After Being Dumped by the Film Empress, My Acting Skills Soared - Chapter 5

Chapter 5

While Shao Niannian was drowning in ecstasy, the atmosphere over at Jiang Yan’s place was as low as an ice cellar.

Jiang Yan’s manager was nursing a headache brought on by the woman in front of him. “If your mother hadn’t specifically instructed me to look after you, I’d have dumped a reckless person like you in the wilderness to rot a long time ago.”

Jiang Yan toyed with a few dice in her hand, swirling them. Her elaborate, fluffy vintage banquet gown had long been replaced by comfortable silk pajamas. Several opened bottles of red wine sat on the table; some were already empty. Yet, the woman sitting on the sofa showed no hint of a flush on her face, as if she hadn’t been the one drinking at all.

“You could get away with saying that in the past.” Jiang Yan drained the last bit of wine from her glass. “Now, you pull over two million a year just from my endorsements. Flipping on me already?”

“If you don’t want the job, you can write your resignation today. There’s a long line of people waiting to be my manager.” Flushed by the room’s heating, a hint of intoxication finally touched Jiang Yan’s eyes, turning her gaze sultry.

Jiang Yan spoke softly, but every sentence pierced her manager’s vitals. The manager jumped in frustration, taking several deep breaths for fear of passing out.

“Fine, you filmed a movie, but why did you have to provoke Wen Jing? Don’t you know that ‘ancestor’ is famous for her vengefulness? And if you’re going to break up, at least wait until the year is out! Sending her a text on New Year’s Day… how is that any different from slapping the Young Lady’s face and telling her to get lost?!”

The manager roared, “I am truly going to be angered to death by you!”

“If I don’t like her anymore, if the feeling is gone, I just tell her to split. What’s the big deal?” Jiang Yan tossed the dice into the air and caught them steadily as they fell. “She doesn’t look like she hasn’t moved on. What are you worried about?”

“I’m worried that with how reckless you are, you’ll trip up sooner or later. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.” The manager’s head throbbed. After being distracted by Jiang Yan for a while, he remembered something else. “And what was that move tonight?”

“First, you have her led to a prime front-row seat, then you have me buy trending searches.” The manager’s expression soured. “You haven’t switched targets already, have you?”

“I haven’t picked up any new scripts for you lately. You’d better keep your head down and stay out of trouble! Sort out the mess with Wen Jing first!”

Jiang Yan let her curls spill over her cheeks, her eyes curving as if the manager had said something hilarious. “Wasn’t that person tonight brought in by Wen Jing to annoy me? I’m just doing what you said—cleaning up Wen Jing’s mess.”

“With a temper like yours, no wonder I’m the only star under your wing who’s actually famous.”

The manager rolled his eyes so hard they almost disappeared. “What do you mean ‘the only one’? You sure like to flatter yourself.”

“Dealing with one of you is enough. If I had a few more like you, I wouldn’t bother managing them no matter how much money I made. I’d probably just be saving that money for my future grave.”

“Fine, I get it. Hurry up and leave.” Jiang Yan leaned back into the sofa, using the remote to flip through TV channels—mostly old black-and-white films from the 70s.

The acting in those films was often stylized, with rhythmic, operatic chanting. Most people found it unbearable to listen to, but Jiang Yan loved it, wishing she could play these old movies on loop 24 hours a day.

She watched for a while and, not hearing the door close, tilted her head toward the manager. “Why are you still standing there?”

The manager rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “You’ve had so many girlfriends… it couldn’t be because they refused to watch these boring movies with you that you dumped them all, could it?”

Jiang Yan squinted at him, staring silently until he felt a chill down his spine. He forced a smile and slowly backed out, closing the door.

Thud.

As the door closed, it was as if all the burdens and her public persona were stripped away. She hurled the dice in her hand against a glass door, making a sharp, banging sound. The crisp noise, accompanied by the operatic singing from the TV, felt exceptionally eerie in the small room. She lay motionless on the sofa for a long time, as if that one act of venting had exhausted all her strength.

Ding-dong.

Her phone chimed. Jiang Yan glanced at the screen. There was a single WeChat message from Wen Jing:

“Didn’t you say you wanted to compensate me? I’m taking the lead role in my next drama. You come be my acting coach.”

Jiang Yan frowned slightly, but her gaze didn’t linger. It returned to the black-and-white movie. The film had reached the part where the lovers were being torn apart, growing to loathe each other. Even with her eyes closed, she could recite the coming scenes.

Unfortunately, someone wasn’t willing to let her rest. Wen Jing’s second message arrived shortly:

“You can keep pretending you didn’t see it. If I don’t get a reply in ten minutes, I’m bringing people to your house tomorrow to smash things. Or maybe you’d prefer to see yourself on tomorrow’s front-page trending news?”

“Annoying.” A faint smirk touched Jiang Yan’s red lips. At this moment, she fully agreed with her manager. Wen Jing was a difficult person to shake.

Based on Wen Jing’s troublemaking at the banquet, Jiang Yan didn’t think the girl had any lingering affection for her. But the part about her being vengeful? Jiang Yan agreed completely. Wen Jing had probably found a new way to torture her.

Jiang Yan found it boring, but she wasn’t afraid. She had caused plenty of trouble since her debut; one more from Wen Jing wouldn’t change much. Still, she waited until the very last second of the five-minute mark to reply.

Jiang Yan: .

It was hard for Wen Jing to tell if Jiang Yan was suffering. Regardless, seeing that reply sent right at the deadline made Wen Jing’s temper flare instantly.

“She’s sick!” Wen Jing hissed through gritted teeth. “Jiang Yan is literally insane. A total psychopath.”

“How someone like her can live so long without being beaten to death is a testament to the patience of the people who work with her.” Wen Jing felt like she was looking for trouble, but thinking of the leverage she held gave her a strange sense of satisfaction. It wasn’t that she liked Jiang Yan that much. It was just that Wen Jing was usually the one to dump people; she had never been discarded before.

Simply put, she couldn’t swallow the insult.

Shao Niannian changed out of her gown. Those layers of tulle were useless for anything other than looking pretty. She shut the cat out of the room and lay on the bed drying her hair while talking to her best friend, Su Chaoyue.

Shao Niannian recounted her day. On the other end, Chaoyue was struggling with jet lag and a screen full of German text, her head throbbing. Hearing Niannian’s unrequited love story only made it worse.

Sipping black coffee, Su Chaoyue said dryly, “Have you finished reading your scripts, or are you just going to let your ‘romance-brain’ run wild? Don’t end up so broke you have to dig for wild vegetables to afford a flight to Germany to find me.”

The euphoria of being near Jiang Yan vanished instantly. Shao Niannian calmed down. “Why do you have to be so blunt?”

“Honest advice is hard to swallow.” Su Chaoyue yawned. “You didn’t listen to me back when you had to repeat your entrance exams. Be careful you don’t trip up again.”

Shao Niannian kicked her feet. In a single night, she had already devised a perfect plan, and the primary catalyst for that plan was Wen Jing. To get close to Jiang Yan, she first had to get into the production Wen Jing was in.

But she kept this plan to herself, replying only: “Don’t worry, everything is under control! Just wait for my good news.”

“I’ll believe it when I see it.” Su Chaoyue was overwhelmed by the long names in German literature, but she didn’t hesitate to burst Niannian’s bubble. Based on Niannian’s story alone, she could tell the relationship between Wen Jing and Jiang Yan was anything but ordinary. Niannian likely knew it too, but when she didn’t want to believe something, words were a waste of breath.

Chaoyue, a literature major, believed in “truth through practice”—and that applied to love as well. An idealist like Shao Niannian wouldn’t budge until she fell down and felt the pain for herself.