Qiao Tang and Su Hao’s expressions changed instantly when they heard the commotion outside.
No one else understood what was going on, but they did… Those were the parents of students from the arts-exam training school. They had come for them!
No, they couldn’t let Yu Lingyi find out!
Su Hao reacted quickly. He grabbed Yu Lingyi’s hand and said, “Qiao Tang opened a livestream a couple of days ago to promote our new drama, and an underage viewer sent her a tip. The viewer’s parents are demanding a refund… Qiao Tang, hurry up and deal with it.”
Qiao Tang immediately understood. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry. I’ll take care of it right away.”
Su Hao continued, “Lingyi, didn’t you say you were a little tired just now? I’ll take you home to rest. Tomorrow is an important day for us.”
Yu Lingyi actually knew it was about the training school too, but for now… she nodded. “All right.”
Su Hao breathed a sigh of relief and hurriedly led Yu Lingyi away.
The rest of the staff also left one after another.
Shen Zhi had been standing in an unnoticed corner, so she immediately took advantage of the distraction and followed Qiao Tang to see what was happening.
In the conference room.
Several parents had brought their children and blocked the doorway. Their faces were angrier than the last.
Most of the students were sixteen or seventeen years old, both boys and girls. Some had red-rimmed eyes, some kept their heads lowered in silence, and one girl was clutching a stack of printed documents.
Qiao Tang tried to maintain order. “Parents, please calm down first. This isn’t an appropriate place for shouting.”
A middle-aged man immediately exploded. “What did you say when you took our money?”
Another woman slapped the contract down on the table. “You said you had inside connections, famous teachers, and guaranteed exam predictions. You said you could help the children prepare their portfolios before the exams. And what happened? All of their preliminary applications for the school entrance exams were rejected!”
Qiao Tang’s expression shifted slightly. “What do you mean, rejected?”
One of the students said, “The self-introductions and performance clips you filmed for all of us were exactly the same template. I applied to three schools, and teachers at two of them told me outright that we looked like products from an assembly line. They told me not to package myself using someone else’s material!”
Another parent added, “And those so-called famous teachers you advertised don’t even understand the proper procedures on a real set. They don’t know how to teach camera technique. All they do is make the children cry, shout, and kneel! They don’t know what teachers actually ask during interviews!”
“My child is now too afraid to take the rest of the exams!”
“And there’s the issue with the portfolios’ copyright! My daughter talked about her family situation in hers… You edited the video into a short advertisement and paid to promote it! Her classmates all saw it! Now they’re making fun of her!”
Qiao Tang rolled her eyes inwardly.
Their arts-exam training program existed simply to make quick money.
The few teachers they had hired were part-time instructors who had previously led arts-exam crash courses for a few months.
They didn’t know how to truly teach students to understand characters, analyze scripts, or perform in front of a camera… They only taught according to a standardized template.
It was an assembly line, plain and simple.
But what arts-exam training school wasn’t like that these days?
People who genuinely studied the arts had started when they were young.
These children had only begun at fifteen or sixteen because they couldn’t make it through the regular academic path. Weren’t they just trying to use an assembly-line approach to pass the entrance exams?
Qiao Tang really wanted to shout all of that at them. If they couldn’t pass, why didn’t they look for the problem in themselves? What did they want from the training school?
But she knew that Yu Lingyi and Su Hao were going for their premarital medical examination and to register their marriage tomorrow.
If things blew up now and Yu Lingyi investigated the training school, many secrets would be exposed.
Qiao Tang smiled at them. “The arts entrance exams are inherently unpredictable. There’s no way to guarantee that every child will pass… How about this? You can enroll in our program again next year, and I’ll give you twenty percent off the tuition.”
One of the parents shouted angrily, “That’s not what you said when you took our money! You claimed you had inside information and exclusive exam questions, and you made all kinds of promises! If you hadn’t advertised that way, we wouldn’t have come looking for trouble. But you did advertise it! I’m telling you, we’re going to sue you!”
Qiao Tang couldn’t handle the situation on her own anymore. She decided she would have to find Su Hao.
She could only lower her voice and say, “We’ll hold an emergency meeting tonight to discuss a solution and give you an answer as soon as possible.”
One of the parents immediately replied, “Fine. If you don’t give us an answer tomorrow, we’ll come back tomorrow. We’ll come the day after that too. We’ll come every day until you deal with this!”
“All right, all right, of course,” Qiao Tang said, soothing them for a long while.
She even promised that the finance department would provide an initial refund proposal the next morning. Only then did she barely manage to persuade them to leave.
—
Shen Zhi had been standing behind a corner in the hallway the entire time, recording their argument.
At first, she wanted to send the recording to Yu Xiaxing immediately.
But then she remembered that Yu Xiaxing had repeatedly warned all of her subordinates: no matter how urgent the matter was, they were not to contact her after work.
And it was already after work…
Shen Zhi had no choice but to send it to Assistant Lu.
She had captured all the key points: the students’ portfolios had been rejected, their performance templates were nearly identical, and videos of minors had been used in advertising…
Lu Yanzhao was as quick as ever. He finished watching the recording within minutes and called her.
Lu Yanzhao said, “Ms. Shen, can you still catch up with those parents?”
Shen Zhi replied, “I think so. They only left a short while ago.”
Lu Yanzhao quickly explained what he needed. “Please go after them and stop them. The Shengde Arts College Entrance Support Center will be opening soon, but… the problems those parents mentioned about the previous school really do exist.”
“Our teachers are all experienced practitioners, not professional educators. We’re very worried that we won’t be able to attract enough students.”
“Catch up with those parents and tell them that Shengde can provide legal support and help them recover the tuition fees they previously paid. But after they get their money back, they’ll need to enroll directly at Shengde.”
“All right!” Shen Zhi was already running after the parents.
Lu Yanzhao added, “They’ve already been taken advantage of once by false advertising, so you don’t need to exaggerate anything or make any promises. Just tell them what we can actually do.”
Shen Zhi tightened her grip on her phone. “Understood!”
She hung up and immediately ran toward the parking lot.
The parents were leading their children outside, their faces still grim.
Shen Zhi caught up with them. “Excuse me, parents. Please wait a moment.”
The parents turned around. When they recognized her as a familiar celebrity, their eyes lit up.
They never would have expected that their first encounter with a celebrity would be the celebrity herself running after them!
That alone laid the foundation of trust for Shen Zhi’s conversation with them.
She quickly explained the main points.
“…So that’s the situation. As long as you sign up with Shengde in advance, we can have Shengde’s legal team help you recover the tuition fees. Would you be willing to do that?”
