The More Tragic I Act, the Stronger I Get — My Fans Beg Me to Stop Killing Off My Roles-Chapter 309: A still from the drama silences the entire internet
Jiang Ci was utterly baffled by his assistant's sudden action.
With his hand receiving IV fluids immobilized, he could only watch helplessly as his phone was snatched away.
His stomach continued to spasm in waves, the sour, rancid taste of vegetable cream mixed with stomach acid constantly surging upward.
Hooked up to a glucose drip, his face was sallow, with several strands of hair stiffly stuck to his temples from dried cream.
Sun Zhou watched him in this state, feeling as if his own internal organs were twisting together in heartache.
He felt he absolutely had to do something to salvage his artist's dangerously precarious mental state.
Thus, Sun Zhou forcefully held his tablet in front of Jiang Ci, opened a page, and spoke in a deliberately cheerful tone.
"Bro! Look! Cheer up! The animated version of our magazine cover is out!"
On the screen was Vogue's meticulously retouched "Ruins Deity" animated image, crafted by a top-tier team.
The young man in the photo was noble, coldly gorgeous, and utterly arrogant.
Standing atop ruins, he casually crushed a rose in his hand, with fragmented dynamic light and shadow flowing over him.
Every frame was art.
Jiang Ci looked at the glamorous, dazzling version of himself on the screen, then sniffed the persistent sour smell clinging to his own body.
"Burp!"
A belch carrying a putrid, cloyingly sweet aroma uncontrollably erupted from his throat.
There was a floor-length mirror in the lounge.
In the mirror, the "undercover agent" hooked to an IV drip, looking haggard and withered,
was framed together with the "deity" being deified across the entire internet on the screen.
The scene was absurd to the extreme.
"Bro! Don't just look at this! There's something even more amazing!"
Sun Zhou completely failed to notice the bizarre atmosphere. His fingers flew across the tablet screen,
opening a Weibo page, so excited he was practically spraying saliva.
"Brother Kun! It's Brother Kun! He reposted your interview!" 𝙛𝒓𝒆𝙚𝒘𝒆𝓫𝙣𝓸𝙫𝓮𝒍.𝒄𝒐𝓶
On the Weibo page, a gold V-verified account
had reposted the interview Jiang Ci had given during the Vogue photoshoot.
That account's ID represented an era in the entertainment industry.
An entertainment industry godfather-level figure, "Brother Kun."
The accompanying text was just one short sentence, yet each word carried immense weight.
"In this dazzling world, quietly guard your own heart."
The appearance of this Weibo post was like dropping a depth charge into a calm lake.
This was no longer simple praise; this was the mainstream resources of the Beijing circle formally accepting Jiang Ci.
It was a leap across social strata.
The comments section had gone completely insane.
"Holy shit! Brother Kun personally stepped in! What level of recognition is this!"
"Gege is absolutely incredible! Even Brother Kun acknowledges his clarity of mind! The one and only true deity in the domestic entertainment industry!"
"I always said Jiang Ci isn't just traffic! He's a thoughtful actor! Are the haters' faces stinging?"
"A deity has descended! Jiang Ci fell to the mortal realm to purify us ordinary people!"
Sun Zhou read these comments aloud, so excited he was practically dancing.
"Bro! Did you hear that! The whole internet is praising you! You're a true deity now!"
Meanwhile, the "true deity of the domestic entertainment industry" being deified across the internet was currently trembling badly due to low blood sugar from prolonged dieting.
He struggled for a long time, trying to insert the straw the nurse gave him into the bag of warm glucose,
but just couldn't align it with that tiny opening.
Right then, the phone Sun Zhou had snatched away began vibrating wildly on the table.
Two characters flashed on the screen.
Lin Wan.
Sun Zhou fumbled to answer the video call.
"Jiang Ci! I saw Brother Kun's Weibo post! Well done!"
Lin Wan's bright, beautiful face appeared on the screen,
her tone full of excitement and pride.
She had intended to properly congratulate this treasure she had discovered,
but when the camera, following Sun Zhou's movement, clearly captured the miserable state of the person on the bed,
all her words got stuck in her throat.
Jiang Ci was leaning weakly against the pillow, his face paler than the bedsheet behind him, his hair a mess, with a needle still stuck in the back of his hand.
The smile on Lin Wan's face instantly froze solid,
followed immediately by overwhelming fury erupting from her chest.
"Jiang Wen! Damn it!"
A furious roar startled Sun Zhou so much his hand shook, nearly dropping the phone.
"What did he do to you?! How did he torture you into this state! Terminate the contract! We're not filming this kind of show anymore!"
Looking at Jiang Ci's half-dead appearance on the screen, Lin Wan felt deeply uncomfortable.
Jiang Ci was startled by her shout, weakly opening his mouth to try and explain.
"Lin Wan Jie, I'm fine..."
"It's just... I ate too much and feel a bit nauseous..."
He was just telling the truth; the cream really was too disgusting.
But this explanation, landing in Lin Wan's ears, automatically translated into another version.
This kid, tortured into such a state, is still putting on a brave face, still covering up for that insane director.
Lin Wan only felt the fire in her heart burn even fiercer, ready to slam the table and rise.
"Don't speak up for him! Jiang Ci, I'm telling you, health is your capital! An actor's responsibility isn't used like this!"
Hearing the phrase "actor's responsibility," Jiang Ci weakly blinked, his muddled thoughts suddenly illuminated.
He remembered the original intention behind choosing this path.
He interrupted Lin Wan's impending next round of roaring,
his gaze clear, his voice distinct, "Sister Wan, it's nothing. This is what I, as an actor... as myself, should face."
All her words were blocked back by that one look.
While Lin Wan was roaring at the screen, Sun Zhou's other hand was holding his own phone, fearfully scrolling through Weibo.
Beneath the blazing hot searches #Jiang Ci Ruins Deity# and #Brother Kun Supports Jiang Ci#,
a new hashtag carrying an ominous aura silently climbed up.
#Jiang Ci Icebreaker Leaked Set Photos#
Clicking in revealed a blurry, sneakily taken photo.
In the photo, Jiang Ci was being carried out of the film set on a stretcher, covered with a blanket, the specifics unclear.
No matter how well the film crew handled confidentiality, it couldn't stop the pervasive paparazzi substitutes.
Malicious speculation and filthy language bred in the comments section.
"'King of BE Aesthetics'? More like 'King of Fragile Hearts'! Acted in a tragedy and acted himself into the hospital? Really, you see something new every day."
"Predicted the Z-surname top-tier celebrity's downfall so accurately before, how come he didn't foresee ending up on a stretcher? I think he's just a marketing hype, overacted and messed up."
"Laughing to death, praised for 'quietly guarding his own heart' one moment, then getting stretchered onto the hot search list the next. That heart is guarded pretty restlessly."
"What's wrong? Sun Zhou, why do you look so awful?" On the video call, Lin Wan keenly sensed something was off.
Sun Zhou's lips were pale as he turned his phone screen toward the camera, his voice trembling, "S-Sister Wan, a negative hot search... someone secretly took a photo of Brother being carried out..."
Lin Wan only needed one glance before her face instantly froze over. "These gutter rats again."
She quickly calmed down, a flash of ruthlessness in her eyes.
"Don't panic. I'll have the Public Relations Department handle it right now. Suppress the hot search first, then issue a statement... Damn it, these paparazzi substitutes, once filming wraps, I'll deal with them one by one!"
Just as Lin Wan was swiftly preparing to deploy her plan,
Sun Zhou's hand holding his own phone suddenly stilled.
He discovered, to his horror, that no matter what the PR team did,
the popularity of that hashtag was still eerily climbing!
There was clearly someone behind it working against them!
For a moment, Sun Zhou's palms were soaked in cold sweat, a sense of powerlessness enveloping him.
Could it be that this time they really were going to...
Right in this nearly despairing atmosphere, he suddenly glimpsed that 'Icebreaker' producer Old Zhang had just posted on his social media feed.
Just one picture—it was Jiang Ci's face, smeared with cream and bloodstains, from the monitor.
Below it, director Jiang Wen's account instantly liked it.
Sun Zhou's heart gave a "thud," and before he could think it through, he saw the direction on the Weibo negative hot search plaza abruptly change.
An account no one expected updated its status.
The official Weibo account for the movie 'Icebreaker.'
The impact of the photo's imagery was so strong it made the entire Chinese internet shudder.
A high-definition still.
In the photo, the young man knelt on the marble floor of a luxurious villa.
That youthful face was smeared with ridiculous white cream and glaring bloodstains.
His face was slightly tilted upward, looking toward some direction outside the frame.
His eyes were empty, containing nothing.
The appearance of this still slapped the little haters' faces hard.
That sense of brokenness that could be felt even through the screen
shattered all rumors about being "pampered" or "putting on a show."
One picture made tens of thousands of little haters across the entire internet shut their mouths at the same time.
Sun Zhou's hand holding the phone trembled uncontrollably.
His screen was frozen on that photo.
The scrolling comments section below was flooded with overwhelming ellipses and "holy shits."
