Few would guess that this popular star was now walking down the old street with his hands tucked in his sleeves.

At the courtyard gate, he met someone unexpected.

Tall but extremely thin, wearing a loose, baggy down jacket, his hair long and unkempt.

This was Shen Sanshui, Qi Hao’s junior high classmate and neighbor downstairs.

The guy who wrote web novels and dreamed of becoming a grandmaster.

“Sanshui!”

Of course, you greet someone you meet.

“Haozi, big star now.”

Shen Sanshui looked slightly uneasy seeing Qi Hao.

Though they were classmates since childhood and lived in the same building, they hadn’t seen much of each other in recent years.

Qi Hao used to fight constantly with his family.

In recent years, Shen Sanshui stayed home all day, rarely going out.

Today, if his parents hadn’t gone visiting and if the house hadn’t piled up two big bags of trash, he might not have left at all.

Since childhood, he and Qi Hao had always been compared.

Back then, Qi Hao dropped out of junior high to chase dreams—it became a stain on Teacher Qi’s reputation and gossip for neighbors.

In contrast, Shen Sanshui excelled academically and got into a prestigious university.

But as Qi Hao grew more famous, becoming a household name nationwide, while Shen Sanshui became a homebound dreamer living off his parents, their reputations reversed completely.

“Don’t joke. Big star? Just scraping by. You know I never did well in school, and my parents are teachers—I had too much pressure. I just ran away.”

Qi Hao waved off the cigarette offered—he didn’t smoke, not because it was bad, but because he never smoked.

He was a teacher’s child—he had to set an example in everything.

“Scraping by is fine. I can’t even support myself.”

Shen Sanshui blew a smoke ring, his face shrouded in smoke.

Same age as Qi Hao, but his face was worn out from sleepless nights.

“Things will get better,” Qi Hao sighed.

He knew a sad, thick wall now separated him from Shen Sanshui.

They could never again play marbles together after school like they did as kids.

“Thanks for your good wishes~” Shen Sanshui smiled faintly, imagining something wonderful.

Probably becoming a grandmaster, reaching the Platinum level with one novel.

He’d heard these terms from Qi Hao’s mom—no woman escapes gossip, and Qi’s mom, a teacher, was no exception.

Qi Hao and Shen Sanshui made Qi’s mom question life itself.

For a while, she even doubted whether education mattered at all.

Many educators probably felt similar confusion.

After all, her son didn’t go to school but became a star, while the boy downstairs, Shen Sanshui, aced his studies yet chose to live off his parents.

Was it personality—or educational failure?

After some awkward small talk, they went home.

That night, Qi Hao chose to use the “Harmony Brings Prosperity” reward training session.

Whether or not he was a Penguin shareholder, no matter how much the system rewarded him, his own acting was his foundation.

First, pick today’s training partner.

After confirmation, Random 1/Random 2/Random 3 became Hui Kwan Ying / Zhou Xingxing / Fang Long.

These three…

Qi Hao quickly realized.

Today was a comedy actor special—Hui Kwan Ying, Zhou Xingxing, and Fang Long were all comedy actors.

No doubt—he picked Zhou Xingxing.

According to Wang Jing, Zhou Xingxing chose gold over friends.

Said he valued money more than friendship.

Qi Hao despised that philosophy.

Like with Old Tian—you give him two thousand yuan, he won’t betray a single piece of information about Old Tian.

Money can be earned again; friends last a lifetime.

Of course, the training NPC didn’t care—he was just a tool for Qi Hao to train comedy roles.

Qi Hao picked A Chinese Odyssey Part One: The Holy Mountain, stepped into Zhou Xingxing’s perspective, and trained the scene where he begged for sympathy.

Qi Hao felt a wave of dizziness, then opened his eyes—he was outside the Hua Mansion.

That was the one good thing about the training space.

No matter how you set up a classroom, it could never match the immersion of a real movie set.

“Hey hey, the scene’s about to start—don’t move, no matter what happens.”

“You said you’d give me all your money—don’t back out.”

“Ha, with your intelligence, do you think you can fool me?”

“Fair point!”

Non-NPC characters strictly followed the movie’s portrayal—though stiff, they were sufficient for scene practice.

The other character who competed with Tang Bohu in pity soon arrived.

The role was well-designed, and actor Liang Rongzhong performed it excellently.

After finishing his part as Zhou Xingxing, Qi Hao went back and performed his own part again.

To be fair, acting alongside Zhou Xingxing truly improves one’s craft.

Zhou Xingxing’s acting has indeed been underestimated.

This tear-jerking scene took several takes to pass.

Zhou Xingxing coached him hand-over-hand on the side, sometimes even pulling Qi Hao aside to demonstrate the scene himself, bit by bit.

The real Zhou Xingxing doesn’t have such a good temper.

According to Zhou Xingxing, Qi Hao’s main problem right now is that he hasn’t fully shed his idol baggage.

That’s definitely an issue.

In “Heavenly Dog” and “The Promise,” he still didn’t go crazy enough.

Since no outsiders could see inside the training space, Qi Hao decisively transformed into a lunatic—his Tang Bohu was even crazier than Zhou Xingxing’s.

And that scene with the Four Talents traveling together? The shame factor was off the charts.

Qi Hao even fought with the woman who turned back to kill.

“OK, the fight was decent, but that earlier dialogue scene still fell short—you didn’t control the details well. Actually, you could kiss him first; that’d completely erase your shame. Yeah, for the movie!”

The training NPC Zhou Xingxing enthusiastically offered suggestions.

“Wait, you didn’t kiss him!” Qi Hao was stunned.

“You don’t have to stick strictly to the script in the training space—you don’t need to be so rigid.”

Zhou Xingxing gripped Qi Hao’s shoulders, fully embodying his role as a training NPC: if it helped the host’s acting, he wouldn’t mind if the host kissed him.

“But it’s not in the movie plot!” Qi Hao wanted to cry.

The actress playing this woman is Li Jianren—he’s truly a bastard.

“Whether he’s willing doesn’t matter much—you can just force it. Want me to hold him down for you?”

Even as an NPC, the comedy master retained his sense of humor.

“Ugh~”

Qi Hao glanced again at the bearded woman who had respawned in front of him.

He couldn’t help but feel like vomiting.