The Martial Arts Stunt Double of the Entertainment Circle – Chapter 18

Chen Wanwan turned to leave, and just then something occurred to Tuoba Yan. She stood up and called out, “Wait!”

Chen Wanwan stopped, puzzled. The two of them faced each other across the third floor, and a faint breeze stirred the pond framed below by the pavilion’s wooden galleries into shimmering ripples. Leaves rustled loose from the great trees that grew entwined together and drifted down, spreading ring after ring across the water.

“Zhang-jie hurt your arm just now, didn’t she?” Tuoba Yan said. “That kind of grappling move is hard to control the force on. She didn’t do it on purpose — please don’t take it to heart.”

            

“It’s nothing.” Chen Wanwan had been so entertained watching Tuoba Yan run her lines earlier that she’d forgotten all about it. Now that it had been brought back up, the sulky irritation settled in again, and she gave a cold nod.

“Let me teach you, then.”

Chen Wanwan froze. “What did you say?”

            

Tuoba Yan’s lips curved, eyes crinkling with a smile. “I said, let me teach you that Elbow-Pull Arm-Lock¹ move.”

Chen Wanwan couldn’t tell what game she was playing. From the very first glance, she’d felt this girl didn’t look like anyone from the stunt-doubling trade, and she’d been nursing suspicion and hostility ever since. She looked Tuoba Yan up and down. “You? Zhang-jie couldn’t teach me, and you think you can?” There was more than a little spiteful self-deprecation in it — and, of course, open doubt about Tuoba Yan’s ability.

Actions speak louder than words. Tuoba Yan set her script on the ground, weighted it down with her phone, then sprang up in a single leap and landed steadily on the gallery railing.

            

Chen Wanwan’s breath caught in a sharp gasp. “What are you doing?!”

There might be a pond below the gallery, but a fall from a third floor would hardly be survivable.

“Proving it to you.” Tuoba Yan tilted her head, eyebrows arching in a playful flick — and before Chen Wanwan could get another word out, she spread her arms like a hawk stooping on prey and launched herself violently off the railing.

            

Chen Wanwan’s face went white. “Ahh—!”

The gory disaster she’d braced for never came to pass. Tuoba Yan had already scouted the terrain: mid-fall she caught hold of a sturdy branch, swung on it once in the air, and — with an agility that beggared belief — flipped neatly into the second-floor gallery.

Her expression was as calm as ever, wearing a faint smile, as if she’d done nothing more demanding than hop back and forth over a rain puddle.

            

Then she did it again — back up onto the railing, steady as before, turning to face away from the pond. “Back up a bit,” she called to Chen Wanwan, who was craning her head over to look down.

Chen Wanwan’s mind had gone blank; she retreated several steps. And then, unhurried and effortless, Tuoba Yan vaulted right back up from the second floor and produced that fox smile that made you want to slap her. “Am I qualified to teach you now?”

Reluctant as she was, Chen Wanwan had to admit it: the girl’s skill was extraordinary. Moves like this were a dime a dozen in wuxia dramas, true — but those stunt performers had steel wires cinched at the waist, and anything shot in fine detail was usually broken across multiple cuts. A so-called wuxia film like Female Constable Wu Zhen’er, which sold itself on romance, could never achieve anything this fluid and flawless.

            

Tuoba Yan walked up, and just as Zhang-jie had demonstrated, brushed past her — arm threading under Chen Wanwan’s armpit, left hand closing gently around her wrist, pulling it firmly in toward her chest while a foot swept her legs out, pinning both her arms behind her back in the same motion.

“Let go!” Chen Wanwan snapped.

Tuoba Yan let go, very obediently.

            

Chen Wanwan was no fool. She’d merely been locked in an unspoken contest with Zhang-jie, both of them in the wrong frame of mind — that was why nothing had ever clicked. Having Tuoba Yan put the lock on her personally had, ironically, mapped out the logic for her. She ran the sensation back through her mind and said, “Again.”

Before long she had the move down to within a hair of perfect. “Let’s swap,” Tuoba Yan said. “Try it on me.”

“Sure.” Chen Wanwan was secretly delighted. Scare me, toy with me, will you? Time you got a taste of your own medicine.

            

One look at her expression and Tuoba Yan knew exactly what mischief was coming — but she played her victim’s role honestly all the same. Chen Wanwan nailed it in one go, toppled her cleanly to the ground, and sat astride her in triumph.

“Are you done yet? Let go of me.” Tuoba Yan’s voice gave away nothing.

“No.” Chen Wanwan had finally gotten her rival to embarrass herself, and she wasn’t letting go of the moment that easily. “And don’t ‘you’ me. I’m older than you — you have to call me Jiejie.”

            

“Fine. Jiejie.”

“Say it again.”

“…I’m getting angry now, you know.”

            

“Oh, I’m terrified!”

Beneath her, Tuoba Yan exploded without warning — clamping down hard on Chen Wanwan’s arm and rolling, dragging her down to the ground too. Chen Wanwan, inexperienced as she was, loosened her grip in her surprise, and Tuoba Yan slipped free in the same instant and pinned her, wide-eyed and ashen, beneath her.

Face to face this close, both of them went still for a beat.

            

Chen Wanwan noticed how exquisitely shaped Tuoba Yan’s brows were — fine, straight, elegant; her eyes limpid black-and-white, clear as glass. The whole arrangement of her features was frankly outrageous. Her skin, too, was fair and delicate, and Chen Wanwan couldn’t help wondering, helplessly, whether it would spring soft under a pinch.

Breathing in the faint shampoo scent of that long hair, Chen Wanwan grew a little dizzy. A stray lock had escaped at Tuoba Yan’s temple and wound its way down her cheek, sliding into the deep hollow of her chest — and that snow-pale expanse seemed to exert some inexplicable pull. Chen Wanwan’s eyes simply would not come unstuck.

Tuoba Yan, for her part, was puzzled. She followed Chen Wanwan’s gaze down to her own chest and tugged her collar closed over it. “What’s there to look at? It’s not like you don’t have a set of your own.”

            

Chen Wanwan’s face flushed scarlet. She shoved Tuoba Yan off and, brain running at full throttle, steered hard away from the topic:

“In any case — thank you for this. I hate owing favors more than anything. If there’s ever anything you need from me, I’ll do my best. Within reason, of course.”

Tuoba Yan scratched her head, a bit sheepish. She’d only offered to teach in hopes of helping Zhang-jie out somehow — but an opening like this, she wasn’t about to waste. “Could you teach me acting, when you have time? I can’t find my way into it on my own… You saw me just now.”

            

“Leave it to me.” Chen Wanwan promised without reservation.

The two of them walked back to the set, chatting and laughing, and Chen Wanwan’s first order of business was a solemn apology to Zhang-jie. Zhang-jie shot a glance at Tuoba Yan, who stuck out her tongue, abashed.

From there, shooting went smoothly. In truth, Fei Dong had already been weighing whether to put Tuoba Yan on the clock early — restyle her into the female lead’s hair and costume and swap her in for Chen Wanwan’s harder fight work. Who’d have thought Chen Wanwan would suddenly see the light? All that trouble was spared.

            

“Good! Great work, everyone.” Fei Dong’s big voice rang out, and the whole set relaxed.

“Chen-jie, you were way too rough — my arm’s about to come off.” The background extra playing the pickpocket grimaced, teeth bared, face scrunched up in pain as he complained. Chen Wanwan was immensely pleased and shot a glance at Tuoba Yan.

Tuoba Yan smiled back, warm and sincere, thumb raised high. Zhang-jie, standing at her side, offered an encouraging smile of her own — the two of them identical in expression and gesture. And Chen Wanwan felt, for reasons she couldn’t name, a little bit happy.

            

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