Ma Yuanyuan went home, took a shower, and sat down on her bed. She opened her editing software and dragged through the footage frame by frame.
She deleted everything the man buying the watermelon had said beforehand.
Li Le's knife moved from the cutting board to the man's face. She pulled out that segment and slowed it down, then slowed it down again-the image quality suffered badly. Apparently, her equipment still wasn't good enough, but she could see it clearly. She would restore it with software after finishing the edit.
Watermelon juice still clung to the blade, which rested steadily beside that face, its tip less than a centimeter from the tip of his nose.
She added martial arts drumbeats.
Cut to normal speed. Li Le held the knife flat in one hand, a box of sliced watermelon resting on its spine, and extended it.
"I can't lower the price, but I can give it to you for free."
The audio for that line was an absolute mess. Wind, voices, and the barbecue stall's exhaust fan were all mixed together. She couldn't make it out at all.
It was all because Li Le refused to cooperate with her videos. Whenever she asked him to wear audio equipment, he ignored her.
When she arrived at the night market the next day, Ma Yuanyuan handed him the Wireless Mic.
"Put it on, or hold it by your mouth."
"What for?"
"To record a line."
"What line?"
"I can't lower the price, but I can give it to you for free."
Li Le took the mic and obediently recited it once. This was Ma Yuanyuan's condition for promising not to tell Wang Xiaoliang: he had to cooperate with her videos.
She played it back, listened, and shook her head.
"Lower."
He tried again.