The local leader that Han Chu and Su Zheng found was a small-time engineering workshop owner. The man seemed to have a colorful past. When he was young, he had been a constant visitor at the police station. After he grew up, due to a lack of certifications, he had started to work for others.
Even though the man was not that educated, his brain was a good one, and that was only improved by his willingness to work hard. After working in the field for a few years, he had accumulated enough funds to start his own workshop. He had found the friends that he had played with and started his business. Today, his business had grown to a stage where he could live a comfortable life. He was still far from being considered a business tycoon, but it would not be wrong to see him as a local rich person.
Probably because he needed to move around for socialization along with the connections that his friends had formed throughout the years, he would often be seen at the local pub having a drink or the local stalls enjoying the food. As this happened more often, he became the person in Feng Yuan City where all the news gathered. As long as the information was not something extremely secretive, normally, whenever something happened, he would be the first to know.
“The man is not bad, at least not a cunning character from what I’ve seen, but he’s a bit too straightforward, and his way of thinking is sometimes too narrow.”
The frowning Han Chu concluded his impression of the local leader. Then, he tutted. “Xiao Su didn’t go prepared. Initially, we assumed everyone in the field would know each other and the local here would give Xiao Su’s teacher some face, but the people there only knew a few from the field, and they only used one standard to measure their friendliness with outsiders—friendship through bottles. Those who are willing to drink with him are his friends, and those who refuse are turned to the door. I can’t let Xiao Su get drunk, so later, I’ll bring someone else with me to see if I can ask for more information.”
Ye Shuang thought about it. “Is it because you two drink so little so they refuse to tell you anything?”
Han Chu glanced at her and huffed. “We were drinking. Even if the man is trustworthy, that doesn’t mean all of his friends are. This is our first meeting. Who would be so careless that they’d drink until they were unconscious in front of a bunch of strangers?”
To place their personal safety on the morality of strangers, that was definitely dumb. Furthermore, when Han Chu and Su Zheng met with the local leader, there were many of the latter’s friends around him. Who could guarantee that everyone gathered there was a stand-up citizen? After all, Han Chu was carrying many valuable items with him. If one of the drunkards accidentally broke, or someone swiped, his laptop, who was going to be responsible?
After hearing that explanation, Ye Shuang understood the difficulty. Diplomacy was unneeded to communicate with such characters—directness was preferred. To ensure that one was clear-minded while earning the man’s affection, being able to hold one’s liquor was necessary. In other words, one should be able to drink everyone else under the table while ensuring one did not drunk. Other than that, there really was no other solution.
After telling Ye Shuang what she needed to do for the next few days, Han Chu needed to leave. This explained why he had gone back so early. He had probably found an excuse to escape to find someone else to face the war of alcohol later that night.
Han Chu could not stay for long, and it was Ye Shuang and Anthony who stayed back at the apartment.
“For now, there is no need for us to get involved in Cedrick’s business.” He sat in the living room for a while. After getting the number of the reinforcements he needed, Han Chu prepared to leave. Before he departed, he left behind the more important and valuable things that he carried and told Ye Shuang, “Since the news has reached us, Madam Grace will know about it as well. We’ll decided what to do depending on her move.”
“Okay.” Ye Shuang agreed. “It falls more on Madam Grace to do something compared to us anyway.”
After sending Han Chu away, she turned back to realize Anthony had already started studying the bug Han Chu left behind. A chip and a mini bug, neither of them was either cracked. Probably, the golden retriever wouldn’t have the chance to sleep that night. Ye Shuang did not disturb him and returned to the bedroom to watch her drama. Since she had contributed her laptop, she couldn’t access the internet and need to rely on the television program to kill her time…
…
“Xiao Luo, come over here.” The director called Luo Mingxin over when there was a break. He lit a cigarette and frowned. “How are you feeling about the shooting progress? You’re as good as ever. If we rush this, we might be able to wrap the shoot up before the designated schedule.”
Luo Mingxin was confused. He knew that the director did not call him over for useless small talk, so he smiled and nodded. “Thank you, director. Rushing the shoot should be no problem, if the partner is willing to catch up.”
For example, if the female lead could stop bugging him on the pretext of learning the lines but was trying to get onto him. If she could just focus more on her acting skill, then perhaps there wouldn’t be so many reshoots.
The director coughed because he understood what Luo Mingxin was hinting at.
It was impossible not to feel pressure from the sponsors. Even though most directors wished for quality, there would always be someone higher up to please. No matter how famous one was, due to the fact that making a movie required a large amount of money, one had to refer to the sponsors. People had given them the money to make the movie, so they could not reject the sponsors’ requests, could they?
The director smiled slightly. “In any case, she doesn’t have that many scenes in the movie. Just focus on doing your part, and if hers is lacking, we’ll just have her reshoot the scenes and edit them in post… Hmm, but that is not why I called you over.”
Luo Mingxin smiled, knowing that the meat was coming.
“Xiao Luo, don’t you think you’ve been bringing too many friends to the set recently?” The director paused for a moment before continuing with hesitation, as if he was trying to gauge his words so that he would not offend Luo Mingxin. “Even though we are not a sealed set and do not mind people coming to visit, it’s not that good to have too many outsiders walking around…”
Luo Mingxin cut to the chase. “Is there anything you feel is inappropriate? My friend didn’t wander around when she was here, did she?”
“Your friend… Didn’t she take a costume home with her? Even though you brought it back the next day, that is not really acceptable.” The director frowned deeply, and dissatisfaction crawled into his voice. “Furthermore, she touched our computer, right? The people from the prop department came to inform me that the computer has been unusable since then. Did your friend use it to visit some website and cause it to download some virus?”
Virus? Just the thought of it made Luo Mingxin want to laugh. Ye Shuang had just inspected the computer the day earlier, it had been manipulated from afar by the best hacker, and not long after that, the computer had died from virus.
Even a script would not make up something so coincidental. Obviously, someone was erasing their tracks!
Of course, he could not tell the director that. Luo Mingxin, who knew some inside information, tossed the guilt to Ye Shuang. “It’s probably a coincidence. How about I find some technician to come fix it?”
The director looked at Luo Mingxin and finally nodded. “Go ahead, but next time, don’t bring unnecessary people to the set anymore.”