Chapter 13
The filming officially began the next day.
There's a lot to film today: Yu Miaomiao carefully approaching the newly rescued, badly injured tabby cat; playing with the tabby cat with a cat toy; caring for the sick tabby cat; applying medicine to the tabby cat, and so on.
These scenes are not in a continuous sequence.
Film crews rarely shoot according to the plot; usually, to save money, they shoot one scene at a time before shooting another.
Scenes like those set in villas are distributed throughout various stages of the plot, interspersed with hospital scenes, pet shop scenes, and outdoor scenes.
For films and television shows where the plot plays a significant role, this filming method puts the actors' professionalism to the test.
However, Yu Miaomiao is currently only filming a promotional video, where the emotional changes are not obvious and the acting requirements are low, so it is not very challenging.
The appearance of the tabby cat changes significantly at different stages of the story. It is initially a skinny tabby cat, then a tabby cat of moderate size in the middle stage, and finally a tabby cat that is slightly chubby in the later stage.
Of course, this couldn't be done by just one cat, so the production team hired three tabby cats.
This morning, Yu Miaomiao's co-star was a skinny tabby cat. The cat's body was painted with realistic wounds, dirt, and bloodstains by special effects makeup artists.
This tabby cat named Egg Tart is very close to Yu Miaomiao—to be precise, almost all cats are close to her.
As soon as the cage was opened, Egg Tart darted to her side and kept rubbing against her until the filming started. Only then did it reluctantly retreat at its owner's command.
The owner whispered instructions from the side, "Egg Tart, treat yourself like you would a stranger, be fierce, bare your teeth, and do it!"
But Egg Tart's big, affectionate eyes didn't look like the wary and fierce look a stray cat would have towards humans.
The director had no choice but to call "cut".
The owner was speechless, apologized to the director, picked up the cat and quietly criticized it.
When filming resumed, it completely forgot its owner's instructions and snuggled up to Yu Miaomiao.
While the equipment was still being tested, Yu Miaomiao turned around and blocked the egg tarts from other people's view.
She reached out and gently stroked Egg Tart's dirty fur. This was the first time the little cat had received such treatment, and it squinted its eyes in happiness.
"Meow, meow meow?"
Can't you understand what your master is saying?
Yu Miaomiao spoke to Egg Tart in cat language, her voice soft, but Egg Tart froze as she rubbed her hand against her.
"Meow~" Egg Tart turned its head away guiltily, its eyes glancing elsewhere.
The cat doesn't understand what you're saying.
"Meow! Meow meow meow."
Don't play dumb, I know you understand!
"Meow, meow meow meow."
Listen carefully to your master's instructions; I don't want this to happen again next time we film.
Meow~
Got it~
When filming resumed, it went very smoothly.
But after the shoot ended, Egg Tart didn't stick close to Yu Miaomiao as usual. Instead, it lay in its owner's arms, barking loudly and looking very aggrieved, as if it was sulking.
Yu Miaomiao carefully studied the script, pretending not to hear.
As a cat demon, she naturally has the ability to communicate with cats, but it's not always smooth sailing.
Cats with higher intelligence tend to make clear and distinct sounds, like the three bars yesterday and the egg tart today.
Some young cats or cats with low intelligence have fragmented meows that are sometimes difficult to understand.
For example, the previous golden shaded kitten also liked Yu Miaomiao and liked to stay by her side, but those annoying meows were sometimes just a series of "I like it, I like it, I like it, it smells so good, I want to lick it, I want to lick it, I want to lick it..."
In response to Jiang Chengyi's breathy sounds, it was a chorus of cries of "Humans are terrifying, humans are terrifying, humans are terrifying, help, help, help..."
The next scene is Yu Miaomiao taking the tabby cat from the hospital home and playing with the cat toy with it after its injuries have healed.
This time, she was paired with a medium-sized tabby cat named Ma Tuan.
The cat was released and slowly strolled over to Yu Miaomiao's side. It licked her fingers, meowed once, and then sat down beside her, appearing composed and reserved.
Following the pre-arranged steps, Yu Miaomiao played with a cat toy with Matuan.
The feathers bouncing in the air aroused the cat's natural instincts. Sometimes the movements were too large, causing the cat to jump out of the camera's range or in the wrong direction, so we had to reshoot several times.
The morning was quite productive; four or five shots were filmed. The director and the production assistants went to lunch arm in arm, all smiles.
The fact that they cast ordinary people as the leads shows that this wasn't a big production. From the producer and director to the crew members, they were all people who got things done, and none of them had any sense of superiority.
Otherwise, given the usual practices of film crews, the director and lead actors would have to be given special treatment, not to mention living in temporary dormitories with the rest of the crew.
The lunch was even more plentiful than the previous night's meal. Yu Miaomiao forced herself to eat a few bites, but her cat-like tongue simply couldn't get used to the strong flavors and steaming hot food.
Aunt He brought over another batch of boxed lunches and quietly came to Yu Miaomiao's side, telling her not to eat and to go to the small kitchen later.
So she stopped forcing herself to swallow, left the noisy place, and came to the villa to find peace and quiet.
Half of the villa was filled with electrical wires, equipment boxes, lights, and photography equipment, while the other half was a scene carefully set up by the props team.
Cat trees, cat beds, half-eaten cat food, plush toys and cat wands are everywhere.
There's also an automatic cat toy; with the push of a button, it not only moves around, but the feather-tipped stick swings wildly—it's downright crazy.
"Buzz—"
Egg Tart suddenly appeared out of nowhere and bumped into the automatic cat toy. The feather stick started spinning wildly.
It was startled and ran to another corner of the villa to eat its cat food.
The automatic cat toy rolled to Yu Miaomiao's feet, its colorful feathers swaying left and right. The cat's excellent dynamic vision allowed her to easily track the feathers' movements, and then—
"Smack!"
Yu Miaomiao grabbed the feather, let go, and then quickly grabbed it again in the next second.
easy.
Feeling the force of the struggle in her palm, she felt a surge of pleasure at her successful hunt.
She seemed to have played a similar game a long time ago.
Back then, there weren't such high-tech machines. Her mother would play with her, and she would play with a cat paw stick for an entire afternoon, plucking the feathers until they were sparse and sparse, but neither of them felt tired.
After that, I never played it again.
Yu Miaomiao played with the automatic cat toy for a long time until the voice of the stage manager approached, and she realized that it was time to go to the kitchen.
Reluctantly releasing the feathers and turning off the cat toy, she looked up and found Jiang Cheng leaning against the villa's front door, watching for who knows how long.
Yu Miaomiao was startled, followed by shame and anger.
How long did he look, and what did he see?
She explained dryly, "My scene is the first one this afternoon, so I'm here to familiarize myself with the props."
As soon as he finished speaking, he realized something was wrong. Why did he have to explain to Jiang Cheng?
Jiang Cheng walked straight in, stopped in front of Yu Miaomiao, bent down and picked up the cat toy, turning it on with a "click".
The cat toy immediately started spinning and made a "lilililili" sound.
This music is incredibly stupid.
He grabbed the cat toy, then let go, then grabbed it again, repeating this several times.
The other person's face was backlit, so their expression was obscured, but the laughter in their voice was clear: "It's quite fun."
Yu Miaomiao felt blood rushing into the capillaries on her face.
Yu Miaomiao has an incredibly strong mentality, so she naturally won't take this small setback to heart.
Exposing weaknesses in front of the enemy is actually a way of showing weakness and lowering their guard, which is actually a good thing.
Yu Miaomiao mechanically stuffed food into her mouth while brainwashing herself.
"The food today is so delicious, I ate it so fast!"
Aunt He was all smiles.
Yu Miaomiao came to her senses and realized that she had unknowingly eaten most of the food.
Three days have passed since that day, and filming is more than halfway complete.
Jiang Chengyi showed no abnormality and even took the initiative to ask Yu Miaomiao to practice their scenes together.
This was originally a good thing.
However, Yu Miaomiao always felt that during their occasional eye contact, there was a very subtle smile in those sharp phoenix eyes, which made her inexplicably uncomfortable.
"Why isn't Sanjo here yet? He's usually here around this time."
Aunt He poured the cooked rice and dishes into a tin bowl, muttering to herself.
These past few days, Yu Miaomiao has been relying entirely on Aunt He's special cooking for her meals, and her meal partners are always San Tiao.
After the two finished eating, they walked together for a while longer. Then one went up the mountain, and the other went to the villa.
San Tiao has a sense of responsibility as an elder and always walks ahead of Yu Miaomiao to pave the way.
Before each parting, he would always give a few words of advice in a rough voice, as if worried that the curious kitten might secretly follow him up the mountain.
"Meow meow meow"
I'm going to patrol the territory, so don't wander off.
"Did he fall into a pit? With only three legs, how will he climb out?"
Aunt He became increasingly anxious. She couldn't continue washing the dishes, so she told her colleague and hurriedly went out to look for the cat.
Yu Miaomiao watched the other person's departing figure. She couldn't eat the last bit of food left. It was almost time for her rehearsal with Jiang Chengyi, so she walked towards the villa.
Jiang Chengyi was already waiting in the courtyard. Just as Yu Miaomiao was about to go in, a burst of laughter rang out from not far away.
She paused, her keen hearing allowing her to recognize a faint meow amidst the laughter.
The cat's rough, hoarse, and faint meow fell silent after just one sound.
It was as if someone was choking him, and he could only force out his last breath from his throat.
"We'll rehearse the scene later."
Yu Miaomiao hurriedly said a sentence and ran towards the source of the sound without looking back.
The closer they got, the clearer the laughter and chatter became.
"Cover up its dark circles, it looks awful."
"Yes, yes, draw some eyeliner too."
Why didn't you suggest applying blush too?
"It's not impossible."
“Hahahahahahaha!”
From the front courtyard of the villa to the back, the source of the sound was finally found.
Yu Miaomiao walked briskly, panting from exhaustion, and looked up ahead.
In the shade of the woods, several young men in overalls huddled together.
One of them was holding a cat in his hand, while several others around him were holding cosmetics, including foundation, eyeliner, and blush, and someone was holding up a mobile phone to record a video.
They stared at the cat with excited eyes, as if they all wanted to try their makeup skills on this ugly cat.
This is indeed a very ugly cat.
Black and white spots are irregularly distributed on its thin body. Its tail is broken off, it is missing a left foreleg, its right eye is blind, and a black spot covers its left eye, as if it has been punched.
This is indeed a very stubborn cat.
With his legs gripped and his neck choked, he still twisted his body restlessly, waving his half-broken left leg, his chest heaving violently, squeezing out the little air left from his lungs, making a "hoarse" sound.
His face had been smeared with something; his dark circles were covered with snow-white foundation, and his cheeks were adorned with bright red blush. Oily mascara had gotten into his eyes from struggling, making them bloodshot. Combined with his hoarse voice and ferocious expression, he looked both comical and increasingly ugly.
No wonder the people around them laughed.
"What are you doing?"
A cold voice interrupted their laughter.
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