Chapter 322: The First Day in the Entertainment World

Chapter 322: The First Day of Transmigrating into the Entertainment World

As consciousness sharpened, he synced up with his new body.

After dying of old age in his last life, he'd transmigrated again.

He wondered what kind of novel he'd landed in this time.

An Yi opened his eyes.

The first things that hit him were a blindingly bright light and stale air thick with hair gel, sweat, and some nasty cologne.

He was sitting on a plastic chair in a cramped, messy room stuffed with costumes and random junk—some kind of makeshift dressing room or stage backstage.

What pissed him off was the voice in front of him—spit flying, yapping nonstop.

A middle-aged guy in loud clothes, a bit chubby, hair slicked back with too much grease, stood there with his hands on his hips, finger practically in An Yi's face, rattling off bullshit like a machine gun:

"...I'm talking to you, An Yi! Are you even listening? Boss Yang is doing you a solid! Tons of people would kill for this! It's just dinner, what's the big deal? You'll get plenty of gigs out of it!"

"That drama, *Autumn Water Strategy*—one of the two male leads! It's the hottest IP out there! You know how many people are gunning for this part?"

When the guy saw An Yi just staring back at him blankly, with none of his usual timid, squirming attitude, his anger spiked. His voice went up, dripping with menace:

"An Yi! I'm talking to you! Are you even fucking listening?! Don't bite the hand that feeds you!"

"Who the hell do you think you are? Your little group fell apart ages ago! You're a nobody stuck in the eighteenth tier! If it weren't for that face, nobody would give a damn about you! Don't get all high and mighty with me!"

"I'm telling you—if you don't agree today, I'll make sure you never work in this industry again! Getting you blacklisted is one word from Boss Yang!"

An Yi blinked, his long lashes casting faint shadows under his eyes, and zeroed in on the source of the racket.

Too loud.

Gross.

He lifted his gaze to the man's face, twisted with rage: "Shut up."

Deng Yingrui—the original owner's manager—was caught off guard by those two words and that calm, piercing stare. His throat seized up, his words died, and he actually shut his mouth.

But that weird obedience lasted all of two seconds.

A wave of absurdity and outrage at being disrespected blew right through the shock. Deng Yingrui's face went beet-red as he shrieked:

"What did you say?! You're telling me to shut up?! Have you lost your damn mind?! You got no respect for me?! You ungrateful little bitch! Shameless piece of trash! If the company hadn't signed you, you'd have starved on the streets!...%@&*beep beep beep*￥#@..."

A stream of filth poured out of his pig mouth, full of personal attacks and nasty curses.

An Yi: "..."

He let out a soft sigh. As the manager kept pointing at his nose, spit nearly hitting his face, An Yi suddenly stood up.

He clenched his fist, raised his arm, and drove it straight into the guy's face.

"Thud!"

A dull impact, followed by a crisp, bone-snapping "crack."

All of Deng Yingrui's curses and screams got stuck in his throat, turning into a short whimper.

His eyes bulged, then rolled back. His fat body swayed and crumpled like a sack of mud, out cold, blood pouring from his nose and streaking down his greasy face.

An Yi glanced at him. Even grosser.

But at least it was finally quiet.

An Yi looked down, gave the unconscious manager a cold glance, and sat back down on the plastic chair.

He needed to figure out what the hell was going on.

He closed his eyes and started absorbing the memories and info left by the body's original owner.

The original owner was also named An Yi.

Eighteen.

His job was idol—or rather, ex-idol.

After transmigrating over a dozen lifetimes, he'd come back as a sing-dance-rap idol.

Interesting.

He'd been part of a boy group called "Glitter" that was briefly popular but quickly tanked due to bad management, uneven skills, and no follow-up support.

The other members were either rich kids who treated it as a hobby and went home to inherit the family business once they flopped, or nepo babies with connections who'd already lined up their next gigs.

Only the original owner was a regular kid from a normal family, chasing a star dream. With his good looks and a burst of passion, he'd signed with this company called Canxing.

The contract was for fifteen years. Three had passed, leaving twelve long years of being tied down.

After "Glitter" fell apart in name, the original owner became a piece of chicken rib to the company—tasteless to eat, but a shame to throw away.

Until recently, a rich investor named Boss Yang had run into the original owner by chance, been instantly blown away by his looks, and decided he wanted to exploit him.

The unconscious guy, Deng Yingrui, was the original owner's manager, clearly well-paid as the middleman, and had been pulling out all the stops to pressure and lure him into giving in.

The carrot was that if he gave in to Boss Yang, he'd get one of the two male lead roles in the hot costume drama IP *Autumn Water Strategy* and use it to make a comeback.

The stick was that if he refused, he'd be blacklisted on breach-of-contract charges and shelved, never to see the light of day again.

The original owner was timid by nature and crushed by a massive penalty clause. He was tormented, unwilling to give in but powerless to fight back. In his extreme anxiety and fear, An Yi happened to take over his body today.

An Yi slowly opened his eyes, now getting the full picture.

An eighteenth-tier idol?

Being sexually exploited?

A massive penalty fee?

And... a twelve-year indentured contract?

Fine.

Being an entertainer was a first for him.

He looked around. It was a prop storage room on a set.

He was here to take in Deng Yingrui's "pearls of wisdom."

From the fragmented memories left behind, An Yi learned that after the disbandment of the group "Glitter," the other members had gone their separate ways, each chasing their own future. Only the original host, a kid from an ordinary family with no connections or resources, remained stuck to Sparkle Star Entertainment—a ship that looked fancy on the outside but was actually falling apart.

The company gave him no real opportunities, but it didn't let him sit idle either. It treated him like a cheap leftover, using him wherever he could be squeezed dry.

One day, he'd be singing and dancing at the opening ceremony of a mall in some third-tier city; the next, he'd be a background prop in a shoddily made web drama, the kind where he didn't even get a single line.

He was kept busy, but he had no idea what it was all for.

And today, his presence in this obscure little production was out of the ordinary—he'd landed a role with actual lines.

It was a low-budget period drama, and he was cast as a nameless henchman by the side of the villain's leader. The script simply referred to him as "Attendant A."

The role had three scenes in total, each with a few lines—nothing more than "Young master, they're catching up!" or "This lowly servant has failed you, young master!" or "I'll fight you all!"—the standard repertoire.