Chapter Fourteen: Penance Wraps Filming-A Show-Stopping Farewell / Chapter Fifteen: Mrs. Sicilia's Superb Acting and the Godfather's Silent Tears

To avoid disrupting Texas and the others' performances, Madam Sicily had not appeared on set these past few days. Still, she watched everyone's acting from backstage, smiling from time to time, her eyes filled with affection as though she were watching her own children.

When Chen Qi arrived, Madam Sicily backstage immediately looked over and said,

"Director Chen Qi, the filming was remarkably precise. I think this shoot was practically perfect."

"Whether it was perfect depends on how satisfied the audience is. But since even you say so, Madam Sicily, I can rest easy."

Chen Qi had originally planned to simply invite Madam Sicily to eat, but seeing the smile on her face, he could not help asking tentatively,

"Madam, what did you think of Texas's performance just now?"

"As an assassin, her performance was still immature. But as the successor of a family, she was already outstanding enough." Madam Sicily smiled faintly and gave her final assessment of Texas. "She will become an exceptional Godfather."

"Madam Sicily, you really are starting to treat everyone like your own children." Chen Qi could not help teasing her. Madam Sicily did not deny it, merely saying calmly,

"But after this film is over, they will no longer be... Consider it a small unfulfilled wish of this old woman's, finding some compensation through this method."

"You've gotten into character, Madam Sicily." Chen Qi sat down beside her. Their time together had made him feel somewhat closer to Madam Sicily, rather than merely holding her in awe as he had at first.

Perhaps the personality of "Vito Corleone," this Godfather, had gradually influenced Madam Sicily during her performance. Or perhaps dressing as a man allowed her to more freely do things she normally would not, making her feel as though she were someone else.

At the very least, Madam Sicily now possessed far less of the majesty of a Syracuse ruler. After filming the assassination scene, she carried a little more human warmth, looking more like... a "father."

"But if even you've gotten into character, I believe Chastisement, Si Ye, Texas, and the others must feel the same way. You don't need to worry so much about losing them. Perhaps you can simply become their Godfather in real life."

"...I'll consider it."

Upon hearing that, Madam Sicily did not immediately refuse. Instead, she nodded softly.

Just then, there was a knock at the door. Before Chen Qi could respond, a Sarkaz halo poked in through the doorway, followed by a head of striking red hair.

"Director Chen Qi, are you in there? Ah! Madam Sicily is here too!"

"...Exusiai, why are you here?"

Chen Qi was also curious why Exusiai had come looking for him. But unable to keep anything bottled up, Exusiai explained her purpose the moment she entered the room.

"Director Chen Qi, didn't you say we would all have roles, and that there would be a thrilling gunfire scene too? Why hasn't it started yet?"

"Where are the guns I was promised?! Where did my gunfight scene go? I want to shoot!"

Exusiai indignantly accused Chen Qi, clearly resentful of his "unfair treatment" during this time. She was obviously the one most looking forward to acting, so why would he refuse to meet her demands?

"Well, according to the script, aside from pure-blooded Syracuse natives, other races cannot join the family. Sarkaz are the same—if there are any, they are mostly family assassins."

Chen Qi looked at Exusiai helplessly. "I originally planned to give you the role of the assassin who kills Madam Sicily. You could have had all the gunplay you wanted, but you turned it down."

"Of course I did. I like this family, after all."

Exusiai loved the way The Godfather conveyed the importance of cherishing one's family and loved ones. She especially liked Si Ye's character, "Sonny." Though this eldest brother was hot-tempered, curious, and easily angered, he truly was a good man who sheltered the family from the storm.

Especially during that earlier scene, when Carlo, played by Lappland's father, abused his wife, and Si Ye, playing the older brother, grabbed him and beat him senseless, Exusiai admitted that she really liked the character and said she wished she had an older brother like that.

Lappland had been delighted too. Si Ye had actually become a little emotional at the time and broken three of her father's ribs. Lappland had laughed louder than anyone.

"I don't care. The next time there's a gunfight scene, I have to be in it!"

"...You said that yourself."

Seeing Exusiai acting shamelessly in front of him, Chen Qi wanted to say that it was not as if he had never given her an opportunity. It was just that Exusiai did not have Croissant's professional acting ability—though she was not an actor in the first place.

Still, since Exusiai wanted a gunfight... his script really did have such a scene.

"Fine. There is only one large-scale gunfight in my movie. If you can make a cameo appearance in it, Exusiai, I'll let you shoot to your heart's content."

"But you must listen to my directions, understand?"

"Really?! Thank you so much!"

The instant she heard that she would finally get the gunfight she had been eagerly awaiting, Exusiai was overjoyed. Chen Qi smiled along with her, but inwardly, a hint of wicked amusement had already surfaced.

Because in the next scene, Exusiai would definitely get to fire to her heart's content. But the target she would be shooting at... she probably would not want to know.

On Chen Qi's planning document nearby, the title of the next scene was written in bold—"Sonny's Death."

Si Ye's Wrap, the Most Spectacular Farewell

"Ah... this is so boring. How much longer do we have to wait here before filming starts?"

The next day, Exusiai had been dragged to the filming location by Chen Qi early in the morning. Holding a prop gun personally handed to her by Mephisto from the props department, she waited in boredom for the gunfight she had been looking forward to.

Chen Qi had promised her yesterday that she would participate in the most intense barrage of gunfire in the entire film. Exusiai had barely slept all night, too excited to settle down. The moment Chen Qi called for her that morning, she had rushed over without delay.

Yet she had been waiting from morning until nearly dusk. Why had the car Chen Qi mentioned still not arrived?!

"Patience, young lady."

Beside Exusiai stood an elderly Sarkaz man like herself. He wore a comical eyepatch painted with an open eye. He seemed to be asleep the entire time, yet always spoke at exactly the right moment.

"Didn't Director Chen Qi say that they still had some scenes to film over there? I myself waited until the afternoon before leisurely walking over from the church."

"But this is really boring, Grandpa Agniell." In this short span of time, Exusiai had already become familiar with the elderly Sarkaz beside her. Agniell had also taken quite a liking to this lively girl from his own race. He removed his eyepatch and said with a smile,

"If you're bored, how about making a bet with this old man?"

"A bet? Sure, I love those!" The moment Exusiai heard there was something to do, she perked up. "What are we betting on?"

"How about betting on what we Laterano people are best at—guns?" Agniell felt the timing was about right. Remembering Chen Qi's earlier instructions, he said to Exusiai without the slightest hint of awkwardness,

"We'll both put on eyepatches and fire blind. Once the car arrives, we'll bet on who hits that unlucky fellow more times. What do you think?"

"Oh? We're betting on that? Then you might lose terribly, old man!"

As a sniper operator for Penguin Logistics, Exusiai had always been confident in her accuracy. Though she used two submachine guns and favored suppressive fire over precision, well... wasn't firing more shots the same as being accurate?

Although the toy gun in her hand, called the "Violin Typewriter," was certainly not as comfortable as her own weapons, she was still confident she could beat an old man when it came to accuracy.

"Then it's settled. We Sarkaz share emotions, so we can tell which shots each of us landed. No cheating!"

"Whoever gets more hits buys the other a fancy pizza today!"

"No problem, as long as it doesn't have pineapple on it." Agniell smiled faintly. Then he immediately noticed a speeding car in the distance.

And that was their target.

"All right, time to put on the eyepatches. Remember, don't take yours off until I tell you to."

In the distance, the one driving over personally was none other than Si Ye, who played the eldest brother Sonny. He looked somewhat angry at the moment because of the previous scene.

In that scene, Carlo, played by Lappland's father, had abused his movie daughter again—and Si Ye had watched the entire thing.

Playing a character who valued family during this time had made Si Ye increasingly aware of the importance of familial bonds. He felt himself slowly becoming Sonny. Even in that impulsive, easily enraged, lecherous man, he had found many precious qualities.

Just as Madam Sicily had said, "A man who does not make time for his family cannot be called a man."

What Si Ye had learned from Sonny was that, as the eldest brother of a family, one had to step up and shoulder every responsibility when necessary, and... cherish one's family.

And now, this domestic abuse scene involving Lappland's father had undoubtedly struck a nerve with Si Ye—after all, his sister in the film was pregnant!

"You damn crude Syracuse bastard, you're dead!"

Si Ye drove toward a toll booth according to the script, unaware of what awaited him ahead. To achieve the best possible filming results, Chen Qi had to keep Si Ye completely ignorant of this wrap scene.

Si Ye did not know that the next scene would be his last, much less that Chen Qi had prepared such a grand farewell for him.

Si Ye finally drove up to the toll booth. Hurriedly taking out two banknotes and handing them to the attendant, he saw the luxury car ahead refusing to move forward and cursed anxiously,

"Bastard, hurry up!"

Si Ye honked the horn, but the car ahead not only failed to move forward—it backed up instead, blocking his vehicle.

At that very moment, Si Ye sensed that something was wrong. As the gates of the toll station suddenly closed, he abruptly realized something and hurriedly looked to the other side.

What he saw were several assassins dressed in black and holding guns—and without exception, every one of them was Sarkaz!

Si Ye's pupils narrowed slightly. He suddenly realized what the blood packs Chen Qi had made him wear before driving were for.

"Rat-tat-tat-tat-tat-tat-tat-tat-tat-tat!!" XN

Sarkaz from every direction opened fire on Si Ye inside the car. The blood packs on his body burst at once, leaving him "covered in wounds."

But Si Ye himself was not injured at all. He struggled to crawl out of the car. So enraged was he that he even wanted to charge through this hail of bullets and beat up the bastard who abused his sister.

Naturally, Chen Qi had already anticipated that. The moment Si Ye opened the car door, Exusiai and Agniell, positioned there, raised their guns together and aimed them at him.

"Rat-tat-tat-tat-tat-tat!!" XN

Another round of gunfire followed. Though he could not be hurt, Si Ye could still feel the impact. His entire body felt as if it were coming apart, and he could not take another step forward for a long time.

Yet even so, he stubbornly remained standing. As if all the fury he felt toward everything around him erupted at that instant, he let out an unwilling roar.

"Aaaaahhh!"

It was a roar that was thirty percent fury and seventy percent frustration. He clearly knew that if this had been a planned alley fight, then even with such firepower, he could have devised a way to defeat them. Yet he had unexpectedly fallen here, beaten so thoroughly that he could not fight back at all.

"Whoosh!"

In the end, with the sound of something slicing through the air, a tranquilizer dart from nowhere struck Si Ye in the neck. Only then did his entire body finally go limp, and he collapsed into a pool of blood.

On the other side, a Sarkaz stepped forward and aimed at Si Ye's "corpse," unleashing another burst of gunfire...

"Bang!" Finally, as though in retaliation, someone kicked Si Ye, who no longer showed any sign of movement. Only then did all the extras withdraw from the scene as planned.

"Was that satisfying?" Agniell pulled Exusiai away for some distance. Only after ensuring she could no longer see the "tragic" scene did he ask.

"That was amazing! I love the feeling of spraying bullets with a submachine gun!"

Exusiai eagerly tore off her eyepatch and finally let out a delighted cheer. As a Sarkaz, nothing thrilled Exusiai more than suppressive fire and explosions.

Even though she had only made a minor cameo, Exusiai was already completely satisfied. But then she belatedly remembered something, turned her head, and asked,

"By the way, Grandpa Agniell, who exactly did we shoot in the movie?"

"...A bad man, child. Someone who, once he stepped into the abyss of the Mafia, was destined to become a bad man."

Agniell fell silent for a moment and did not directly answer Exusiai's question. He also severed his mental sharing with her and smiled without revealing anything.

"All right, let's go eat pizza, child. You landed forty-eight hits. You won."

"Yay! I've never hit that many before! When the movie comes out, the audience is definitely going to love me to death! I took down a bad guy!"

"All right, Si Ye is still unconscious. Hurry and carry him into the car. We still need his 'corpse' later."

Chen Qi immediately used the communication device to instruct the Art Troupe to load the still-unconscious Si Ye into the car. They still had another scene to shoot afterward, so Si Ye's miserable appearance could not be cleaned up yet.

"This drug will keep Si Ye sleeping peacefully for an entire day." FrostNova was sitting beside Chen Qi, temporarily taking Talulah's place.

Chen Qi had arranged for Talulah to focus specifically on filming Texas's scenes. Texas was still acting out the part where she fled Columbia and sought refuge in the Syracuse countryside. Talulah's progress and Chen Qi's would proceed simultaneously.

Therefore, FrostNova was temporarily serving as assistant director. Seeing Si Ye's utterly miserable "dead" appearance through the camera, she could not help frowning and asking instinctively,

"Chen Qi, you didn't keep this scene from Madam Sicily too, did you?"

"How could that be? Madam Sicily has read the entire script. How could she not know that Si Ye would definitely 'die'?" Chen Qi shook his head and answered,

"Keeping Si Ye's 'corpse' is only so Madam Sicily can feel something when she sees it. Maybe when she sees one of her 'children' in such a miserable state, she can give us an Oscar-worthy expression or something..."

"...I have no idea what you're talking about, but you really can be quite ruthless for the sake of filming."

FrostNova did not understand what this "Oscar" Chen Qi kept mentioning was. On this land, even televisions could not be considered universally available. Being able to watch a movie in a theater was already something only wealthy families could afford; most people had no chance to enjoy such treatment.

Under those circumstances, there were no formal awards at all. But FrostNova knew that this "Oscar" was definitely one of Chen Qi's goals, a byword for reaching the pinnacle.

"I won't deny it. As a director, I can be very 'cruel' to actors in pursuit of the best results."

Chen Qi smiled faintly, then gently took FrostNova's hand and said word by word,

"But I'm very gentle with every one of our own people, FrostNova."

"...You."

FrostNova did not resist the contact as Chen Qi held her hand. Instead, she revealed a smile as gentle as a spring breeze and nodded faintly.

She could not deny that, either. To everyone in the Art Troupe, Chen Qi was the gentlest person of all.

Madam Sicily's Superb Acting, the Godfather's Silent Tears

"I'm sorry, Chastisement. You know that, as a director, I have to achieve the best filming results, so I couldn't give all of you the entire script."

Chastisement: "...I understand, Director Chen Qi. I'll tell Father—Madam Sicily—the news."