The director didn’t say anything, but the stagehand beside him perked up excitedly. “Sister Wang, are you serious?”
“Would I lie about something like this?”
Sister Wang immediately called Butler Li and explained the situation to him.
After hanging up, she gave the production team an OK gesture.
The director had been weighing the pros and cons of offending this investor, but then he suddenly recalled how casually Yu Jiaojiao had given away millions of yuan worth of stuff in the first episode.
Sure, the outside world called her the drama queen of all drama queens, but a drama queen this generous? Bring on a hundred of her, no problem!
He steeled himself. “Let him pull out! Let him pull his funding!”
The production team was overjoyed.
The director stepped away to call the company and report the situation.
On camera, Gu Xiaozhi had no idea how serious this was. She was engrossed in her phone, chatting as if no one else was around.
She was in her circle of plastic sisters, bragging about how she had threatened the director with just one sentence and gotten an investor to pull his funding.
[Just you wait. In a little while, if I tell the director to go east, he won’t dare go west.]
No sooner had she sent that message than the stagehand’s voice rang out. “Gu Xiaozhi from Group Four, when are you going to start your mission?”
Gu Xiaozhi immediately shot the stagehand a displeased glare, as if throwing daggers. “What mission? Listen up. I want the rules changed. I want the other seven people to come back.”
“Your contract with the production team clearly states that you agree to follow all of the show’s rules. Are you trying to breach it?”
“How dare you talk to me like that?!” Gu Xiaozhi slammed her hand hard on the dining table next to her. “I could have you kicked out of this production team with just one word, believe it or not?!”
The stagehand was so angry he laughed. “If you don’t start your mission within twenty minutes, we have the right to keep all footage and pursue legal action against you for breach of contract.”
From the start, “Extreme Challenge” was set up differently from ordinary variety shows. The producers were worried that contracted guests might quit midway because they couldn’t handle the difficulty, so the contracts were quite strict, with very high penalty fees.
Gu Xiaozhi hadn’t understood the contract when she signed it, but that didn’t stop her from throwing her weight around, counting on her biological father’s relationship with the investor.
“Unless you call the others back, don’t even talk to me about doing the mission.”
With that, she let out a huff and ignored everyone.
The entire production team was seething with anger. They looked at Sister Wang with hopeful eyes.
And Sister Wang did not disappoint them.
Ten or so minutes later, a team of composed, impeccably dressed elites arrived on set and immediately began discussing the details of the investment with the production team.
Gu Xiaozhi finally sensed something was wrong. She walked over and asked, “Who are these people?”
“Sorry, no comment~” The stagehand gave her a polite, professional smile, flashing a perfect eight teeth.
But soon enough, a call from her biological father revealed who they were.
“Gu Xiaozhi, what the hell is going on?! All you do is cause trouble for me out there!! Your Uncle Zhao’s investment just got returned by the production team!! They said they found a new investor. Did you piss someone off on that set? Tell me the truth!”
“I… I didn’t…” Gu Xiaozhi instinctively tried to deflect the blame.
“You promised me when you first wanted to get into the entertainment industry! And now, in the blink of an eye, you’ve caused me this much trouble. And now, your Uncle Zhao’s cooperation deal with our family has fallen through too!”
“If you keep causing this much trouble, get your ass back home immediately!”
With that, he hung up.
Gu Xiaozhi was suddenly lost and panicked. She had envied her best friend’s “young rich lady” status for a long time. In her eyes, her friend used that status to navigate the entertainment industry like a fish in water. Not only could she act alongside many handsome actors and be adored by fans, but she also earned tens of millions or even hundreds of millions a year. Luxury goods flowed through her life like water. Gu Xiaozhi thought she was no worse than her friend—so she could do it too.
She had barely managed to convince the Gu family patriarch to let her enter the entertainment industry and used connections to get on this variety show. She hadn’t even really started her career, and already she had this bucket of cold water thrown on her.
Feeling utterly wronged, Gu Xiaozhi found her biological father unreliable, so she thought of her best friend, the young female star. She immediately called her.
The other end picked up quickly. Gu Xiaozhi, adding some embellishments and twisting the facts, began crying and complaining. “Boo hoo… The production team is bullying me, the new girl. I asked my dad… I mean, my uncle, to have Uncle Zhao help me out, but the production team just returned Uncle Zhao’s investment. Now my uncle is blaming me, boo hoo hoo…”
“Is that so? Xiaozhi, don’t worry. I know the general manager of the company that owns this production team very well. I’ll talk to him and make sure the production team doesn’t give you a hard time anymore.”
A smug look reappeared on Gu Xiaozhi’s face, but her voice remained pitiful and grateful. “Tiantian, you’re the only one who’s so good to me~”
“Don’t worry. You’re my best friend. They wouldn’t dare not show me some respect.”
With that, Tiantian hung up.
As Gu Xiaozhi seethed with jealousy over the fact that Tiantian could say something like that so effortlessly, she began to fantasize about the day she would become famous and attain that same status.
She shot a contemptuous glance toward the stagehand, fully expecting him to come crawling and groveling at her feet.
But reality did not go as she’d hoped. A few minutes later, the stagehand warned her again: “Guest Gu Xiaozhi, are you still not going to start your mission?”
Gu Xiaozhi was absolutely livid. She opened her WeChat chat with her best friend Tiantian and sent a message urging her. To her surprise, the reply she got was:
[Sorry, Xiaozhi, but Mr. Li said the new investor was brought in by one of the guests on your show. They doubled the investment, so it’s not easy to push them around. Just hang in there for now. When I have some free time, I’ll personally talk to Mr. Li about it.]
Seeing that message, Gu Xiaozhi’s eyes practically shot flames. She cursed incessantly in her mind, both blaming her so-called best friend for making empty promises and trying to figure out which damned guest had brought in the new investment.
But this time, she finally displayed a bit of sense—or rather, she finally grasped her situation. She didn’t dare lash out at the production team anymore.
Just as she was fuming silently, she suddenly looked up and spotted Sister Wang standing with the director and the others.
She had seen Sister Wang earlier when she tried to snatch Yu Jiaojiao’s dressing room. A flash of realization hit her, and she understood exactly who was behind this.
Gu Xiaozhi gritted her teeth and officially added Yu Jiaojiao to her enemy list.
She swore to herself: she would make Yu Jiaojiao pay!
“Guest Gu Xiaozhi, this is your final warning. Are you still not going to start your mission?” The stagehand’s voice had grown increasingly impatient.
“…Fine. I’ll do it!” Gu Xiaozhi snapped.
After the system mentioned that Sister Wang had stepped in to handle the investment, Yu Jiaojiao stopped paying attention to that side of things.
She followed Wen Qiang and finally arrived at one of their destinations for purchasing supplies.
“Finally here!” Wen Qiang let out a long sigh of relief.
She turned to Yu Jiaojiao. “Let’s split up and take a look around to see where the green beans are.”
“Okay.” Yu Jiaojiao nodded slowly. Then she glanced to the side, and her gaze landed on a patch of green.
She suddenly tugged at Wen Qiang’s waistband and pointed triumphantly at the patch of green. “Isn’t that right there?!”
“Where?” Wen Qiang followed her finger, then blinked and looked at Yu Jiaojiao in bewilderment.
“Those are snow peas…”
Yu Jiaojiao: “?”
Wen Qiang: “??”
Yu Jiaojiao pointed in two more directions. “What about that one and that one?”
Wen Qiang: “Those are long beans and peas…”
Yu Jiaojiao: “???”
The system erupted in laughter: “Hahahaha…”