Chapter 43 - Results
In the entertainment circle, people’s demands of female artists were somewhat harsher. If a male star slept with someone, it was just frivolous gossip. If a female star slept with someone, then it was moral corruption. This outdated Chinese mindset caused female artists to be very fearful of being connected to this sort of scandal. It seemed that this time, it would be tough for Zhuo Jingjing to free herself of this accusation.
However, Zhuo Jingjing had already prepared herself mentally ever since she made the decision to shed all pretenses of cordiality with Song Zicheng. Everywhere online, people were scolding her, so she simply didn’t look anymore as she hid at home and waited for news from Dari Media.
Yu Tang was at home during the holidays. He read through the doc.u.ment sent over by Dari Media, and raised his eyebrows slightly before giving the human resources department a call.
“Zhuo Jingjing’s contract? Apologies, Young Director Yu, we haven’t received any notice of this. Do you think highly of this artist?”
Yu Tang didn’t say anymore and directly hung up. He didn’t want to bother with the messy things in the entertainment circle. If it wasn’t because it involved Song Xiao, he definitely wouldn’t want Dari’s shares.
“Brother, that nuisance is here again.” The weather was cooler, and little princess Yu Miao pattered over, a pair of fluffy slippers on her feet.
“Who?” Yu Tang closed his laptop and turned to look at his sister.
“It’s that one who likes to flip skirts.” Yu Miao curled her lip and hugged her brother’s arm, unwilling to go out.
“Little Miss, Madam asked you to go down and play with the little friend.” The maid outside knocked on the door.
Yu Tang stood up and pulled his sister along with him as he went out. Since Yu Dan’s son was here, Yu Dan himself had definitely come as well. He sent his sister to their little brother’s room to play with him, then turned to go downstairs.
“Where’s Miaomiao?” Mother Yu was chatting with Yu Dan’s wife and son. That brat was nestled in his mother’s embrace, and when he lifted his head and saw Yu Tang, he burrowed into his mother’s arms in fear.
“She doesn’t want to come down,” Yu Tang replied indifferently, before turning his head to look at Yu Dan, who was sitting on the side. “Father still hasn’t returned. Uncle Dan, let’s go there and sit for a while.” As he spoke, he lifted his hand and pointed at the tea room.
Mother Yu looked at her son in astonishment. It was only then that she remembered that Dari Media’s shares had been given to Yu Tang.
“Regarding Zhuo Jingjing, do you intend to throw her away just like that?” Yu Tang lifted his tea to take a sip. No matter how much he drank this first-rate Mingqian Longjing, the taste was never better than when Song Xiao steeped it.
“She’s only a small p.a.w.n.” Yu Dan smiled and poured himself a cup of tea. “Why is eldest young master so concerned about her?”
Zhuo Jingjing was only a small step in Yu Dan’s plan to bring down Xinghai Entertainment. Even if he bought this brainless woman, it would be difficult to use her to earn money now that her reputation was this awful. Furthermore, her contract with Xinghai Entertainment still hadn’t expired; helping her switch companies meant that he would have to pay a hefty penalty fee for the breach of contract. This really wasn’t profitable.
Yu Tang slowly set his teacup down. Outside the French windows, the husky was learning how to hop like a bunny on the lawn. It hopped up to the window and stood upright as it plastered itself to the gla.s.s, its tongue lolling out foolishly.
“If you trick this dog into thinking that you’ll give it a bone after it bites the boss of wild dogs, but then turn around and refuse to give it the bone, guess what he’ll do?” Yu Tang pointed at the husky’s nose through the gla.s.s. The dumb dog jabbed its nose against the gla.s.s, trying its best to move closer and lick his finger. “Later, when you want to fool other dogs, can you guess if they’ll be fooled?”
Yu Dan was taken aback and looked at Yu Tang in shock. The so-called feral dog naturally referred to Zhuo Jingjing, and the boss of the wild dogs was Song Zicheng. Yu Dan had tricked Zhuo Jingjing into opposing Song Zicheng, and now turned around and didn’t want her anymore. It wasn’t worrying if she demanded something in return; what was scary was if she didn’t. If Zhuo Jingjing were forced to the end of her rope, it was hard to say what she would do.
Moreover, if Yu Dan continued digging out the cornerstones of Xinghai Entertainment and his reputation deteriorated for it, he feared that it would be very difficult later if there were a genuinely talented artist he truly wanted to pull over.
Yu Dan hadn’t considered any of this at all. He merely thought that Zhuo Jingjing was nothing more than a small star; if she was destroyed, then just let it be. But thinking about that ma.s.sive breach of contract fee, Yu Dan felt his heart ache. Wasting a large amount of money to buy trash really wasn’t his style.
“Give yourself some room in your conduct.” Yu Tang lowered his gaze. This really wasn’t his style either. He used to have control over the power of life and death, and always eliminated everything completely. Currently, however, he still wasn’t strong enough, and modern society also didn’t allow one to murder as they pleased, so he could only do it this way first. “If you think this isn’t worthwhile, think of something.”
Standing up, Yu Tang patted Yu Dan’s shoulder and didn’t continue speaking. What should be pointed out had all been said. As for how Yu Dan wanted to deal with it, that wasn’t Yu Tang’s concern. What he was concerned about was that he had made an appointment with Song Xiao to play online games at three in the afternoon, and it was now already two fifty.
Yu Dan watched Yu Tang’s figure turn and leave, and could only feel a chill run down his spine. This child was only sixteen, but he was more shrewd and ruthless than Yu Dan in doing things.
Everyone would hit a person who was already down. Although Zhuo Jingjing wasn’t as arrogant as Qiu Mingyan in the company, she had still offended people before. Leaping to popularity too fast, it was inevitable that some of the small artists would be envious. With her scandal exploding this time and the company bent on trampling her to death, a lot of people seized the opportunity to get in on the action.
“Jingjing and I started with small roles together. I still silently admired her when I saw how fast she became popular, but I never imagined that she could be this sort of person.”
“Everyone in the company knows that she relies on her popularity to act self-important, and she doesn’t even show the boss deference.”
Someone even anonymously revealed that Zhuo Jingjing’s habitual miscarriages were caused by repeated abortions. The last time she had a miscarriage, she even wanted to seize the opportunity to put the blame on the son of the company’s top management.
This sort of behavior really was shameless. Before, there were numerous fans of Zhuo Jingjing who defended her; now, there were many who hated her. Because it really was too outrageous, it was even considered one of the top ten most popular entertainment topics of the year.
Zhuo Jingjing waited and waited. She waited until ‘Pink Winter’ was no longer showing, and when Dari Media still didn’t have any news for her, that was when Zhuo Jingjing completely panicked. Song Zicheng was busy preparing for the release of ‘Profound Theory’, and didn’t have the time to bother with her. However, the media showed no signs of slowing down as they continued to happily step on her. It was impossible for her to continue to get along with Xinghai Entertainment. Her only hope was to sign a contract with Dari Media. Their people had even promised to pay the breach of contract fee for her…
Wait a second, the breach of contract fee! In a fl.u.s.ter, Zhuo Jingjing dug out the contract and carefully looked for the terms concerning the breach of contract fee. However, she realized that it wasn’t explicitly stated in the contract that Dari Media would pay the breach of contract fee; it was only ambiguouslystated that they would help her leave her original company.
Xinghai Entertainment’s contract was the standard contract that had been drafted when Song Zicheng’s partner had still been around. It was extremely rigid and guaranteed that she would be unable to afford the damages. If she couldn’t leave Xinghai Entertainment, then her career was utterly ruined, and she wouldn’t be able to work in the future!
She had nothing, nothing! In the end, she still couldn’t play the game as well as Qiu Mingyan. At the very least, Qiu Mingyan could still receive child support from Song Zicheng every month!
Zhuo Jingjing’s nails dug into her flesh. The faces of Song Zicheng, Song Xiao, Qiu Mingyan, and Yu Dan flashed through her mind. If it was impossible for her to continue making a living, then they shouldn’t dream of having an easy time of it. Just as she was sinking into despair and preparing to retaliate against everyone, Dari Media called.
“Miss Zhuo, you’ve waited a long time. We wish to invite you over to discuss the matter of your transfer to our company.”
It wasn’t a friendly tone at all, but it was a life-saving spring of water cracking through the soil. In an instant, Zhuo Jingjing was pulled out of the darkness.
After settling these matters, His Majesty the emperor went to cla.s.s once more, his schoolbag over his shoulder.
The results for the mid-term exams were announced, and Song Xiao nervously went to take a look. He got full marks in all the humanities subjects. He barely pa.s.sed maths, chemistry, and biology, and physics was quite awful. When all the marks were added up, his result wasn’t considered good, and Song Xiao placed in the middle of his grade.
“You go into the humanities stream in the second year ba.” Yu Tang was standing behind him as they looked at the list of names together, and he placed his chin on Song Xiao’s available head.
“What about your name?” Song Xiao, with a big head on top of his own, gazed at the last column of names. The grade rankings were arranged from left to right, and the last column had the names of the students at the bottom.
His Majesty the emperor was dragged over to hover around the last few rows of the list, and was immediately unhappy. “Do I look that bad?”
Song Xiao was silent when he shot him a glance, but his eyes said “yes”. Think about it: someone who never did homework or test papers, slept during cla.s.s, played ball during the break, and who was busy every day with the work of the student union – could he study well?
Yu Tang grabbed hold of Song Xiao’s hand and pulled him straight to the first column, pointed to the two big words, ‘Yu Tang’ right in front of him, then hmphed.
Song Xiao’s eyes widened. He took Yu Tang’s scorecard and inserted it into the self-service machine to view his report card and verify it one more time – Yu Tang really was 25th in their year! Turning his head to look at Dugu An, Song Xiao saw him quietly stuff a school report into his pocket. “Anyi, what rank did you get?”
The secret guard looked left and right. In order to spend time as a couple, the two fellows had come to school three hours earlier. Right now, it was still early, and no one else was around, so Dugu An dropped his gaze and replied, “Answering the empress; this subordinate is 998th place.”
Song Xiao raised his eyebrows. From what he knew, this secret guard was fairly good in his science subjects, perhaps because of his interest in concealed weapons and poison. Every time they had minor tests, he would place somewhere at the top. Furthermore, a secret guard was trained to strengthen their memory since young, so Dugu An shouldn’t have gotten this ranking.
Sure enough, when the test papers were returned, a few of the subject papers with Yu Tang’s name on them weren’t in Yu Tang’s handwriting at all. On the contrary, it was the secret guard who had copied His Majesty the emperor’s flamboyant and large handwriting.
The author has something to say
Little Theater
Xiaoxiao: Xiao An, what’s your rank?
Xiao An: 998th. So long as it’s 998th, I’ll bring home a paper full of red Xs.
Xiaoxiao: …
Cheating during exams is wrong. Bullying cla.s.smates into switching exam papers is also wrong. Little friends, don’t learn from Fish Tang.
Baobao Notes
(quietly) I cheat during exams. Imo, if you aren’t caught… jk, I hope I’m not a bad influence.