CH 24.2

Qi Xingchen had to stifle a laugh. He stood where he was and contemplated for a moment, before resignedly placing the basin down and walking towards Bo Ye.

Then, he knelt down and started rolling Bo Ye’s track pants up. “If you enter the water like this, won’t your pants be wet?”

Bo Ye was not playful as a child, and he had never experienced catching fishes or frogs in the water. Hence, he didn’t even think of cuffing his pants.

How could he allow Qi Xingchen to help him with it though? He quickly bent down and cuffed the other side.

As his body proportions were good, his calves were longer than regular guys. They were also slender and well defined, as a result of the regular dance practices that were explosive and full of vitality.

Qi Xingchen’s gaze fell onto Bo Ye’s exposed calves for three seconds. If others were dressed in cuffed pants and carrying a tree branch, they would surely look foolish.

That wasn’t the case for this man. Instead, he looked like a knight carrying a precious sword and going to slay dragons, his countenance akin to the epitome of righteousness.

Qi Xingchen cleared his throat, “Erm, go ahead. All the best.”

Bo Ye felt that Qi Xingchen’s words were strange, as though the latter thought of him as a spearing toolbox.

He felt around as he walked towards the centre of the pond, meticulously looking out for traces of fishes swimming about. When he found his target and predicted the fish’s movement, he raised his hand up high ---

But failed, and the fish escaped.

He switched his target.

Again, he failed, and the fish escaped.

He couldn’t help but frown, as he analysed the reason for his repeated failure. At this moment, a voice sounded from behind him, “Why aren’t you continuing?”

There was an unmistakable trace of laughter in the voice, and Bo Ye unconsciously turned around.

All he saw was the youth behind him who had also cuffed his pants. The corners of his eyes curled up, and above the thin monolids were faint traces of green veins.

“... Don’t you laugh.” Bo Ye immediately guessed, “You already knew that we won’t be able to catch fishes this way?”

Qi Xingchen was a naughty fan, “Of course not. I just found out too.”

Who would believe this shrewd man? Bo Ye threw the branch away and scoffed.

Qi Xingchen didn’t feel guilty about lying to Bo Ye for such a long time. He tried to coax the latter, “Actually, I have a better way of catching fishes.”

“Oh?” A smile flickered across Bo Ye’s face, “Teacher Xingxing, please advise.”

“Teacher Xingxing” was the name used by Little Tie’s classmates, but when the same name came from Bo Ye, there was an indescribable feeling to it.

In a rare instance, Qi Xingchen rubbed his nose.

Bo Ye could tell that he was feeling shy, so he added, “Why did Teacher Xingxing stop talking?”

“... Alright, stop calling me that.” Qi Xingchen hastily begged for mercy, “I’ll say, I’ll say it now!”

His method was to get Bo Ye to chase the fishes on one end, while he used the basin to trap the fishes from the other side. This was the old method that he used to catch fishes when he was young. As long as there were enough fishes around, they would probably be able to catch a few.

Bo Ye followed Teacher Xingxing’s instructions seriously, and each time they caught a fish, they threw it to the riverbank. Finally, the duo carried the basin back together; there wasn’t much water inside, but it was filled with fishes.

Zhang Feiyun had already returned to their temporary shelter, but he had returned empty handed. It wasn’t the tropical season, so the fruits that hung on trees were very small and sour, and if they ate it, they would feel even hungrier.

Initially, everyone was troubled over how to fill their stomachs. Now, looking at the abundant catch that Qi Xingchen brought back, all of them were thrilled at the thought of having a barbeque in the wild, just like the scenes from dramas.

After the initial cheers, an awkward feeling arose, “Wait, we don’t have anything much, how are we going to cook the fish?”

Among the group, Luo Qiuman and Tao Tao knew how to cook, but they didn’t have any outdoor survival experiences. On the other hand, Zhang Yunfei had outdoor survival skills, but he didn’t know how to cook.

Qi Xingchen sighed, “Now, everyone, listen to my instructions. Just do what I ask you to, will that work?”

“Yes!” The group answered in unison.

“Brother Yunfei, go gather some twigs. Pick those that are thin and dry. Sister Ziyu, Sister Tao Tao and yourself will look for some wild vegetables using Baidu. Our lives are in your hands, don’t pick the poisonous vegetables! Sister Qiuman, I’ll have to trouble you to wash the bowls and chopsticks. As for the rest…”

Qi Xingchen thought about Bo Ye’s fish-spearing stance, “... Stay here and help me prepare the fish.”

“Roger!”

Everyone split up according to instructions, and after a while, only Qi Xingchen and Bo Ye remained under the shade.

When they were by the pond, Qi Xingchen had already cleaned the fish up quickly, removing the scales and the innards.

Bo Ye pointed at the basin, “What else do we need to do?”

“Bring the condiments over.”

Bo Ye passed him the condiments, “What are you planning to do?”

“We’ll grill half of them, and boil soup with the other half. It won’t be sufficient if we just have soup.”

Bo Ye was inexperienced at cooking, so he squatted at a side and watched as Qi Xingchen spread the condiments onto the fishes.

“Teacher Xingxing,” Bo Ye had observed for a while before he said, “Can I help you? How about this, you can teach me, and we can do this together.”

“It’s fine.” Qi Xingchen replied honestly, “Getting a novice to help is no help at all. If you feel bad about this …”

Qi Xingchen pondered for a moment, “Then sing a song for me.”

After transmigrating into “Peach of the Night”, he was always occupied with trying to stay alive, hence he seldom listened to music.

Even though this was the fake idol, he was at the stage where he could take the fake one as the real, and it wasn’t a bad thing if he could occasionally hear him sing.

Singing was Bo Ye’s profession, hence without any hesitation, he started singing his own famous ballad.

The feeling of listening from a speaker was different from listening to the acoustic version live. The low and masculine voice floated steadily across the tranquil forest, and even the winds couldn’t help but tremble at the voice.

Qi Xingchen unconsciously immersed himself into the song. Within a single track, he couldn’t help but think of his real idol.

He couldn’t hold back the feelings of love and adoration that flowed from the bottom of his heart, and the corners of his lips slowly curled upwards.

Bo Ye could tell from Qi Xingchen’s expression that he was in a good mood, so he gently probed, “Xingxing, where did you learn cooking from?”

He had almost never asked others about their private lives. Firstly, it was rude to do so, and secondly, there were few who would evoke his curiosity.

However, the little fan’s reaction from the night before unsettled him, so he couldn’t refrain from wanting to know more.

Qi Xingchen was truly in a good mood, as he replied cheerily, “I don’t know how, but I managed to learn after cooking a few times.”

Bo Ye heard something different from his words. “Didn’t anyone cook for you when you were young?”

“It’s not like that. I wasn’t that pitiful.” Qi Xingchen replied, “But if I did it personally, I can ensure that I'm well-fed.”

The filming assistant who had just recovered from Bo Ye’s voice chimed, “Xingxing, you’re so handsome, so easygoing and you can cook! The girl who gets married to you in future will surely be very blissful!”

Bo Ye was suddenly reminded of Zhou Yu’s girlfriend, and he glanced over at Qi Xingchen.

“Hey, hey, hey, why are all of you so concerned about my marriage?” Qi Xingchen was busy marinating the fishes, he didn’t even raise his head as he joked, “I’m filming ‘Thrifty Travels’, not ‘If You Are The One’ [3] right?”

Everyone had completed their tasks well. Thus, Qi Xingchen could live up to expectations, as he found an empty spot and set up two fires, one to grill the fish, and the other to boil the soup.

The fish had to be skewered with the branches for grilling, and Qi Xingchen couldn’t bear to let the female celebrities do such a bloody thing.

Hence, he called the other two males over, then took out the branches that he sharpened, then pointed out, “Let me demonstrate how we can use these branches.”

He then took the sharp tip and aimed it at the fish’s widened mouth, then shoved it in accurately and steadily with a “pop”.

Bo Ye, “....”

After skewering the fishes, Liu Ziyu asked, “What should we use to cook the fish soup? We don’t have a pot.”

“What do you think the basin was given to us for?” Qi Xingchen’s words hit the nail on the spot. “To the production crew, we don’t need to wash our faces. The more downtrodden we look, the better it is. Hence it is…”

Qi Xingchen carried the basin filled with water and set it on the fire, “It’s a pot.”

Liu Ziyu, “.....”

Director Zhao said, “... You crafty boy, I hope that all your fishes will be burnt!”

Unfortunately, fate didn’t stand with Director Zhao. After a short while, fragrance wafted from the fish grill.

Following that, the appetizing smell of the fish soup permeated almost the entire mountain!! Zhang Feiyun took a sip first, and his expression immediately turned from worry into astonishment, “Wow! Wild fishes are indeed tasty! Everyone, hurry, come over and eat!’

The guests rushed forward and enjoyed their feast. Bo Ye would always be last in line during meals, hence Qi Xingchen quickly pulled out one of the fishes from the rack and secretly shoved it into Bo Ye’s hands.

As they relished their food, the production crew felt somewhat upset. As Maimang TV’s flagship variety show, the crew of “Thrifty Travels” had always enjoyed the best treatment.

No matter where they went, there would always be chefs following the crew to prepare their three meals, and the dishes were always different throughout the day.

Today, they were filming in the mountains and the filming equipment was too heavy. In order to lighten their load, the director had only allowed the production assistant to bring snacks such as bread, biscuits and sausages.

In comparison to the warm and aromatic fish soup that the guests were having, what they had was not fit for humans!

Qi Xingchen didn’t forget about searching for the key even during mealtime. He unintentionally spotted a few people who were staring intently in their direction.

An idea struck him. He washed his own bowl, then poured out some fish soup and took one piping hot grilled fish.

And joined the production assistant, who was seated by a corner.

The production assistant was a young lady. As she saw Qi Xingchen approach, she blushed, “Xingxing, are you looking for me?”

“Yes,” he nodded. “Biscuits are too dry. Have some soup.”

“Is it really for me?” The production assistant gulped, as she reached out for the bowl.

But before she touched the bowl, she withdrew her hand swiftly, “Wait, Xingxing, are you trying to trick me?”

Qi Xingchen choked, feeling somewhat offended.

Was this his image in the hearts of the production crew members?

“I’m not trying to trick you,” Qi Xingchen explained, “I was just worried that you weren’t eating well, and at the same time, ask about how the keys look like.”

“... I was right!” The production assistant felt relieved that she didn’t fall for his trap. She waved her hands and said, “Xingxing, the director doesn’t allow us to reveal this, so I can’t tell you.”

“He’s eating lunch in his own tent. He can’t see, so only the heavens, the earth, you and I know of this.”

The cameraman who didn’t bother following and was zooming in on them: “....”

Damn, are you treating me as invisible?

Qi Xingchen refused to give up. He held the cloudy white fish soup before her eyes and said, “Anyway, I’m just asking about how the keys look like, and not the location where they're hidden. This isn’t considered breaking the rules.”

“...” The production assistant mulled over his words, and it seemed reasonable!

“The keys …” She clenched her teeth, but in the end, she couldn’t resist the dual temptation from the handsome man and good food. “The keys have been made into the shape of a fruit using wax.”

“Don’t ask me the exact type of fruit, that’s all I can tell you.”

“Great!” Qi Xingchen generously agreed, then handed over the food to her and rushed back gleefully to report, “Later, we should look up when searching for the keys. The crew had made it into a fruit and hung it on a tree!”

The production assistant: “!!!”

She actually forgot that in the mountains, only the trees would bear fruits!

Furthermore, in order to achieve realistic effects, the prop team had even hung the keys onto real trees. The guests only needed to walk and look at the trees that bore fruit, and eliminate the other types of trees, such as pine and poplar trees.

An hour later, at the peak of Panlong Mountain, they found the first key.

Four hours later, they found the second key in the valley of Fengju mountain, then promptly returned to the village.

Director Zhao and Assistant Director Lee carried bewildered expressions. How could that be? Did one of the guests have divination powers?

The keys were so hard to find, but they managed to find them before nightfall?

And they haven’t even used the tents that were prepared!

Even more infuriating was that when they completed their mission, Qi Xingchen’s wits showed again. “Sister Tao Tao, we don’t have to take the same route back. We can descend Fengju Mountain, then ask the villagers to give us a lift or rent a car to us.”

The leader of the props team, who had prepared many scary props hoping that the guests would have to search the mountains late into the night, commented, “Oh my! Next season, we’d better not invite this kid again!”

As per their daily routine, after the guests returned to their rooms to clean up, the director called everyone out to announce the mission’s prize.

“Since all of you managed to fulfil the condition of completing the mission before nightfall, you’ve triggered the hidden prize. The prize this time is …”

Tao Tao asked, “A Pass card?”

“No,” Director Zhao replied, “The hidden prize this time is a wish card. It can complete one of your wishes in relation to the mission. This card will be useless after ten minutes.”

Everyone didn’t understand Director Zhao’s words, so they looked at one another. Director Zhao continued, “How about this, I’ll cite an example. Let’s say the wish card was given to Ziyu. Ziyu can wish that she can stay out of all missions from now on, without affecting the prizes. Do you get it now?”

“... Understood.”

In this case, the wish card provided even more benefits than the pass card, since it had the effect of extricating someone once and for all!

In reality, all the missions that they completed required a large amount of brain power or energy.

After doing this consecutively for a few days, aside from the energetic folks, the rest were drained.

The appearance of this wish card was the ark that could take them out of hell, naturally no one would reject it.

In fact, the crew’s motive for introducing the wish card at this point was clear - they wanted to see the guests tearing at each other.

Right now, the team was too harmonious, and there weren’t any sparks flying around. This meant that there were increasingly less sensational moments.

Originally, the tension between Liu Ziyu and Qi Xingchen could be edited and used to incite a battle, while “Thrifty Travels” would benefit from it.

Yet, Liu Ziyu unexpectedly gave up on attacking Qi Xingchen, and became protective of him instead.

The production crew were caught in a dilemma.

Fortunately, they had countless means of inciting conflict. Director Zhao rejoiced, “Don’t forget that the wish card has a time limit of ten minutes. Three minutes have now passed, have you decided who to give it to?”

The leader Zhang Yunfei was visibly troubled.

The more conflicted Zhang Yunfei appeared, the happier Director Zhao was. He held his watch and started counting down, “Six more minutes… Five more minutes… Four more minutes… Yunfei, are you sure you’re not going to say anything?”

It’d be too late if they didn’t start talking now. Zhang Yunfei stomped his foot, “I’ll speak first!”

“Perhaps all of you might think that I’m biased, but this card … I still want to give it to Xingxing.”

“Ah?” A look of confusion appeared on Liu Ziyu’s face. “You wanted to give it to Xingxing too? If I had known that, I wouldn’t have held my tongue.”

“Oh, so that’s what’s happening.” Luo Qiuman slapped her thigh, “I was worried of an internal conflict, so I didn’t dare to say this. My first reaction was to give this to Xingxing.”

Bo Ye didn’t speak; he simply nodded.

The reaction of the one person who felt that the card could go to anyone and didn’t really care for it, Qi Xingxing: “???”

Director Zhao, who was waiting for the guests to start tearing at each other: “???”

… Damn, this kid shouldn’t just be called a smartass, he was a little demon!

However, since things had turned out this way, there was no use trying to fight it. Director Zhao dispiritedly handed the card over to Qi Xingchen, “Two more minutes, you should hurry up and make a wish.”

“Woah, Xingxing, you’ve got to think about it properly!”

“That’s right! How about exempting yourself from the rest of the missions? You’ve worked the hardest over the last few days, so you can use this chance to take a break.”

“Otherwise, you can wish that the individual prizes can be increased, so that it can also be used in the next episode.”

“Or…”

While everyone had drowned his ears with their comments, Qi Xingchen didn’t take in any of them.

He raised his hand confidently, “I’m ready.”

Director Zhao asked, “So quickly?”

“Yes.”

“Then tell us.”

“My wish is, if you find out how we managed to complete the mission today, you must not reprimand your staff workers.”

Standing at the last row with the production crew, the production assistant who had been feeling uneasy about leaking the news was stunned for a moment.

It turned out that … he wasn’t simply making use of her.

The expedition today had made everyone exhausted. They quickly showered and went to bed, and silence fell upon the yard.

Qi Xingchen was still thinking about Zhou Yu’s scandal, so before he slept, he launched Weibo.

Under the successful manoeuvring by the PR team, every single piece of negative news relating to Zhou Yu was pulled out and widely broadcasted.

Not only were there screenshots of his naked body and chilli-covered face, the shots were made into emojis and became widely used, directly cementing his reputation as a bastard.

The largest beneficiary of this incident was Qi Yuji. Both Qi Xingchen and Qi Yuji’s Weibo accounts were “accidentally” revealed.

Qi Xingchen’s fans had increased from more than nine hundred thousand to a million.

Qi Yuji’s outcome was vastly different. As the protagonist of this incident, her followers increased from about 1.3 million to about two million!

However, there were also netizens who frowned about the scandal, questioning if this was a joint publicity stunt by Qi Xingchen and Qi Yuji.

And the numbers were rather significant. Immediately, there was a large group of anti-fans who started attacking Qi Xingchen, calling him disgusting for using others’ private matters for publicity.

The more vicious ones even commented that a D-lister like Qi Xingchen shouldn’t be allowed to continue his activities, and should be leashed instead!

Qi Xingchen: “...”

Who wouldn’t feel upset from being cursed but countless strangers?

As a public figure, he couldn’t directly confront them. Qi Xingchen pondered for a while, and felt that anything he said would likely be distorted by them, hence he climbed out of bed, faced the window, and took a picture of the night sky.

He didn’t add a caption to it, and simply posted it on Weibo.

Perhaps it was because his idol’s name was related to the word “Night” [4], in his heart, the night is the most magnanimous.

It could take in everything that’s good in the world, and could also tolerate all the stains in the world.

Eventually, with the passage of time, night after night, the wounds would gradually fade, and everything would become a memory, vanishing in the stream of time.

Qi Xingchen gazed at the moon for some time, and his mood finally calmed.

When he went to bed, he continued surfing. However, he suddenly realised that messages about comments and a surge in fans had filled his notification page!

What’s going on? Could it be that Qi Yunxiao bought him more traffic again?

Qi Xingchen frowned as he launched his Weibo.

“Bo Ye has become your fan.”

[3] 非诚勿扰 - a Chinese dating variety show.

[4] 夜 - The “Ye” in Bo Ye’s name also means “Night”. Hence, his fandom is also called Night Sky.