86: Chapter 86 Two Monsters Paired Up

To make space for Zhao Yang and Huang Yimei, the crew did not work that afternoon.

The two of them walked hand in hand, strolling through the streets and alleys of Hucheng. The bluestone road of the old street was lined with parasol trees; leaves covered the ground, crunching softly under their feet.

Huang Yimei pulled Zhao Yang along, their fingers interlocked, pointing things out to him as they walked—this place had delicious candied lotus root, and that place had particularly large wontons.

At the end of the alley stood a three-hundred-year-old ginkgo tree. Huang Yimei suddenly stopped, her expression becoming bashful as she raised her hand: "Brother Yang, tell me, why do I have so much strength?"

Looking at her bewildered, ethereal face, Zhao Yang held back his laughter and said solemnly: "Think carefully, have you been bitten by a spider recently?"

Huang Yimei was stunned for a moment, then slowly shook her head.

"Then have you accidentally eaten anything strange? Like a glowing fruit, or a pill someone chased you down to stuff into your mouth?"

"No!" Huang Yimei rolled her eyes. "Brother Yang, I'm not joking! Haven't you noticed that my strength is abnormally high?"

Zhao Yang sighed and patted her head: "Then you must be a Martial Forest expert delayed by modern society. In ancient times, someone like you would be called a person with natural Divine Power, and you'd be dragged off to be a general."

Huang Yimei gave a bitter smile: "Brother Yang, what are you saying? Don't you think I'm weird? Having such strength, like a monster."

Zhao Yang cupped her face: "Times are changing, society is progressing, and even monsters can grow up to be this beautiful."

Huang Yimei pouted: "Brother Yang, stop teasing me!"

Zhao Yang shrugged, extended his right hand, and rested his elbow on a stone pier by the side of the road: "Don't you think you have a lot of strength? Come on, let's arm wrestle."

Huang Yimei was stunned for a moment, then placed her hand on it too.

"Start," Zhao Yang said casually.

Huang Yimei immediately exerted force, but no matter how hard she tried, Zhao Yang's wrist didn't budge. A moment later, a great force pressed over, and her hand was firmly pushed down.

"Again." Refusing to accept defeat, she tried one more time, but still lost.

"See." Zhao Yang let go of her hand and said indifferently: "My strength is even greater than yours, so I'm a monster too. It's perfect that you and I are together; don't go out and wreak havoc on others."

"Brother Yang..." Huang Yimei's face flushed red instantly. She buried her face into Zhao Yang's arm and mumbled something. Zhao Yang didn't hear it clearly, only feeling his arm tickle.

The next morning, Zhao Yang went to the set to visit.

He drove a van, and as soon as he opened the trunk, Meimei immediately brought all the strong laborers from the crew over. Self-heating rice, snacks, fruit, coffee, cigarettes—the temporary storage room was packed full. The production assistant's eyes welled up with tears, and he almost wanted to kowtow to Zhao Yang on the spot.

Producer Zhang held a cup of coffee and remarked to the Xu Da Meinu beside him: "See that? That is what you call vision."

Xu Da Meinu nodded, her gaze falling on Huang Yimei not far away, a look of envy appearing on her face.

Huang Yimei was wearing Yue Lingshan's costume, filming a fight scene.

She brandished a long sword with great vigor, the wire rig hoisting her as she flipped down from the roof, her skirt fluttering; she possessed both Immortal Qi and heroic spirit.

The martial arts director stood next to the monitor, sucking his teeth in amazement: "This girl really should practice martial arts. Her core strength is stronger than the Kung Fu Emperor. If we were filming a duel, I bet Teacher Yu and Teacher Ji wouldn't be able to handle her strength."

Zhao Yang watched Huang Yimei filming, contemplating the matter of Brotherhood of Blades. If Huang Yimei were to play Ding Baiying, they couldn't film it according to the original version. By blending the two versions and extending the timeline, Ding Baiying would still be a supporting character, but she would be responsible for beauty, for coolness, for raising the overall visual appeal of the series, and for making the audience unable to resist licking their screens!

After the morning's filming wrapped up, Zhao Yang was helping Huang Yimei unhook her wire harness when there was a sudden commotion at the entrance of the set.

Four people stood at the entrance. Sister Xi was in the front, A Feng was holding his ribs, A Wei had his arm in a sling, and an assistant held a gift box; the three of them stood in a row behind her. After stating their purpose, the group was led by Producer Zhang to Huang Yimei.

Producer Zhang's face showed nothing, but inside, his heart was in turmoil. He had long anticipated that Zhao Yang's status would be enough to keep the Hong Kong actors from causing trouble.

But he never expected that these people would actually come to apologize after getting beaten up. It seemed that his understanding of Zhao Yang, Huang Yimei, and Tomorrow Culture was too shallow.

In his mind, Tomorrow Culture had already become one of the top priorities for future cooperation in the film and television industry.

Huang Yimei was also quite puzzled, walking toward them with confusion. The three who had been beaten began to tremble visibly.

When Huang Yimei reached them, without needing a reminder, they all knelt down in unison: "Young Miss Huang! We are sorry! We were wrong! Please forgive us!"

The entire set fell silent.

The production assistant forgot to move props, the lighting technician forgot to adjust the lights, and Producer Zhang almost spilled the coffee in his hand—is an apology supposed to be this intense?

Huang Yimei was a little flustered: "Why are you kneeling? Get up quickly!"

The four said in unison: "Young Miss Huang, everything that happened yesterday was our fault. Please be the bigger person and forgive us."

Zhao Yang, standing to the side, curled his lip. Saying it so in sync, they definitely had practiced. Seeing Huang Yimei look over in a panic, Zhao Yang smiled: "Make your own decision. Forgive them, or let them kneel for a while longer."

Huang Yimei didn't even think about it and immediately said: "Get up quickly, I forgive you."

The four seemed relieved, as if granted amnesty, and stood up. Sister Xi bowed to Huang Yimei again: "Thank you for your magnanimity, Young Miss Huang. In the future, I will definitely discipline the artists under me well."

Huang Yimei nodded: "You're welcome, you may go. They are still injured, hurry back and rest."

"Thank you, Young Miss Huang." Sister Xi looked grateful as she hurried away with the three of them.

Huang Yimei watched their retreating figures, then looked at Zhao Yang, her mind full of questions: "Brother Yang, why did they apologize to me?"

"You hit them, and they came to ask for your forgiveness. It's reciprocity; it's perfectly normal." Zhao Yang ruffled her hair, his tone indifferent, "So next time you encounter something like this, you should still hit them."

In fact, the root of why things were resolved this way lay with Gao Qilan. Having shared Zhao Yang's intelligence, and with the guidance of an old bird like Wu Yuedong, Gao Qilan's commercial acumen was extremely sharp. While hunting down Nasdaq, she had also pulled off several big operations in Hong Kong, directly cutting off the lifelines of two Hong Kong conglomerates; one of them happened to be the big boss of Sister Xi and her group. However, it was not yet time to tell Huang Yimei about these things. She still needed to grow.

Huang Yimei opened her mouth, her expression bewildered. She always felt something was not quite right, but what Zhao Yang said seemed very reasonable. She wanted to ask more, but Zhao Yang's phone rang. Seeing his serious expression when he answered the call, she immediately closed her mouth sensibly.

The call was from Meng Dehai, and the content surprised Zhao Yang quite a bit.

Zhao Yang frowned slightly: "Uncle Meng, that is to say, you don't know specifically what they are looking for me for either?"

"Correct. But you don't need to worry; Director Li from Haizhou is an old acquaintance of mine. He is not someone who doesn't know his place, and he won't make things difficult for you."

"Alright, then I'll wait for his call."

After hanging up, Zhao Yang always felt something was wrong.

Haizhou, Zhang Xiaohua.

This place, this name, always gave him a feeling of familiarity.

But no matter how he thought about it, he couldn't remember where he had heard it.