CH 65

The low laugh tugged at Ning Xi’s heartstrings. She looked at the man grinning beside her. “What’s so funny?”

“I’m laughing at your cute expression just now.” Chang Shi Gui pulled Ning Xi into his embrace, and let her rest on his shoulder.

Feeling the warmth from his body, Ning Xi smiled. She picked up the remote control and changed the channel. As the person in question, when she heard the variety show hosts exaggeratedly reporting about news of her, she felt somewhat abashed.

The next morning, when Ning Xi prepared to return to the set after breakfast, Zhang Qingyun called and told her that Chen Yijun and a few others had issued apology letters online. The Chen and Wei families were also trying to contact her.

“I don’t want to see them.” Ning Xi said plainly. “I’ll have to trouble the company with this.”

“It’s no trouble.” Zhang Qingyun could tell from Ning Xi’s tone that she was in a relatively good mood. “How about you take a few days’ rest? I can try to discuss with Director Lin to get your scenes postponed?”

“I have the most scenes in this show. If I don’t go, the filming probably can’t continue.” Ning Xi looked at the two men in the driver and passenger seats. “Don’t worry, Shi Gui has arranged two bodyguards for me. Even if reporters arrive, there’s nothing to worry about.”

Zhang Qingyun was dumbfounded. This point had slipped his mind.

“That’s great. Call me if anything crops up. I’ll be going to discuss another endorsement project for you this morning, so I won’t have time to go to the set. You take care.”

After hanging up, Zhang Qingyun raised his head and looked at his boss, who had been staring intently at him. He rubbed his nose. “It’s fine, everything’s alright.”

Li Jianhui nodded silently. As the only female celebrity promoted by Jiuji, Li Jianhui had high expectations of Ning Xi. That was why he was shocked when he found out that she was in a relationship with the head of the Chang Enterprises.

After rethinking the issue overnight, the delight he felt suddenly turned into worry. It wasn’t that he was materialistic, but given Chang Shi Gui’s identity, it would be difficult for Ning Xi to marry into the Chang family. Even if she managed to marry into the Chang family, would she really rise up the ranks and become a phoenix?

The Jiang family wasn’t even on par with the Chang family. Chen Zhenzhen was Jiang Hongkai’s second wife, but what happened to her in the end?

At that time, the police had announced publicly that Chen Zhenzhen was diagnosed with depression after a miscarriage, and eventually ended her own life.

However, only Chen Zhenzhen and the Jiang family would probably know the truth about her death.

Three days before Chen Zhenzhen’s suicide, she had told him privately that she had the intention to return to the entertainment scene. If that was the case, why would she kill herself three days later?

Or perhaps … her death wasn’t a simple suicide?

The Jiang family had been a strong presence in the capital. Hence, whatever suspicions Li Jianhui had towards them, he didn’t dare to announce them. Eight years have passed, and he had finally found another female celebrity who was even more talented and charismatic than Chen Zhenzhen. Yet, she had followed in Chen Zhenzhen’s footsteps, and got herself involved with someone from a prestigious family.

He might be a shrewd businessman, but it was impossible for him not to worry when he was personally witnessing another young lady falling into an abyss again.

“Boss, Mr Chang is different from Jiang Hongkai.” There was a hint of disappointment in between his brows. “Perhaps Ning Xi’s ending will be different from Chen Zhenzhen’s.”

As a bystander, it was a hateful and rude thing to be pointing fingers at someone else’s relationship. Zhang Qingyun might be worried about Ning Xi’s future, but to reject all possibilities before anything happened was simply an act of bias.

“Yes, I understand that.” Li Jianhui tapped the cigarette in his hand. He’d been trying to quit smoking recently; the cigarette had been in his hand for close to half an hour, but he didn’t light it up. “Carry on with your work.”

Zhang Qingyun nodded, then left his boss’ office.

On his way out, he met other people from the company, and they were extremely polite to him. Previously, many of them had made snide remarks when he decided to spend all his efforts to promote Ning Xi and transfer other celebrities under his management to others. Now that Ning Xi’s popularity was on the rise, and she was also romantically linked to Chang Shi Gui, these people could only enviously from aside.

“Qingyun,” Zhou Zhengchuan’s manager Li Sheng called out when he saw him. “Wait a moment, I have something for you.”

Zhang Qingyun stopped in his tracks. Very quickly, Li Sheng brought two boxes of chocolates over to him. “Zhengchuan is promoting a new brand of chocolates. The manufacturer gifted him with quite a few boxes of chocolates. Take two to try, if you like them, I’ll pass more to you next time.”

Zhang Qingyun took the two boxes and said, “Thanks. I can’t finish them alone. I’ll pass a box to Ning Xi this afternoon so that she can try some too.”

Li Sheng was a capable manager. When Ning Xi’s popularity was low, he had even arranged for Zhou Zhengchuan to bring her around. Hence, even though Zhang Qingyun could tell that he was trying to establish closer ties with them, he didn’t reject his advances.

Upon hearing Zhang Qingyun’s words, Li Sheng widened his smile. “No worries. If you need anything, just let me know.”

Li Sheng continued smiling even after Zhang Qingyun had left. He was glad that he made the decision to allow Zhou Zhengchuan to help promote Ning Xi when she was new. Otherwise, it would be difficult if he wanted to establish any relations with Ning Xi now.

If the people from the management agency were already this polite to Zhang Qingyun, Ning Xi’s treatment when she went on set was even better.

The production crew had already guessed that there was something going on between Ning Xi and Chang Shi Gui, but all of them thought that Chang Shi Gui was only fooling around with Ning Xi. They had never expected that Chang Shi Gui would openly reveal his relationship with Ning Xi.

Aside from revealing their relationship, Chang Shi Gui had even posted a few times on Weibo, and criticized the troublemaker Miss Wei. It seemed almost certain that he would eventually marry Ning Xi.

Therefore, no one was surprised that Ning Xi arrived with two additional bodyguards. Many A-listers in the industry would normally have a few bodyguards with them. Ning Xi had only brought two, which seemed relatively low-profile.

Humans were strange creatures. If Ning Xi and Chang Shi Gui’s relationship did not surface, then if a B-lister like her brought two bodyguards along, they would naturally gossip about how she liked to act high-profile.

Now that she had a rich and prolific boyfriend, many felt that this was necessary, and even felt that she was too low-profile.

This only goes to show how hypocritical people were.

Even if the revelation of the relationship had caused a massive change in the production crew’s attitude towards Ning Xi, she was still very focused on acting. When she needed to cry, she cried; when she needed to fall, she fell; she was as professional as before. Hence, even those who were initially sour about her status started seeing her in a different light as well.

The filming in the morning went on very smoothly. Ning Xi only had two scenes in the afternoon, so she could rest for a while longer. Therefore, when a person who identified himself as “Chen Qiran” called her, she spoke to him for a longer time.

“Arrange for a meeting?” Ning Xi flipped the script in her hand and blinked slightly. “Mr Chen, you probably don’t understand me.”

“It’s true that I hate Chen Yijun, but that doesn’t mean that I’ll want to cooperate with the mistress.” Ning Xi sneered. “Your mother knew that Chen Guanrong had a wife, but she still happily became a mistress, and even wanted to snatch everything from the wife. Your mother and you, plus the Chen family’s father and son, are the same to me.”

“People shouldn’t be so shameless.” Ning Xi heard the exasperated yells from the phone, and said, “It’s not that I’m intentionally going against you. Your mother, Chen Yijun, Chen Guangrong and you are all not good people.”

She couldn’t be bothered to continue listening to the scathing words on the other hand of the phone. She simply cut the line, and threw her phone aside.

All these jokers coming out from all around, what were they trying to do?

======================

“That b*tch!” When Chen Qiren heard the line being cut off, he was so angry that he almost smashed his phone against the wall.

“What’s wrong? Ning Xi’s not willing to cooperate with us?” She Jiaojiao looked at her son’s unhappy face, and felt puzzled. “Doesn’t she have a feud with Chen Yijun? Why isn’t she willing to work with us?”

The enemy of an enemy is a friend. Why didn’t this logic work on Ning Xi too?

Chen Qiren didn’t dare to tell She Jiaojiao that Ning Xi despised the two of them, so he had to hold his anger back and explain to his mother, “She doesn’t know us well. Also, she has Chang Shi Gui to back her up. Of course it’s natural that she’s unwilling to cooperate.”

“If she didn’t have a boyfriend like Chang Shi Gui, I wouldn’t have asked you to try to contact her too.” She Jiaojiao snorted disdainfully, “She’s only an actress, what else can she do?”

Chen Qiren listened on without a word.

“A smart woman only needs to know the way to a man’s heart.” She Jiaojiao looked at her own smooth fingers. When she noticed that her freshly manicured fingers had been slightly spoiled, she frowned. “Now that you are in the company, you have to watch out for Chen Yijun. I worry that he might play tricks behind your back.”

“Don’t worry. Chen Yijun has caused so much embarrassment to the family, Father’s still angry with him now. How much more tricks do you think he can play?” As he thought about how Chen Yijun was probably extremely anxious now, he felt exceptionally satisfied.

All these years, Chen Yijun was the distinguished young master. Everyone wanted to get into his good books, or gain his favour. On the other hand, his mother and him were always the topic of gossip; even though they seemed friendly with him on the surface, he knew that they despised him.

They were both their father’s children, so why was it that only Chen Yijun got the better treatment?

“That’s true. Your father cannot even stand the sight of them now.” She Jiaojiao raised her chin elatedly, “If it’s not for the fact that her family is still quite powerful, your dad would have long divorced her.”

===============

Chen Yijun had made a public apology to Ning Xi. His tone was extremely sincere, but Ning Xi did not give a response. In comparison with Wei Siqi’s malicious attitude, Chen Yijun showed how remorseful he was. There were people who started to take the view that he was at least repentant, but Ning Xi’s unresponsiveness was somewhat unbecoming of her.

Just a passerby: Whether he deserves to be forgiven or not is not up to us. It’s for Ning Xi to decide. All of you are not Ning Xi, and you have never been through what she has. So shut up and stop playing saints behind your keyboards.

This comment jolted everyone to their senses. No matter how sincere Chen Yijun’s apology letter was, it couldn’t reverse the fact that Ning Xi’s parents were gone. How could a single apology make up for all the hurt that he brought?

Entertainment gossip boy: If you truly mean it, then you should seek Ning Xi’s forgiveness face to face. By posting an apology letter online, are you writing it for show to the netizens, or forcing Ning Xi to forgive you?

This was the original user who had first exposed Ning Xi’s educational achievements. He had quite a large following, so when the comment was posted, many people agreed with him.

That’s right, if they truly meant it, then there was no use in saying so much online. They should just directly apologize to Ning Xi face to face.

It wasn’t like Ning Xi was staying on another planet. Why couldn’t they just find her?

After concluding the filming for the day, Ning Xi’s car, which was leaving the set, had reporters surrounding it. Very quickly, the number of reporter increased, making it difficult for Ning Xi to leave.

The bodyguards saw the situation and immediately stepped out of the car, wanting to drive the reporters away.

“Ning Xi, the young master of Chen Enterprises has apologized to you publicly. Will you accept his apology?”

“Ning Xi, Mr Chang has already opened up about your relationship. Will you be getting married soon?”

“I’d like to ask, did you really have a crush on Chen Yijun before?”

Ning Xi wound her window down, and looked at the microphones and pen recorders that were outstretched towards her, as well as the reporters who were trying to interview her. She pulled down her face mask and said, “As of now, no one has come personally to apologize.”

“Do you mean to say that those classmates who bullied you previously have yet to proactively contact you?”

Ning Xi did not reply to this question. Instead, she brought up her relationship with Chang Shi Gui. “Shi Gui and I are still dating, we haven’t considered marriage at this point in time. Thanks for your concern.”

“Then what about your crush on Chen Yijun, is that true?”

As she heard the relentless question from the reporter, Ning Xi almost laughed scathingly. To put it simply, she had never looked Chen Yijun in the eye at all then, why would she have a crush on him?

“That year, I was busy trying to get the top in our grade. All I was thinking about everyday was how to answer questions and get good grades. Where would I get the energy to notice others?” Ning Xi looked at the cameras with an astonished look, “It’s very difficult to top the class in the First High School.”

Reporter: Even though Ning Xi sounded very gentle, why did her words sound like “Who does Chen Yijun think he is, I’ve never been interested in him”?

But … it was true that it was difficult to top the class in First High School.

In fact, anyone who could enter the school would have good grades, so one could imagine how hard it would be to be top in grade.

Hence, Ning Xi 's words made perfect sense. It was so important to be top in her grade, why would she have the time to have a crush on the school hunk?

No matter how gullible the reporters were, First High School was truly reputable, so everyone would know how difficult it was to top the class.