Chapter 48

  "Wow wow wow I'm going to shoot an ad I'm going to be on TV I'm going to be famous......"

  Xiao Hei: "That advertising slogan is disgusting, the person who wrote it probably has no brain, and as a hamster why do we have to be exposed under the spotlight? And eat in front of everyone, and crawl around on a table like cockroaches, we're hamsters not insects——"

  "Ah, I'm returning to the entertainment circle again! Fresh flowers, spotlight, red carpet, flashing cameras... Ah, my familiar life is finally back by my side. I knew this small hamster body couldn't withstand my powerful soul..."

  Xiao Hei: "Fatty, I don't quite understand why you insist on getting so close to humans. Whether it's the master or others, you always seem willing to stay with them. Humans are such complex creatures, they'll even starve themselves to keep their weight at a certain number, isn't that terrifying? And the commercial you're about to film is for junk food, can you believe they'd put trash on TV? Don't you feel insulted?"

  "Are you saying my butt is round or not? I think I've lost weight recently and my muscles are a bit loose, so my butt isn't as plump as it used to be. It's really frustrating! And I don't know what angle to pose in front of the camera to look cute now... Should I have a 7-8 split fringe or a big bun or should I just pull all my hair up to look more mature?"

  Xiao Hei: "Fatty, you're getting too close to humans, you'll definitely regret it later."

  "It's been a long time since I've seen spotlights, thinking about it makes me a bit nervous, ah, my terrible mental quality... how can I make myself look like I'm not on TV for the first time? Hurry up and wait online..."

  Xiao Hei: "If you get the chance, are you going to start speaking human language for once?"

  "Yes, always ready."

  Xiao Hei: *silence*

  The little black bear couldn't take it anymore and slammed the vegetable ring in his hand onto the face of the milk tea face who was squatting on the swing, swinging back and forth with a flirtatious expression. The latter let out a loud "ahh" as he brushed off the fragments of the vegetable ring from his face, staring at him with triangular eyes, accusingly saying "You're just jealous!" In response, Hei Fu let out a cold laugh, glanced at it disdainfully with the corner of his eye, and then turned around, quickly flipping into his own small room on the second floor of the wooden house.

  It took two days for him to calm down from his excitement.

  Xiao Hei also didn't speak with him for two whole days.

  The last day, the hamster slept beautifully with the contract signed by Jiang Chuan Longfeng Yumiao - it was only then that he knew Jiang Chuan's real name was "Lei Lie De Reins", and the surname Reins sounded cool and somewhat familiar, but he wasn't sure if he had really heard it somewhere before... As for the stupid owner's Chinese name, "Jiang" was his mother's surname, and "Jiang Chuan" was also the name given to him by his mother - Jian Yan thought that both names were good-sounding, and was glad that Jiang Chuan had a mother who understood these things, otherwise it would be hard to imagine such a handsome face seriously saying "Hello, my name is Jiang Dali"...

  After all, foreign friends always like to mess with Chinese names, just like when everyone was in elementary school and there were always a few classmates who would fight over being called "Tom".

  Obviously, Fang Yu and Jin Ran have the same attitude towards Jiang Chuan's name. The agent looked at the contract in his hand, kicked his foot and asked the young man who was looking down at the script: "I've been wanting to ask, is there any special meaning behind the name Jiang Chuan?"

  Jiang Chuan, who was lowering his head to read the script, thought for a moment and then replied: "Haichuan Bainuo, Houdé Zàiwù."

  "It's pretty good."

  "Really?" Jiang Chuan said, "My father almost choked to death when he first knew the meaning of this name... He thought my mother was deliberately mocking him."

  "Why?"

  "It's because my family is... never mind, I won't say," Jiang Chuan said. "You wouldn't want to know."

  Jiang Chuan obviously had a lazy look on his face, and Fang Yu was curious but didn't dare to ask further - after all, not everyone has the audacity of Yuan Zhenran.

  The shooting date of the advertisement was scheduled for mid-April, and after getting the script, Jiang Chuan started to take a look at it every day, trying to use mental anesthesia to get used to the terrible lines. However, by the seventh day, he completely gave up on this plan because he found that it was simply self-inflicted spiritual torture. Just thinking about himself acting out the advertisement and reciting the lines in his mind made him unable to properly read the script of "Republic of China's Strange Stories".

  "My mind is full of 'how stupid I am' and 'mouse eating potato'"

  ……

  As winter departs and spring arrives, around April, H city seems to be one of the earliest regions to welcome spring. While the north is still snowing, the plants in this southern city have already begun to sprout tender green buds, as if they had awakened overnight, and the entire city has suddenly been rejuvenated...

  As the weather gradually warms up, I don't know when everyone stopped walking around and nostalgically talking about the collective heating in the north. The staff of "Republic of China Strange Record" also went from wearing down jackets on the first day of filming and being frozen to jumping around to now only wearing a single layer of clothing and running out to show off.

  By early April, an even worse situation emerged - the sky began to drift with continuous rain, and the rain washed this southern small city, the entire film and television city was shrouded in a misty rain.

  When the south wind comes, the whole city is humid and maddening. Jiang Chuan repeatedly urges his life assistant to buy new underwear because his can't dry, and the cat litter in the cage changes from every three days to every day, as the sand that was just poured in becomes wet and clumps together overnight.

  When everyone is busy, it's not easy to take care of the hamsters all the time. The wood shavings and cotton in the cage can't always be kept dry and comfortable. Sometimes I have to endure the feeling of being wet all over, huddled in the hamster house, thinking: "I'm a hamster who's going to star in an ad, why do I still get treated like this?"

  Xiao Hei seemed to be coping with ease.

  It seems like this guy is quite at ease with any situation.

  The change in weather made Jianran increasingly dislike staying in his cage, so every day he would follow Jiangchuan everywhere - the crew members seemed to have gotten used to Jiangchuan's pet hamster coming to watch the filming every day, and some kind-hearted sisters would even bring it some nuts or something to feed it - as a result, Jianran became the happiest living creature in the entire crew - sitting under the rain shelter blowing cool breeze with a hint of moisture, cracking melon seeds and shaking his little legs, after eating his fill he would lie down on Fang Yu's leg and take a nap, waiting for his master to come and pet him during the intermission, then he would open his eyes and rub against him a couple of times, and when his master started filming again, he could go back to sleep.

  As for other humans, they were not so lucky.

  They had to endure the torture of "rainwater hitting their bodies a bit cool, running two more steps and their whole body was wet and sticky". The worst thing is that as the weather gets worse, Jiang Luocheng's temper also becomes more brutal than before. The actors' daily humiliation after filming also rises in a functional graph... Among them, the most miserable are Wang Mo, who plays Qiao Sheng, and Jiang Chuan, who plays Huai Jin. They both wear relatively formal clothes, and often after one scene, apart from being scolded by Jiang Luocheng from head to toe, their costumes are all sweaty, and even makeup can't be held back.

  "This is still okay, I've shot a period drama that directly spanned the entire summer - you can imagine how suffocating it was? Sometimes when we were filming winter scenes in 40-degree weather, we still had to wear down jackets... just thinking about it now makes me feel like crying. Every day someone would get heatstroke, and the worst time was when three out of four main actors collapsed... now whenever I watch that drama, I can shed tears of gratitude, it's really great that we were able to finish filming it alive."

  Ginger River subconsciously looked back at Jiang Luocheng, who was sitting behind them. Jiang Luocheng immediately glared back: "What are you looking at? Stop dragging your feet and making excuses all day. Finish filming early and wrap up work quickly, so we can suffer less."

  "Oh."

  Jiang Chuan finished speaking and turned his head to look at Fang Yu, blinking: Haven't you told the director about the advertisement yet?

  Fang Yu calmly raised his hand and made a zipping motion across his mouth: shut up.

  Jiang Chuan: "...Director, can I ask you something?"

  Jiang Luocheng held up his lunchbox, frowning and looking quite annoyed, asking: "What?"

  Jiang Chuan: "If one day someone in the crew proposes taking a leave of absence to go out and make some extra money for a day —"

  Jiang Luocheng: "Dead."

  Jiang Chuan: “......”

  Jiang Chuan turned his head again to look at Fang Yu, and Fang Yu also blew a whistle and turned his head away.

  ……

  The day finally arrived when the contract was signed and it was time to shoot the commercial, scheduled for the afternoon. Fang Yu couldn't hide it any longer and finally mustered up the courage to explain the situation to Jiang Luo Cheng a week in advance. As expected, Jiang Luo Cheng exploded as soon as he heard the words "take half a day off", taking a deep breath and preparing to scold - but then looked up and saw that the person standing in front of him was Fang Yu...

  Jiang Luocheng: "......"

  Considering how badly Jiang Chuan was treated recently, he might have felt some sympathy for him and finally nodded in agreement.

  Jiang Luocheng said so to outsiders.

  "In fact, you still benefited from Yuan Jinyan's reputation," Fang Yu said. "If I weren't Yuan Jinyan's agent and you weren't Yuan Jinyan's junior fellow apprentice, our families would be crying and collecting our corpses right now."

  Jiang Chuan: "...all those ideas about accepting advertisements are yours, don't drag me into it."

  "You are the principal offender," Fang Yu said impatiently, "I am at most an accomplice."

  Jiang Chuan: "...won't I be worn out by small shoes from now on?"

  "Wow, Chinese has made progress, and you even know how to wear small shoes," said the irresponsible agent. "Don't worry, it won't happen, Jiang Luocheng's own money is being spent on delaying the progress, and even if he really wears small shoes, then..."

  Jiang Chuan: "What's going on?"

  "Just bear with it and it will pass."

  Jiang Chuan: “......”

  On the day of filming, after smoothly completing the three required shots in the morning, Jiang Chuan was like a donkey being rushed onto a scaffold and got on the car. On his way to the studio, he felt as if he was being escorted to the execution ground, thinking that his lifelong reputation would be ruined in an instant.

  "What's wrong with you, do you want to jump off the car or something? Go ahead and jump," Fang Yu poked the young man sitting next to him with his hand. The latter calmly turned his head and looked at him as if he was looking at a madman. Seeing that intimidation didn't work, Mr. Agent tried to persuade him in a gentle tone, "Look how tangled you are, all knotted up... It's not that hard to act in a commercial, is it? Can you compare it to facing Jiang Luo Cheng? And the client is being very considerate, just letting you sit there with a poker face and recite those lines, then eat two mouthfuls of potato chips, and that's it. The whole thing will be over in ten seconds, and you'll get 200,000 yuan... Do you understand, little brother? 200,000 yuan, for a newcomer like you to get this price, you should be celebrating with flowers..."

  "It's not about the money."

  "Moreover, there's the issue of fame - from now on you can get rid of this internet celebrity identity. Do you know how people mock you online? They say your height is only 1.5 meters, so you dare not take standing photos."

  “……”

  "Really, let me search it for you?" Fang Yu pretended to take out his phone, "The keyword is 'Jiang Chuan 1.5 meters' ——"

  "Aren't you supposed to stop me from seeing these things?"

  "I think you urgently need to know about the severity of the problem now."

  "It's okay, I'll go and film the advertisement obediently."

  "That's good, oh, I remembered wrong, 1.5 meters was referring to another internet celebrity who raised a dog, not you."

  "Can raising a dog also make one an internet celebrity?"

  "Yes, and he's redder than you."

  “……”

  "Do you know when a web celebrity has no dignity? Never mind, after acting in this commercial, you'll be more popular than him."

  "It will work."

  "Good boy."

  The conversation between the broker and the artist was so beautiful that it transcended the sky, causing the little assistant sitting in the front passenger seat to cover his face with his hand, trying to cover up his already lost dignity and three views. After a pause, he looked at the rearview mirror and sat there with a serious expression, analyzing the "seriousness of the situation" with Jiang Chuan, who was also seriously faced, and sincerely asked: "Fang Ge, if you lose your job in the future, will you not take this illegal and criminal road of swindling?"

  Fang Yu: "Am I like that kind of person?"

  Little assistant: "Like."

  Fang Yu made a gesture as if to hit someone, and the little assistant hurriedly shrunk his neck. At this time, the driver slammed on the brakes, and the car came to a beautiful drift stop in front of the Jiajia Advertising Building. The driver said: "We're here."

  ……

  Just as Fang Yu introduced, Shangjia is indeed a well-known domestic tyrant enterprise with a high degree of fame - just from their advertising department, which can occupy an entire office building alone, this kind of lavish momentum can feel the coming of the tyrant's aura.

  When Jiang Chuan and his team got off the car, the person in charge had been waiting outside with the team for a long time. Seeing Jiang Chuan and his team arriving on time, he was very happy and came up to ask with a smile: "Where is the hamster?"

  As soon as the words fell, I saw the tall and big man who followed Fang Yu, wearing a duck tongue hat, and had been silent all the way, slightly pushing up the brim of his hat, revealing the curved curve of his chin in the shadow. Then he slowly took out a fluffy thing from his pocket and said in a low voice: "Here, I've got it in my pocket."

  The staff of Shangjia all looked at each other in embarrassment, not knowing what to say - fortunately, the person in charge bravely stepped forward and said: "Mr. Jiang's relationship with his pet is indeed very good, from the photo circulating on the internet, we guessed that you must pay great attention to spiritual communication with your pet every day."

  "The weather is humid and it doesn't want to stay in its cage, so it's wandering around everywhere." Jiang Chuan said honestly.

  Then, as expected, the scene fell into an eerie silence once again.

  Enter that magnificent building.

  Take the elevator directly to the floor where the studio is located - as soon as the elevator door opens, a large screen appears in front of you, playing a promotional video for "Shu Shu", which is nothing more than a series of narrations such as "Shu Shu comes from natural fertile soil", "Each potato is carefully selected by hand" and "First-class factory facilities, hygienic production process". The person in charge takes Jiang Chuan and others to watch it for a while, claiming to be "more familiar with the product". After watching the promotional video, they finally pass through a long corridor and arrive at the studio at the end of the corridor.

  It's worth mentioning that the corridor is filled with artistic photos of various snack foods produced by Shangjiajia - from the earliest "Shangjiajia Corn Roll" to the latest one, which is currently empty in the photo studio. The person in charge said that after the advertisement is finished, this place will be hung with the artistic photo of "Tudou". Fang Yu praised them with a smile, saying "too much corporate atmosphere and enthusiasm", "very creative", "really looking forward to our Tudou's artistic photo, must send me a copy when it's done". On the other hand, Jiang Chuan didn't say a word from start to finish. In fact, he thought everyone in this building was crazy as soon as he saw the first "puffed food art photo".

  The studio is very lively, with photographers, makeup artists and directors all in their positions.

  The stylist prepared four sets of clothes for Jiang Chuan, each representing the four seasons of Bora. Jiang Chuan obediently put on the first set of plaid shirt and otaku pants. At this time, the makeup artist rushed up to transform him, first putting a thick, heavy beer bottle bottom black frame glasses on him, then putting on an explosive hairstyle wig, and finally applying some foundation to make his originally dark skin look pale and pale. Jiang Chuan took one look at himself in the mirror and was startled, thinking which dead otaku is this.

  He turned his head and asked Fang Yu: "How do I look?"

  "The earth will collapse and the dust will fall." Fang Yu said sincerely.

  Jiang Chuan: “......”

  "The entire creativity of the advertisement lies in the fact that when the background is changed, it will be divided into four different seasons, and each season will be displayed in a childlike slide show format - and for each season, Jiang Chuan has to wear different clothes representing different occupations - namely, a potato chip-loving otaku; a potato chip-loving student, a potato chip-loving athlete, and a potato chip-loving urban white-collar worker..."

  Each styling is recorded once, and after post-editing, it becomes a man sitting at the table edge changing four styles back and forth. Each style retains one line of dialogue, and after all are synthesized, the lines of dialogue specified in the script are spoken continuously.

  Jiang Chuan couldn't believe he had to recite such stupid lines four times in a row - but since everyone was already here and he was too weak to resist, he could only obediently follow their arrangements, sporting the ugliest hairstyle of his life as he made his way to the white square table in the center of the studio. On the table was a computer, a bag of potato chips, and next to the chips sat a hamster, which was enthusiastically rummaging through the bag.

  Hamsters don't know the taste of sorrow.

  Jiang Chuan opened the bag of potato chips on the table, and then, following the instructions of the staff, he casually threw the potato chips onto the table - with a rustling sound, the small potato chips in the packaging bag scattered all over the table. The hamster quickly opened its short legs and hugged the piece closest to it, taking a bite...

  The director was a kind-hearted fat man, who was now squatting behind the monitor and raised his hand to gesture to Jiang Chuan - the latter nodded and sat down, and the director said: "Let's start!"

  Jiang Chuan hesitated for a moment, then casually thought back to what the otaku in his memory looked like. Keeping one hand flying quickly on the keyboard, he stretched out his other hand and snatched the potato chip from the hamster's paws on the desk. In the hamster's upturned triangular white eyes, he calmly threw the potato chip into his mouth and crunched it with a "crunch crunch" sound. With an expressionless face, he said: "Squeak squeak, squeak——"

  "Crack!"

  Jiang Chuan immediately stopped chewing, turned his head around - the food in his mouth was a bit nauseating, but thinking that he seemed to be surrounded by a group of "full of corporate atmosphere and enthusiasm" madmen, he still swallowed the potato chips with a gulp, asking: "What?"

  "The first line of dialogue at the beginning doesn't need to be read by you, it will be added later. You start from the second line - The idea of snatching food from a hamster's hands is not bad, if possible, please make an exaggerated snatching action, and then when snatching, you can start your second line of dialogue, with a slightly urgent tone, have you ever seen an otaku go crazy?"

  Jiang Chuan: “......”

  Director: "Camera two, zoom in on the screen for a moment and focus on that hamster's close-up."

  The director muttered to himself, while Jiang Chuan quietly watched the hamster. When it heard the words "scriptwriter", it lifted its paw and smoothed out the hair on its head, shook its buttocks, and Jiang Chuan said: "...".

  It's probably just an illusion.

  After all, animals were not allowed to become spirits after the founding of the country.

  Jiang Chuan refocused his attention and nodded slightly to indicate he understood the director's intention. At this moment, the director made a hand gesture indicating "once more".

  Jiang Chuan thought for a moment, and instead of sitting back down in his chair, he slightly lifted his buttocks, with his right hand still on the keyboard of his laptop. When the director announced the start, he began to type quickly. After a while, he silently counted the time it would take to add the first line of sound effects later. He stretched out his other hand and, with exaggerated movements, snatched the potato chips from the hamster's paws, loudly reciting the lines "Mouse, mouse, mouse eating potato chips" as he leaned back in a pose that made it seem like he was about to fall over. At the same time, the potato chip he had snatched from the hamster's paw fell into his mouth.

  At the same time as the potato chips entered, a hamster squatting on the dinner table suddenly burst into a performance, angrily kicking the scattered potato chips on the table with its paws.

  Jiang Chuan sat steadily, leaned down and picked up a potato chip, brought it to the hamster's front, used the chip to poke the hamster's round little belly, and smiled: "You have one bite, I have one bite, I'll feed you mousey potato."

  The director shouted "cut" with satisfaction.

  The expression on Jiang Chuan's face vanished instantly.

  "Wow, that hamster is quite an actor."

  "It's really super cute!"

  "This newcomer is also acting quite well, with detailed movements handled perfectly - no wonder he's from Director Jiang's team."

  Hahaha.

  The staff around started discussing in a low voice, the director sat silently behind the monitor for a while, after watching the performance of the hamster and Jiang Chuan's ending, he finally happily announced that the first set of clothes had passed - The director and Jiang Luo Cheng were on two different lines, at this moment, he praised Jiang Chuan's acting skills, saying: "The small details you added are very creative, and you have performed your own characteristics very well!"

  The last few words directly caused Jiang Chuan, whose face was already very stiff, to walk down from in front of the camera with a face that was even blacker than the bottom of a pot. Moreover, Fang Yu still came up and asked him: "How does it feel?"

  "If I have to accept this kind of stupid advertisement again, I'll hug you and jump from the top floor of the IM building." Jiang Chuan took off his thick beer bottle bottom prop glasses and stared at the agent with a pair of beautiful azure eyes, saying expressionlessly, "I'm serious."

  Jiang Chuan's gaze is actually very lethal.

  Unfortunately, he forgot to take off the wig on his head - so he looked at the agent standing in front of him, first staring at himself with a solid face for a while, then suddenly twisting his face, and then he burst out laughing without warning, holding the table "Hahaha" until tears came out. Jiang Chuan was so angry that he almost went mad, throwing the wig and prop glasses onto the agent's head, and then went to change into the second set of clothes in a huff.

  The second set of clothes is school uniform.

  It was the kind of uniform you'd only see in idol dramas - a suit-style school uniform. This time, when Jiang Chuan walked out of the dressing room, all the staff on set fell silent for a moment. As he approached, he impatiently adjusted the collar of his white dress shirt under his uniform jacket and raised an eyebrow to ask the makeup artist, "Do I need to change my look?"

  When she met those azure eyes, the makeup artist sister was stunned for five seconds. On the sixth second, she finally reacted that the handsome guy in front of her was talking to her. She nodded hastily and gave Jiang Chuan a new look - this time, they kept Jiang Chuan's original skin tone, but slightly softened his facial features with a light foundation, and dyed his hair black. After some fussing, Jiang Chuan looked much younger.

  It actually still has a bit of a student feel to it.

  "Wow, Mr. Jiang, this ad will attract a lot of students' attention, I guarantee it!" The makeup artist sister said while working on him, "You're really handsome, when I was in school, my dream campus heartthrob looked just like you - simply a textbook example of a model."

  Jiang Chuan's face, which had been stiff with tension, relaxed ever so slightly upon hearing these words.

  He turned his head to look at the hamster, which was crouched on the dressing table, nibbling on potato chips. After staring at the hamster for a while, he suddenly bent down and asked, "Ah Fei, am I handsome?"

  In the man's gaze, the hamster paused for a second as it held potato chips and ate them crazily.

  Then it quietly broke the potato chips in its hand——

  "Is that so? Well, in that case." Jiang Chuan straightened up with satisfaction.

  Makeup artist sister was stunned: "......what does it mean?"

  Jiang Chuan took a glance at himself in the mirror and calmly said: "My Ah Fei just said that Master is so handsome he's dripping with charm."

  Hamster raises both paws and shakes its butt.

  Makeup artist sister: "..................."