CH 36

Translator: Rin    Editor: Mars    Proofreader: Ume

Feng Dong had expected that Jiang Li would go for the audition of ‘Mountain Tea Garden’. Being Jiang Li’s agent for so long, he knew Jiang Li’s personality of wanting to try out every kind of character very well. Once, a modern drama invited him to play the first male lead. The script was very ordinary and could even be considered poorly created, but the role of a psychiatrist in it was very outstanding. He didn’t hesitate to give up on the male lead and took the role of the psychiatrist, and was able to finally carry the viewership of the whole drama himself. 

After confirming with Jiang Li, Feng Dong called the director, Lin Zhendong’s, assistant.

Lin Zhendong was at this point 71 years old. He was the leading director in the Chinese film industry and had won many box office championships in Chinese films; including the Golden Bear Award, Golden Rooster Award, and Hundred Flowers Award; and was one of the representatives who pushed the Chinese film industry to international heights.

When the famous actor Zeng Shun won the film award with Lin Zhendong, he once said that as an actor, if he had never worked with Director Lin in his life, it would be the biggest regret in his acting career.

Jiang Li had also studied many of Lin Zhendong’s films and hoped to have the opportunity to work with him. However, ten years ago he had shown signs of retreating from the industry. Apart from teaching his two students in their film productions, he didn’t direct any more films for the past ten years.

Now that the former titan of the film industry had re-emerged, the people who wanted to work with him were naturally like carps in the river.

[T/N: Carps in the river means a lot.] 

What surprised Feng Dong was that the other party was also interested in inviting Jiang Li to audition. He said that he had seen the role Jiang Li played and was very appreciative of his acting skills.

After agreeing on the time of the audition, Feng Dong was a little excited. He quickly called Jiang Li back and told him to go to City Z for the audition the day after next. 

City Z was where Jiang Zhan was having a business trip. 

Jiang Zhan was also unable to return from his business trip in a short time, so it was just in time for Jiang Li to go over. However, they might need to ask Ji Shu’s wife to help them take care of Jiang Nuomi again.

Two years before, Ji Shu had married his girlfriend of eight years, and Jiang Li still remembered how Jiang Zhan, who was sitting next to him, gently held his hand without others seeing when they exchanged rings in the hall.

Jiang Li leaned on the sofa, recalled the past four years and unconsciously laughed softly. He actually felt that he was having a comfortable and tranquil life, with a steady relationship that he had longed for. The helplessness of being forced into this world had long since disappeared, and was replaced by happiness that he had never felt before.

“Host, you seem to be in a very good mood.” System’s voice rang out, “Is it because of the new movie?”

“Half of it.” Jiang Li smiled, he was of course happy that he was able to go for the audition of the film of the director he admired, but more than that, he felt a sense of satisfaction that he had never felt before when he looked back on the years he had spent with Jiang Zhan.

Jiang Li loved the job of an actor, but didn’t consider it as the only thing in his life. This was evident from his early announcement of his retirement from the industry in his previous life. Now there was someone around to spend a lifetime with. Comparing both, certainly Jiang Zhan was more important.

“Little Cutie, is the favorability still maintained at 95%?” Jiang Li asked.

“Yes, there’s no change.”

Jiang Li pulled out the system tablet that he hadn’t paid attention to for a long time, clicked on Jiang Zhan’s interface, and the first column of the favorability showed 95%.

After the favorability had unlocked the deep love achievement and reached 95% two years before, the data hadn’t shown any other changes in the last two years. At first System thought it was a data malfunction and tried to refresh the backstage several times to fix it, but the data shown remained the same, proving that Jiang Zhan’s favorability did stop at 95%.

The system had doubts but Jiang Li didn’t care about this. Regardless of the favorability, Jiang Zhan’s feelings for himself didn’t need to be expressed. 

Moreover, thinking from another perspective, if the favorability wasn’t full, this meant that he wouldn’t be able to leave this world. System said that even if the task was completed, the host could choose to leave or stay, but there was nothing perfect in the world. He still couldn’t trust this system completely. So, even though the favorability was stagnant, it was not a bad thing for him.

The information belonging to Jiang Zhan on the tablet was just a simple sentence when he had first come, but as he captured him, they had all been filled. Even Jiang Zhan’s dressing and eating preferences weren’t left behind. While in the personal information, the name ‘Jiang Li’ was written clearly in the spouse column. 

The information of the male lead on the system was automatically generated according to his personal perception, which meant that in Jiang Zhan’s heart, Jiang Li was his other half.

Jiang Li put the system tablet away, stretched and got up from the sofa to look for Jiang Nuomi who was sulking and out of sight. 

Two days later, Jiang Li took a plane to City Z.

He didn’t tell Jiang Zhan about him going over, and only contacted Ji Shu. Ji Shu knew he was coming and had arranged for someone to wait for him at the airport, to send him to the hotel where Jiang Zhan was staying. 

Jiang Zhan was very busy during this business trip. He met with partner companies during the day and socialized at night, so he was so busy that his feet hardly touched the ground, and it was almost 1:00 am when he returned to the hotel.

[T/N: His feet hardly touched the ground: Very busy] 

After being busy working for a few days, and drinking a lot of wine, Jiang Zhan had a headache. Ji Shu helped him open the door, inserted the room card and then waved his hand, asking him to rest. He then closed the door, ready to take a shower and sleep well, but after walking two steps he saw luggage placed beside the sofa in the wing.

The silver gray suitcase reflected silver lines under the light and Jiang Nuomi’s photo was unusually conspicuous on the luggage.

Jiang Zhan, who was drowsy earlier, suddenly became sober as if he had water poured on him and a huge surprise appeared in front of him. Jiang Zhan strode in the direction of the bedroom, through the narrow gap of the unclosed door, he saw faint light coming out. 

His hand suddenly stopped as he was about to touch the door knob. He slowly grasped onto it and pushed open the door gently.

The bedroom was air-conditioned and a bulge could be seen in the middle of the large bed. 

Jiang Li liked to sleep in low temperature, rolling himself in the blanket made him feel secure.

Jiang Zhan subconsciously lightened his footsteps, walked around the bed, and saw a head peeking out from the blanket. 

At that moment, Jiang Zhan felt that something warm was spreading out in his heart. 

He sat down at the edge of the bed, reached out and gently pulled the blanket that was covering Jiang Li’s head to look at his sleeping face. He looked at it quietly for a while, and lowered his head to kiss the tip of his nose.

Although his action was very gentle, he still woke Jiang Li up.

The two of them looked at each other, Jiang Li’s sleepy eyes slowly turning clear. He blinked twice and crawled out from the blanket, “You’re back.”

As he said this, he smelled the heavy scent of alcohol on Jiang Zhan. He wrinkled his nose and asked discontentedly, “Why did you drink so much?”

Jiang Zhan also knew he smelled bad and stood up from the bed, “I’ll go take a shower first.”

Jiang Li grasped onto him, got up from the bed, directly jumped on his back, and wrapped his arms around his neck, “Let’s go together.”

Jiang Zhan lowered his head, smiled and carried him into the bathroom.

The two of them did it in the bathroom for almost two hours, and Jiang Li was carried out by Jiang Zhan when it ended. 

The two laid on the bed. Jiang Li told Jiang Zhan about his audition and asked him when he would be done with his work, and if it was early, they could go back together.

Jiang Zhan was almost done with his work over here, he would only need to leave the next tasks to Ji Shu, so he said he would go to the audition with him the next day.

“The president of Jiang Group is going to accompany me to the audition.” Jiang Li turned his body and laid on Jiang Zhan’s chest, “I’m such a big shot.” 

“It’s good that you know.” Jiang Zhan lightly patted the top of his head and slightly increased the room’s air conditioning temperature, “You have an audition tomorrow, go to sleep.”

“Good night.” Jiang Li came nearer to kiss him and rolled over to lie next to him.

“Good night.”

…

The next day, the two of them arrived at Director Lin’s house twenty minutes early.

Although Old Master Lin was over seventy years old, his body was still strong and he was energetic as he spoke with great enthusiasm. 

The official script of ‘Mountain Tea Garden’ was still being revised, and it was not yet time for formal casting, so Jiang Li’s audition this time was a shortcut specially given to him by the old master.

The old man had been semi-retired for a long time, but he still occasionally paid attention to some of the news in the entertainment circle and knew of Jiang Li’s existence because his granddaughter liked him. He had watched Jiang Li’s drama with her. 

As a director for decades, Old Master Lin had contributed two-thirds of his life to film production, so he knew how much capability an actor had by one glance.

Jiang Li’s acting skills and presentation impressed him.

Even if Jiang Li didn’t take the initiative to contact the production of ‘Mountain Tea Garden’ this time, he would still ask his assistant to send Jiang Li an invitation.

While Jiang Li was in the audition, Jiang Zhan was waiting in the waiting room. He was not worried about Jiang Li’s audition this time, and with Jiang Li’s ability, he was confident that Jiang Li would pass.

The audition didn’t take too long. About twenty minutes later, Jiang Li and Old Master Lin came out of the house. From their conversation, Jiang Zhan heard that the role had been finalized, the main actor for Jiang Mian in ‘Mountain Tea Garden’ would be played by Jiang Li. 

This was expected by Jiang Zhan. He promised to Old Master Lin that Jiang Group would invest another 100 million in the production of ‘Mountain Tea Garden’. 

On the way back, Feng Dong was the driver. Jiang Li and Jiang Zhan sat in the backseat as they chatted and discussed the next two days of  fun at the famous attractions in City Z, just as Jiang Li had no work scheduled for the next few days, and Jiang Zhan was also not busy.

Old Master Lin had been cultivating his own moral and molding his temperament these years, and was living in the mountains that was far from the city. Although there were not many cars on the way back to the city, the mountain roads were windy and not easy to drive. Jiang Li glanced at the trees and the mountains surrounding them and reminded Feng Dong to drive slower. 

Feng Dong smiled as he inclined his head and responded “Don’t worry, I know ……”

“There’s a car!!!” Jiang Zhan, who was sitting next to Jiang Li, suddenly shouted.

Suddenly, a truck had come out from a junction where the road was blocked by the mountain. Feng Dong was shocked and quickly turned the steering wheel to the left, making a sharp turn. They were able to avoid the truck but were caught off guard as they crashed into the foot of the mountain. 

“Boom -” a strong impact made the whole car shake violently.

The accident had happened in a flash, Jiang Li snapped open his eyes. It was a familiar scene, as if it was the last moment he faced before his death in his previous life.  As his sight was shaking, he saw Jiang Zhan who jumped onto him and protected him underneath his body. 

Jiang Li was slowly losing his consciousness. He felt something warm dripping from the body of Jiang Zhan, who was protecting himself, onto his face. One drop after another, they slid down his face and into the collar of his shirt.

He felt a sharp pain in his heart and opened his mouth to call out to him, but finally lost consciousness.

…

Jiang Li didn’t know how long had passed until he heard the sound of someone talking in his ear. However, the sound was a little too soft for him to hear clearly.

He felt a subtle pain from his head, making him frown. He opened his heavy eyes and a large white ceiling appeared in his vision. There was the sound of something dripping coming from the medical instrument next to him.

Where am I?

Jiang Li went into a trance for a moment, and then remembered the figure of Jiang Zhan jumping over and hugging him before he lost his consciousness. He suddenly sat up on the bed, lifted open the blanket, and wanted to get off the bed. However, the nurse beside him saw what was happening and quickly held onto him as she said, “Your body is very weak now, please don’t simply move around.”

“Where is the person who is with me?” Jiang Li grabbed her hand and asked anxiously “Where are the people who were brought in with me? Are they okay?!”

“Don’t worry, everyone else is safe, lie down first.” The nurse said, trying to help him lie down.

Although she said so, Jiang Li’s heart was beating rapidly, as if there was a kind of uneasiness enveloping his whole body. He could not stay quietly any longer, he just wanted to see Jiang Zhan quickly. He broke free from the nurse’s grip and walked quickly towards the outside. He was then met with the person who was entering the room.

The familiar yet strange face of the person made his footsteps stop suddenly. His eyes were filled with disbelief as opened his mouth and called out, “… Brother Xu”

Xu Guoren was Jiang Li’s manager in his previous life. When he saw Jiang Li had woken up, his worried expression turned into surprise. He stepped forward and grabbed Jiang Li’s hand, “You’re finally awake! I was worried sick! Do you know how long you’ve been in a coma?”

“What did you say?”

Jiang Li felt a little stuck in his mind, his ears were still buzzing due to the after-effects of the car accident, making him unable to hear what he was saying, but chill could be felt creeping up from his feet. 

“What did you say?”

Jiang Li heard himself ask another question; his whole body was uncontrollably trembling as he grasped onto Xu Guoren’s hand. His throat was as if it had been sawed, it was arduous and hoarse, “Where is Jiang Zhan? How is he?”

“Jiang Zhan?” Xu Guoren looked confused, “Who are you talking about? Ah Li, are you still not fully recovered? I’ll go call the doctor.”

Xu Guoren then went out of the ward. Jiang Li looked at his back as he left and stood frozen in place, he looked down at his hands as if he had realized something, he then rolled up the sleeve of his left hand, revealing the scar on his arm.

This was the scar left during a shoot when he first entered the entertainment industry, a scar that only existed in his previous life.

After a long while, Jiang Li whispered to System in his heart, but no one answered.

He just stood in place and called it repeatedly many times, the little cutie that accompanied him in another world didn’t respond, as if it had never appeared before.

This world had no All-Rounded Strategy Game, no Little Cutie System, no Jiang Nuomi who was pretentious, and even more so, no Jiang Zhan who promised him that he would stay with him for a lifetime.

The game ended in the same way as he was pulled into it, as if it was just a fleeting dream, and now he was the only one who had woken up.

Why… the favorability isn’t full yet right?

The coldness of his hands and feet spread through his entire body little by little, Jiang Li felt as if he was in an ice cellar, trembling with coldness.

The blood that Jiang Zhan had dripped onto his face before he fell unconscious seemed to still be on his face, he raised his hand to touch it, but he only felt a handful of wet hot tears.