Translator: Vian
Editing: namio, celes
Rong Xu was starring in "Black Clouds", and his role was Ling Xiao.
The timing that this information came out was too perfect. Tonight was "Vie for Supremacy"'s big finale. All of the viewers were excitedly talking about the story, but then this piece of information was suddenly revealed and immediately made all those netizens who were paying attention to "Vie for Supremacy" also notice this matter. Notice that Rong Xu who played Wanqi Yao was involved in the "Black Clouds" crew.
It's unknown if the timing of the information's release was deliberate, but either way, the timing made the whole matter even more widespread.
How do they suppress the water army?
The way the "Black Clouds" crew chose was to buy more water armies than you!
This crew had never lacked money.
As everyone knows, the most expensive things in a movie were the actors' salaries, post-production special effects, and promotion. "Black Clouds" spent very little on the first two. Everyone came to act due to friendship. Nevermind those big coffee seats, even Qin Cheng wasn't paid a single penny.
As for the post-production special effects, it was even simpler. It wasn't an ancient-setting film, science fiction film, or action film, and there were very few major scenes. The crew did not spend much on this aspect. Thus, the crew placed the most funds for promotion. Now that they met someone who dared to blatantly buy the water army in front of them, it was simple to suppress them in this crude manner.
[Although Rong Xu is a bit young, it's not like it's unacceptable as long as he performs well. ]
[Looking forward to the character posters and trailer.]
[I love Ling Xiao! He's my male god! If Rong Xu really is playing him, I wonder if he can perform well, so nervous ah…]
The water army didn't need to say how good Rong Xu was, but they also didn't need to say that he's not good. It only needed to control the way the wind blew and make the netizens stop paying attention to the blackspots who were desperately flattering Rong Xu. Like this, it would be considered successful.
Not to mention, the water army the crew bought were all high-grade water army accounts. When you click on their accounts, whether it's their Weibo account or Tieba account, or any other forums' account, they were all ordinary accounts with records of past posts and they even signed in every day!
The right to speak was gradually controlled by their water army, and Director Liang released a sigh of relief. But before he prepared the next wave of action, he was suddenly shocked by a certain matter.
Assistant Director Wang voiced his amazement: "Rong Xu's fans… are quite amazing?"
They saw that in Rong Xu's fan clubs and Tieba, all the moderators and bar owners jointly issued a statement.
It had been less than four hours since the marketing account exposed 'Rong Xu starring in "Black Clouds"�� and those blackspots had also only just appeared for a little over an hour, but these top fans had already posted a list.
This list had been downloaded over thirty million times! After opening it, it was actually an Excel spreadsheet. The first column of the table was the User ID, the second column was the location of the BBS (such as Weibo, Tieba, forums, etc.), the third column was the user's post, the fourth column compared the user's past record of posts, all to reveal one fact——
Before this, ninety-nine percent of these users had never posted anything related to Rong Xu!
The statement was very long. At the end, many top fans solemnly expressed:[We ask that, as a fan of Rong Xu, you keep on saying you love Rong Xu's "Ambush" and "Vie for Supremacy" and think that he acted extremely well in these two dramas, but why have you not posted anything related Rong Xu in the past three months? ]
This time, everything went without saying.
Since you like Rong Xu so much, appreciate him, and follow him, then how come you've never even posted a single thing related to him? You think everyone is stupid and so easily deceived?!
Director Liang looked at the spreadsheet Assistant Director Wang downloaded, stupefied.
The blackspot water army wasn't the regular zombie water army. Their accounts' information looked rather real, meaning that they had an average of at least a hundred posts per account. It would've taken a lot of effort to look through all of these past posts and compare them!
No, it should be said that even finding all these thousands of water army accounts without missing even a single one was already something ordinary people couldn't do. And how long has it been? It had only been an hour and a half!
Rong Xu's fans might not have been able to find out who was behind the water army, but what they could do was give the other families' fans—especially Ling Xiao's—evidence: Evidence that these people were all blackspots. That Rong Xu's fans had never said that "only Rong Xu was qualified to play Ling Xiao" and that they never once thought that "Rong Xu acting in "Black Clouds" was the crew's honor".
This kind of action and teamwork, Director Liang couldn't help but feel a little moved.
After thinking for a moment, Director Liang said: "Let's release the trailer."
Assistant Director Wang was a bit surprised: "Didn't we decide to release it next week?"
Director Liang laughed happily: "The child's fans are doing their best, don't you know what it means to strike while the iron is hot? It just so happens there's a wave of heat, so we should take the opportunity to act and freeload off it to make that mystery person who wants to mess with our crew and Rong Xu eat a loss in silence."
On a similar note, Luo Zhentao borrowed the power of Huaxia Entertainment's PR to ban a batch of accounts while at the same time manipulate an appropriate amount of data on the blackening posts gathered by several netizens. For example, when a netizen refreshed, they often wouldn't see the posts. The tag the blackspot water army purposely made, #OnlyRongXuisLingXiao, which could only lead to war, was directly removed from the preparatory trending searches.
Completing all of this, Luo Zhentao started working together with the people in the company to find the person behind the water army. After he finished a call, he turned to see his little artist with his head bowed down, quietly looking at his phone screen. He seemed to be looking through a spreadsheet that was densely packed with words. Just looking at it caused Luo Zhentao's scalp to feel a bit numb.
Luo Zhentao spoke as he walked over: "The problem didn't blow up, the matter with the blackspots is more or less solved, so the problem now is the leak. The blackspots from before incited the resentment of some of Ling Xiao's fans. Even if we suppress the blackspots' comments, I'm afraid those fans still won't immediately feel anything good towards you. Right now, the company has already planned to contact several marketing and media accounts to first clarify the situation and mellow it out a bit."
Speaking till here, Luo Zhentao finally remembered: "What are you looking at, Xiao Xu?"
Rong Xu continued looking through the spreadsheet with his head down. Luo Zhentao curiously moved closer and mumbled the first line of words: "ID: Shut-in Bunny… Cape forum… Rongrong is Ling Xiao, if he doesn't play him, who will…" His voice abruptly stopped, Luo Zhentao involuntarily exclaimed: "What is this?!"
Rong Xu turned off his phone and readily put it into his pocket. The youth's lips curved, a soft smile appearing on his beautiful face. His bright, clear eyes shone with a radiant light. He sincerely looked at his manager and said in a serious voice: "This is the feelings my fans gave to me."
Lu Zhentao was speechless. He still didn't understand what that was, but he felt that it shouldn't be anything bad.
Soon, Luo Zhentao knew of Rong Xu's fans' handiwork. When he heard that these fans actually recorded thousands of the water army's IDs and reviewed their past posts, turning it into a well-formatted spreadsheet, Luo Zhentao was dumbfounded: "…Their ability to handle things is even better than mine ah!"
Many of Rong Xu's fans seemed to be highly skilled and experienced, which could be observed from the "Ambush" voting event. Back then, who would have thought that for this little unknown star, his fans would actually develop such a smart voting strategy? And even after they were outvoted by the water army, they fought back, pointing out the fact that the other party bought the water army and won a lot of popularity and reputation for Rong Xu.
Perhaps one of them by themselves wasn't as experienced as Luo Zhentao, but when they came together, even Director Liang didn't dare to underestimate them as he sighed with emotion.
With the spreadsheet made by the fans, Luo Zhentao's work became a lot easier. He just needed to contact the marketing accounts, spread this matter, and let more people see this spreadsheet and know that these were blackspots trying to blacken Rong Xu. Like this, they would achieve their goal of clarifying the truth.
But what Luo Zhentao didn't expect was that Director Lang would actually stand by Rong Xu during this time and fiercely support him.
***
["Black Clouds" Crew: In response to "Entertainment Circle's Gossip King"'s malicious speculation, we are reserving our stance and have notified our lawyer to investigate "Entertainment Circle's Gossip King" for their actions of leaking information. Since the start of filming, "Black Clouds" has been the focus of many fans. Currently, the filming is about to be wrapped up. Thank you for your support. In an hour, we will have a pleasant surprise prepared for everyone. @Director Liang Chao @Rong Xu @Yu Siyu]
When this post came out, the fans were in an uproar.
The crew was actually going to send a lawyer's letter to "Entertainment Circle's Gossip King"? It seems they took this incident extremely seriously, that marketing account's owner really made a mistake this time ah!
But quickly, some netizens noticed:[Did you guys find that the wording used by the crew was "leaking information"! This was a leak! Then… what Gossip King said as true? Rong Xu is going to play Ling Xiao?!]
It wasn't just this, the netizens also discovered: [Director Liang is the Director for "Black Clouds", we already knew that. But why did the official Weibo tag Rong Xu and Yu Siyu? They should've tagged Director Liang because he's a member of the crew. But to tag Rong Xu and Yu Siyu… no way right? It can't be that Rong Xu really is the male lead and Yu Siyu is the female lead?!]
[But Ling Xiao never had any dating scandals when he was alive ah, not a single one! Even if you have to say he had one, then it's probably that he had a really good relationship with He Xinrou. He Xinrou can play herself, why would they need Yu Siyu to play her? Wait a moment… does this movie really need a female lead?!]
The netizens discussed this matter in full swing, where could they have time to think about that post from "Entertainment Circle's Gossip King"? Their attention had already been placed on "Black Clouds", eager to know whether Rong Xu was the male lead or not and what kind of role was the female lead, Yu Siyu.
[Could it be… the movie gave Ling Xiao a fictional female lead?]
This guess caused countless netizens to be apprehensive. On the other side, the crew took advantage of this opportunity to unceasingly hunt for news of the leaker.
Finding who leaked the information was very difficult, as there were too many people who knew about the crew. With all the people coming and going during filming, they had no idea who could've done the leak.
However, things were much simpler if what they wanted to know was where "Entertainment Circle's Gossip King" got the information.
But when the crew contacted "Entertainment Circle's Gossip King", the other party refused to provide the name of the leaker and even arrogantly said that they could go ahead and send the lawyer's letter, their studio wasn't afraid! They weren't starting any rumors or such, everything they said was the truth. We can accuse them however we want and they would accompany us.
This shameless attitude enraged Director Liang till his face was red and he wanted to shout out curses. Now, he naturally didn't know that the moment he hung up the call, a black car in B-City parked on the side of the road in a low-key manner, right in front of the office building where the studio of the "Entertainment Circle's Gossip King" marketing account was located.
Although a lot of things happened this evening, the actors and crew members still needed to rest. Everyone slowly left the studio one by one and returned to the hotel.
On the way back, Rong Xu received comfort and encouragement from many crew members. After working together for more than a month, they all couldn't help but have good feelings towards this gentle youth who always liked to smile and hoped that he didn't take a hard blow from this blackspot water army incident.
When Rong Xu stepped out of the elevator and walked to his room's door, he looked up and saw a distinctly handsome man standing in the hallway, making a phone call.
When he saw Rong Xu, Qin Cheng lightly nodded and said on the phone, "You go handle this matter and give me a reply tomorrow morning," then hung up and came over to Rong Xu.
The hallway lights shone down, brightening the entire corridor like it was daytime. Qin Cheng wore a long trench coat that outlined his tall and straight figure. He had a great upper and lower body ratio. The long messy hair didn't make him look unkempt; on the contrary, it had an attractive quality to it and made him appear extremely handsome and stylish.
He walked up to Rong Xu and after carefully observing for a while, he saw that there was nothing strange with the youth. Only then did he lower his voice and say in a light tone: "I have already asked someone to find out who is behind the water army. There is no need to worry about this matter, there will definitely be a result. You have a good rest today, it will be fine to perform like you normally do for filming tomorrow."
The man's upfront words slightly surprised Rong Xu. Without thinking, he asked: "Why are you investigating the matter with the water army?"
Hearing this, Qin Cheng abruptly stiffened. He just wanted to comfort the other so he wouldn't worry about the situation and be disheartened by this scum who wanted to deliberately blacken people, but he forgot that his relationship with this youth had not reached this point yet. For him to suddenly say this, it seemed like he was meddling too much.
In an instant, a hundred reasons quickly flashed through Qin Cheng's mind. He still hadn't found a reasonable excuse when he suddenly heard Rong Xu softly laugh. His alluring eyes curved into beautiful crescents, and he spoke like he'd only just realized: "Was it Auntie Qin who made you to do this, telling you to take care of me?"
Qin Cheng: "..."
After a moment, he slightly nodded: "En."
Rong Xu seriously continued: "Please give my thanks to Auntie Qin, but she doesn't have to be so worried about this matter, I have a sense of proportion." Pausing here, Rong Xu's smile deepened: "You don't need to worry about me, have a good rest instead. We still have to film tomorrow, no need to think too much about it. Also, I want to thank you… Qin Cheng."
In an instant, the low and pleasant voice that earnestly pronounced the two words "Qin Cheng" caused the man who was just ruefully lamenting, "why did he think it was because of Mother again," to freeze. He immediately looked up to see the corner of this youth's lip slightly rise into a brilliant smile as he looked at him.
His pair of eyes shone captivatingly in the light like the most magnificent gems, so fragile and beautiful that people couldn't help but want to hold them in the palm of their hands.
His throat seemed to be a bit dry, but Qin Cheng calmly hummed "En" and apathetically said: "You should go rest earlier."
Rong Xu nodded: "You too. Then, see you tomorrow?"
"… See you tomorrow."
The two doors closed at the same time. After Rong Xu entered his room, the smile on his face slowly withdrew. He called Luo Zhentao to come over to his room and in a quiet voice, told the other: "I think I have a guess to who bought the water army."
And in the next room, the moment he closed the door, the man suddenly leaned back against the door and covered his face with his left hand. In the dark room, only the bright moonlight shone through the window, bringing a hazy luminance to the room.
Three minutes later, a post quietly appeared on a certain Weibo——
[Lotus Seed Paste and Orange Stuffing: His voice is so pleasant to hear, how can it be so… gentle?]
Translator's Corner:
Vian: *circus music* *announcer voice* Come, come! Everyone gets ONE guess to who bought the water army! Those would get it right gets an orange!
namio: XD I just realized I mistook the efforts of Rong Xu's fans as being helped along by Xu Jin's… water army? But then again what he ended up doing could totally be just hunting down Mystery Man over here.
Vian: Xu Jin didn't do anything here though XD
celes: Well, one does have to admire the dedication of Rong Xu's fans. At first, I was confused about the blackspots until I realized Rong Xu was being praised too much. As for Mystery Man, I think everyone can guess who it is.
BBS – Bulletin Board System; Refers to the electronic bulletin board system a.k.a. forums.
Cape forum – Just a specific forum site, mainly for news it seems. Couldn't find much on it.