Chapter 79: The King of Acting

  Media reporters waited at the gate of the psychiatric hospital until midnight, but unfortunately, they never saw Tang Xiaosheng appear. It wasn't until the next morning that they learned Tang Xiaosheng had already left the hospital.

  Although there were no pictures of Tang Xiaosheng leaving the mental hospital, there was no shortage of news reports about him the next day.

  Unlike in the past half month, the focus of media attention has shifted and almost all reports are on one topic - is Tang Xiaoshan pretending to be mentally ill?

  Although the psychiatric experts from Jinghua City Mental Hospital explained to the media again that Tang Xiaosheng suffered from intermittent mental illness, with a condition that was sometimes good and sometimes bad, which would suddenly improve, most citizens sneered at this explanation and hardly anyone believed it.

  Sina.com conducted a public opinion poll on this issue, and the results were overwhelmingly one-sided:

  "Sina Survey: Do you think Tang Xiaosheng's mental illness is fake?"

  1. No. Appraisers are not that easy to fool. Votes: 2107

  2. Yes. Never underestimate the acting skills of extras. Votes: 55,842

  Within a short morning, over 50,000 Sina netizens participated in the vote, with more than 90% of them believing that Tang Xiaosheng disguised himself as a mentally ill person by relying on his acting skills and deceived the judicial psychiatric experts.

  Coincidentally, on the Tianya forum, a netizen posted an analytical post titled "Schizophrenic or King of Acting?"

  In the post, the netizen analyzed whether Tang Xiaosheng was pretending to be mentally ill from multiple perspectives such as performance studies, psychology, logic and anatomy, with both theoretical analysis and case-based arguments, writing over 20,000 words.

  This post sparked a heated discussion among many Tianya forum netizens:

  "Post 511, Master single: The post is too long and I didn't read it. Whatever the original poster said, I think Tang Xiaosheng's mental illness is fake, completely relying on acting skills to deceive the identification experts."

  "12th floor, melody: The post is indeed too long, didn't finish reading it. However, Tang Xiaosheng should be pretending, this acting skill is really awesome, the real version of 'The King of Comedy'!"

  "The 513rd floor, being low-key: It's not hard to act out a play, what's hard is acting out a play for 24 hours straight, continuously for half a month; it's not hard to act well in a drama group, what's hard is acting out a play in front of the whole world and deceiving everyone. The king of acting skills, I think these four words are quite fitting when used to describe Tang Xiaosheng. Also, the original post is too long, I didn't read it."

  "Floor 514, walking with head down and back straight: Tang Xiaosheng is a great guy, no need for explanation."

  ……

  Netizens' follow-up posts were very active, but most of the posts discussed were not about whether Tang Xiaosheng was pretending to be mentally ill or not, as this seemed to be a self-evident problem. The topic that netizens were really interested in became Tang Xiaosheng's acting skills.

  Some netizens were amazed at his superb acting skills, which even experts couldn't detect; while more netizens wondered how he honed his acting skills.

  A female reporter from the Beijing Morning Post, after repeated investigations, found the landlord of a civilian house where Tang Xiaosheng once lived and learned some information from the landlord.

  The landlord told the reporter that six years ago, Tang Xiaosheng rented a room from her and ended up living there for six years. When Tang first arrived, she often heard strange noises coming from his room, including crying sounds, laughter, mournful cries, screams, and even animal calls...

  At first, the landlord also thought it was strange and suspected that something unexpected had happened in the room. Later, she found out that Tang Xiaosheng was practicing performing in the room, imitating various sounds. Such sounds were heard almost every day for the next six years.

  The landlord also said that Tang Xiaosheng's life was very monotonous, either practicing acting in the rental house or going to the film and television city to shoot films. His whole life was spent shuttling back and forth between the rental house and the film and television city, 365 days a year, almost every day. He lived such a life for six years.

  After the reporter finished interviewing the landlord, he went with the landlord to the house where Xiao Sheng used to live. What's even more amazing is that although Tang Xiaosheng had moved out of this room for over a month, the layout of the room remained unchanged.

  The landlord explained that after Tang Xiaosheng moved out, she also wanted to rent the house again. Unfortunately, seven or eight people came to see the room and felt that the living conditions of the house were too poor, not suitable for human habitation, so the house was never rented out in the end.

  Tang Xiaosheng lived here for six whole years.

  The journalist looked around the room and found that the furniture was indeed very simple: a worn-out small round table, a wooden chair with a missing leg, a rusty electric fan, a simple wooden bed board, and nothing else except for posters of Chinese and foreign performing stars covering the walls: Bruce Lee, Al Pacino, Sylvester Stallone, Sean Connery, Tom Cruise, Stephen Chow, Audrey Hepburn

  The reporter then took a few photos in the room and posted them on the official website of Jinghua Times, exposing Tang Xiaosheng's dragon suit life.

  Compared to the news reports of the past few days, this report seems dull and ordinary, only talking about some mundane trivial matters, but the public's reaction was unexpectedly fierce.

  In this news, the reporter wrote: "I think everyone now knows one thing, Tang Xiaosheng doesn't have anything mysterious, he is just an ordinary young man who works hard to pursue his dream of being an actor. He is not a performing genius either, all his acting skills come from long-term practice."

  However, it was this seemingly ordinary person who became a sensation in the city of Jinghua over the past half month, subtly influencing the city. His bitter experience as a migrant worker inspired countless workers living at the bottom of society; his steadfast love for Long Xiaoxue made us believe that true love still exists in the world; his kindness to nursing homes and orphanages made this cold winter especially warm; and his solo battle against kidnappers even led to the surrender of murderers to the police... Of course, what was most talked about was how he used his extraordinary acting skills to deceive forensic experts and successfully avoided being wrongly imprisoned.

  "In the past two days, many people have started calling Tang Xiaosheng the 'King of Acting'. Undoubtedly, he is an excellent actor who can perform brilliant plays. However, his life is even more brilliant, and his performances are also unforgettable. The four words 'King of Acting', I think Tang Xiaosheng deserves them."

  As comments and news like this were released, the phrase "King of Acting" quickly spread across the internet. Many netizens began to take an interest in Tang Xiaosheng's performances and searched for videos of his acting online.

  Unfortunately, in the past six years, Tang Xiaosheng has either been a stand-in or an understudy, and has not had any plays of his own. The only videos about him that can be found online are recordings from when he was undergoing psychiatric evaluation at a mental hospital.

  Some journalists couldn't help but feel puzzled, wondering why an excellent actor like Tang Xiaosheng hadn't found a suitable role to play. To get to the bottom of it, they specially went to Jinghua Film and Television City to investigate Tang Xiaosheng's experience with filming. As a result, they unexpectedly learned a shocking piece of inside information.

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