◎Warming Feet, Rubbing Waist◎
After hearing Zhou Qining’s words, Song Chan’s groggy brain was forcibly booted up.
In a daze, her stalled consciousness replayed what had just been said in her memory.
‘Chanchan, have you seen the hot searches?’
‘Your husband beat someone up!’
The fuzzy words strung together, and Song Chan could hardly avoid suspecting she’d had a hallucination.
She’d only taken a nap—how had something so fantastical happened?
What hot search? What husband? And who’d he beaten up?
The ‘husband’ Zhou Qining mentioned could only be Su Yicen, without a doubt.
But who had Su Yicen beaten? And why? And it had even made the hot searches?
A string of question marks swirled in Song Chan’s head. Her drowsy mind cleared in an instant, and her sleepy, seductive eyes brightened up.
She hurriedly asked, “What happened? Who did Su Yicen beat up?”
Song Chan’s reaction clearly exceeded Zhou Qining’s expectations. Though she kept her voice down, she couldn’t suppress the surprise in her words.
“My god, Chanchan, you really didn’t know?!”
Zhou Qining was probably busy on her end. Amid the noisy background sounds, she could hear people constantly calling her name. She tried hard to keep her volume low to avoid being overheard.
“You know Wei Lai, right?” Zhou Qining whispered to her. “Your husband beat him up.”
Fully awake now, Song Chan still couldn’t get used to hearing Su Yicen called her ‘husband’ so naturally by someone else—the feeling it evoked when spoken from another person’s mouth.
A layer of goosebumps rose involuntarily on her skin. She couldn’t help shivering, her scalp tingling.
“No! Hold on.”
Song Chan belatedly realized something. Her heart sank, and her volume spiked uncontrollably, nearly shattering Zhou Qining’s eardrum on the other end.
“Who did you just say?”
Song Chan repeated for confirmation, that name that had flashed by her ear.
“You said Wei Lai?… The Wei Lai I know?”
“The foreign-born Chinese idol with massive traffic?”
She hadn’t reacted at all when it was mentioned earlier, but now she was freaking out. Zhou Qining was completely baffled by Song Chan’s behavior.
Somewhat helplessly, she said, “You haven’t seen the hot searches? The real-time ones are all ‘exploding.’ The whole Weibo is talking about it right now…”
As she spoke, Zhou Qining’s voice grew quieter. She could hear someone calling her again from the other end of the line, this time in a sharp, urgent tone that she couldn’t ignore anymore.
With no other choice, she told Song Chan.
“Chanchan, this is my first time doing a live sales stream today. I can’t be away too long. I saw the hot search and snuck away to tell you.”
“I have to get back to the stream now. Check the hot searches yourself, but don’t worry too much….”
By the time Zhou Qining mentioned the hot searches, Song Chan had already opened Weibo. Sure enough, the number one real-time hot search had a glaring purple-red ‘exploding’ label attached.
Su Yicen Injures Wei Lai on Set#
The severe wording was eye-catching enough to make anyone wince and pay attention.
Not wanting to hold up Zhou Qining’s work, Song Chan steadied her tone, sounding casual.
“Don’t worry, go get back to it. I’ve got this.”
After hanging up, her racing heart and worries reached their peak.
The phrase ‘injured’ was far too serious. Song Chan had no idea just how badly someone was hurt to warrant such a description.
And the two people involved were both people she knew well.
One was her legal partner; the other was the collaborator from the recent unpleasant incident.
Song Chan’s finger hovered over the screen, hesitating to tap. Deep down, she had a rough idea of what happened—Su Yicen must have found out about the cover shoot last time, and it was probably because of her.
The more she thought about it, the more terrified she felt. She worried about Su Yicen getting in trouble, and she feared Wei Lai might be seriously hurt.
A tangle of complex emotions surged through her, and her abdomen—which hadn’t hurt that much before—began to throb with waves of cramping pain.
Intense cramps wracked her, turning Song Chan’s face deathly pale. She curled up on the bed, drawing in sharp breaths, unable to straighten her waist.
She clenched her fist and pressed it against her lower abdomen, rubbing to ease the pain, but it barely helped.
Fine beads of sweat covered her forehead. The period pain made her nauseous. When one wave passed, she dry-heaved and popped an Ibuprofen into her mouth. Reaching for the milk glass, she realized it was already empty.
With no choice, Song Chan forced herself up, struggling off the bed. She wanted to head to the living room for water to swallow the pill.
Every step felt like torture, each one stirring up a surge in her lower abdomen. Blood flowed uncontrollably from her body.
The water in the thermos was still lukewarm. The Ibuprofen capsule in her mouth had started to dissolve, tasting awful as she swallowed it down with the warm water.
She could clearly feel the warm liquid traveling down her esophagus into her stomach, soothing her body temperature and easing the unbearable pain a little.
Feeling somewhat better, Song Chan propped her elbows on the dining table and finally tapped into that hot search.
@Entertainment Big Reveal: 【Shocker! Insider from the set reveals #Su Yicen Injures Wei Lai on Set#. Chaos everywhere, but Su Yicen just stood by unmoved, as if it was deliberate.】
Song Chan’s already tense heart pounded even harder when she saw the top Weibo post under the hot search.
The way this marketing account phrased it made it sound like Su Yicen had deliberately injured Wei Lai.
She tapped on the animated GIF attached to the post. It was clearly a maliciously edited collage of a few consecutive shots.
But the problem was, it perfectly captured Su Yicen swinging a prop stick at Wei Lai, followed by Wei Lai staggering back from the impact.
After watching it, a thin layer of sweat beaded on Song Chan’s palms. She lost her confidence.
In the past, Song Chan wouldn’t have cared about something like this. She might have even immediately considered how to politely propose ending the Secret Marriage Agreement to Su Yicen.
But at some point, she had started subconsciously—unconsciously, even—paying attention to him, caring about his joys and sorrows, and following his schedule.
In Song Chan’s impression, Su Yicen wasn’t the reckless type. Why had he done something so irrational this time?
The worst part was that the solid hit to Wei Lai’s shoulder had been photographed.
If Wei Lai ended up with any real issues, Su Yicen’s acting career would be over, and he might even face a lawsuit.
Even though the marketing account’s description was obviously exaggerated, the photo was undeniable.
Song Chan had handled external PR for ZE Fashion for a while and had some experience dealing with crises.
But faced with this situation, even she couldn’t think of what to do right now.
Before checking the comments, Song Chan had braced herself for Su Yicen to be torn apart online. Behind a screen, people with keyboards could spew the vilest things.
What she hadn’t expected was that in this exploding hot search—where the content was most unfavorable to Su Yicen—the over 50,000 comments were shockingly unanimous.
They were all attacking Wei Lai.
Song Chan’s worries eased after seeing the comments below the Weibo post.
Dreams Have Everything: 【Insider, not a Su Yicen fan, just speaking fairly. Good hit, well done. Wei Lai deserved it—that arrogant prick who throws tantrums daily and treats no-names like dirt. Now that he’s up against a real bigshot, why isn’t he spamming his typo-filled Weibo rants anymore?】
Want to Raise a Big Fat Cat: 【Wei Lai is such a letdown. I used to be a diehard fan. Last year, a group of us went to visit the set. He promised to come out after wrap-up. We traveled thousands of miles, stood in the cold wind for three hours, only to see on Weibo that he’d already flown to the Maldives for vacation. He even mocked us for being naive enough to believe him. We unfollowed on the spot.】
Professional Melon-Eater: 【I don’t even want to rehash Wei Lai’s disgusting history anymore. Apart from his decent face, everything about him is a letdown. Just look into it, and it’ll make you lose your appetite (vomit).】
Sticky Rice Carbon Grilled Mochi Ball: 【OMG, what’s going on with you all upstairs? I thought Wei Lai getting beat would tank Su Yicen, but nope—it’s Wei Lai’s house collapsing. Hahaha, dying of laughter (laugh-cry)】
Comments from Wei Lai’s fans trying to defend him were completely buried under the flood of attacks, invisible.
This hot search was like the final straw that crushed his already shaky persona.
Not just under this post—every Weibo under the hot search tag was filled with the same condemnations.
Even other marketing accounts jumped in with passive-aggressive jabs at Wei Lai and his team, calling them unprofessional gold-diggers in Domestic Entertainment.
Two celebrities even ‘accidentally’ liked posts about Wei Lai’s tantrums, pushing his fake image to the brink and inciting the whole internet to demand he get out of Domestic Entertainment.
Cut Off Your Future: 【Trash like this artist—get out of Domestic Entertainment! Can’t even speak Chinese properly and has the nerve to call himself overseas Chinese. Go back to your own country.】
Liu Qi Ba Jiu Shi: 【I wasn’t mad at first, just eating melon. But then I scrolled to a post about him throwing tantrums at my bro—eating melon that hits home, who gets it? Trash, get lost!】
Buy Fried Chicken by the Pound: 【Just dug up fresh dirt: During a water scene, his hat fell off, and he made his female assistant—who was on her period—dive in to fetch it. Total letdown, the more you dig, the worse it gets. Vomiting up last lifetime’s meals…】
Dream of a Billion Young Men: 【Hahaha, sis upstairs, that ‘it’ is spot on.】
Fairy Tease: 【No joke, can the authorities tighten regulations? Domestic Entertainment isn’t a trash bin—stop letting any garbage come fish for money!】
Song Chan skimmed the comments under the hot search. Public opinion had completely shifted.
Almost no one mentioned Su Yicen beating Wei Lai anymore. When it came up, it was praise like ‘well done, cleaning up Domestic Entertainment.’
Before she could exit the hot search, Song Chan saw a clarification statement from Su Yicen Studio posted just a minute ago.
The statement was straightforward, emphasizing it was an accident during a wuxia fight scene, not intentional.
Accidental injuries in action scenes were normal, and the melon-eating crowd accepted the response.
Though the current public opinion relieved Song Chan, only someone on the inside like her knew Su Yicen hitting Wei Lai was definitely more than a filming mishap.
Song Chan still felt this incident involved her. Unsettled, she decided she had to ask Su Yicen about it.
She opened her contacts and, rarely taking the initiative, called him.
After a long silence, the connecting tone finally rang—along with the sound of the door opening at the entrance.