"It's over?"
Lu Ze somewhat unwillingly clenched the today's three hundred and fifty yuan . That was right: after four days, his shoot was over.
During the four days, he'd spoken a total of seven lines. Apart from the two lines on the first day, the other five lines were not even that long.
His character was the first bodyguard of the regiment, who exploded from an artillery shell quite early in the play. How much play was left for his replacement bodyguard? It was not even close compared to his part.
Recalling the main lead's stiff face just now as he held his dying body and wept, Lu Ze smacked his lips, feeling that even he could have done better. Perhaps this was the misconception produced due to his soaring progress?
In the four days, he'd studied through a few more courses. Apart from Script Comprehension and Dialogue Training, he had studied Actor's Basic Expression Control and Body Language Control Utilization.
The current Lu Ze had progressed too far ahead compared to the Lu Ze of a week ago. If one looked at the contrast, it would be big enough to make anybody's jaw drop to the ground. Compared to the previous him, who didn't even understand posing before a camera, the current him could already be considered a qualified greenhorn actor.
If he were to be compared to a fresh graduate of acting school, perhaps he would be somewhat lacking in theory. However, as far as practice was concerned, the result would not be so clear-cut. After all, in the school, whether one studied or not was up to the person. But, if he were to not study in the system, he would only be awaiting whips.
Putting the money in his bag, he went around thanking everybody he knew on the shooting crew. Although nobody had taken care of him—a minor character—working with the crew in these four days had greatly benefited him, allowing him to understand the basic operations of a shooting crew.
After taking his leave, he came out of the film city. Today morning, somebody had taken away the mobike outside his home, costing him a bit more time, and thus causing him to miss breakfast. So, he went to Liu Le's father and bought some buns, before sitting down on the roadside and taking a bite.
Back to the topic, since he had to arrive at work before five thirty, he'd been getting up at four forty for the past few days. At first, he was quite fearful if the system would make him oversleep and make him late. He could only set several alarms and hope that they would work. Fortunately, the moment the alarm rang, the system would immediately put the course on hold and kick him out of the dreamland..
"Having breakfast? How are you out so early today? Your job is done?" Liu Le popped out of nowhere and sat beside Lu Ze as he asked with a cigarette in his mouth.
"Yeah, my work is considered done today." Swallowing the final bite, Lu Ze burped in satisfaction and wiped the oil off his hand with a tissue paper while speaking with a lowered head.
"I had been thinking for these past few days as to what kind of special you could be until I went to your shoot and saw you in action. Your acting is quite good. I'm thinking I'll just introduce it as a war drama special. That way, I can say that you have experience with war drama."
"War drama? Alright!"
Lu Ze sank into contemplation for a bit. If he became a war drama special, apart from playing an extra, all his dialogues would most likely only come from war dramas. However, a moment later, he felt that he'd been overthinking it a bit. The current him was merely a special extra. Even supporting himself required all his effort. So, his considerations were too far out. At this point, his priority should be to survive. Thus, after a momentary hesitation, he agreed.
"Good. I'll contact you…All you have to do is wait. If there is nothing else, I'll leave." Patting his shoulder, Liu Le stood up and left to select extras for the next play. The promise he left behind moved Lu Ze deeply. The income he had made these past few days had been directly handed over to him. In other words, Liu Le didn't have a cut in between.
Even though the latter had not made a single penny from him, he was still happy for him and was still finding work for him. Such kindness was quite heavy. Lu Ze didn't know when he would be able to repay it.
Patting the dust off his butt, Lu Ze headed home. En-route, he habitually looked around but didn't see Yang Dan by the road.
In fact, he didn't meet Yang Dan at all these days. Due to his latest work, he didn't have evening shoots, allowing him to pack off before five thirty. When he returned home, Yang Dan would still be working, and by the time she returned, he would have gone to sleep, studying in the dreamland.
He didn't meet Yang Dan today either, but he didn't feel any disappointment. She was just his neighbour, and he didn't have any special feelings toward her. She was only a friend with whom he got along well.
Upon returning home, he directly went to sleep. Since his future road was war drama, he should take some emulation courses related to the Japan war era and prepare for future shoots.
The course was more or less similar to the old man emulation, divided in observation phase and three simulation phases. However, the simulation phases were divided into one month, one year, and eight years.
Only upon opening his eyes did he discover that when he'd been in system space, his memories all gone. He'd forgotten that he'd been studying an emulation course and wholeheartedly inserted himself in the character. He was treating the system space as reality. Only when he was killed and loaded into the system interface again did he realize that he was in an emulation course.
The course didn't restart at his death, wasting his time before death. Instead, it counted the total time he'd been alive to match the phase requirements.
Once the third phase was over, Lu Ze fiercely sat on his bed with his entire body drenched in sweat. This time, his score of the third phase was quite high, reaching 98 points. He didn't suffer any lashes. It was quite a perfect run, but he couldn't find any joy.
For the first time, he did the training without his memories. He wished to cry, because without his memories, he treated every NPC in the system space as a living person. Then, he saw all of his friends being killed one after another, being shot by bullets, exploding into smithereens due to artillery shells, and dying without a corpse.
It was especially the case in the third phase, as he lived in that chaotic world for eight years as a soldier. The pain of more than nine years flooded his brain, making him recall those "brothers" of his.
He wept bitterly, somewhat in disbelief if his current life was real or still a dreamland. After about twenty minutes, he forced himself out of it.
'Everything is fake, nothing exists.'
…
Filling his belly with three dishes—garlic sprout pork, yam and radish stew, meshed soya lettuce—which had gone completely cold, along with lukewarm rice, Liu Le put down the bowl and burped.
"Little yong is asleep?"
"Asleep." His wife, playing with her phone on the bed, replied.
Having been married for more than ten years, they had long lost that passion and closeness. Both had their own jobs and their own personal circles now.
Taking a glance at his wife, who was not in any mood either after dinner, Liu Le tidied up the bowls and chopsticks. Then, he opened Wechat on his phone and took out his notebook from the bag and began to make notes.
There was a chat going on in the supervisors' Wechat group. Some were asking to borrow extras, some were asking work for their own people, and there were also people posting health tidbits as well as funny short videos.
De Shuai: "Old Zhao, do you have someone for war dramas under you? Somebody who could act a bit, like cry and things like that!"
Old Zhao: "Big Peng made you ask, no? I don't! Even if you ask me, where am I to find one?
Second fatty: "What the hell? If they want that kind of a special, they should go to the union. Why on earth are they asking us?"
De Shuai: "It's just two f*cking scenes, and the price offered is not high either, yet they also want good acting. Where will you find such a person in the artist union?"
Second fatty: "Do they think our people are f*cking gods? Impossible...It's impossible."
De Shuai: "Forget it! I'll reply to Big Peng that it's impossible and advise the director to scrap the scene."
Old Chang: "Health enthusiasts must see! Eating this can actually kill you!"
As Liu Le scrolled through the chat, he immediately knew what was going on. Some director was absolutely insistent on shooting a tragic scene of a soldier at his deathbed. If he had gone to actor's union- that was a bunch with people with at least twenty-thirty thousand yuan monthly income- naturally nobody would have been willing to accept the low price and high requirements. Even if he raised the price later to an acceptable amount, there would have been actors feeling that they couldn't act in such a scene or the drama was lacking.
In the end, the crew decided to try their luck and see if they could pick out somebody capable from the extras. If they couldn't, regardless of how much the director wanted to shoot this scene, he could only let it go.
Liu Le considered for a moment, thinking about the war drama special under him. How were Lu Ze's acting skills? Liu Le had heard that the latter was a self-taught actor, but what kind of acting did he do? He had no clue.
However, he wanted to ask, just in case. What if Lu Ze said that he could do it?
Liu Le was about to give Lu Ze a call, but looking that it was already almost twelve oclock, he didn't make the call.
The drama would still go on for a few days, so there was no hurry. Tomorrow, he could ask him face-to-face while also seeing for himself how Lu Ze's acting was . Otherwise, if he just reported the other on his word, and the latter couldn't do it, he would be the one taking the blame.
Thinking to this point, Liu Le put the phone down and took a bath. Then, he laid down on the bed with his wife, both sleeping with their backs facing each other.