Chapter 257: Bloody Storm

Translator: Dragon Boat Translation Editor: Dragon Boat Translation

The essence of human nature is gossip, and everyone loves to be nosy on the internet. More and more people join in the fun of gossips. Apart from the luxury brand G Corporation, Lu Siyu had many other endorsements, and the curious netizens tagged all those brands one by one.

Even the official account of the TV drama she was currently shooting was flooded with comments.

Many people rushed to Lu Siyu’s Weibo account, demanding her to come out and explain and apologize.

With the aggressive publicity she had been receiving recently, Lu Siyu’s popularity was soaring. Although she had no recent works, she had numerou endorsements, and her account already had millions of followers.

Her loyal fans naturally didn’t believe that their idol could do anything wrong. They rushed to the scene, asking the curious onlookers to present evidence; otherwise, it would be considered spreading rumors.

Both sides engaged in a fierce battle in Lu Siyu’s comment section.

The more they argued, the more heated it became. Soon, Lu Siyu’s name also made it to the trending topics.

At this moment, inside the film and television city’s studio, Lu Siyu had just finished a day of shooting. After politely thanking the director and the crew, she and her manager walked into the dressing room together.

“The director has a good impression of you. Keep up the good work, but also work harder on your acting skills,” the manager reminded her.

“I know, Manager Yue,” Lu Siyu obediently nodded. Just as she was about to sit down to remove her makeup, a young assistant rushed in, looking anxious. “Something bad has happened, we’re trending!”

“Why would that be bad news? Why are you panicking?” Lu Siyu said casually.

For someone like her, who didn’t have any recent works, getting on the trending list would usually require paying for it.

So, when it happened naturally without spending money, it was actually a good thing for maintaining her popularity.

“No, you have to take a look,” the assistant said anxiously, handing over her phone.

The manager was about to take the phone when her own phone rang.

He answered the call and, as he listened to the message on the other end, his expression turned increasingly grim.

“Sorry, President Zhou, please don’t worry. I’ll verify the situation with Lu Yu immediately. We’ll handle this matter properly, and it won’t affect your brand’s image.”

As he was on the phone, another call came in.

The manager hung up, hurriedly contacting the person in charge of Lu Siyu’s Weibo account to remove the trending topic, delete the hashtags, and ban several accounts that were spreading negative information.

After receiving a dozen more calls and offering numerous apologies, things finally calmed down.

He looked at Lu Siyu with suppressed anger, “You better tell me the truth. What is the matter with these revelations on Weibo? The best time for damage control is within three hours. Now, we can still use the excuse that you’re busy filming and not responding. After three hours, everyone will think you’re guilty, and they’ll assume all those allegations are true. Then you’ll face not only contract cancellations but also massive compensations to the brands.”

Lu Siyu knew that lying to her manager at this time would only make things worse. She also hadn’t expected that Lu Miao, a mere student, would suddenly go trending and expose those TV station-related incidents. She gritted her teeth and admitted, “Those revelations are indeed true.” The manager was infuriated, “Why didn’t you tell me earlier?”

Colluding with people from R country to deal with fellow citizens, this kind of problem was too sensitive and could result in a complete blacklisting.

If he had known about this dirt, he would never have accepted the contract in the first place.

“Manager Yue, I’m sorry. Before I debuted, I had someone deal with those revelations online. I also informed the TV station at that time, so I didn’t think I needed to tell you,” Lu Siyu apologized sincerely.

Seeing the phone ringing again, the manager hung up, put the phone on silent mode, and took a deep breath, “This matter can be big or small. What’s your relationship with Lu Miao? Is there any way she can come out and cooperate with us to explain? It’s best to confess the truth publicly on Weibo.”

“It’s probably impossible. She and I are like sisters, but for some reasons, my parents didn’t like her and kicked her out of the Lu family. She resented us because of that and has since hated us. Back at the TV station, I was so angry with her that I made a foolish mistake. If she were to come out, she would only smear me and expose more detrimental information. She won’t help me,” Lu Siyu said, lowering her head.

She didn’t dare to mention the fact that they were swapped at birth, fearing that if she did, her manager would look down on her even more and not help her.

Nor did she dare to exaggerate the story, saying only that Lu Miao was kicked out of the family.

Hearing this, the manager was even more troubled. The messy grudges in wealthy families were indeed inevitable, no matter where you went.

With a furrowed brow, he paced back and forth several times before turning to Lu Siyu, “Post on Weibo, publicly admit your mistake.”

“But won’t that ruin everything? What if all the brands cancel their contracts?” Lu Siyu panicked.

“I want you to say that you and Lu Miao are from the same hometown, and back then, out of competition, you didn’t want her to steal the limelight, so you were influenced by someone and made a mistake. Shift the focus from collaborating with people from R country to the petty conflict between ambitious girls. Then sincerely apologize to Lu Miao and the production team. I’ll ask Weibo to cooperate and make a trending topic about learning from mistakes and making amends. Netizens are usually more forgiving to those who dare to admit their faults and apologize. It may even earn you more sympathy from your fans. When the hype dies down a bit, I’ll get some gossip about other celebrities in the industry for the marketing accounts to expose, shifting everyone’s attention away from this incident. The internet has no memory. If you keep a low profile for a while, people will quickly forget about this matter,” the manager explained.

As the top manager in the industry, Qin Yue had taken care of countless artistes and was quite experienced in dealing with crisis public relations. He quickly came up with a complete response plan.

“Be careful, be careful with your words. Don’t say anything inappropriate that will provoke Lu Miao into revealing the truth. Don’t say specifically that the people from country R instigated you to use you. After all, even though he had already returned, no one could guarantee that he wouldn’t jump out and refute you after seeing it. You just have to be vague and lead everyone’s thoughts to him.”

“Got it, Manager Yue. I’ll post it on Weibo now.”

Although Lu Siyu was unwilling, she could only listen to her manager and apologize to Lu Miao.

“You’d better not hide anything else from me. Otherwise, if something like this happens again, I really can’t help you.”Qin Yue said seriously.

Lu Siyu nodded and didn’t say anything else.

In any case, only she and her mother knew that she had drugged Mr. Zhang with the love charm. Other than that Master Mountain River, no one else had the antidote.

As long as CEO Zhang was around, she could continue to stay in the entertainment industry steadily..