After identifying the suspicious target, it was time to begin verification...
About ten minutes later, Liu Rulan called back.
"I heard Director Tannis is currently preparing for casting in 'Fast Speed Shadow 7,' which will include an Asian race car driver with excellent driving skills. So perhaps because your performance in this race was too outstanding, Qin Yuezhang mistakenly thought you were there to compete for the role," Liu Rulan speculated.
This information was confirmed with Shu Han just now. A long time ago, Shu Han had heard about this news and prepared to give it a try, but after waiting a long time, there was no official announcement from Director Tannis. Later, Shu Han shifted his development focus back to the domestic market, and the matter was left unresolved without further attention.
"Fast Speed Shadow?"
Xiao He was somewhat surprised.
For no other reason than knowing from the name suffix extending to "7" that the previous series of films must have been very successful—especially the first and second installments.
And "Fast Speed Shadow 1" was already a product from over twenty years ago, calculated carefully, it was even several years older than Xiao He himself.
This film series had become essential viewing for racing fans, and surprisingly, Director Tannis successfully broke the curse of "sequels inevitably being bad films." Every subsequent generation of "Fast Speed Shadow" he filmed was a very exciting, high-quality work. Although not quite masterpiece level, they were absolutely acclaimed commercial films that performed well at the box office, almost annually appearing on some film bloggers' overseas recommendation lists.
That it could still reach a seventh installment now was genuinely somewhat astonishing.
But looking at Director Tannis's achievements over the years and his cabinet full of international awards, one should know that his life had been very fulfilling with few regrets. What he filmed now were topics and content he personally liked. No matter how high the requirements or how difficult the filming, he had the time and money to perfect the details and make the films the best they could be.
Such an internationally renowned director was indeed a target many actors wanted to collaborate with.
"So thinking about it now, Qin Yuezhang appeared there not to watch the race, but for Director Tannis?"
After his surprise, Xiao He felt somewhat speechless.
Seriously, he knew nothing about this!
And Director Tannis hadn't even approached him, so why was this person creating imaginary enemies?
Xiao He felt he was being terribly wronged.
"Qin Yuezhang has always been accustomed to being pampered domestically. If someone rubs him the wrong way, he's very likely to proactively target them," Liu Rulan stated frankly.
"So how do we handle this now? Anyway, apologizing is out of the question."
Xiao He himself was the wronged party—how could he possibly initiate an apology to the other side?
"Who said anything about you apologizing?" Liu Rulan was also quite exasperated. "I'll first contact the senior management at Xingchen Film Industry to test their stance."
"Should I return early then?"
"No need. I can handle this level of public opinion. Besides, now that you've been nominated for Best Supporting Actor, even more people will be watching you."
Even without Xiao He proactively provoking anyone, many had already secretly added him to their opponent lists.
There was no helping it—on the path to kingship, one always encounters many rivals.
Xiao He: "...Thanks, I'm already trembling with fear."
"Alright, enough talk. I'm flying to Beijing now—we'll talk later."
"Okay."
After hanging up, Xiao He's expression completely cooled.
He pushed aside his original dinner and opened his laptop.
In less than half a minute, Xiao He found the video circulating online about him bullying a female student at school.
The video footage was very blurry, clearly secretly recorded. The boy with his back to the camera wore a somewhat familiar school uniform, violently kicking someone on the ground.
"Damn bitch, bastard—"
The boy's voice tone was somewhat strange, as if during voice change period. At a rough listen, it really did somewhat resemble his voice.
But how could Xiao He not know whether he had done these things or not?
Xiao He laughed in sheer anger.
His fingers nimbly tapped on the keyboard, and soon he had restored the audio.
Hmm, this time the voice sounded much more unfamiliar.
It seemed the other party had some skills, able to modify the video's audio to sound so similar to his.
Upon more detailed inspection, Xiao He also discovered the audio sources weren't unified, and the video was suspected of AI face-swapping.
But during big data screening, the original video hadn't been detected.
Xiao He guessed this original video was probably from overseas, leaving no traces domestically at all.
That made the screening scope even broader...
Xiao He set it to screen in the background and turned to look at the so-called school forum posts.
To be honest, when Xiao He was in school before, he really hadn't heard of his high school alma mater having any campus forum.
At most they used QQ back then, rarely hearing about campus forums.
Of course, Xiao He wasn't completely denying its existence—it's just that when he was actually attending school, he genuinely hadn't heard of this thing. Possibly others were using it, but he didn't know.
So Xiao He started searching back for his former alma mater's forum.
Unexpectedly, it actually existed!
And this so-called evidence screenshot truly originated from his former school's campus forum.
But it was clearly visible that this forum had been abandoned for many years, with most dates basically stopping around ten years ago.
And this original post discussing how some female student committed suicide by jumping off a building due to Xiao He's school bullying was actually telling a story about a female student from a neighboring school who had an abortion after secretly engaging in intimate relations with a male classmate, ultimately leading to her suicide.
Why call it a story?
Because the last reply in this post clearly provided clarification, stating this incident was just a strange tale circulating in the school at that time. Somehow it spread increasingly wildly, becoming what it is now, complete with specific names, which was utterly absurd.
Forum management wasn't very strict back then—almost anything could be posted there. Perhaps the forum moderator found this post somewhat interesting, so they never deleted it, and it still lies quietly in the campus forum to this day.
But looking at the date—it was already fifteen years ago.
—Come on, he was still in elementary school back then!
You can't possibly claim that while in elementary school, he went to a high school to bully a female student and drove her to suicide by jumping?
To smear him, what obscure corners did they dig this stuff out from?
Xiao He now genuinely admired these people.
Then there were claims about his parents using power to suppress people—
This piece of information lacked actual screenshots or evidence, only circulating in these people's conversations.
Reportedly, Xiao He's father was a high-ranking official in the local education bureau, while Xiao He's mother was a school teacher and grade-level director, simultaneously serving as homeroom teacher for Xiao He's class. Knowing full well her son was bullying classmates, she chose to cover up and conceal it, turning a blind eye to students' pleas for help, even suppressing students instead, making students find problems within themselves.
Thus, this female student, finding no recourse for help, despairingly chose suicide.
Later, the female student's parents tried to sue the school and seek justice from the education bureau, but were also driven away by Xiao He's father, who suppressed the matter.
Who could have imagined that the person who caused someone's death back then would now become a big celebrity, living shining brightly under the spotlight, while that female student's family remained shrouded in the shadow of losing their daughter...
Finally, in these people's chats, some continuously hinted that Xiao He's father engaged in corruption and bribery. That Xiao He could debut and co-establish Linghui Studio with Liu Rulan, becoming a boss, indicated his family was wealthy—so where did that money really come from?
Certainly his father did unethical things, and perhaps Xiao He's mother also accepted gifts and money from students' parents...
Xiao He: ...
To be fair, if such things truly existed, they would indeed be infuriating.
But, you motherfuckers, stop using my name!