Chapter 172 172 Bustle

Chapter 172: The Scandal

The *Boundless Ambition* crew was unfairly implicated in this situation, as the collapse wasn’t due to the film’s plot.

As a straightforward commercial film, objectively speaking, while *Boundless Ambition* wasn’t as stellar as the trailers suggested, it wasn’t terrible either.

However, at the critical moment of the film’s release, its lead actor became embroiled in a cheating scandal.

The media’s coverage was explosive, instantly blowing up on trending searches—more sensational than a variety show. The primary and secondary women involved took turns exposing him, presenting damning evidence one after another, leaving the actor with no room for denial.

The lead actor of *Boundless Ambition* was indeed garbage—a fact Lu Xu, Zheng Xiao, and the others all agreed on. However, his infidelities hadn’t occurred during the Spring Festival season, nor even in winter, but half a year prior.

In other words, the scandal could’ve surfaced anytime, yet it was strategically dropped right as *Boundless Ambition* premiered during the Spring Festival season. The timing was undeniably suspicious.

"Lü Ming signed on for *Boundless Ambition* before this," Xu Wen said to Lu Xu. "Likely, someone sat on the story until now to maximize damage."

Lü Ming was the lead actor of *Boundless Ambition*, a rising star with industry clout. The film was meant to boost his career—his agency had planned to secure him better resources if the box office performed well. Unfortunately, Lü Ming couldn’t keep it in his pants.

"Regardless, this couldn’t have been pulled off by the *Boundless Ambition* crew," Xu Wen remarked. "As for who’s really behind it, who knows?"

The only thing Lu Xu could confirm was that the *Fearless Life* team hadn’t done it.

Lü Ming still had some stans who, despite the overwhelming evidence, defended him, arguing that the timing of the exposé during the Spring Festival season was clearly intended to sabotage *Boundless Ambition*.

The *Boundless Ambition* crew seemed to share this belief.

As soon as Lü Ming’s scandal broke, the production team tried to silence the accusers, but the women refused, even accusing the crew of intimidation.

Additionally, the *Boundless Ambition* team issued a statement claiming that the scandal’s timing was a hit job orchestrated by "certain malicious competitors."

Yet, with Lü Ming’s misconduct being indisputably proven, the crew’s statement didn’t stop the bleeding—*Boundless Ambition*’s box office took a massive hit.

"The Spring Festival season is next-level chaotic," Lu Xu mused.

His agent shot him a look. "Good thing you don’t have any dirt on you. Otherwise, with this momentum, you wouldn’t have escaped either."

In reality, whether it was Lu Xu and his team or the *Fearless Life* crew, many suspected that the "malicious competitor" referenced by *Boundless Ambition* was the film whose title started with "Return."

*Fearless Life* had no reason to play dirty.

Given its current box office trajectory, surpassing *Boundless Ambition* was a given. With increased screenings, it might only take a couple of days to overtake *Boundless Ambition*—there was no need to crush it outright.

Moreover, neither *Fearless Life*’s director Miao Zhi nor its lead actor Lu Xu were the type to undermine rivals. Their promotional strategies always revolved around the film’s content.

If Miao Zhi had been playing games, he wouldn’t have lost his award to Liu Rennong in the first place.

As for Lu Xu, he had even less motive—*Fearless Life*’s box office was soaring, and he was already a Contention Award-winning Best Actor with a bright future ahead.

Why would the valedictorian bother sabotaging the second-place contender?

Of course, this was just an analogy—*Fearless Life* wasn’t the top earner yet.

The reason *Return Undecided* was under suspicion, aside from Liu Rennong and his disciples’ shady rep, was another factor:

Although *Return Undecided*’s opening-day box office had surpassed *Boundless Ambition*’s, its pre-sales were higher to begin with. More tellingly, when analyzed by time slots, *Boundless Ambition*’s ticket sales growth had actually outpaced *Return Undecided*’s during the latter half of the opening day—after around 4 PM.

If this trend had continued, *Boundless Ambition* stood a real chance of overtaking *Return Undecided*.

However, after *Boundless Ambition*’s statement, *Return Undecided*’s team promptly released a high-horse statement, asserting that they had always competed fairly and ethically during the Spring Festival season. They emphasized their shared goal with other productions of expanding the market and fostering a harmonious environment, urging everyone not to let "a few bad apples" ruin the festive spirit.

The implication of the *Return Undecided* crew was clearly that Lü Ming was a bad apple.

This infuriated the *Boundless Ambition* team beyond measure.

Lü Ming's scandal blew up on New Year's Eve, even overshadowing the jokes from the Spring Festival Gala that had gone viral. Due to the scandal, *Boundless Ambition*—which had initially been outperforming *Return Undecided* in box office momentum—tanked the next day, dropping to fourth place in real-time rankings, trailing behind *Return Undecided* and *Fearless Life*, and even falling below that yearly kids' movie that made its annual appearance.

The latter was usually excluded from the fierce competition of the Spring Festival releases, as its audience was highly specific and rarely overlapped with other films.

However, this children's movie was often referred to as the Benchmark for Hits—in other words, any film that surpassed it in box office was a true hit, while those that didn't were considered undeserving of their reputation.

*Boundless Ambition* was already screwed, yet it still had to endure the *Return Undecided* crew's mockery.

"Lü Ming's film career is basically over," Xu Wen said matter-of-factly. "The contract between the crew and him was very detailed. As the lead, he bears significant responsibility for *Boundless Ambition*'s box office collapse, and the subsequent compensation will likely clean him out."

"But he brought this upon himself, so he can't blame anyone else."

In short, with Lü Ming's scandal breaking out, *Boundless Ambition* was effectively out of the running for this Spring Festival season. Even if the crew tried their best to salvage Lü Ming's image or attract more audience support, other films in the same release window wouldn’t let them succeed.

Screen time was too valuable. Only if *Boundless Ambition* fell could other films secure more screen time.

...

On the second day of release, influenced by the previous day's box office performance, *Fearless Life* saw a slight increase in screenings, rising to 19.6%.

A nearly 5% increase was nothing to sneeze at.

At first, Lu Xu's fans were thrilled, but when they saw the screening distribution, they were pissed.

Most of *Fearless Life*'s additional screenings came at the expense of *Boundless Ambition*, while *Return Undecided*, still ranked first, maintained its 29% share almost unchanged.

*Boundless Ambition*'s screenings plummeted, and another rescue-themed film, *Countdown 18*, also saw a 2% drop. The impact of box office fluctuations on screenings was felt by other films, but *Return Undecided* remained completely unaffected.

"...*Return Undecided*'s per-screen earnings aren't even that strong, are they? Why does it have such a high screening share?"

"Now *Fearless Life* has 19%, but who’s ever seen a Spring Festival release where the first place has 29% and the second has 19%? Screen time is priceless during this season!"

"What if *Fearless Life*'s single-day take surpasses *Return Undecided*? Wouldn’t that be awkward?"

"Having watched both *Return Undecided* and *Fearless Life*, I still think *Fearless Life* is better. Actually... if you ignore Lü Ming being a dumpster fire, *Boundless Ambition* is also better than *Return Undecided*."

*Fearless Life* tells the story of Bai Qianshan, while *Return Undecided* is a feel-good family drama with the same basic premise as *How Much Do You Know*. Such films are usually well-received during the Spring Festival. However, the lead performance in *Return Undecided* was still wooden, with inconsistent emotional delivery, making it harder for the audience to immerse themselves.

With *Return Undecided* getting such a high screening share, it’d be embarrassing if its per-screen average doesn’t hit half a billion."

This time, Lu Xu didn’t go to the cinema to watch *Return Undecided*. *Fearless Life*'s promotional grind was relentless—after its strong opening-day reception, the Roadshow expanded further.

The Roadshow wasn’t limited to major cities like C City but also included universities, Bai Qianshan’s hometown, and his high school, where his childhood friends were invited to share his story.

Despite their advanced age, they still remembered clear as day Bai Qianshan’s brilliance in science and their shock upon seeing him in the news.

"Everyone thought he wouldn’t come back, that he’d stay overseas."

"His parents mentioned he had returned, but where was he? No one knew. Back then, people here said his parents were putting on a front, unwilling to admit they’d 'sold' their son abroad, so they lied. It wasn’t until years later that everyone realized how remarkable he was."

"It was incredibly hard—not just for Bai Qianshan himself, but also for his parents. The gossip was unavoidable. At the time, there were even suspicious people digging for dirt about him, but they found nothing."

In Bai Qianshan’s hometown, *Fearless Life* had the highest screening share, and the numbers blew them away—almost every showing was packed, with many audience members returning for second watches.

After barely finishing the Roadshow in one city, Lu Xu didn’t even have time to sleep before rushing to the airport for the next day’s event.

During the roadshow, Lu Xu had no sense of how popular *Fearless Life* was, only noticing that the theaters were packed and each screening saw the creators warmly welcomed by the audience.

After the second day's roadshow ended, several crew members huddled in the hotel to check the day's box office numbers. Lu Xu was exhausted but still opened his phone to check the data.

The opening day box office of *Fearless Life* not only surprised the audience but equally shocked the creators.

It was both the best opening day for director Miao Zhi and the highest opening day box office for Lu Xu as a lead actor.

The strong box office performance filled everyone with motivation, making them work even harder on the roadshow.

That day, despite *Boundless Ambition* losing ground steadily, neither Miao Zhi nor Lu Xu expected *Fearless Life* to surpass *Return Undecided* at the box office, given the full 10% difference in screenings.

As it turned out—*Fearless Life* indeed didn't overtake *Return Undecided*.

But...

The day's box office rankings were as follows:

1st place: *Return Undecided*, total box office of 357 million RMB.

2nd place: *Fearless Life*, box office of 354 million RMB.

The difference was just over 3 million RMB, practically breathing down its neck.

The problem was, *Return Undecided* had 10% more screenings than *Fearless Life*. If that extra 10% had been allocated to *Fearless Life* (which had 19.6% screenings), its box office could have increased by 178 million RMB.

Meanwhile, *Return Undecided* managed only an additional 3 million RMB with its extra 10% screenings—a frankly embarrassing performance.

"...Honestly, *Return Undecided* even had better time slots than *Fearless Life*. I really want to say, if those prime-time screenings had gone to *Fearless Life*, its box office would’ve soared even higher."

"+1, what kind of terrible time slots are these? Even non-fans feel sorry for *Fearless Life*."

"Seriously, *Return Undecided* needs to vomit back some screenings. I said it yesterday—is the crew the cinema's daddy or what?"

"Maybe not the daddy, but they must’ve signed some secret agreement nobody knows about."

"With 10% more screenings, they only managed 3 million RMB more in box office? How pathetic. Doesn’t the crew feel awkward about this?"

The *Fearless Life* team, including Lu Xu, felt that their film’s screening share could rise some more.

Sure enough, as expected, *Fearless Life*’s screening share did rise, while *Return Undecided*’s got a tiny trim.

The specific numbers showed *Return Undecided*’s new screening share at 28.9%, while *Fearless Life*’s climbed to 22.9%.

Online commenters reacted: "..."

"They couldn’t spare even 1%?!!"

"...So why don’t the cinemas just give *Return Undecided* 99% of the screenings? If it's so damn profitable, it deserves 99%!"

The cinema chains turned a deaf ear to the criticism.

Meanwhile, *Boundless Ambition*—which was written off from the Spring Festival lineup but still managed over 80 million RMB in daily box office—spoke out publicly again, accusing others of stealing their box office.