The Villainess A Marked the Seductive Movie Queen - Chapter 15

Chapter 15: Soften

After a brief adjustment, the crew resumed filming.

With Ruan Minxue’s pointers, Xiao Zhizi improved rapidly. Her portrayal of “grievance” now carried a better balance of teenage stubbornness and emotional release.

Liu Yitong also finished her scene smoothly: Qiao Jing, having no parents to back her up, put on a brave front. She appeared indifferent, but in reality, she was secretly envious of the parent-child interaction across from her, her fists clenching out of a guilty conscience born from forced independence.

When questioned by the homeroom teacher, Qiao Jing’s answers were consistently brief. Her only long sentence occurred when the other parent mocked her for having no one to love her:

“Even with someone to love them, your family only managed to raise a thing like this. Maybe without anyone to love me, I can turn out more like a human being!”

“You!”

Both sides glared at each other, breathing heavily.

“Cut.”

Zhang Lishen called a halt. The script supervisor recorded the progress, and several directors gathered around the monitor to review.

The assistant director was fairly satisfied with the facial expressions of the two girls in the frame and offered a few words of praise. However, upon seeing Zhang Lishen’s grim expression, she quickly and dejectedly shut her mouth. Fine—her satisfaction didn’t matter if the head director wasn’t buying it.

“Liu Yitong.” Zhang Lishen took off his headphones and frowned. “Why do you talk like you’re singing?”

Caught off guard by a comment that was hard to classify as praise or criticism, Liu Yitong looked at the director’s face and confirmed it was a critique.

She had been a girl of few words since childhood, always concise and never using much force to enunciate. Later, when she joined an idol theater, the staff found that besides being a dance lead, her slightly raspy voice was very catchy. They had her develop her rapping skills. She learned trap rap; to match the auto-tune, she often deliberately blurred her pronunciation and enunciation to create an electronic, psychedelic feel. She had practiced this for a whole year.

Zhang Lishen didn’t spell it out, but Liu Yitong had an epiphany. She likely blurred her words during the long sentence, and the rhythm didn’t match natural speech patterns.

“I used to be an idol,” Liu Yitong explained simply, adding, “I’ll pay attention to my lines from now on.”

Perhaps Liu Yitong’s quick understanding appeased Zhang Lishen. The director said nothing more, merely gesturing for her to do a pickup shot.

Being a newcomer, Liu Yitong focused so hard on her pronunciation this time that her emotions faltered; she looked like she was over-enunciating on purpose. Zhang Lishen called a stop and frowned. Seeing Liu Yitong practicing her expressions on her own, he recognized her self-awareness and simply ordered another take.

A single line went through three takes. After listening to the final playback, Zhang Lishen’s expression remained displeased.

Once the head director’s “atmospheric pressure” dropped, the set of hundreds of people fell into a sudden, dead silence. Zhang Lishen turned his head and glanced at Ruan Minxue beside him.

He saw Ruan Minxue’s gaze resting undisguised on Liu Yitong. The girl opposite was unaware, stubbornly looking down and mouthing the words to herself.

“Ahem.” Zhang Lishen cleared his throat.

Ruan Minxue’s eyelids lifted slightly. She turned her head, gave him a casual glance, and then went back to flipping through her script, looking completely uninvolved.

Understanding the hint, Zhang Lishen picked up the intercom: “Get Jiang Qi over here.”

The performance coach, who had been busy with scheduling in the neighboring unit, was hauled back to help Liu Yitong adjust her lines. Jiang Qi was a college-level teacher with extensive experience. She quickly noticed Liu Yitong’s vocalization issues and reminded her of her tongue and tooth placement.

Liu Yitong had been a top student in high school; her comprehension was high. When she repeated the line again, it was nearing perfection. However, once the camera rolled, a minor slip occurred, and she swallowed the sounds of the last few words.

At that, the script in Zhang Lishen’s hand was slammed onto the ground. It was only a roll of paper, so the sound wasn’t loud, but the dust it kicked up made everyone’s hearts sink.

As a teacher, Jiang Qi admired Liu Yitong. The child had spirit and soul; she understood everything immediately. Seeing the girl about to be intimidated, the teacher’s protective instinct kicked in. She spoke up:

“I only taught her a few sentences and Yitong already learned them. That’s very impressive! It’s unrealistic to expect years of habits to be scrubbed clean in an hour, isn’t it, Director Zhang?”

The assistant director, pitying the hardworking newcomer, chimed in: “Exactly. This line isn’t vital to the plot anyway; it’s fine to let it slide. She’s a newcomer and she’s definitely nervous right now. If you’re really not satisfied, why not do a reshoot later?”

Nervous?

Zhang Lishen suppressed his irritation and looked at Liu Yitong.

Facing high pressure, the girl had displayed incredible calm from beginning to end. Though her eyes were downcast, there was no sign of submission; even her hair seemed to radiate a stubborn defiance. That defiance wasn’t a childish talking-back, but a pride bordering on conceit. She was defiant because she didn’t believe she couldn’t overcome it; she didn’t believe she couldn’t do it.

On the other hand, Xiao Zhizi—who hadn’t even been scolded—looked terrified, her fingers trembling. She looked more like the one about to be yelled at than Liu Yitong did.

Zhang Lishen had a clear self-awareness. He knew that on set, he sometimes overestimated the limits of normal humans and became obsessive. He accepted others taking control when he went too far, but the voice had to be heavy enough—convincing enough to persuade his perfectionist brain to back down.

Right now, the voices around him lacked that weight. He crossed his arms, his face darkening.

Xiao Zhizi noticed the director’s expression and hurried to Liu Yitong’s side, tugging at her sleeve. She whispered: “Yitong, why don’t you just soften up? We’re young and inexperienced. Just talk to the director properly, say we’ll do better next time…”

Hearing this, Liu Yitong secretly clenched her loose fist. On the surface, she just curled her lips in a comforting smile. She knew the pros and cons; she knew she could be more rational and choose to show weakness, or act more impulsive to establish a “don’t mess with me” image.

But Ruan Minxue was here.

She realized that in front of the person she liked, both logic and impulse failed, defeated by a lowly sense of conceit. She wanted to appear brilliant in front of a brilliant person. She wanted her performance to satisfy herself in front of her crush. Otherwise, her “like” would feel devalued, relegated to a form of low-class desecration.

Moreover, the current high-pressure environment was nothing. She had experienced much more suffocating things. Enunciating a single line wasn’t that hard; muscle strain from dancing hurt much worse than this. It was just a line—it wasn’t impossible.

Clink.

A sudden, crisp sound caused a momentary crack in the heavy atmosphere. It wasn’t loud, but the lingering resonance made people’s hearts quiver. Liu Yitong quietly looked up and caught a glimpse.

She found that the director’s assistant, trying to lighten the mood, was handing out tea to the directing team. Ruan Minxue had accepted a durable small steel cup, but she didn’t drink. She simply placed it beside her. Whether intentional or not, the cup bumped awkwardly against the metal chair leg, creating that light sound.

Liu Yitong saw the chair leg and immediately withdrew her gaze, not looking up. Her vision was suppressed, but her hearing was sharp. She heard Ruan Minxue flipping through her script. Despite the distance and the background noise of the machinery, the rustling sound of the woman’s fingers turning pages was exceptionally clear.

Liu Yitong chided herself: Am I being too sensitive? Why does her presence feel so overwhelmingly high?

Zhang Lishen stared at the girl, but she remained stubborn and didn’t look up. He turned to look at Ruan Minxue. The woman who had been rustling the script moments ago had stopped. Her finger tapped rhythmically on the corner of a page, and her gaze was fixed on the girl opposite, seemingly waiting for something. However, the girl was so stubborn she didn’t make eye contact once.

The whole crew was waiting. Zhang Lishen didn’t want to waste more time and spoke directly to Liu Yitong:

“Do you want me to delete this line, or find a voice actor to dub it later?”

Liu Yitong’s fist tightened. The two options sounded like a negotiation, but given Zhang Lishen’s pursuit of excellence, they were essentially an abandonment and an insult to an actor.

Liu Yitong didn’t take the bait. She responded calmly: “I can practice it well.”

It wasn’t a grand promise or an emotional outburst; she was simply stating a fact.

“When?”

“The next time the camera rolls.”

Zhang Lishen fell silent. Pushing the decision back to the head director—this fledgling girl was arrogant beyond measure. If he wanted to make things difficult and said to roll the camera now, was she truly confident she could pull it off with zero errors?

At that moment, Ruan Minxue, who had been silent the entire time, finally spoke:

“Let’s film my scenes first.”

Broadcasting a series follows logical order, but filming doesn’t. For convenience, scenes in one location are often shot all at once. Thus, actors might have to play a passionate love scene the moment they meet, while the final “wrap” scene filmed is actually their characters’ first meeting.

Zhang Lishen confirmed through the intercom that the neighboring unit’s set was nearly ready. He took the opportunity to back down and announced a change in location.

Liu Yitong remained where she was. She didn’t look up, only staring at her toes. In her peripheral vision, she saw the shadows of the crew retreating one by one. The set emptied, and a light source grew brighter in the distance. When the people left, the light came in.

When she finally looked up, she couldn’t even catch a glimpse of Ruan Minxue’s back.

Of course, she wasn’t narcissistic enough to think Ruan Minxue had spoken up to protect her. The woman was likely just pursuing efficiency; helping her out was probably just a convenient byproduct. But in reality, Liu Yitong had indeed benefited from Ruan Minxue’s intervention.

Her heart was filled with complex emotions.

“That scared me to death,” Xiao Zhizi said, having stayed behind to wait for Liu Yitong. She patted her chest in relief. “You’re something else! Just soften up a bit! If Director Zhang is scary—and I think he is—you could have just acted pitiful for Ruan-jie. When I messed up earlier, if I hadn’t acted cute with Ruan-jie first, I probably would have been scolded by Director Zhang too!”

Liu Yitong merely pursed her lips and said nothing.

“Alright, it’s over now!” Xiao Zhizi laughed. “Ruan-jie’s scenes are about to start. Want to go watch together? We can see a textbook-level performance from a Best Actress winner!”

“Okay.”

The two girls quickly caught up with the main group to observe Ruan Minxue’s first appearance as Du Ran. As expected of a seasoned senior, Ruan Minxue’s handling of the character’s introduction was effortless. A working professional, exhausted by her job but trying to rally her spirits to meet her neighbor’s homeroom teacher—the image of a modern city woman was naturally established. It left a deep impression without being overly dramatic.

Liu Yitong watched from the side, mesmerized by the sound of that jade-like voice delivering lines. She noticed Ruan Minxue’s technique; the strength of her tongue was just right, sending the words out precisely through her teeth.

She silently repeated her own lines. She realized that because she was used to the fast pace of rap, her tongue muscles were accustomed to being relaxed. When she needed to mobilize them suddenly, the strength wasn’t there.

When filming ended for the day, the director announced the wrap. The crew cheered and dispersed, happily making plans for late-night snacks.

Liu Yitong left alone, walking toward the hotel. Her head was down, her gaze wandering over the ground—not out of low spirits, but out of observation. She noticed small, smooth pebbles by the roadside. She picked one up, walked a few steps, saw another of a similar size, and picked that one up too.

She continued this all the way back. By the time she reached the hotel, she had a small handful. Expressionless, she scrubbed the stones in saltwater over and over until they were slick and clean.

Clutching the stones, she stood before the bathroom mirror and looked at herself. Then, she stuffed the stones into her mouth—one, then another.

Her mouth was full. She opened it, attempting to make a sound. Her soft tongue struggled to move through the gaps between the stones; her mouth felt sour and numb.

She remained expressionless, calmly grinding her tongue against the stones, and began to practice her lines.

Over and over again.

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