Recently, an online rumor attracted little attention until an official Weibo account published a list. Within a day it swept across much of the internet, and six of the top ten trending topics concerned it.
After the first season of Extreme Challenge became a runaway success, audiences clamored for season two. The organizers planned it while viewers speculated about the guests. A previous poll had included several popular stars, but whether those names would be invited was another matter.
Such an eagerly anticipated show could make practically any guest famous, provided they performed reasonably well. Countless moderately known artists fought for a place, pulling strings and approaching patrons wherever they could.
The organizers could not fill the cast entirely with unknowns. They confirmed several famous and highly anticipated stars first; the remaining spots went to artists with powerful connections.
Yazhi had missed the ordinary opportunity.
By the time Wang Cheng took charge, every place had already been allotted. The production team had only announced a few of the names, saving the rest for later.
As they prepared to reveal the full lineup, Wang Cheng approached Zhao Jiansheng. Zhou Group’s involvement forced the organizers to drop two people from the unpublished list. But only one of the remaining guests was a prominent star the producers had invited specially. Everyone else had a powerful patron.
The producers had deliberately saved that star’s announcement to build excitement just before filming and ensure strong ratings after broadcast. They absolutely would not remove that person.
Yet dropping any of the other well-connected guests was a problem, much less two. The organizers passed the decision to their sponsor. Compared with Zhou Group, the other backers were insignificant, so the sponsor promptly removed two artists.
Netizens had no idea what had happened behind the scenes, but the celebrities who lost their places were furious.
Not every celebrity could find a patron easily. Some traded intimacy for opportunities. After going to such lengths, having fame snatched away at the final moment felt intolerable. One of the ousted actresses remained furious despite her sponsor’s promise to compensate her.
She posted a message on Weibo mocking shameless people who stole opportunities through connections, lamenting her own situation and the entertainment industry’s supposed moral decline, apparently oblivious to the irony.
Her fame was limited, however. Only a little over a hundred thousand people followed her, some of them purchased followers. Few responded, and she could not stir up a storm alone. She thought the post would simply disappear, until it suddenly became popular several days later.
A notoriously scathing Weibo account called Justice in Black and White frequently posted stories about show business, supposedly exposing the corruption hidden beneath glamorous gossip. Roughly eighty percent of the inside information it published had proved accurate.
The account was linked to several major celebrity scandals. The biggest involved a star whose public relations team staged a spectacular deception online. After being exposed, the celebrity’s career collapsed, and hardly anyone heard of them again. That scandal made the account famous, with nearly six or seven million followers.
The day the official lineup was released, Justice in Black and White published allegations of corruption within Extreme Challenge. Two innocent artists had allegedly been replaced after the cast was finalized, and their replacements came from the much-discussed Yazhi Media.
Many industry insiders knew Yazhi had a new chairman. Unlike Zhao Chenlin, the idle rich son who had formerly run the agency, this chairman was committed to developing the company. With Zhou Group backing him, it was natural for him to secure opportunities for his artists, and plenty of people would accommodate him.
To entertainment veterans, such arrangements were ordinary. To outsiders unfamiliar with the industry’s unwritten rules, they were scandalous.
The people orchestrating this uproar were clearly targeting Yazhi Media.
They used Justice in Black and White to start the discussion, then hired large numbers of paid commenters to keep it trending. Once ordinary netizens joined in, the attacks on Yazhi became open and vicious, complete with campaigns shouting ‘XX, get out of show business!’
Nor did they stop there. They dragged Yazhi’s other artists into the fight.
Those with genuinely poor reputations had only themselves to blame. But the attackers apparently wanted to tarnish all Yazhi’s rising newcomers, circulating false claims about artists stealing endorsements or replacing other celebrities on variety shows.
As if the uproar were not fierce enough, the organizers of the smear campaign contacted the displaced actress and urged her to post again, perhaps claiming she could no longer bear to stay silent and ‘had to reveal the truth.’ That escalated matters further.
Some netizens demanded an explanation from the official Extreme Challenge account, but the organizers sidestepped the allegations and offered only promises that they would meet expectations and do their best. Wang Cheng did not use Weibo. To him, computers were primarily work tools, so he knew nothing of the controversy.
The entertainment newspapers soon reported the scandal, however. It had attracted too much attention to ignore. Pan Zhihai’s newly hired young assistant brought Wang Cheng a newspaper, looking so conflicted that he scarcely dared speak. The expression was impossible to miss.
“Do you want to tell me something?” Wang Cheng asked.
The assistant hesitated, then carefully laid the paper in front of him. “Chairman, you’ll understand when you see this.”
Wang Cheng read the front-page story and quickly grasped what had happened.
Pan Zhihai had not mentioned it, but he had been away with He Zihuan lately and might reasonably have missed the news. What was Yazhi’s public relations team doing, though? How had such a serious incident gone unanswered?
As if sensing his thoughts, the assistant explained, “President Pan usually handles these situations, but he’s been away two days. The public relations team has tried to respond, but the opposition has hired so many paid commenters that we can’t suppress the story anymore. What should we do?”
“What do you suggest?” Wang Cheng asked. The assistant was startled to be asked his opinion, but gathered his thoughts quickly. “Shouldn’t we investigate who’s behind the attacks? It feels like someone’s deliberately targeting Yazhi. And there’s something else, though I’m not sure if I’m imagining it…”
“Go on.”
“The other side seems to know the agency’s artists unusually well. Many of the people caught up in the rumors aren’t even famous, so why would anyone pay attention to them? They’ve also mentioned scripts accepted by our artists, including ones funded by Zhou Group. We know which roles have actually been promised in advance, but the attackers are dragging even those projects into it. Whoever is behind this understands Yazhi extremely well. The indiscriminate attacks almost seem intended to destroy the whole company.”
Wang Cheng had not expected such insight from the assistant. “You’ve analyzed this well. Keep your suspicions to yourself for now. But we can’t allow them to do whatever they like. Ask the head of public relations to see me.”
“Yes, Chairman!” The assistant left delighted.
A man soon entered Wang Cheng’s office and emerged half an hour later. Within another hour, new gossip appeared online.
A report alleged that the minor actress loudly portraying herself as a victim had originally obtained her Extreme Challenge spot through connections too. She was nowhere near famous enough to be invited otherwise. Her family had neither wealth nor influence, so how had she obtained the place? That was where the story became interesting.
Apparently, she had courted a wealthy patron to advance her career. After sleeping with him, she secured a promise. He knew someone connected to the show and obtained a place that had originally been reserved for another artist. Delighted, she bragged to people around her about stealing the opportunity.
Another celebrity promptly claimed to be the one she had displaced. Others came forward saying they had witnessed her boasting about it.
The dramatic reversal left spectators reeling.
Most netizens were there for the spectacle, and the artists involved were far from major celebrities. With few loyal fans to resist the change of direction, the online crowd changed sides immediately.
As the saying went, the mantis stalks the cicada, unaware of the oriole behind it.
She had thought she had stolen someone’s chance without realizing a bigger predator was lurking behind her. Perhaps it was simply fitting retribution: they were all cut from the same cloth.
Wang Cheng went to Pan Zhihai’s office, retrieved several surveillance recordings from the computer, forwarded them to his own email, and asked the assistant to investigate.
Within an hour, the young assistant found the relevant footage.
Several days earlier, Wang Cheng had ordered cameras installed in different areas of Yazhi. The installation had taken place when few employees were around, and some cameras were very well concealed. Even staff aware of the regular surveillance would not suspect the hidden ones.
One of those cameras was in Pan Zhihai’s office.
The footage showed someone sneaking in three nights earlier, rummaging through the desk, accessing the computer, and copying all its files. That explained how the attackers knew so much about Yazhi’s artists. The intruder knew the company well enough to go straight to Pan’s office, and even cracked the computer’s password, which only Pan Zhihai and Wang Cheng knew.
“What should we do, Chairman?” the assistant asked.
“Someone must have ordered him to do this. Don’t tip them off. Pretend you know nothing and deal with the online controversy first. Tell public relations to watch developments and respond appropriately. Leave the rest to me.”
After preserving the evidence, Wang Cheng returned to the Binhai apartment after work. When Chu Yifeng came home, he asked to borrow someone.