....
Night had fully settled over the city, but Regal's office was still awake.
He was writing.
Or typing out the script from his mind into the docunt file.
It was just him in the room.
His fingers moved across the keyboard, almost faster than he could think.
He was deep into one of the pivotal scenes - the infamous 'hotel room reveal'.
The tiger scene.
The audience would be coming in blind, just like the characters - waking up hungover, half-dressed, and wrecked. Alan's scream. Phil's disbelief. Stu's dry-heaving.
And then...
The tiger's roar from the bathroom.
Regal typed faster, shaping each beat with care.
Every word was tid like a joke with a ticking clock behind it.
Phil cautiously turns the handle. The bathroom door creaks open an inch—
—the low rumble of a growl. Then—
ROOOAAAR.
They scream and fall over themselves.
Smash cut: the door slams shut again.
And then, all at once - his fingers froze.
A dull heat blood in his spine.
The air in the room thickened - just for a breath - and before he could exhale a system panel popped up and within a second the world shifted.
•-----[SKILL SLOTS]-----•
» [Slot-2:] Writer(Rank – World-Class) [Active]
•------------------------•
Regal didn't even get ti to check it out...
He blinked - and his office was gone.
In its place stood a trashed hotel suite, daylight leaking in through cracked curtains. The air slled like champagne, sweat, and expensive regret. A chair was overturned near a pile of feather boas. A baby was crying faintly in the background.
And right in front of him...
The tiger.
Massive. Breathing. Real.
Its amber eyes stared into his as it crouched inside the bathroom, its growl rising, deep and visceral. Regal felt the floor vibrate under its weight. Felt the dry sting of fear in his throat. His heart slamd into his ribs.
He stumbled backward.
Phil, Alan, and Stu weren't there - but the mont was. The raw, uncut truth of it.
Then, just as suddenly as it ca, it ended.
Regal snapped back into his chair.
Or out of it, rather - because the chair tipped over from his jolt. He hit the floor with a loud THUMP, sucking in air like he'd been drowning.
"Shit... what was that..." he breathed, wide-eyed, chest heaving.
He blinked rapidly. His heart was still hamring in his ears. His fingers tingle. His back arched where it had smacked the floor.
The door burst open.
Samantha rushed in, heels clicking on the tile. "Regal?!"
She stopped dead at the doorway.
Her boss was sprawled on the ground, one hand cradling the back of his head, trying to soothe a pain that didn't seem to show.
But the other hand - covered his mouth, barely containing a grin so wide, so blindingly joyful, it was almost unsettling.
His eyes were lit.
Not just with excitent, but with electricity. Inspiration, adrenaline, madness - pick a word. They all applied.
Samantha winced. "Oh god, not this again..."
She knew that look. That spark. That grin that ant sothing in his brain had broken through.
He looked like he just tasted lightning.
Regal slowly sat up, still chuckling under his breath.
"I think..." He murmured. "...the scene works."
Samantha narrowed her eyes. "And I think I am not getting paid enough to deal with whatever spiritual possession that was."
Regal didn't answer. His hand was already back on the keyboard, fingertips trembling, but ready.
A few more keystrokes.
Pause. Breath. Save.
And then he tried again.
Tried to will it. That shift. That sudden drop into the scene. The way the tiger's breath felt humid against his cheek. The sll of broken room service trays and Vegas regret. He closed his eyes, tried to reach.
But nothing happened.
He let out a slow breath and sat back.
He couldn't force it. That much was clear.
Still... whatever that was, it had cracked sothing open in him.
And yet - he didn't need it.
Not every ti.
The system had already uploaded the full structure of The Hangover into his brain
Now he could see the shape of it.
Yeah.
He didn't need another miracle right now.
He just needed to write.
And trust that when the next drop cos... He should be ready for it.
.....
"You want to look for - Tiger, Chicken, and a Dog - who can act?" Samantha squinted her eyes as she repeated Regal's another absurd demand.
Regal tried to explain. "Only Tiger... and maybe a Dog too... Chicken could be negotiable. I an, we can fake that one with enough takes, as long as the actor isn't allergic."
Samantha ran a hand down her face. "That's not the point, Regal. Can't we just use VFX? I an... I don't want to brag, but we kinda knocked it out of the park with [Death Note], didn't we?"
What Samantha had said is indeed true.
If there was one thing the industry, critics and audience unanimously praised about [Death Note] -
It was visual work.
The CGI.
In fact, Regal was certain people still hadn't fully grasped the level of detail packed into that film's visuals. It would age well - like all great craftsmanship does.
The offers UniqueFx Studio is getting itself is the undeniable proof of their success.
And Regal heartfully believes they deserve it.
Anyway that's about it for [Death Note].
But it can't work for [The Hangover].
He wants the real deal to be on the sets, and film it.
Samantha exhaled like she already knew he wasn't changing his mind. Because he wasn't. This conversation wasn't negotiation - it was curiosity.
She was just poking at the corners of his decision to understand it.
It had been about a week since Regal started actively working on The Hangover script.
Which, frankly... was very unlike him.
Completely and truly unlike him.
If this were the old Regal - the one she knew from [Death Note] days - the first version of the script would have been done by now.
But this ti?
This ti was different.
If what he told her was true... he was just working on a cody.
A road trip gone wrong. A bachelor party. So weird animal stuff. He'd narrated a few bits to her here and there - funny monts, absurd setups, sothing about a stolen mattress and a baby with sunglasses, and sure, it sounded fun.
But whether it would actually work?
She couldn't say. Cody was tricky.
Still, Regal didn't seem worried.
Not at all.
He really wants to relax a little while working on this project and wants to feel the comic gigs himself and make sure they work before going onto sets.
It is an important step in his future plan.
Especially with the thoughts he has for those 'two' giants of his past life.
But when it cos to [The Hangover]?
Unlike both of his first and second films - [Following], and [Death Note] - isn't sothing where everything can be written in the script, and simply film it as close as possible... not that it is as simple.
Yet it has the structural assurance of making sure things are working - but [The Hangover] won't have any of the assurance.
The film's premise is inherently chaotic - a missing groom, a tiger in a hotel room, a baby with a briefcase, and a drug lord's revenge.
The clean three-act arc buried under all that disorder. The genius in the absurdity. Stu's unraveling anxiety, Phil's reckless charm, Alan's unpredictable wild card energy - and the ticking bomb of Doug's disappearance tying it all together.
The challenge lies in making the madness feel plausible within the story's logic.
If the madness felt random, the whole thing would collapse. It wouldn't be funny - it'd be exhausting.
Regal's job was to make sure it all tracked. That each ridiculous beat looped back to the heart of the story - the unraveling of three idiots trying to solve their own blackout.
That's why the actors mattered so much.
Not just acting ability - chemistry.
Phil. Stu. Alan - the trio's dynamic is the film's heart.
Balancing Phil's leadership, Stu's anxiety, and Alan's insanity while giving each character monts to shine is key.
....
The single most crucial elent Regal was determined to lock down for [The Hangover] was the team - not just talented, but positive.
After the emotional tightrope of [Death Note], he wasn't about to gamble on unstable egos or behind-the-scenes drama derailing his set again.
That experience had taught him a brutal lesson - even the most precise filmmaking could crack under the pressure of a toxic work environnt.
This film needed to be different.
Lighter. Freer. Fun.
But that didn't an careless.
Despite [The Hangover] chaotic, codic premise, Regal wanted the script to hold the sa standard of storytelling precision as his earlier works.
[Following] had been minimal but surgical. [Death Note] was a psychological thriller.
Now, [The Hangover] - even with its wild energy - had to be just as tight under the surface.
Its biggest challenge? Structure.
The story unfolded backwards. A blackout night in Vegas pieced together through fragnted mories, photos, and conversations. Each clue was a breadcrumb, leading the characters ....and audience, deeper into the mystery of Doug's disappearance.
That kind of nonlinear puzzle required a very careful hand.
One misstep in pacing or clarity, and the audience would be left behind - confused, disconnected, or worse, bored.
Regal needed to make sure every tiline jump landed cleanly, that viewers always knew where they were, and more importantly - why it mattered in that mont.
And then there was the climax.
A showdown with Mr. Chow that veered between absurd and dangerous, followed by the mad dash to salvage a wedding that hung by a thread.
Everything had to click - the humor, the tension, the emotional payoff.
The audience had stuck through the insanity. Regal owed them a landing that didn't just answer the mystery, but justified the ride.
Because at the end of the day, even chaos needed aning.
And [The Hangover], for all its wild, drunken spirals... still had a story to tell.
.
....
[To be continued...]
★─────⇌•★•⇋─────★
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