Pet King

Zhang Zian raised both his hands high, laughing foolishly. Unlike in his imagination, however, there was no exciting scene facing him.

Besides things concerning pets, his creditworthiness had dropped. Most of the customers, the movie fans, and the elfins all looked at him like they were looking at a silly a** person. No one believed what he said.

“Really! All of you must believe me!” Zhang Zian explained, awkwardly lowering his hands.

There was a hardcore movie fan who came to the shop practically every day, but they were still not yet aware of his dark past. They asked excitedly, “Really? When will it be shown? I’m going to take my whole class and book the whole venue!”

“At present, it is scheduled to have a domestic premier at the Capital Film Festival in late April. Immediately after that, it will be screened at all major cinema chains in the country!” Zhang Zian generously shared the new information with everyone.

“Oh? Really? What is the frequency of showtimes? How much do the movie tickets cost?” the movie fan continued to ask.

“This…” Zhang Zian did not know how to answer the question. He could only shake his head helplessly. “I haven’t had time to ask about any of that yet. The frequency of showtimes is hard to confirm right now, right?”

“Are you silly? Of course this kind of thing has to be arranged in advance. If you know the producers of the film, tell them to go to the managers of the major cinema chains with meals, drinks, rebates, and red envelopes before it’s too late! The data from the first day the movie is aired is very important; it affects the number of times the movie will be aired each day in the future. Let the filmmakers take their own money out to pay for the attendance numbers and the box office. Don’t feel embarrassed. Nowadays everyone is doing this. If anyone doesn’t do it, they will surely regret it! This is a good film, but even fragrant wine is afraid of deep valleys!”

The movie fan’s words were rough, but not unreasonable. He seemed to have a great understanding of the inside workings of the movie industry. He painfully explained the gains and losses of the situation to Zhang Zian and talked until Zhang Zian’s heart was slightly moved. He hesitated as to whether he should give Feng Xuan a subtle reminder.

The movie was too important to Famous, and they could not afford to have anything go wrong. Half of their success had been achieved after getting to Berlin’s Film Emperor, but the domestic box office was as unpredictable as the domestic stock market.

He looked towards Famous to ask for its opinion.

Famous was both shocked and excited. After waiting for so long, the official airing of the movie was finally confirmed. Despite the excitement, however, it had still managed to maintain its calm and restrained attitude. After all, that level of excitement was not the first time for it; it was a dog who had done big scenes.

It shook its head indifferently and explicitly rejected Zhang Zian’s inquiry. It had defeated countless rivals in the film industry, and it disdained the use of such low level means. Absolute strength could crush all the evil doers.

Zhang Zian nodded his head to express that he understood, then turned back to the movie fan. “Thank you for your kind intentions, but it’s still better to let things unfold naturally. The people’s eyes are bright, and good films will not be buried. No matter what you do for roughly produced films, in the end, they are just a pile of chicken feathers.”

That movie fan wanted to continue to persuade him, but Zhang Zian signaled that their discussion was over. There was no need to say anything else.

It was only at that time that the other people finally believed that Zhang Zian was not randomly fooling them again. One by one they expressed their well wishes towards him and Famous––they had managed to wait for the clouds to disperse to see the moonlight.

The other movie fans present shared the explosive news with their friend circles and their Weibo accounts. The information spread quickly, but whether others believed it was something else entirely.

Zhang Zian accepted the congratulations with ease and was laughing with the movie fans. Anyway, Feng Xuan did not tell him that he had to keep it a secret.

At that moment, his phone rang again.

He thought that Feng Xuan had forgotten to tell him some information he wanted to share, or that Feng Xuan’s assistant was contacting him, so he separated himself from the crowd and walked into a corner. He would let Famous accept the congratulations from the movie fans.

However, the message on the phone screen was not sent by Feng Xuan, nor was it by Wei Kang to remind him to quickly return the underwater sound device.

It was a message, and after the free online chatting applications started to become widely used, practically no one was willing to spend the money to send a text message. What was normally received through text was advertisements or notifications, but this was not.

The sender was Sihwa.

The text message only had a few words: “I’m Sihwa. Help me congratulate Famous! Also, I’ve finished learning the language.”

She did not know that the text message would show who sent it as long as their name was in the receiver’s call log; she had even especially emphasized that she was Sihwa. Furthermore, she had typed the wrong “Fei” in Famous, because she had heard other people call it Famous. She knew how to pronounce it, but she did not know which “Fei” word it was.

It was her first time texting, and her first time typing. It was also her first time using Chinese letters to type.

Zhang Zian had taught her before how to use WeChat to send free messages. She had learned it and sent some voice messages, but after the novelty had passed, because she had no one else to send messages to besides him, she had not sent any messages again.

She did not use the free WeChat, but instead specifically used the text messages that one had to pay for. There had to be some special meaning behind it.

Zhang Zian was very surprised, but he did not have the time to think deeper into it. He walked over to Famous and said, “Sihwa told me to congratulate you.”

Famous was stunned but cried out with a Woof! It wanted Zhang Zian to thank her in response. He should have gone upstairs to thank her face to face, but he was surrounded and could not get away.

The rest of the people in the shop did not know who Sihwa was, but after they heard her name, they thought she seemed like a fresh girl. There was another round of people making digs at Zhang Zian and ridiculing him.

Zhang Zian silently remembered everyone who ridiculed him, planning to have his revenge on them later on. He then took large steps and went upstairs.

Pi was in front of the computer, the keyboard tapping as he typed on it. When it heard footsteps, it turned to look at Zhang Zian.

“Pi, let me tell you some good news. Dog Warrior is going to officially air soon!” he excitedly told Pi the good news.

“Zhi zhi!” Pi was equally excited. It pushed the keyboard aside, jumping down from the chair and dancing about.

“No matter what, we need to think of a way to celebrate a bit today… How about an unprecedented game of ultimate hide-and-seek?” Zhang Zian suggested.

“Meow! Hide-and-seek! Galaxy wants to play hide-and-seek!” Galaxy happened to be chasing the American Shorthair and ran past them through the hallway. It immediately rejoiced upon hearing Zhang Zian’s words.

“Zhi zhi…” Pi had been traumatized from the hide-and-seek games with Galaxy, and upon hearing that they would be playing ultimate hide-and-seek, it got even more scared and started to shrink into a corner. It scratched its ears and cheeks to think of an excuse to not participate. Presumably, Famous would do the same thing.

“We can talk about this later. I have to go and find Sihwa first.”

Zhang Zian let Pi and Galaxy continue writing and playing. He knocked on the door of the bathroom. Sihwa was sitting in the bathtub, dazedly staring at the outside through the small window. Her face had a look of tiredness that was rarely seen.

Hearing him knock the door, she turned her head around and smiled lightly. “So many people like Famous!”

“That’s because Famous is very hardworking, and this is what it deserves. A lot of people only see the good times––when Famous has succeeded. They do not know how much hard work and sweat it put in to stand on that stage,” Zhang Zian answered. “There is no success that comes purely due to luck.”

She nodded. “I’ve finished learning the language. Do you want to record the sounds now?”