CH 31

April 3, 2021kaychandra

Chapter 31: Handsome faces bring disaster

Translated & Edited by KChandra

Luo Hui was a junior white-collar worker in a company, and she had to pass by Ya De Apparel every day to go to and from work. That day she drove her scooter home as usual. When she was waiting for the traffic light, she felt a little bored and took a look at Ya De Apparel beside the road, and this time she was frozen.

She didn’t know when this huge publicity photo was put on the exterior of Ya De Apparel. The model on the poster was sitting on a luxurious sofa, obviously in the most gentlemanly posture, but his eyes seemed to look down on all the passers-by.

When she met those eyes, Luo Hui felt as if her chest was suffocated for a moment. Her heart felt as if it had been gently grasped by someone, tingling and sour. She almost forgot to even breathe.

Staring blankly at the poster, she forgot that her vehicle was still stopped at the red light until the car behind her honked several times. Only then did she react and drive away from the intersection with some reluctance.

She was already twenty-eight years old now, long after the age of casually looking at a beautiful man and being smitten. But, that poster just now was different. Just a few glances reminded her of the feeling of peeking at her first crush on a boy in school.

Who was that model?

She suddenly felt a little disappointed. She just focused on that poster, but didn’t pay attention to the model’s name. The more she drove, the more she felt lost. After seeing a traffic sign ahead that allowed vehicles to make a U-turn, she slowed down and finally gritted her teeth and turned her vehicle around.

If she didn’t find out who the model was, she might not even be able to sleep tonight.

Unfortunately, she still didn’t get a chance to see the model’s name, because when she turned around to go back, she realized that there was a rear-end incident at the traffic light just now, blocking the road.

She pulled over to the side of the road and waited for nearly half an hour, but the traffic jam didn’t improve, so she had to drive home. The first thing she did when she got home was to open her computer and find her Cape Forum account, which she hadn’t used for a long time, and posted.

‘Has anyone seen the new poster outside Ya De Apparel? Kneeling down to beg you to tell me who the model is. Thanks!!!’ Unfortunately, probably because her title was too inconspicuous, no one answered her even after waiting for half a day. Even the thread she posted sunk into the sea.

She was even more disappointed. She looked up the list of Ya De Apparel spokespersons on Qiandu, but none of them was the model on the poster. She had to grudgingly eat a meal and go to bed.

In her dreams, the man in the suit with a pair of good-looking eyes quietly watched her, like a sweet dream, letting her sleep peacefully all night.

She didn’t know that many fans had gone crazy after just one night.

Gongxi Qiao’s advertisement print photos caused a huge stir as soon as they were officially released by Ya De Apparel’s advertising department. It was for no other reason than because those photos were so sensational that many people’s brains went blank the moment they saw them. Only the word ‘good-looking’ was left in a constantly repeating cycle.

How could there be such a charming man in the world? He was simply so handsome that people couldn’t walk.

“What’s so good about these pictures!! I’ve only seen it a hundred times and used it as my computer desktop background!”

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“He’s not a man, he’s a male vixen emitting powerful hormones. I’ve escaped the attacks of countless little fresh meat, but I didn’t expect to find myself falling victim to a poster. This heartless, shameless and unreasonable world.”

“Buy two sets of the latest men’s clothing at the Ya De Apparel counter and you’ll get a genuine Qiao Shao poster. Don’t ask me why I’m eating steamed buns today, and don’t ask me why I don’t have a boyfriend but still want to buy two sets of men’s clothing!”

The chief of a traffic police unit had been very distressed for the last two days, because areas under the jurisdiction of their unit had recently experienced frequent rear-ends and scrapes, and the incidents were almost always in the same place. Some colleagues teased that this was a psychic event. Today, the most important thing was that the superiors had expressed dissatisfaction with the matter, and he had to go survey the scene again.

The red street light was normal, the road signs were marked without any errors, and there were no pedestrians scurrying around the intersection, so how come rear-ends kept happening? As a rational person, he definitely didn’t believe that this was some kind of psychic event.

“Bang!”

Just when he was thinking hard, another rear-end incident happened, but both car owners were extraordinarily nice to talk to and settled the matter peacefully without any noise.

Only, before the owners of these two cars left, they both snapped pictures of Ya De Apparel.

He looked at the Ya De Apparel building suspiciously. He often passed by here when he was on patrol, and there seemed to be no problem here.

Finally, he squatted here again for most of the day and found that many pedestrians passing by here would take out their cameras to take pictures of a certain large poster on the Ya De building. It was both men and women. He cocked his head and observed this poster for a long time and then felt as if he had found the answer.

Ya De Apparel’s publicity department was also a bit tearful when they received the request call from the traffic department. Originally they put up the poster just to promote their new product. How could they have thought that Gongxi Qiao’s photo would be so infectious that it would even affect the traffic?

Although the traffic department only requested them to put the posters away rather than having a forceful attitude, they had to agree to this request for the positive image of the company.

Gongxi Qiao had just walked out of the agency’s front door when he was blocked by a bunch of reporters, and they were asking all kinds of questions that he didn’t understand.

“Qiao Shao, what do you think about your poster causing traffic congestion?”

“Some people commented that you’re a walking hormone, do you agree with this statement?”

“After the new Ya De clothing was launched, it was quickly sold out. Do you think this has something to do with your posters?”

“Qiao Shao!”

“Qiao Shao!”

Gongxi Qiao has been discussing the new movie with Director Wang for the past few days, so he had no idea what these reporters were asking. He folded his hands and said to these reporters who wanted to pounce on him, “Sorry, dear reporters, but your question …… What is it about?”

The reporters looked at each other when they saw Gongxi Qiao’s puzzled face as if he didn’t know what they were asking. Finally it was a female reporter from a more famous entertainment program who spoke up, “Qiao Shao, the traffic jam outside the Ya De Apparel building was caused by your print advertisement that was hung outside. Yesterday, at the request of the traffic department, that large promotional poster was withdrawn. What do you think about this matter?”

Gongxi Qiao froze, then laughed politely and said, “Today isn’t April Fool’s Day.”

At this time, He Peng came over and said, “Journalists, please give way. We respect all reasonable actions taken by our business partners. However, our Xiao Qiao has been discussing a new project with Director Wang recently and doesn’t know much about what’s going on in the outside world. Therefore, it’s not convenient to answer your questions, please understand.”

After saying this, he didn’t care how the reporters reacted. He escorted Gongxi Qiao to the nanny car with several security guards from his agency and left the scene with the reporters chasing after him.

Outside there was so much buzz, and he, the person in question, didn’t know about it?!

The reporters almost cursed in their hearts, and then froze when they came back to their senses. Discussions with Director Wang about a new project?

The same Director Wang who told reporters last week that he would be making his finale this year?

Director Wang was second only to Director Lee in the director’s circle, and his works had won many domestic and international awards. Hearing that he was about to make his last film, many fans felt very sorry about it. Some were also very curious about what Director Wang’s last film would be, but no news was revealed.

Now, listening to Gongxi Qiao’s agent, Director Wang’s film would involve Gongxi Qiao’s participation?

When they figured this out, the entertainers regretted it even more. They knew they should have tried to stop Gongxi Qiao earlier. It was a shame that they missed such big news.

So at noon that day, an entertainment program aired the scene of the interview with Gongxi Qiao, with the headline. “Gongxi Qiao is likely to participate in the filming of Director Wang’s new movie.”

The video was posted online and attracted a lot of attention.

At first, people were speculating whether Gongxi Qiao would participate as an investor or an actor, but later on, the discussion got skewed.

“Did you guys notice that Qiao Shao had a bewildered and worried look on his face when people asked him about causing traffic jams. That little look seemed to say, ‘What are you guys talking about, I can’t understand ah.’ This look is too cute.”

“Yes, yes, and the way he said it wasn’t April Fool’s Day, so meng it simply made people cry. Baby Qiao don’t doubt, the reporter friend didn’t tease you, it’s true, hahaha. So heartbroken looking at Qiao Shao’s bewildered face.”

“Am I the only one who noticed that a female reporter secretly touched Qiao Shao? Don’t think that your serious expression can hide from me, the look in your eyes has betrayed your heart!”

“I have to say, Qiao Shao’s poster is really handsome handsome handsome cry! Now as long as I see his poster, I have a feeling of falling in love, but the thought of having countless love rivals, I feel a little unloved.”

“Above, I’m your love rival.”

“The two above, I’m your love rival.”

Gongxi Qiao breathed a sigh of relief after dodging the reporters’ hounding. “Brother Chen, what’s wrong with all those reporters today?” It was like they had been given an injection of chicken blood.[1]

“Ya De called me last night and said that because of a non-refusable reason, they had no choice but to take down your poster from the headquarters.”

“The reason for not refusing was…?” Gongxi Qiao touched his face.

A narrow smile appeared on Chen Ke’s face. “Since your posters were hung out, rear-end accidents occurred frequently in the area. The local Department of Transportation had no choice but to request Ya De headquarters take back your posters. Ya De headquarters agreed to this request for the safety of pedestrians.”

After saying that, he handed his phone to Gongxi Qiao, “This is the announcement Ya De headquarters sent out on Weibo.”

Gongxi Qiao took the phone and looked at the wails below this Weibo post. His expression was a bit peculiar, and he said only after half a day, “Isn’t this an exaggeration?”

“This really isn’t hype. Even if Ya De and our side want to create hype, there’s no way the traffic department would go along with it,” Chen Ke said with a smirk. “Even the Imperial Capital Traffic Department forwarded this Weibo to show their acquiescence. Congratulations, you’ve taken another step up in popularity because of this poster incident. “

Gongxi Qiao: “……”

Thinking of those TV dramas where the heroine turned around and passersby were so stunned that they fell or crashed their horse-drawn carriages, he immediately had an inexplicable sense of shame.

The general manager of Ya De Apparel was in a good mood recently, because after their new product was launched, the sales reached a terrifying figure, which had greatly exceeded their prediction.

“General manager, the PR department said that they hope the finance department can approve a budget for additional printing of Gongxi Qiao’s poster booklet as a giveaway for consumers.”

“There’s no reason to hesitate about this kind of thing, let the finance department approve it as soon as possible. Also those posters for ordinary consumers shouldn’t be shoddy, make sure they’re exquisite.”

An exquisite poster wasn’t a very expensive product. However, what was the profit of a set of clothes? Anyone with a brain could calculate that figure.

Although there were many consumers ruthlessly spending money to buy Ya De clothes because of Gongxi Qiao’s posters, when those clothes were worn, they found that the clothes were really excellent. Although the price was more expensive, it was worth it.

Consequently, everybody went back and found that although Gongxi Qiao was the most popular lead actor in ‘Immortal Mountain Courtyard’, he had the least number of endorsements.

The other lead actor, Zheng Lei, endorsed five products at once, including drinks, potato chips, sneakers, milk, and male face wash, not to mention other print ads.

Compared to Zheng Lei, Gongxi Qiao not only had just a single pitiful endorsement, but the commercial he shot wouldn’t be aired on TV until next month.

“A certain person’s fans have a lot of cheek, they think their idol is the most popular, but unfortunately the number of products endorsed isn’t even a fraction of my family’s Sanshi[2], I wonder how much guts they have to brag like that.”

“Heh heh, and it’s only an endorsement of a new product, not a general endorsement. What’s there to be proud of?”

As an entertainer, you couldn’t help but be compared to others. After knowing that Gongxi Qiao’s endorsements were pathetically few, Zheng Lei’s fans came out in droves to mock him, as proof that Zheng Lei was more popular than Gongxi Qiao.

As soon as such remarks came out, the Qiao fans hadn’t said anything yet, but passerby fans already couldn’t stand watching it.

“I say, can a certain person’s fans take a break, all day jumping up and down annoying people ah. Your idol is popular across the galaxy, okay. To put it bluntly, Gongxi Qiao doesn’t need to endorse those products. He’s not short of money. Is the money your idol got from two or three endorsements enough for him to buy one watch?”

“Also, OP, heh heh, which of your idol’s endorsements are high-end consumer goods? Are these products worth a fraction of Ya De? Don’t say Gongxi Qiao is a new product spokesman. Even if he only endorsed Ya De’s print ads it’s still more classy than your idol. If you have the guts, go look at Ya De’s previous spokesmen. Which one doesn’t beat Zheng Lei by 18 blocks?”

The Qiao fans who didn’t get to fight watched dumbfounded as they saw the passerby fans fighting with the Sanshi fans, and inexplicably had the illusion that they were the passerby fans and those passerby fans were the hardcore fans.

Qiao fan A, bewildered, asked: Why can’t I keep up with the times in just a few hours?

Qiao fan B, profoundly, said: You don’t need to know too much, just understand the four words.

Qiao fan A continued to be bewildered: Which four words?

Qiao fan B: Handsome faces bring disaster.[3]

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