I'm really good at this.

After Li Shanqi made his own revelation, the atmosphere in the private room suddenly became tense.

Finally, Zhang Hong broke the silence.

His expression was serious, and he asked very earnestly, "Yamazaki, could you please introduce your work?"

Then he received silent stares from everyone present.

Especially a certain young lady with long, straight black hair, she even started shaking her leg.

Zhang Hong quickly tried to salvage the situation: "No, I didn't mean anything by it. I just wanted to see your photography skills through your past work."

Lin Muqing gave him an elbow strike to the kidney.

"Well... there are no pirated DVDs sold in Japan, and besides, they're currently not allowed to be imported into China," Li Shanqi answered instinctively, then immediately realized, "No! Brother Hong, I really can't!"

My reaction just now was purely a habit from my previous profession.

His friends in Japan knew he was in this line of work, so they often asked him to help them buy DVDs.

He's gotten used to it.

Zhang Hong fell into deep thought.

He was thinking.

Okay, actually he was thinking of a bad idea.

In the past, he was as pure as paper, and extremely Buddhist.

That's because he didn't have any expectations for the future; at twenty-three, he already saw what he would look like at sixty.

So he lived like a plant.

Do not offend anyone, do not help anyone, do not like anyone, and do not hate anyone.

But now it's different.

He saw hope for takeoff and found the motivation to make money, so... he decided not to remain a "vegetative state" person.

He wants to be a bad guy.

Stroking his chin, Zhang Hong suddenly changed the subject and asked a question: "Yamazaki, have you told anyone else in China about your job as a cinematographer? Like your parents, relatives, or old classmates?"

Li Shanqi said with a wry smile, "Brother Hong, stop joking. How could I possibly say something like that? I still have some self-respect."

If Zhang Hong hadn't pressed him so hard, and if he hadn't genuinely wanted to mend their broken friendship, he wouldn't have told him.

"I see~~~" Zhang Hong's tone fluctuated inexplicably, making him seem particularly sarcastic.

Then he asked another question: "Do you need to be there constantly watching over that hair salon?"

"That's not necessary. I only do hair for a few of my old clients now, and they usually need to make an appointment. I only go to the shop occasionally." Li Shanqi was very wary. "Brother Hong, it's useless to say that. Even if I close down the hair salon, I'm not going to go back to being a photographer."

"That's probably not up to you now," Zhang Hong smiled, his fate uncertain.

Since the hair salon wouldn't go out of business just because Li Shanqi left, Zhang Hong had no worries about the future.

From now on, he's going to be a bad man focused solely on making money.

And Li Shanqi was exactly the kind of talent he needed.

The main problem is that we can't find other talented people.

Zhang Hong took out his phone and opened his contacts and WeChat groups one by one: "I'll show you something amazing~~ Yamazaki, look what this is~~~"

The address book contains the contact information for Li Shanqi's parents.

The WeChat group is a WeChat group for my high school classmates.

Not only were all the students in the class in the group, but even their homeroom teacher was there.

Li Shanqi seemed to sense something: "Brother Hong, what are you trying to do?"

Zhang Hong smiled wickedly: "Guess~~"

Li Shanqi's eyes widened in terror: "Brother Hong! Brother Hong! You're my own brother! Please don't do anything rash!"

"Impulsive? I'm absolutely ecstatic right now!" Zhang Hong's grin stretched almost to the back of his head. "Not even Jesus could stop me! I'm telling you!"

Li Shanqi's expression suddenly turned resentful: "Brother Hong, you've changed. You weren't like this before... How could my melancholic, aloof, and handsome god-like Brother Hong become like this?"

Zhang Hong's eyes were deep, his voice low and magnetic: "Yamazaki, people change, especially after being toughened up by society. Take you, for example. You were clearly an ambitious young man who would stay up all night to study photography techniques, so how could you give up your dreams and come back to run a hair salon in such a dejected state?"

And it's a fraudulent hair salon!

The whole thing—a little pink light and frosted glass—looks so professional!

A man who deceives others' feelings doesn't deserve sympathy!

Li Shanqi smiled wryly: "Brother Hong, I thought you understood me. After all, you were the man who once told me, 'All romantic fantasies about the industry are essentially rooted in ignorance of the industry.' I should have listened to you back then."

He was apologizing tactfully.

Zhang Hong started to play the emotional card, his tone suddenly becoming very deep: "No, I was actually quite envious of you back then, after all, you had your own dream, while I was still searching for my own dream."

"But later I realized that longing is the emotion furthest from understanding. So now I have no emotions. And I've also found my own dream."

Zhang only wanted to make money, marry a rich and beautiful woman, change his family and life, and then successfully reach the pinnacle of life.

Li Shanqi was filled with grief and indignation: "Brother Hong, what will it take for you to let me go?"

He absolutely mustn't tell anyone he works as a pornographic film cameraman in Japan! He doesn't want to suffer social death...

"Child, it's not that I'm letting you off the hook, but that you need to let yourself off the hook." Zhang Hong, like a saint, put his arm around his shoulder and gently persuaded him, "A person who carries too heavy a burden of history will find it difficult to move forward."

Li Shanqi continued to sigh, "But Hong-ge, you probably don't understand... what I went through in Japan."

"Then tell me, how am I supposed to know if you don't tell me?" Zhang Hong suddenly switched from artistic mode to normal mode.

Li Shanqi glanced at the other strangers, opened his mouth but didn't say anything.

Zhang Hong encouraged him, "Just say it. I bet you've been keeping it bottled up for a long time. Don't make yourself sick. Don't worry, we're all family here. From now on, we're all family, and no one will tell anyone."

He turned his head and asked, "You agree, right?"

Everyone nodded in unison (except Lin Muqing): "That's right! We didn't hear anything! We don't know anything!"

They just want to be gossips!

Perhaps some of them have other ideas, like Lin Chuan...

"Yes! You can tell from our eyes that we're all upright people! Compared to Brother Hong, we're as innocent as blank sheets of paper." Lin Chuan said righteously. "Brother Yamazaki, could we add each other on WeChat? I don't mean anything by it, I'm just curious about your work. Uh..."

After taking Lin Muqing's "Mountain Collapse Strike," Lin Chuan was unable to rise again.

Lee Yamazaki's defenses were about to be broken down.

He sighed again and said, "Don't laugh at me."

Zhang Hong nodded: "Don't worry, we won't. No matter how funny it is, we won't laugh."

Do you have any cigarettes?

"Yes." Zhang Hong took out a cigarette, handed it to him, and then lit it for him himself.

Zhang Hong also lit one for himself.

However, a hand reached over and snatched the cigarette away, also throwing away a pack of cigarettes and a lighter that Zhang Honggang had placed on the table.

Zhang Hong turned around and met Lin Muqing's cold and disdainful eyes.

Lin Muqing frowned: "I hate the smell of smoke."

Zhang Hong shrugged: "I will quit smoking in the future, but definitely not now."

"There won't be a future." Lin Muqing looked disgusted, took out a lollipop from her bag, tore off the wrapper, and stuffed it into his mouth. She turned her head away from him, just playing with a strand of hair at her sideburns. "Give it up. I hate the smell of smoke."

Zhang Hong nodded, then reached out and took the cigarette from Li Shanqi's mouth, stubbing it out in the ashtray: "From now on, no one in the team is allowed to smoke in front of Director Lin."

Li Shanqi was stunned for a moment, then sighed, "Fine, but I won't join. Brother Hong, promise me that if I really tell you, you'll let me off the hook."

"Okay." Zhang Hong said sincerely, "If you tell me, I won't tell your aunt and uncle or your old classmates about your time as a cinematographer."

"Well then, I'll tell you, don't be afraid." Li Shanqi seemed to be recalling something, and his expression became very distorted.

"That was my lifelong nightmare. You know, those adult films, right? Sometimes you have to get really close to film them."

"Then that time... that male actor, I couldn't dodge it, it was all over my face and the camera. So I quit my job and came back."

The male comrades present were all stunned for a moment, then instantly understood.

Everyone exchanged glances, and their gazes toward Li Shanqi became strange.

Lin Muqing raised an eyebrow but didn't say anything.

Bai Xueye looked completely bewildered: "Huh? That's it? What does that mean?"

"Children don't need to know," Zhang Hong replied, then patted Li Shanqi on the shoulder sympathetically. "Okay, thank you for your hard work."

Then, quite naturally, he wiped his hand on Lee Yamazaki's clothes.

Li Shanqi: "..."

He smiled with relief: "I have to say, it really did make me feel a lot better after I said it."

He felt as refreshed as if he had just put on a new pair of underwear on the morning of the first day of the Lunar New Year.

It's similar to that feeling of "Ah, I don't care about anything anymore, I feel like there's nothing to be afraid of."

"Brother Hong, you won't tell anyone, will you?"

"Silly child, when has Brother Hong ever lied to you? Of course I wouldn't tell anyone about you being a director of adult films. But..."

Zhang Hong smiled slightly and turned the phone, which was face down on the table, over.

The screen shows that it is recording audio, and it has been recording for ten minutes.

"But if you don't join, I'll be really sad. And when I'm sad, even I'm afraid of myself. Yamazaki, you know what I mean, right?"

Lee Yamazaki suffered cardiac and pulmonary arrest.

P.S.: Daily request for votes 2/2!

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