The Devil Doctor's Spicy Love
Chapter 156: The process of healing

Chapter 156: The process of healing

Jia dropped by the same evening for her dinner at the hotel’s restaurant. She didn’t see anybody from the drama crew which she had expected. Everybody was holed up in their rooms.

"Partner~!"

She threw a salty gaze at Mingshen. "Can you stop following me for once?"

"It was my following you that saved you from becoming one with the sea~"

Her brow twitched.

"It’s a lament though. You didn’t get your sweet sugar rush. The case was already solved by the time we reached," he poked her.

"Is it now?"

"I think you missed to see the part where an arrest was made."

"I saw that."

He chuckled. "But you aren’t satisfied."

Jia’s eyes narrowed. "Are you? I saw you talking to the forensic doctor from Supervisor Lei’s team. I wonder what you had to talk about when the cause of death is so clear."

"Hm it might not be so simple~"

"What do you mean?"

"Secret."

She glared at him. "How many times should I tell you to not treat crime cases as your entertainment! If you have any suspicions, then you should take it to Supervisor Lei."

"I have already."

She sighed in relief. "Thank God."

"But he dares not listen to me so I am gonna wage a war now."

"..."

Jia didn’t know how to react.

"Don’t look at me like that, Spicy. I did not start it and I don’t like it when anybody who is NOT a doctor brushes off my inputs. For that matter anybody who IS a doctor isn’t allowed either because I always know what I am talking about~" He laughed. "This is gonna be fun."

"Oh my God..." she felt a headache coming. "Mingshen, you cannot put Beijing and Tianjin forces at odds with each other. We have to cooperate, not fight with each other."

Mingshen leaned closer with a hint of craftiness. "Where is the fun without a fight?"

"If you don’t want me to make you one with the sea, then you better stay within your limits and not cause trouble."

"Um..."

Behind her, Meng Rin hesitantly intervened. "Can I pass?"

"I am sorry. Please go ahead."

"Thank you."

"Are you doing okay?"

Meng Rin’s bubbly self had withered like a dying flower. The circles under her eyes screamed of exhaustion. "Not really. It has become so gloomy now. Nobody wants to talk about it...If you don’t mind, can I join you for dinner? Nobody is in the mood and I don’t wish to be alone..."

"Sure."

They took a seat at the corner side table and quietly ordered their food.

"I still cannot believe that Director Wan has...He was just there until last night and now...Everything is so horrible," her eyes ached as she exhaled shakily. She gently wiped her eyes. "And Meymey getting arrested amidst is just too hard to bear."

Her phone buzzed and she switched off the ring.

Jia smiled understandingly. "Do you like Chow Mey?"

"Of course," Meng Rin looked surprised as if there wasn’t supposed to be even a question as such. "She is so beautiful and talented. I treat her like my elder sister. But the world is being so harsh on her..."

She blinked. "Like how?"

Meng Rin stared at her glass. "Chow Mey turned thirty-two this year, but she still wants to continue acting."

"What is stopping her then?"

She was taken aback. "I don’t think you know how our industry works. An actress crosses thirty and she starts to get treated like an old woman. She gets too mature roles like being a mother or other such when she is only in her thirties. Our worth in this industry is only until we are in our twenties. We are considered..." she grimaced, "young and fresh."

Jia silently listened to her.

"But it’s the opposite for an actor. It’s said for a male actor to reach the prime of his acting career when he enters his thirties. Look at Caishen and Haoyu. They are in their thirties and they are getting the best roles of their life. But we, on the other hand, constantly have to prove ourselves. It’s scary. I am twenty-six. In four years, I will be facing the same fate as Chow Mey..."

Her gaze lowered. "I heard that it wasn’t easy for her to get the lead role in this drama. She was twenty-seven when this drama started. The production team knew that by the time it would be over, she would be well above the acceptable age.

They were afraid of the audience finding her too old or losing connection with her. Chow Mey had fought a lot for this role because she knew that this might very well be her last popular stint as an actress. The roles which she will get later on would be just plain humiliating to even listen to."

Meng Rin quietly lifted her gaze and faced Mingshen. "That’s why she worked so much on cosmetic surgeries. To keep looking young as much as possible. To not look like a wasteland for producers and directors to dump trashy roles on her."

Mingshen stared at her in silence.

"I heard your argument last night, Dr. Yang. I agree with you. I think you understand our problem but at the same time you don’t. Beauty is the gold standard here. If we don’t look the part, then directors don’t even glance at us. Then how will the audience see us if we are not casted in the first place? We just become invisible."

Mingshen sneered. "You are prepared to ruin your bodies for a stranger audience behind the screens you have never even seen and who support you but can also abandon you at the drop of a hat?"

She froze.

He shrugged. "The problem is the producers and directors here. You just need to slap them into their senses and make them understand basic math. Thirty is not equal to fifty. Maybe they were really slow in their studies as a child. Nothing that cannot be fixed with a little positive encouragement~"

"..."

Jia’s mouth twitched.

Meng Rin couldn’t help but ask a very obvious question, "Do you understand that any top management for a movie or drama holds the most power and gets to decide the cast?"

He laughed. "You don’t tell me about power. I am Yang Mingshen. I practically swim in power and influence."

"..."

She eyed Jia, throwing her a blank look. Jia returned a sympathetic and understanding nod.

"You cannot lift a finger against me. But you will only understand that when you are prepared to break your fingers first," he smiled mischievously.

Meng Rin had a little trouble understanding at first but she slowly caught the gist. Her phone lit up and she peeked at it. She locked the phone and said, "Are you suggesting...we fight with the directors?"

"I don’t suggest. I wage wars. But you get it now~"

She was left even more dumbfounded. "Are you crazy? We fight and lose what little chance we have in scoring good roles? If we are marked as troublesome actors to work with, then that becomes our reputation and nobody even lets us try for auditions anymore!"

"So?" Mingshen lazily cocked his brow. "If this is a common problem across your gender then all actresses should do something about it. But that’s the problem. You don’t want to try. Nobody wants to. So you duck your heads and comply with everything. Like I said to Chow Mey, you ought to be selfish, not benevolent."

"They wouldn’t listen to us! And it’s easy for you to say because you have the power to make people bend to your will. We don’t have that."

"I am not comparing your fighting method with mine anyway. I can ruin somebody’s whole career with a snap of my finger. You cannot do that. So what options are you left with?" He tilted his head.

"If one person isn’t heard, then gather two people. If two aren’t heard, then gather four. You do this until you bring the whole army to slap the fuck out of the management."

"That’s impossible," Meng Rin looked in horror.

"That’s why I said that you aren’t prepared to break your fingers," he smiled. "Do you know what a body does to heal a cut?"

It was evident that she didn’t.

"Thousands of platelets come together to form a clot to stop the bleeding. Then our immune system fights like crazy to fend off the bad bacteria. Then the new skin slowly begins to form. Eventually the wound undergoes remodeling and gradually contracts. It’s a beautiful and intelligent process that can take months to finish.

So thousands of actresses should come together to stop this collective bleeding. Fight the industry for your own safety. They will have no choice but to form new rules that have your well-being in place. Eventually, the industry will be remodeled and the norms hurting you all will gradually contract. It takes time and effort to heal an injury whether physical or societal."

Meng Rin shook hard.

"If every single actress tomorrow shuts down to work until some sense is brought into the system for women, then what can the management do? Can your industry survive solely on male actors?" he sneered.

"...That’s too extreme."

"So are your issues. Large scale and deep rooted problems require large scale and deep rooted solutions too. Wounds don’t heal by magic and simply garnering sympathy for your problems won’t get you a shit worth of attention. Nobody has time for sympathy here."