The film set is located at a film and television base in the neighboring province of S City, not far away by car.
Xia Yitong was fidgeting in the nanny car, her hand tightening and loosening around her cell phone, sweating profusely.
Over the years, she was extremely nervous every time she was about to meet Lu Yinbing. She had rehearsed countless ways of greeting in her mind, but she denied them without hesitation, and continued to imagine and deny.
The assistant stole a glance at her and saw her constantly drinking water from the table. He asked, "Teacher Xia, are you feeling unwell?"
Xia Yitong pressed her shaking hands and said, "It's okay. It's hot and I feel thirsty easily."
The assistant silently opened another bottle for her.
"Thanks."
Xia Yitong glanced at her phone. There was still half an hour left, so she opened a movie cached on her phone, watching it for the twelfth time. The movie was called "Catching the Wind", a spy film that was very popular in the first half of this year, and it achieved great success in both box office and reputation.
On the screen, the heroine played by Lu Yinbing wore a navy blue cheongsam, holding a long Camel cigarette between her left fingers, sitting in a chair, her figure and posture were exactly like those of a socialite in the Republic of China. She slowly raised her eyes to look at the handsome man in a straight military uniform, slowly exhaled a puff of smoke from her red lips, and suddenly smiled like smoke: "Are you the Captain Fang that A Lan mentioned?"
Lu Yinbing's lazy and slightly teasing voice came into Xia Yitong's ears through the headphones. Xia Yitong couldn't help but hold her breath and concentrate carefully, as if she could hear her faint breathing in this way.
This is a long shot, with no music, only mutual testing. Two minutes later, Lu Yinbing was less than ten centimeters away from the man. She walked around behind the man, spoke softly, and put the black muzzle of the gun against the back of his neck.
Because there was someone in the dark, Lu Yinbing looked at the camera, but in fact, he was looking at that person. It was a very charming and wild smile. His perfectly shaped thin lips were slightly hooked, his head was slightly tilted, and the corners of his eyes were flowing with a seductive light like a venomous snake.
Captain Fang whispered, "You love me, you won't kill me."
Lu Yinbing smiled and pulled the trigger.
With a bang.
The gun went off.
The shot seemed to have hit her heart. Xia Yitong's pupils dilated, her chest rose and fell twice, and she immediately pressed the pause button, rubbing her face with both hands. She felt difficulty breathing for the twelfth time and urgently needed to relieve it.
After she took a deep breath, her heartbeat returned to normal. She took a few sips of water and continued watching.
They arrived at the set and parked the car outside. Xia Yitong put away her phone before the car stopped, put on a mask as usual, suppressed all emotions, and walked in with only an assistant.
Although she has become very popular, her footing is not stable and it is her first time on the big screen, so it is always better to keep a low profile.
After a quick glance, I didn't recognize most of them. They all looked like crew members, and they all looked lazy.
There was still nearly half a month before the filming started, so it was normal that the actors had not arrived yet. In addition to Xia Yitong, there were three others, all of whom were supporting roles. One of them was Yu Qingyan, a handsome young man who had acted with her before. The two of them had some friendship, so he took the initiative to come over and say hello.
Xia Yitong smiled back at him, and asked a few polite questions about each other's recent situation. She kept looking around and asked casually, "Has Lu Yinghou joined the crew?"
Yu Qingyan said: "I joined the group, but I have already returned to the hotel."
Xia Yitong frowned upon hearing this and asked, "What happened?"
Yu Qingyan looked around and said in a low voice, "I don't know either. It seems that the queen of the film industry went on strike because the director was cursing inside. No one dared to speak on the set."
A big-budget movie was about to start shooting, the funds were in place, and the crew was set up, but at the critical moment, the leading actress actually went on strike! What's going on
"Are we still shooting?" Xia Yitong's heart skipped a beat and she immediately asked, "Did the director say anything before he went in?"
If the camera is not turned on, what will happen to her little maid? She and Lu Yinbing have a rivalry. She brought Lu Yinbing a midnight snack, which must have taken a second! Maybe even more than that!
"I don't know." Yu Qingyan looked in the direction of the lounge with a worried look on his face. He played the third male lead, a close confidant of Lu Yinbing, with a lot of scenes. His agent spent a lot of effort to get him this role. If it fails, the loss will be much greater than Xia Yitong's.
"It should be on." He added, "I just heard that Director Qin wants to find someone to replace him."
"It's going to be hard to find someone in this short period of time, right? I heard that Director Qin took a long time to select the best actress."
"Isn't it? If the start of filming is postponed, it will conflict with the release date of my next film."
"Me too."
The two chatted for a few more words, and Yu Qingyan remembered and asked, "By the way, Yi Tong, what role did you play?"
Xia Yitong said frankly: "Oh, I play a palace maid named Ruyi."
"..." Yu Qingyan's prepared compliments choked in his throat. He choked for a moment before saying, "Very good."
Xia Yitong didn't care. She lowered her head to look at her toes, raised her eyes and smiled, "I think it's pretty good too. It's really good. She's the personal maid of Queen Lu."
Although in the play the close-fitting person is just a tea server.
But Xia Yitong was already very satisfied, and her joy was genuine. The other two supporting actors were much lower in status than her, so they didn't need her to go over. They waited for her to finish talking to Yu Qingyan before taking the initiative to introduce themselves.
Those two people were not as famous as her, but they were older than her. Xia Yitong smiled in advance and said, "Don't call me teacher, just call me by my name."
The four of them greeted each other and then remained silent.
An hour later, Qin Hanlin and two assistant directors came out of the lounge. The leader, Director Qin, had a gloomy face and an invisible rage on his head. The two assistant directors followed behind him, their eyebrows twisted into knots.
Xia Yitong stood up: "Qin..."
Qin Hanlin was the kind of smiling Buddha type of person. Xia Yitong had watched his interview videos and documentaries about the filming of the movie online, and he was very friendly. But now he walked past all the crew members without even glancing at them, and went outside to smoke by himself. It was obvious that this made him very angry.
Xia Yitong sat there for more than an hour, but the director didn't even look at her. Xia Yitong swallowed the last half of the word and smiled indifferently. Her assistant Fang Hui couldn't stand it anymore and couldn't help complaining: "What kind of director is this..."
Xia Yitong said: "After such a big incident, it's normal for the director to be angry and not care about us."
Fang Hui started following her last year. Xia Yitong had become famous, and she was always surrounded by people wherever she went. She was treated very well in the crew, and they were afraid that they had not taken good care of her. When she first arrived here, she felt very uncomfortable for her and said, "You can't be so angry. Someone should come to take care of you."
"Didn't the staff just come? They gave us the room card." Xia Yitong said, "It's nothing, wait a while, it's okay anyway."
Fang Wei was about to say something, but Xia Yitong warned her with a look.
Thankfully, an assistant director finally saw her, rubbed his brows, and smiled: "Teacher Xia Yitong, I'm really sorry to have kept you waiting for so long."
"I just arrived too." Xia Yitong said modestly. Instead of blaming the director, she comforted the assistant director. "I heard about the crew. You've worked hard."
The assistant director couldn't help but look at her more. He had met many popular stars following Qin Hanlin. The more popular these young stars were, the more likely they were to become arrogant and act like big shots. Her humility didn't seem to be fake.
"It's not hard, it's our mistake." The assistant director's smile became more sincere. "Don't worry, we will find the right actor as soon as possible."
"Okay, you're busy, I'll go back to the hotel and rest first."
The assistant director was somewhat stunned. He didn't even say a few words to him to hint at the new female lead candidate, nor did he say anything else? Well, when he saw the cast list, he was shocked. This maid was originally a third-tier artist, and suddenly she was replaced by the popular Xia Yitong. He thought she would at least ask for more scenes when she joined the crew, but now she didn't say anything
The assistant director inexplicably had the illusion that she was not here to act at all.
Xia Yitong's butt was glued to the bench on the set as if it was coated with 502, but in fact, she was as anxious as an ant on hot pot. God knows how much she wanted to go back to the hotel immediately after she heard Yu Qingyan say that Queen Lu had returned to the hotel.
When no one was watching, she almost flew upstairs. As soon as she entered the room, she urged her assistant, her voice trembling with excitement: "Help me find out which room Queen Lu lives in."
Fang Wei went out when she heard the noise, and came back to tell Lu Yinbing that he lived upstairs from her.
Xia Yitong jumped up from the bed, opened the door and rushed out like a gust of wind.
A minute later, she came back and asked Fang Hui nervously, "Is it okay for me to dress like this?"
Fang Wei looked at her and nodded continuously. With a thin waist, long legs, red lips and white teeth, she was more than acceptable, she was simply extremely desirable.
"Really?"
"real!"
Xia Yitong smelled her shoulders and arms and smelled sweat: "No, I'm going to take a shower."
An hour later, Xia Yitong sprayed some of the perfume that Lu Yinbing mentioned as her favorite, and walked to the door of the upstairs room, feeling refreshed.
She took two minutes of deep breathing and knocked on the door.
"Hello, may I ask Lu—" She put on an impeccable and perfect smile, slowly opened it to the person in front of her, and then the smile froze on her face.
She was only mentally prepared that the person who opened the door was Lu Yinbing's assistant, but she was not prepared to see Lu Yinbing directly!
Lu Yinbing was only wearing a nightgown and looked half asleep. She asked coldly, "Who are you?"
She didn't know her at all.
The moment Xia Yitong saw her, his breathing stopped and his mind went blank. After a long while, he introduced himself with a trembling voice: "I am Xia, Xia..."
Calm down, you have to calm down, she said to herself, you finally got to see her, you finally got to say a word to her.
But the more she tried to calm down, the harder it was. Facing the increasingly obvious impatience on Lu Yinbing's face, Xia Yitong became anxious and angry with herself, her eyes turning red.
"Xia Yi—"
"You disturbed my sleep."
Before she could finish her words, Lu Yinbing slammed the door coldly.