Blue Star, Xia Nation, Donghai City.
The crew of 《Manhunt》.
“Cut! Cut! Cut!”
Director Li Cheng slammed down his walkie-talkie and pointed at the monitor, launching into a tirade.
“Zhang Yu!”
“You're playing a high-IQ, antisocial hacker, not some lowlife pulling an all-nighter at an internet cafe!”
“Why are your eyes glued to the screen like that?”
“A hacker should at least look like they can touch-type!”
“The crew is burning tens of thousands of yuan a day just to play house with you?”
The set instantly fell dead silent.
Dozens of crew members bowed their heads and pretended to be busy, none of them daring to speak up.
Under the spotlight, Zhang Yu's face was livid.
His styling was meticulous, his clothes expensive, and every strand of his hair was perfectly in place.
Yet, he had somehow managed to make his performance in the previous scene feel like an internet cafe manager checking ID cards.
To make matters worse, he was actually a trained actor.
More importantly, he had a backer among the investors.
Simply put.
He was a nepotism hire.
Being chewed out by the director in front of the entire crew, how could Zhang Yu save face?
Bang!
He kicked over a nearby prop chair.
“I'm not shooting anymore!”
Zhang Yu ripped off his tie and sneered.
“What a garbage show, demanding so much!”
“Li Cheng, do you really think this production can keep running without me?”
As he spoke, he swept his gaze across the room, his tone growing even more aggressive.
“Find me someone these days who actually knows computers and can act. Go ahead, show me!”
With that, Zhang Yu turned and stormed off, his two assistants trailing behind him.
The set fell even quieter.
Everyone knew they were in deep trouble.
The assistant director, Old Wu, was sweating bullets and hurried over to Li Cheng's side.
“Director Li, we only rented this location for half a day.”
“We have to hand it over to another crew this afternoon.”
“Where are we going to find a decent-looking male actor who can actually touch-type on short notice?”
Li Cheng gritted his teeth, his face as dark as the bottom of a pot.
Just as he was about to blow his top, Old Wu suddenly glanced toward a corner.
“Hey, Director Li!”
“Look at the kid who just fixed the server!”
Li Cheng turned his head. “Who?”
Old Wu lowered his voice and spoke at a rapid-fire pace.
“He was recommended by Professor Liu from Donghai University.”
“Our technician spent two hours struggling and couldn't get it done, but he fixed it in thirty minutes.”
“The key is, he's handsome and tall.”
“How about we let him try?”
Li Cheng followed his gaze.
In the corner, a tall young man was bending over to pack up his toolbox.
“You, the computer repair guy!”
Li Cheng pointed abruptly.
“Yes, you! Come over here!”
Jiang Yue had just placed his screwdriver back into his tool bag.
He had only come to the set today to earn some extra cash.
The crew's server had run into a sudden issue, and their technician couldn't resolve it. They had reached out to someone, who then contacted Professor Liu from the School of Computer Science at Donghai University.
Naturally, Professor Liu wasn't going to make the trip himself.
So, the job fell to Jiang Yue.
Half an hour, two hundred yuan.
It wasn't much.
But for a college student who hadn't graduated yet, it was enough to cover several meals.
Hearing the director call out to him, Jiang Yue stood up and patted the dust off his hands.
He was wearing a simple grey T-shirt.
Standing at 185 centimeters tall, he had broad shoulders and long legs.
His features were clean, his brow sharp, and he carried the refreshing, clean aura characteristic of a college student.
Jiang Yue walked over, took a wet wipe handed to him by a production assistant, wiped his hands, and gave an easygoing smile.
“Director Li, the server is fixed.”
“About the two hundred yuan repair fee, do you think we could settle that first?”
He had no interest in the crew's drama.
Who walked out or who got yelled at had nothing to do with him.
He just wanted to take his money and leave.
Li Cheng, however, stared at his face for a couple of seconds.
This look.
This build.
In front of the camera, he might not necessarily look any worse than Zhang Yu.
“I'll pay you extra,” Li Cheng got straight to the point.
Jiang Yue raised an eyebrow.
“How much extra?”
Li Cheng pointed to the computer desk on the set.
“Change your clothes and sit at that computer.”
“Type on the keyboard and say a couple of lines.”
“If you can pull it off, I'll give you another eight hundred.”
Jiang Yue immediately started doing the math in his head.
Two hundred for fixing the server.
Eight hundred just to sit there and type a bit.
That was a thousand yuan in total.
This was a great deal.
“Sure,” Jiang Yue agreed readily.
He set down his tool bag, took the jacket handed to him by the production assistant, and slipped it on.
Then, he walked in front of the camera and sat down behind the desk.
Sitting opposite him was the female lead of the show.
The popular rising starlet, Qin Shuang.
Qin Shuang looked at the man in front of her, her brow furrowing slightly.
Her time was expensive.
She also despised unprofessional people wasting the entire crew's time.
But with Zhang Yu gone, the crew was stuck between a rock and a hard place. She could only suppress her irritation and offer a reminder.
“You don't have any experience, so don't look at the camera later.”
“Look into my eyes.”
“It doesn't matter if you mess up the lines; we can dub them in post-production.”
Jiang Yue nodded.
“Okay.”
Li Cheng sat back behind the monitor and picked up his walkie-talkie.
“All departments, get ready!”
“Lighting, give me some under-lighting.”
“Three.”
“Two.”
“One.”
“Action!”
The clapperboard snapped.
The moment the spotlight fell, the easygoing expression on Jiang Yue's face slowly faded.
He had always been a focused person.
Since he had agreed to take the eight hundred yuan, this task was no different from writing code in his eyes.
Either he didn't do it, or he did it to the absolute best of his ability.
But the problem was—
He really wasn't an actor.
Three camera lenses were pointed at him simultaneously.
An unfamiliar pressure suddenly weighed down on him.
Jiang Yue's slender, well-defined fingers hovered over the keyboard.
His mind went blank for a brief second.
It seemed this eight hundred yuan wouldn't be so easy to earn after all.
Right then.
A pale blue, translucent light screen suddenly popped up in front of his eyes.
【Ding! Divine-Tier Trait System successfully bound!】
【Current Dilemma: Lack of acting experience and villainous aura.】
【System Mechanism Triggered: Situational Adaptation activated. The prize pool's drop rate for breakthrough traits has been increased.】
A flicker of surprise flashed in Jiang Yue's eyes. However, he adapted incredibly fast, his gaze quickly scanning the light screen.
The interface was incredibly simple, with only three lines of text.
【Current Reputation Points: 10 (Newbie Gift)
Note: Primary Draw costs 10 / Intermediate Draw costs 100 / Advanced Draw costs 1000 per pull】
【Trait Warehouse (Rarity: White, Green, Blue, Purple, Gold)】
【Begin Draw】
The first two lines were clear at a glance.
The last line was clearly a command.
Without any further hesitation, Jiang Yue gave the command in his mind.
“Begin draw.”
【Consuming 10 Reputation Points for a Primary Draw...】
【Congratulations Host, you have obtained the Green Trait: Refined Scoundrel.】
【Trait Description: Your smile will no longer be warm and sunny. Instead, it will exude a chilling coldness and a touch of madness, maximizing the contrast.】
【Equip?】
Jiang Yue swept his eyes using his peripheral vision.
There happened to be a pair of prop gold-rimmed glasses right next to his hand.
They were the ones Zhang Yu had tossed aside earlier.
Jiang Yue reached out, picked up the glasses, and slowly put them on.
“Equip.”
Click.
The bridge of the glasses settled on his nose.
Behind the monitor, Li Cheng frowned.
Jiang Yue had paused for too long just now, and his actions deviated from the script.
He opened his mouth, about to call for a cut.
But in the next second, the words caught in his throat.
On screen.
Wearing the gold-rimmed glasses, Jiang Yue lowered his head slightly.
He rested his slender fingers on the keyboard.
He didn't look down at it.
In the next instant.
A rapid-fire clattering of keystrokes rang out.
The rhythm was dense, clean, and crisp.
A long string of running code appeared on the computer screen.
After all, Jiang Yue could actually touch-type.
As a top student in the computer science department, this was something that had long been ingrained into his muscle memory.
The cold, white light of the screen reflected off his face.
His originally clean and sunny aura, suppressed by the gold-rimmed glasses, underwent a complete transformation.
The gentleness was still there.
But beneath that gentleness hid a chilling coldness, exuding a distinct touch of madness.
On the set, many crew members stopped what they were doing, not daring to make a sound.
Li Cheng, who had been about to call for a cut just a moment ago, slowly sat up straight.
Opposite him, Qin Shuang followed the script, raising her prop gun and aiming it at Jiang Yue's head.
She delivered her line coldly.
“Stop your program.”
“You are surrounded.”
Jiang Yue's fingers didn't stop typing.
He slowly raised his head, looking at Qin Shuang through the lenses.
Then, he smiled.
It was a textbook smile.
One could even call it gentle.
But it was precisely this smile that caused Qin Shuang's heart to suddenly tighten.
Her hand holding the gun trembled slightly.
She knew perfectly well this was a film set.
She knew the person in front of her was just a college student dragged in at the last minute.
Yet for a split second, she truly felt that she wasn't facing an actor.
But a real madman hiding behind the screen.
A high-IQ, zero-empathy monster who treated human lives as mere data to be processed.
Jiang Yue pushed up the frames on the bridge of his nose. His thin lips parted, and his voice carried not a single trace of emotion.
“Officer.”
“What do you think is faster? Your bullet, or my Enter key?”
As the words fell.
A layer of cold sweat actually broke out across Qin Shuang's back.
Rate on N.U.
