On Friday, Jiang Lechen had the day off from his internship. Normally, he would have slung his scooter over his shoulder and reported to the company, but today he was sprawled on his bed, unwilling to move a muscle.

What was the point of going to the company? He practiced dancing diligently every day, and his boss never saw it. He says a few words behind his back and gets caught red-handed.

Other people went to work to make money. He went to work to lose money.

He might as well just stay in his dorm and let himself rot, vegging out from sunrise to sunset. Other than breathing, he wouldn’t contribute any more carbon emissions. How eco-friendly was that?

Just as Little Jiang was surfing online gossip with his alternate account, a commotion suddenly erupted downstairs.

Jiang Lechen peeked out from behind his bed curtain, with half of his bare torso visible. “What’s going on?”

Two heads were already by the dorm window. Jiang Lechen’s twin roommates were playing a game of human Jenga on the windowsill, craning their necks to look outside like Timon from The Lion King.

Hearing Jiang Lechen, Da Ding (the older twin) turned back to tell him, “Quick, quick, there’s a show to watch—they’re filming a scene downstairs!”

Jiang Lechen wasn’t interested and ducked back behind his curtain. “Oh…”

Xiao Ding: “They’re filming a movie! Aren’t you curious, Lele?”

Jiang Lechen: “What’s there to be curious about? Please, show me some respect. No matter how much of a flop I am, I’ve still got half a foot in the entertainment industry. You think I’ve never seen a camera before? Or a microphone?”

Da Ding: “Tsk, tsk, tsk. But why do I seem to remember you getting drunk last time and sobbing all over Senior Sister Huang, crying about how much you missed having work?”

Jiang Lechen’s face instantly turned bright red.

Xiao Ding: “Senior Sister Huang? Which Senior Sister Huang? The cat one or the dog one?”

“Neither,” Da Ding said, wiggling his eyebrows. “It was Senior Sister Cow Huang.”

Xiao Ding: “Isn’t Senior Sister Cow Huang from the College of Animal Husbandry?”

Da Ding: “Exactly. Lele got wasted that day and insisted on climbing the fence into the cowshed. We couldn’t stop him! He rode Senior Sister Huang all around the pen while the staff from the Animal Husbandry school chased him with pitchforks. If I hadn’t carried him back, they would have forked him to death.”

Xiao Ding: “Holy crap. Isn’t that better than any movie?”

Da Ding: “You wanna see it? I got a classmate’s surveillance footage from the cowshed that day.”

Xiao Ding: “Make a few copies of the video! We can play it on the big screen at Jiang the Flop’s wedding!”

Jiang Lechen, burning with shame and anger, grabbed the pillow from his bed and hurled it down. “Have you two no shame?!?!”

The twins, Da and Xiao Ding, cackled without a shred of sympathy.

Just as their conversation was getting lively, there was a sudden stir from the desk under the bunk near the door.

The blackout curtain around the desk was drawn aside, and a tall young man with a dark complexion and a short buzz cut stood up. He wore work boots, and a baggy hoodie couldn’t hide his muscular build.

The man’s gaze swept across his three noisy roommates, pausing momentarily on Jiang Lechen, before he tossed out a single gloomy phrase: “So noisy.”

Then he grabbed his backpack and walked out of the dorm without looking back.

His words were like an axe, cleaving through the cheerful dorm atmosphere at the worst possible moment.

Jiang Lechen lay on his bed, and the twins below stared blankly at the departing figure, their laughter frozen in their throats.

Da Ding was the first to react, rolling up his sleeves to chase after him. “Hey, my temper… It’s not even time to sleep! What’s wrong with a little chat?”

Xiao Ding quickly grabbed his brother. “Alright, alright. We’ve been roommates for five years. Don’t you know what Meng He is like by now?”

Da Ding grumbled, “If he can’t stand us, he should just move out and live on his own. Is the great Young Master short on rent money?”

A men’s dorm room was not always a united front. In their room of four, Jiang Lechen and the twins often hung out together, their relationship harmonious despite their frequent teasing and bickering. Only Meng He was a lone wolf, never speaking more than a single word to them.

From the moment they started school, they all knew that Meng He’s family was rich. Others chose this major because they loved animals or thought being a vet was a good way to make money.

Meng He was different. He was here to inherit the family business.

His family owned a massive pasture in the northwest and specialized in the livestock import-export trade. His classmates jokingly called him the “Young Master of the Horse Gang.”

Unfortunately, this Young Master and Jiang Lechen had never gotten along. It wasn’t so bad at first, but a few times Jiang Lechen had returned to the dorm from the company without removing his stage makeup—glitter in his hair, eyeshadow on his eyelids, and wearing some revealing, open-chested outfit. This “unmanly” appearance was something Meng He couldn’t stand. From then on, their relationship plummeted to freezing point.

Jiang Lechen didn’t really care. That’s just part of being an idol. If some people liked him, naturally, others would dislike him.

At least Meng He’s disgust was out in the open, written all over his face. That was better than two-faced people.

Jiang Lechen tried to calm Da Ding down. “Forget it, forget it. We were being a little loud.”

Da Ding: “I think he’s just jealous of you.”

Jiang Lechen liked the sound of that. “Jealous of my good looks? My talent? Or my ability to juggle my studies and my career while getting the top GPA every year?”

Xiao Ding: “Gag. Could you be any more narcissistic?”

Jiang Lechen: “Then what’s he jealous of?”

The twin brothers said in unison: “Obviously, he’s jealous that you have awesome bros like us!”

Jiang Lechen: “…”

Who were the real narcissists in this dorm?!

The class group chat suddenly pinged as the three of them were chatting.

[XX University – College of Animal Medicine – Announcement Group]

Counselor: @everyone

Counselor: The film crew downstairs at Building Four urgently needs twenty student extras. Conservative dress and hair color only.

Counselor: It’s a six-hour shoot, no meal provided, and fifty yuan. That’s not much money, but if you want to join in on the fun, you can go check it out.

Counselor: They also need one person with a good image for a part with two lines, acting opposite the main character. The cost is two hundred fifty yuan.

Counselor: Any volunteers?

Lil Jiang Hates Ginger: @Counselor Why look far when the answer is near!!!

Counselor: ?

Lil Jiang Hates Ginger: Little Jiang reporting for duty!!!

The moment he sent that message in the group, Jiang Lechen, who had been lying naked on his bed in nothing but a pair of boxers all day, zipped down from his bunk.

It didn’t matter if the cruel landlord at his company docked his pay. The little peasant could take on private gigs at school!

…

As the saying goes, don’t dismiss a flop idol just because they’re a flop. Jiang Lechen might seem unreliable, but he took his acting classes seriously.

Not only had he taken acting classes, he’d even done some proper filming—their group had made three music videos, and he himself had acted in two vertical-screen web dramas.

Yes, “mobile vertical-screen web dramas.”

The kind that aired exclusively on short-video apps, five minutes an episode, over thirty episodes a season, with plots completely divorced from reality, no more than five filming locations, fewer than ten actors in the entire production, and could be binged while sitting on the toilet.

They were low-budget, intelligence-lowering dramas precisely targeted at lower-tier markets, with a demographic of under-tens and over-fifties.

When Da and Xiao Ding find out he is acting in a vertical-screen drama, they look at him with pity, as if he is willingly debasing himself.

Jiang Lechen didn’t think there was anything shameful about acting in such a low-budget, brain-numbing show.

There was never any inherent hierarchy between high art and popular entertainment. Were audiences in third-tier cities not still audiences? As long as they were an audience, they were the ones who put food on his table.

Besides, what was there to be picky about for a small-time flop like him, having work, getting paid, and getting a free boxed lunch?

Incidentally, the two vertical-screen dramas he acted in were titled The Overbearing King of Hell Fell in Love with Me and The Overbearing King of Hell Fell in Love with Me 2.

He played the fourth male lead, the White Impermanence (handsome version).

The viewership was actually pretty high. Every episode got over a hundred thousand likes.

Little Jiang hopped out of bed and got dressed, taking three minutes to wash his face and another three to apply foundation and draw his eyebrows, before rushing downstairs to report to the film crew.

When the assistant director saw him, he paused for a few seconds, looked him over carefully, and asked with certainty, “You’ve acted before, haven’t you?”

Jiang Lechen’s heart leaped. Could it be that the heavens do favor flop idols? Have I met a fan of the White Impermanence (handsome version)?

Jiang Lechen nodded. “Yes, yes, I’ve acted in…”

“I don’t know what you’ve acted in,” the assistant director cut him off. “In China, only three types of men draw their eyebrows. The first works in the fashion and entertainment industry, the second needs to be on camera, and the third is gay. You’re a student, so you’re definitely not the first type.”

Jiang Lechen: “…That’s a stereotype.”

Can’t a regular Chinese man draw his eyebrows?

Assistant Director: “So, are you the second or third type? Or both?”

Jiang Lechen: “…”

Jiang Lechen: “The second type.”

Assistant Director: “Not the third?”

Jiang Lechen shook his head vigorously. “Nope!”

For some godforsaken reason, the assistant director insisted on investigating. “Not for now, or not ever?”

Jiang Lechen got annoyed. “I’m here to be an extra. Does whether or not I’m the third type have anything to do with being an extra?”

“It does,” the assistant director said, fanning himself with the script in his hand. “There’s a role, more lines, a proper featured extra, and the character is the third type. The guy we cast suddenly can’t make it, and I just saw that you have a good look and some experience…”

“Assistant Director!” Jiang Lechen raised his hand without a shred of integrity. “Although I am not the third type, for the sake of art, I can be the third type!!”

A featured extra could make at least a thousand yuan a day. If there were a lot of lines, it could even be two thousand! He’d already acted in The Overbearing King of Hell Fell in Love with Me. What else was there to be afraid of?

---

Author’s Note:

Little Jiang: I’m a man who’s acted in a web drama, thank you very much.