CH 13

Gu Wei: “…”

He couldn’t stand this anymore.

His heartbeat continued to speed up, and his palms began to sweat. Despite his nervousness, Gu Wei tried to explain, “before… I didn’t know that you were Jiang Xun.” 

I didn’t know that you were the unlucky guy involved in this mess of an engagement.

“Who do you think I am, then?” Jiang Xun’s eyes became a little dangerous.

“I thought you were…” Gu Wei caught Jiang Xun’s gaze, he didn’t dare to admit he thought Jiang Xun was an elementary school student. Instead, he chose his words carefully, “I thought you were a customer.” 

Gu Wei didn’t lie, per se, he just omitted a few choice words. He had to smooth things over. He couldn’t afford another misunderstanding.

So, under Jiang Xun’s scrutinizing gaze, he intermittently explained the whole misunderstanding saga from his perspective, hoping the reaction meme would decide to spare his dog’s life. But he deliberately omitted the whole “elementary school kid” business. 

Jiang Xun: “…”

In his twenty-three years of life, he has never seen such a bizarre series of events unfolding.

So this kid was really a good boy. He lived a pristine life without any rich sex experience. And he definitely didn’t have the feat of satisfying a hundred and eighty “customers”. 

It was a miracle in itself that their chicken-and-duck conversation could run that smoothly. Jiang Xun could only say that it was some kind of good luck.

“I’m a serious idol, and I don’t have any… subscription service involving myself,” Gu Wei said, “if I have that, then my career would be over in a heartbeat.”

Gu Wei was very clear about his own position in life and career.

“I can’t fall in love either,” Gu Wei continued his explanation, “falling in love would also kill my career.”

Finally clearing up the misunderstanding, Gu Wei breathed a sigh of relief. But he didn’t know that his relaxed expression was captured by Jiang Xun’s sharp eyes.

In front of his fans, the little idol had a cool, handsome persona who could easily make any fans scream in excitement. And off-stage, he was a cute kid who spoke well. 

How could such a little idol have such wild controversies? Where did those unsightly cursing remarks on Weibo come from?

Jiang Xun frowned slightly when he remembered some of those accusations thrown towards Gu Wei on Weibo. 

Gu Wei sneaked his hand to the door lock and was about to flee. But then, Jiang Xun held his phone and showed the screen to Gu Wei. It was the screenshot of Gu Wei’s previous blunder.

“What are you running for? Have you lost your nerve again?” Jiang Xun pointed to the screenshot on his phone, “explain this first.”

Gu Wei: “…” He honestly forgot about this.

“You are really courageous.” Jiang Xun looked at Gu Wei and commented, “you have the guts to trash-talk me in your Moments, and you didn’t even block me.”

“I blocked you!” Gu Wei became angry when he heard this, and his voice became a little louder, “I didn’t mean to make it so only you can see the post!” 

It’s all WeChat’s fault.

Jiang Xun: “…”

He now understood that Gu Wei was not bold. He was just careless. 

As soon as Gu Wei finished speaking, he immediately realized what he said was wrong, he then covered his mouth in pure reflex. He didn’t want to say anything further. Because he knew that he would just dig his grave the more he explained.

“Ah… I see. So, you mean that your essay was only for my eyes? Little Gu, I truly need to educate you,” Jiang Xun looked at Gu Wei and concluded, “I still want to buy that yearly subscription to teach you a lesson, what do you think I should do?”

“I’m not good at being bullied,” Gu Wei tried to reduce the sense of presence, “and besides, I do not sell any subscription services! You can’t sign up for a year for anything.”

Definitely WeChat’s fault. Now he couldn’t escape from all this “yearly subscription” talks.

“Ge, buying a yearly ‘subscription’ is not good for your health, so let’s calm down, okay?” Gu Wei changed his angle of approach and began to sweet-talk his way to freedom. “You professional players are so busy, how can you have time for… uh… enjoying a yearly subscription, right?

He’s facing a big rogue, so Gu Wei needed to develop a desire to survive this kind of talk.

If he couldn’t reason with logic, he might as well use the emotional approach. 

“What part of me do you have a question with?” Jiang Xun raised his eyebrows.

“No, no, no! Absolutely not, I don’t have any problem with any part of you!” Gu Wei said, “I am just concerned about your health.”

“Ge, I was wrong,” Gu Wei showed a hundred thousand percent sincerity, “I promise there will be no next time.”

What he actually meant: ‘Next time I promise not to block the wrong person.’

There was still an ambiguous relationship between the two of them, and Gu Wei had done nothing wrong. Jiang Xun couldn’t bully him too much. So he relented, “forget it, I’ll forgive you this time. After all, you are my fan.” 

It’s not good to scare Gu Wei off. Their future would still be long, so they still have a chance to see each other again.

“Huh?” Gu Wei was stunned.

Jiang Xun definitely misunderstood something.

He was not a fan of Jiang Xun, he just liked to use Jiang Xun’s reaction memes. He also didin’t  understand the complicated world of e-sports. 

Probably because he always went to tournament games with his groupmates, and because he’s an avid collector of Jiang Xun’s reaction memes, Jiang Xun misunderstood him.

But–

Those who are flexible enough to go with the flow were the winners. 

Gu Wei knew how to be flexible in this situation. 

He, Gu Wei, at this very moment, had officially become a diehard fan of Jiang Xun.

“God Xun!” Gu Wei mustered every bit of acting skills he had right now, “I have been a fan of yours for a long time, can you give me your autograph?”

If he succeeded in this act, he could save his life and sell the autograph for a pretty money. 

Why not just do it?

Anyway, after surviving this calamity and annulling the engagement, he vowed to stay far away from Jiang Xun.

Jiang Xun stared at Gu Wei for a while, and decided to be merciful for once. He didn’t comment on his poor acting skills. Instead, he found a piece of autograph paper and signed it for Gu Wei.

“Can you not write my name on it?” Gu Wei bargained. Jiang Xun seldom signed for others, so if there’s his name on it, it would be harder to see it to the fanboys on his group.

“No,” Jiang Xun refused, “where’s your sincerity?”

To Little Gu Wei:

I hope the future is bright.

Current Shou Ze World Champion,

Jiang Xun

Gu Wei took the autograph and finally felt that he escaped the clutches of this pervert.

A bright future.

This reaction meme might be fierce, calculating, and petty as hell, but he might actually be… a good person deep down?

But this engagement still had to be annulled.

The meme was too fierce for him.

As soon as Gu Wei got into the nanny car, he saw the manager Zhao-jie. 

“Why took  you so long?” Zhao-jie asked casually.

“Sorry for the delay.” Gu Wei hid Jiang Xun’s autograph  behind his back.

His manager didn’t press further, she just had something to say, “I’ll explain two things to you.”

Gu Wei nodded, “Zhao-jie, tell me.”

“One piece of good news and one piece of bad news,” the manager said the bad news first. “In the big IP1intellectual property modern idol drama2a genre of drama with cast that is popular, not a cast that is well-known for their good acting skills. Not that idol drama cannot cast an actor with good acting skills though, it’s just not their priority. ‘Like The Moon’ that you took on before, you’re no longer casted as your previous role.”

Gu Wei: “…”

The manager glanced at him, and briefly explained the reason, “it’s snatched by a guy whose popularity is worse than you. He’s called He Cheng. He probably bought the role for himself.”

Sitting on his side was Fu Zhi, who poked his head over, “that little Internet celebrity?”

“His popularity is catching up to us now,” Luo Chenxuan shook his head.

This circle was like this. If you had backstage support, your path would go smoothly. 

These kinds of dirty plays were quite common. Gu Wei might have never seen it, but he had heard of it to some extent.

But disappointment was still inevitable.

He worked so hard to get that role.

The manager asked again, “but the script of this drama is suitable for your image. The company’s judgment is that they are willing to fight for your participation. Now the role of male second lead is vacant. Do you want to take it?”

“I’ll take it,” Gu Wei answered after he hesitated for a bit.

After his debut, he was mired in many kinds of scandals. But the company took a fancy to that, as any publicity was good publicity. They would send him to guest in many variety shows, and the result showed that he definitely got more popular despite everything. But he personally wanted to try other types of work, and acting was interesting to him. 

Whether he was wronged or not, this circle did not allow him to wallow in his losses. He needed to move on quickly. 

“Okay,” the manager seemed very satisfied with his choice, “the company also considered this role. The script of this drama is good, and the role of the second male lead is pleasing. A good performance will attract many fans. I will send you the new script… wait for a bit… ah, here you go. Study it first, your new role is that of a professional e-sport player. If you want take this role, you better confirm it fast –  the official announcement will probably be made in the next two days.”

E-sports player?

Gu Wei was startled.

The only impression he had of e-sports players came from the big perverted bully Jiang Xun.

Not to mention that he still hid the World Champion’s autograph behind his back. 

Besides carefully studying the script and his role, Gu Wei was confused at what method he should use to understand this character in “Like The Moon“.

“And as for the good news…” The manager pinched the center of her brows, clearly exhausted after a busy day of work, “the company has accepted another variety show for you, it’s themed around escaping and solving puzzles. It’s called ‘Traceless Escape.'”

Gu Wei: “…”

This was not good news for him.

“Don’t object to it yet, hear me out first,” The manager saw his expression, “I know you don’t have a sense of variety show, and everyone also knows this. So, just do your best and don’t care much about your current controversy.”

Gu Wei heard this and understood his situation. Despite it all, his controversy was indeed, his selling point. It did bring a lot of traffic to the variety shows he guested in, and they knew this very well.

“Just don’t cause any more trouble. The situation that happened in Jiangnan last time can’t happen a second time. Again, the company won’t help you remove hot searches this month. If something happens, take care of it yourself.”

The manager continued, “I have adjusted your schedule. You should go back to rest, as you will start tomorrow night. Shi Xinyan will also be with you as another guest, and I will ask him to take care of you.”

After knowing that the group’s variety specialist, Shi Xinyan, also came alongside him, Gu Wei became relieved. After feeling reassured, he asked his last question, “who are the other guests?”

“I don’t know about this for the time being. For the sake of the program’s mysteriousness gimmick, the production team will not tell us that for the time being. At present, there will be five guests including the two of you. If the program’s ratings are good, they’ll invite flying guests3temporary guests who only starred for one episode or so. But I know that both Jiang Ying and Jiang Enyuan4btw, these two might looked like have the same surnames, but they don’t. Jiang Ying is “江影” while Jiang Enyuan is “蒋恩源” aren’t one of the guests,” Zhao Ya clarified. 

Gu Wei was relieved, and the matter of his new variety show was settled in this way. He was going to set off in the evening of the next day, so he still had a night and a day to rest.

The “Night of Stars” program that T.ATW starred in ran late into the evening. By the time Gu Wei returned to the dormitory, it was almost one o’clock in the morning. He had always had trouble falling asleep and was easily woken up. In fact, without his insomnia medication, he often couldn’t fall asleep.

Gu Wei took his medicine, laid on his bed, and received a script that Zhao-jie just sent.

“Like The Moon” was an inspirational youth idol drama. The plot started from the high school life of the two main couples. Both couples started as confused adolescents trying their best to find their own direction in life. Eventually, all of them manage to shine in their own chosen fields.

Gu Wei’s upcoming role was the male second lead, who was a professional e-sports player.

What was the life of a professional gamer like?

The only professional player that Gu Wei knew of was Jiang Xun.

Gu Wei suddenly had a brilliant idea – he thought he could go to Jiang Xun’s Weibo history to get a glimpse of the older man’s life as an e-sports pro. 

Gu Wei opened Weibo, searched for TMW, and the first user who popped up was the familiar TMW-Xun.

Jiang Xun’s Weibo was registered earlier, before he became the TMW-Xun everyone knows about. It was no wonder the account had more than a thousand Weibo posts.

Gu Wei learned his lesson and carefully avoided accidentally clicking the “Follow” button under the account’s name. Taking advantage of the darkness of the night, his courage gradually swelled, and he began to search through Jiang Xun’s Weibo history.

Gu Wei? Sneaking around trying not to be found by Jiang Xun? There’s about a 1000000000000000% chance this will end badly (for Gu Wei).

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