Brother Dao Took the Entertainment Industry by Storm, Fans Beg Me Not to Kill Anymore

After Sha Ye sat down, the atmosphere at the dining table wasn’t awkward at all. Everyone present was a master of conversation at the dinner table, especially the two top-notch agents, who never let anyone’s words fall flat.

Xiao He sometimes couldn’t help but sigh—those two should have been hosts instead. If they were willing to put in the time, they would definitely be major stage pillars for any radio station...

Everyone thoroughly enjoyed the meal, completely putting the audition out of their minds.

After all, it was already over, and worrying wouldn’t change the outcome anyway. It was better to just keep doing their own thing.

So after dinner, Xiao He briefly chatted with Sha Ye about the software, confirming a few bugs and glitches that had surfaced so far. Xiao He promised that he would update and optimize it tonight.

This was essentially a roundabout way of using Sha Ye and his team for software testing...

...

On the other side, Qiu Zhenlong, who had already finished the auditions, still couldn’t make up his mind.

He stared at the three profiles in front of him, reading them over and over again.

The first one was Yang Heng’s profile—his predetermined ideal candidate for the young Emperor Chen.The second was Award-Winning Actor Chen’s profile. As the oldest among the candidates, he was naturally the most stable performer. His portrayal of the older Emperor Chen would undoubtedly be flawless.

Although the real-life model for Emperor Chen did die young, the character’s arc spanned a massive range, requiring vastly different interpretations and performances. In the early stages, he was a young general; in the later stages, he was a steady emperor. A young actor couldn’t capture the loneliness and desolation of his later years, while an older actor couldn’t pull off the arrogance and brashness of his youth.

This was the shackle of age, the chasm between different life stages.

Thus, so far, Qiu Zhenlong had never revealed whether Emperor Chen’s role would be played by multiple actors, separating a teenage body actor from a young adult body actor for different age ranges.

Between these two candidates: Yang Heng looked too young, having primarily played the young Emperor Chen in theater, so Qiu Zhenlong didn’t plan to have him act out the later Emperor Chen. Meanwhile, Award-Winning Actor Chen was indeed older, and the risk of having him play the young Emperor Chen was extremely high, so Qiu Zhenlong also didn’t intend to have him pretend to be younger.

In summary, having them collaborate on the shoot was the most convenient and efficient approach.

Although switching actors mid-role would inevitably cause some jarring transitions, it would perfectly shape Emperor Chen’s character. After all, ”Imperial Enterprise” was never about propping up someone or giving anyone more screen time—it was about shaping Emperor Chen himself. More importantly, it was about Emperor Chen as a person.

Whether one actor shaped him or two actors shaped him, it didn’t affect Emperor Chen’s story development.

But then, there was an exception in this plan—

Qiu Zhenlong placed Xiao He’s profile in the center and stared at the photo in front of him with a grim expression.

When he had assigned that difficult dialogue-heavy scene audition segment today, he had deliberately intended to make things hard for him.

Yet, he never expected the result to be surprisingly satisfying.

Moreover, Xiao He had one advantage: his age felt more malleable than the other two.

That wasn’t to say Xiao He looked younger or older than the other two. Rather, his facial features were better suited to adapting to different age requirements under various circumstances. With a bit of makeup, there was neither the greasy feel of pretending to be young nor the childishness of trying to act mature. This was the inherent advantage of his bone structure.

Several long-lasting Award-Winning Actors had experienced this same phenomenon—their faces seemed frozen in time. Even when they suddenly reached their fifties or sixties, looking at their faces still made people feel as though they had never aged.

So if Xiao He played Emperor Chen, there would be no need for other age-specific actors. Qiu Zhenlong felt that he alone would be more than enough.

But this might put tremendous pressure on Xiao He, and it would be a considerable challenge for their production team as well. Qiu Zhenlong still couldn’t make up his mind.

On one hand, there was a single actor; on the other, there were two. The pros and cons of both approaches were laid out plainly on paper, yet when it came to making the choice, Qiu Zhenlong hesitated.

Could he really lead ”Imperial Enterprise” to recreate the myths of the past?

Could Xiao He really shoulder this heavy responsibility?

A tangled mess of thoughts flooded his mind. Qiu Zhenlong deeply understood that the pressure this time would far exceed anything he had ever faced—

He let out a long breath and prepared to take out his phone to announce the audition results.

But the moment he opened his phone, Qiu Zhenlong saw a notification pop up related to Xiao He.

Qiu Zhenlong: ”...Tch.”

He really didn’t like this type of traffic actor.

Especially when he knew the secrets and truths behind these traffic promotions, Qiu Zhenlong found it hard to develop any goodwill toward actors who loved to market themselves.

But since he had already seen it, Qiu Zhenlong simply clicked in to check what was going on.

Soon, his phone automatically jumped to an app—it was Weibo’s video feed.

[Ren Yibai, Xiao He — ”Let the Mistake Slide” Premiering on Lantern Festival! Final Trailer Officially Drops!]

Oh? It was Xiao He’s new movie?

Qiu Zhenlong’s interest was piqued, and he proactively clicked on the video.

Maybe it was because directly jumping to the app slowed down the software’s operation, but the black video screen had a circle spinning for a long time before the image finally appeared—

The scene was somewhat dim. Qiu Zhenlong recognized it as the edge of a rooftop. Aside from the desolate rooftop top, only the distant setting sun was visible in the distance.

The setting sun had dyed the entire sky red, making it look increasingly eerie and dangerous.

Just as the camera slowly zoomed in, the visual focus gradually shifting from the fiery sky to the rooftop’s edge, a pair of hands suddenly grabbed onto the edge. At the same time, the deliberately subdued background music struck heavily, sending a jolt of shock through viewers’ hearts.

Those hands had long, slender fingers, but they were stained with blood, and the backs of the hands were pale. Yet, in the blink of an eye, the hands disappeared again.

In their place came a loud crashing sound from downstairs—

”Rrrriip—Bam!”

The camera lifted again, but the lighting grew even dimmer, faintly carrying the warm glow of streetlights around them. It was clear that the time had shifted, the sun had completely set, the sky had turned to night, and the location had changed.

When the image showed people again, it was two figures lying in a pool of blood.

The young man was dressed in flashy athletic wear, with a delicate sports watch on his wrist, while the shabby office worker beside him wore a dusty gray suit, clutching a briefcase tightly in his hand.

They looked like people from two different worlds, yet both were stained by the blood on the ground into the same gruesome backdrop—

The scene abruptly darkened...

”Beep, beep, beep...”

The sound of a hospital monitor came from the ears. The young man stood outside the ward, his eyes wide open, staring in disbelief at the person inside.

”He, he... I, I—how did things turn out like this?”

The young man collapsed in despair, clutching his head and madly tugging at his hair. The next moment, he paused, lowered his hands to look at the strands of hair in his palm, and muttered incredulously, ”Holy crap, not only is his body in better shape than mine, but he even has more hair than I do!”

The next moment, he looked up, and the background behind him suddenly changed, shifting from a hospital corridor to a luxurious villa living room.

The young man looked up, staring infatuated at the opulent interior decor, unable to help swallowing hard.

”Goodness gracious... how much would this cost...”

”And... all of this is mine now?”

Standing in the center of the living room, he stared at the towering mountain of cash bundles, took a deep breath, and solemnly opened a bottle of 1982 Lafite.

”Though I feel really sorry for that brother... but it seems I can only—”

”Let the mistake slide—”

With his words, the blood-red characters of ”Let the Mistake Slide” appeared in the center of the screen, as if foreshadowing the danger lurking behind this incident—

The next moment, a hand pulled open a hidden curtain, revealing a massive whiteboard detailing a killer’s plan.

”Bam—”

The wine glass fell to the ground along with him.