17: Chapter 17 Dilraba's backbone is worth a pot of rice.

"Does it look good?"

Lin Chen didn't even lift his eyelids, casually asking while holding the radish carving in his hands.

Yang Mi nodded subconsciously, but she quickly realized what she was doing, immediately lifting her fair, delicate chin to put on an arrogant, aloof facade.

Dilraba, however, didn't hide it at all, her large eyes shining brightly as she nodded her small head vigorously.

"Do you want it?" Lin Chen asked again.

"Mmhmm! I want it! Is it for me?" Dilraba grinned from ear to ear, her fair, delicate face faintly showing a flush of excitement.

"No."

Lin Chen's tone was flat, and immediately after, he exerted force with the five fingers of his right hand.

With a soft "crack" sound.

The incredibly exquisite radish carving was instantly crushed into a pile of debris.

After all, it was just a crisp carrot.

"How can you be like this! You're annoying! So stingy! Hmph!"

Watching the perfect piece of art being destroyed right before her eyes, Dilraba felt heartbroken.

She puffed out her pink cheeks in anger, glaring fiercely at Lin Chen with her watery, large eyes.

Lin Chen wiped his hands with a tissue: "Do you think I'm a street performer? Giving it to whoever wants it? My craftsmanship isn't that cheap."

Dilraba was even more displeased.

She took a big step forward, pressing her full, soft breasts tightly against Lin Chen's arm, the astonishing elasticity and warmth transmitting through the fabric.

She deliberately widened her eyes to put on a fierce look, but it only made her look even more adorably cute and alluring.

"What do you mean by that! How did I become just 'anyone'? I'm your legally registered wife, okay!"

Lin Chen pulled his arm away: "Sorry. I lack many things, but I certainly don't lack wives."

"Lin Chen! You'd better take that back right now!"

Dilraba stomped her feet in anger, her two long, fair legs shaking about, "You've severely hurt my self-esteem! I'm very angry now, and I'll never talk to you again! I will absolutely not eat the food you cook; even if I starve to death outside today, I will never touch a pair of chopsticks!"

Lin Chen paid no attention to her temper tantrum.

He turned and walked to the stove, reaching out to lift the lid of the clay pot.

A rich, alluring aroma of food instantly filled the entire tent.

"Dinner is ready, let's eat."

"Alright!"

A second ago, Dilraba was vowing to go on a hunger strike, but the next second, she cheered without any backbone.

She trotted over to Lin Chen's side, bending her slender, willow-like waist, sniffing hard, and smiling like a flower: "It smells so good!"

Yang Mi had been standing to the side all along.

Watching the two flirt, she couldn't help but sigh in her heart that for someone with a carefree personality like Reba, life was truly relaxed and comfortable.

After dinner, Yang Mi and Dilraba hurried to the Film Crew set to work.

Dilraba's scenes tonight were very light, just a group scene where she served as background decoration, and she didn't even have two lines of dialogue.

Not long after, she finished her work smoothly.

In normal circumstances, actors who finished early would definitely go straight back to the hotel to sleep.

But today, she wasn't in a rush to leave.

After taking off her heavy ancient costume headpiece, she changed into a very cool, casual outfit.

A pair of super short denim hot pants tightly wrapped around her round, perky peach-like buttocks.

On her upper body was a tight white short-sleeved T-shirt.

She held a white cream popsicle in her hand, walking over to Lin Chen's side with her two straight, slender, fair legs, swaying her slim waist.

"What are you looking at?"

Dilraba followed Lin Chen's gaze toward the center of the set, her face full of curiosity.

Lin Chen had his arms crossed over his chest, his body leaning casually against a large tree.

Grandmaster-level Qi Cultivation circulated automatically within his body, making him completely unable to feel the mosquitoes and the mugginess of the night, his whole body exuding an air of ease and freedom.

"Watching them film," Lin Chen replied casually.

Dilraba stuck out her pink, delicate tongue, gently licking the white cream popsicle.

Her small tongue wrapped around the cold popsicle, swallowing the melted, sweet, sticky juice, her movements full of temptation.

"What's so interesting about this? Are you interested in acting?"

In the eyes of an outsider, filming is an easy and fun job.

In the behind-the-scenes footage released online, the actors are all giggling and laughing, and the atmosphere is cheerful.

But in reality, the actual filming set is boring as hell.

For a shot lasting only a few seconds, it often has to be reshot over twenty times due to mistakes in positioning or lighting.

Repeating the same lines over and over is extremely draining on one's physical strength and mental energy.

Of course, this excludes those "number actors" who only know how to open their mouths and recite "1234567" to lip-sync.

Lin Chen had indeed never been interested in acting before.

Different professions are like different worlds; he completely didn't understand this circle.

Even though he was nominally married to five top-tier female stars, he had always felt that they lived in two different worlds.

But now, the situation had completely changed.

Possessing both the God-tier skills of a Grandmaster Director and Grandmaster Acting, he stood outside the set watching others act, and a frantic, burning sensation surged uncontrollably from the bottom of his heart.

This was the side effect brought about by the Universal System.

As long as he leveled a skill to the Grandmaster level, he was destined to develop a deep, bone-marrow-level passion for that industry.

With this passion, Lin Chen instantly developed an uncontrollable obsession with filming, something he had previously been indifferent to.

In the morning, he still felt the set was incredibly boring, but now he was watching it with rapt attention.

He started picking faults.

The director's on-site coordination was too rough, and the camera cutting was a complete mess.

He started picking faults with the actors.

The lines were delivered stiffly, and the body movements were practically like puppets.

Because he was also a Grandmaster of Calligraphy and painting, he even felt that the set props were extremely ugly, and the makeup on the actors' faces was incredibly tacky.

In short, he felt uncomfortable watching it, and his palms were itching.

He wished he could rush up, kick the director away, and then kick the two people acting in the center of the scene out of the frame.

The ones currently performing in the scene were none other than the male lead Li Qingfeng and the female lead Yang Mi.

In the eyes of Lin Chen, who possessed Grandmaster Acting, the performances of these two were barely better than a pile of dog shit.

It wasn't targeting anyone, it was purely an objective evaluation; did this level of deadpan expression and wide-eyed staring even deserve to be called acting?

"Hey, what are you spacing out for?"

Dilraba extended her small, fair, onion-like hand and waved it in front of Lin Chen.

Lin Chen suppressed the urge to jump in and try it out: "What kind of story is your show about?"

"You haven't even read the hit novel 'falling goose long fly'?"

"Do I have to read it?"

"This book is about…"

Dilraba started to explain everything to Lin Chen in a non-stop stream.

It was generally about a female lead who was the daughter of a military family, venturing into the pugilistic world and falling in love with the male lead.

However, the female lead was betrothed to the prince, the second male lead, and had to painfully break up.

Then, the princess, the second female lead, threw herself at the male lead.

The second male lead got jealous and sent an assassin, the third male lead, to kill the male lead.

As it turned out, the third male lead had a crush on the second female lead and didn't make a move for fear of hurting her, instead becoming sworn brothers with the male lead…

"Stop, stop, stop!"

Lin Chen's head started to ache from listening, and he interrupted directly.

What kind of messy, tangled love polygon is this!

However, when Lin Chen calmed down and analyzed it with a professional eye, although the script was nauseatingly melodramatic, it would definitely be a huge hit.

Just like the tear-jerker dramas that used to be popular nationwide, the intelligence of the characters was questionable, and the plot dragged on to the point of driving people crazy, but the middle-aged aunties just loved this stuff.

You love me, I love you, you don't love me… this kind of cliché trope always has a huge audience.

"The script might be rotten, but if it were handed to me to direct and star in…"

Lin Chen unconsciously imagined himself in it, and the desire to jump in and have some fun burned brighter and brighter.

His hands were just too itchy.

"Are there any roles in the Film Crew that haven't been cast yet?" Lin Chen turned to ask Dilraba.

Dilraba tilted her little head and thought for a moment: "There shouldn't be any left; they've almost finished filming half of it. Why are you asking about this?"

"I want to act."

Dilraba's bright red little mouth opened wide: "You want to act?"

"Is there a problem? What kind of look is that?"

Dilraba wrinkled her delicate, exquisite nose: "But, have you ever studied acting?"

"Never studied it."

"…"

"But I was born a genius; don't use the standards of ordinary mortals to measure me."

Lin Chen's words sounded extremely arrogant, but his face was as calm as water, without a hint of haughtiness.

Because in his view, he was simply stating an objective fact.

Dilraba smacked her little lips: "Why do I feel like you're indirectly insulting people again? Why are you a genius and I'm just a mortal? I'm a little fairy who descended from heaven!"

"The Yalong Great Immortal?" Lin Chen replied casually.

"Who is the Yalong Great Immortal?"

"The mother of the Golden Horned King and the Silver Horned King."

Dilraba froze for a few seconds, and finally, the image of that old hag monster holding the Immortal-Binding Rope appeared in her mind.

She was so angry that she pounced on him, grabbing Lin Chen's arm with her two small hands and shaking it frantically: "Go to hell! You're the old hag! You're Zhu Bajie! Teehee!"

"What are you chatting about, laughing so loudly!"

Yang Mi walked over, lifting the hem of her costume skirt.

The previous scene had finished filming, and the Film Crew was moving the equipment to change to an outdoor location.

"Lin Chen says he wants to be an actor!" Dilraba tattled first.

Yang Mi was stunned, her alluring peach-blossom eyes looking at Lin Chen with confusion.

Lin Chen had his hands in his pockets, his tone flat: "It's not like I absolutely have to act."

His words carried a hint of arrogance, but this was definitely not playing hard to get.

A Grandmaster naturally has the pride and class of a Grandmaster.

"Why did you suddenly have such a thought?" Yang Mi asked, full of confusion.

"I'm bored, just want to go down and play around."