Entertainment Industry’s Gourmet Food Service

“Say something --” Xu Che kicked the agent who was cleaning up the mess he made.

“I’ll think of something, I will. We can find a water army, find someone to hack him. I don’t believe someone like him who just debuted has such good resources. He has to have some dirt on him!” suggested the agent.

“Good, we’ll do it like that!” Xu Che’s anger changed into a smile while thinking of the storm to come.

Lately, the gossip forums revolved around this post:

Topic: Gossip Artists who shot to fame overnight in the entertainment industry.

There has been a new male artist that has gotten popular lately, let’s call him M.

First of all, M does not have a major, but was able to sign into a big entertainment company. Before his debut, he was featured in a nationally famous magazine modelling for a luxury brand. It is even rumoured that the director “praised” him.

Later in his first television series he played male lead number 5. But everyone, don’t look down on this male lead number 5, it’s even more capable than some second male leads!

This M became popular at the speed of a rocket, is his talent really not over exaggerated?

1st reply: First!

2nd reply: M? Who is it? Is his last name Mei?3rd reply: The poster above is stupid and didn’t explain, which newcomer in the entertainment industry has the surname Mei? Mei Zhaofeng duh!

4th Reply: Newcomers, non-technical background, big company, magazine, everything is clear, this new person is MSQ

5th Reply: Couldn’t help but read his name out loud. So what’s wrong with him? He’s a handsome boy!

….

15th Reply: I’m OP, personally I think rewards should be given to hard workers, so I won’t comment on those to gain popularity overnight! Maybe they had worked hard for many years and suddenly became popular!

However, this M is a noob, so it’s not the same. As soon as he got signed he got good gigs handed to him. If he’s a rich second gen I’d know. The point is, he doesn't have a background. Haha.

16th Reply: OP where’s your hate coming from, just now you brought idol M up. If you want to say something don’t beat around the bush.

17th Reply: This looks sus.

18th Reply: They had the resources to get in the backdoor, haha, u jelly!!!

…

31st Reply: This is OP, if you don’t want to believe me I’ll give you evidence. How can you have no skills and get popular, even if you beat me to death I won’t believe it could happen!

33rd Reply: If it’s sour you can still eat it, but words cannot be carelessly spoken!! OP don’t speak nonsense!!!

54th Reply: this idol can’t be Mo Shaoqing right? I really like him, what’s going on?

...

78th Reply: Trash talking my male god, OP COME OUT!

95th Reply: You guys are too much, hating my Mo, *hugs my Mo*, haters can go die.96th Reply: Upstairs didn’t explain they’re  NC fan
…..

105th Reply: Everyone don’t hate on OP, overnight celebrities are not coincidences. That M was recently cast in a super popular drama series! Right now TV shows are filled with sponsored roles, M is not the only one.

107th Reply: Sorry, I’m half in the entertainment circle and know some things. Actually what OP said makes some sense.

The 5th male lead was originally supposed to be another idol, but was temporarily replaced by the director, no one knows why the change happened. That poor idol, he’s been in the industry for a few years now and finally got a good gig but…

121st Reply: How else can you climb up, it’s either this or that!

125th Reply: I’ll go, this is too much, for a new comer to dare do this… the industry is a mess…

159th Reply: Is there anything in the industry that’s even fair?

185th Reply: everyone stop speaking in circles, I’m going to ask directly, is it Mo Shaoqing who stole my Che Che’s role in [Legend of Emperor Ling]?

186th Reply: What did I miss…

187th Reply: Post 185 is mighty, I have the same question

188th Reply: Same

…

200th Reply: This is OP, This is a screen shot of Xu Che’s Weibo photo [Photo] and this is Mo Shaoqing’s [Photo]. It’s the same Hanfu! Everyone guessed wrong previously, Xu Che wasn’t cut out of the script, his role was stolen by someone instead!

201st Reply: I support OP!202nd Reply: Nonsense!

215th Reply: What else is there to ask huh, it's so obvious now, it has to be! It has to be for sure…

233rd Reply: I can say that I’ve never seen such a shameless person before.

245th Reply: Male celebrities these days are disgusting, doing shameless things in the open, are you bulling our Che Che for having fewer fans!

267th Reply: god, he looks so young, and can do something like this! Strange, how did he get signed with Xing Yang?

300th Reply: Just a bunch of haters, what about my Mo, how could you talk about him like this! Some fans’ faces are green with envy!

Posts like these were quickly drowned out with curses.

In a few short hours, the forum received a few thousand replies and was trending on the internet.

Hate groups seemed to pop out overnight, and caused all kinds of extreme ridicule.

By the time Xing Yang’s PR team noticed the commotion the next day, things were already out of control. Rumours about Mo Shaoqing stealing a role was already circulating online.

The situation could become more serious, so Han Su, who is in charge of PR, notified Rui Sha.

Mo Shaoqing took advantage of his few days of rest,  he had been updating the menu and felt that since there wasn’t enough time on his hands, stayed home. On one hand, he could rest up and on the other he could conveniently check on his garden.

Previously his home wasn’t elaborately furnished, he didn’t even bring in any modern thighs, only placing a few things on the shelves. He even bought some bed sheets and bedding in case of emergencies.

Mo Shaoqing had believed that he wouldn’t be staying in the space for long, so he meticulously took care of everything that was there. He made sure that everything was orderly and tried not to damage a thing. Even though he knew that it wasn’t easy to accumulate dust, he still cleaned the apartment frequently. Sometimes he would take all the books off the shelf and sit under the sunlight and read.

However all these books were in traditional Chinese or classical texts. There were also books in history, landscapes, biographies etc… all were not to his preferences. So after reading a few times, he gave up.

Listening to Rui Sha’s, he knew in a few days that he would audition in a new TV drama. There was also a variety show. So Mo Shaoqing wanted to clean the books once more before he got busy.

Although the books were old, they weren’t dirty. Mo Shaoqing only needed to lay them out in the courtyard to dry in the sun. Grouping them together by category made it easier for packing and moving.

Mo Shaoqing brought out a stack of books and accidently one got knocked over. From inside a book a small yellow booklet fell out. It was thin and half the size of the other books.

Mo Shaoqing flipped through it, inside was full of pictures and texts describing step by step recipes and cooking techniques. There weren’t many recipes written but it had something that Mo Shaoqing had never heard of before -- like this braised dish!

Mo Shaoqing wanted to keep reading but heard his phone ring. He put the booklet back into the book and immediately left the room.

Confused, Mo Shaoqing was called back to the company by Xiao Wen. He stopped by the PR office to discuss countermeasures.

Under Rui Sha’s guidance, Mo Shaoqing saw the trending forum post and the screenshot from Xu Che’s Weibo.

Even Mo Shaoqing’s fans were pushed to leave messages on his Weibo to dig out the truth, hoping he would reveal everything.

Rui Sha felt a bit distressed, to be interrogated by one's own fans, for a newbie in the entertainment industry, would be stressful. So she immediately called Mo Shaoqing to the company to console him and let him calm down. At this time he shouldn’t respond to anything.

To her surprise, Mo Shaoqing was very calm.

That’s right, Mo Shaoqing was not only not nervous at all, but instead after learning of the situation he had a “it’s finally come” air around him.

Regarding being interrogated by his fans, he wasn’t even a big celebrity. Among all these people, who actually genuinely liked him? Probably most of them were here because of external things like his appearance. If he had been famous for a long time and only had these types of fans, then he would have really been heart broken!

Since he was Xing Yang’s only new artist that was being supported recently, when a scandal like this occurred, the whole Xing Tang PR team would surely help him.

A staff member asked: “Who is Xu Che? What is going on?”

“With no proof at all they were able to pull in so many people, I bet they were all bought off!” said another employee sneering coldly.

In reality, it was the truth. Other than Xu Che and his fans, most of them were part of the water army he hired.

Han Su got everyone to settle down: “It’s not a big deal, it is just a bunch of nonsense. The point is, Shaoqing is a newcomer, we have to deal with it quickly without leaving any negative press! Since we are Xing Yang, it is not good to bully. We need to resolve this with Director Mo, this Xu Che wants to gain popularity so much he’s gone crazy. We should help him out!”

“We’re employees of Xing Yang, not some casual people who throw dirty water at people!”

“That’s right, let’s teach Xu Che a lesson!”

Han Su’s speech motivated the employees present, originally some newcomers were still worried but they soon let go of their doubts.

Xing Yang’s PR team had yet to take action, but online another storm hit escalating the issue to a high level.

ImJiangMuhe: It’s been so long since I had such a delicious cake! When will you make another one for me? [photo] [photo] @Mon_Shaoqing

The comments underneath were exploding in excitement:

“Shit, it wasn’t a hack, a real post!!!”

“Look at the view and the blue sky!”

“It seems Mr. Jiang is still alive, not tied down in bed by Mr. Qi”

“Slice of life photo, licking the screen”

“Not an ad!!”

…

On the other side of the computer, Jiang Muhe was happily reading through the comments. It seems his fame had not reduced over the years! He then selected some comments that piqued his interest, especially the one about the bed, haha!

Jiang Muhe then replied with a smiley face and waited for things to develop! That’s right, he feared the world was not chaotic enough!