Chapter 16

As a college student who spent a lot of time surfing the web, Tang Yuhui usually browsed Weibo whenever she had nothing to do.

After class today, she lay on her dorm bed and opened the trending searches to see if there was any fresh entertainment gossip. The moment she went in, she saw the top trend.

"Ning Luo?... This name sounds kind of familiar."

She repeated the name a few times before finally remembering. Smacking the bed, she said, "Isn't this that little flop who keeps getting exposed for insulting assistants, having a terrible temper, and pretending to be innocent? He actually made it to the top trend? He really is willing to spend money. You rich people have really figured out how to play Weibo."

As she spoke, she tapped into it. "Let's see what other surprises you have that I don't know about."

Less than a minute after she opened it, her roommate in the upper bunk heard her earth-shaking laughter, accompanied by the creaking of the bed as she hammered it.

Her roommate poked her head out. "What's gotten into you?"

Tang Yuhui laughed as if someone had hit her funny bone, cackling uncontrollably. With trembling hands, she held up her phone for her roommate to see, nearly dropping it several times. After a long while, she managed to piece together a complete sentence. "Look... hahahahaha, look! Ning Luo, hahahaha! No, I'm dying..."

Her roommate accurately caught the slogan amid the shaking blur.

"Ten years of commitment, only for cleanliness."

"..."

She slowly asked, "He's this good at advertising? Does he have a death wish?"

Tang Yuhui finally calmed down a little and wiped the tears from the corners of her eyes. "It's not just that. Look below."

Some staff member at a magazine shoot had secretly filmed it and uploaded it online. Even the heavily degraded quality could not diminish the delicate beauty of the face in the video.

Apparently nervous, his moist, rosy, plump lips trembled as they pursed, then his mouth opened.

"Do you know why dinosaurs went extinct? Their forelimbs were too short to applaud your beauty, so they died of sadness."

"Bro, it's enough that you're a little good-looking. Don't be this ridiculously handsome. It makes me want to shove a piano into my mouth and become a lovesick person from now on."

"The altitude here is too high, and I'm a little short on oxygen. My assistant just gave me a breath, and I immediately felt refreshed. I wondered what kind of air was so useful, but it turned out you were just so handsome."

That little mouth opened and closed like it had been smeared with lubricant.

At the end, he blinked at Lu Tingzhou with an expression that said, "See? I told you so. Hurry up and praise me."

Before her roommate had even finished watching, she was already laughing so hard she nearly threw up. She and Tang Yuhui hammered the bed like maniacs, laughing themselves crazy.

The comments below were laughing themselves sick too.

[What the hell is "a lovesick person," hahahaha! Did Ning Luo forget his pure college boy persona? Hahahaha!]

[The entertainment industry's most delightful train wreck, hhh.]

[Putting myself in Lu Tingzhou's shoes, this is so embarrassing my scalp is tingling. I want to carry a train and move to another planet overnight.]

[A new marketing strategy? Not bad. You've successfully caught my attention. [Dog holding flower]]

[This isn't even the end, sisters, go watch the other video! Ning Luo is actually practicing Wudang Cloud-Step, hhhh. It's so funny.]

Someone took a clip from another secretly recorded video of Ning Luo stepping on his own left foot to ascend into the sky and turned it into a meme.

The caption read: "Sleep one extra minute every day, practice lightness skills on the way to your 8 a.m. class."

After seeing it, the morally bankrupt netizens unleashed all their lifetime skills, digging up all of Ning Luo's previous materials and producing memes in massive quantities, one after another.

A photo of Ning Luo crying with his eyes closed.

Netizen: "Those who like the falling-from-the-sky type are in luck. Bro's about to jump off a building."

Ning Luo holding a book with a headache.

Netizen: "Don't call me a bad student. Please call me knowledge-intolerant."

Ning Luo awkwardly smiling in an idol drama.

Netizen: "Fuck, I laughed at how broke I am."

What had started as a minor disturbance caused by three comments swept into a meme war once countless fun-seekers joined in. The war spread to Weibo, Douyin, and Xiaohongshu. The three giants jointly pinned Ning Luo at the top trend, and the heat kept climbing.

The marketing accounts caught the scent and came running, churning out videos, images, and articles in wave after wave to boost the traffic.

Ning Luo's fans had never seen so many people in their lives. Terrified, they huddled in the supertopic and did not dare make a sound.

"Luo Luo, fly bravely. If anything happens, bear it yourself."

And Ning Luo himself genuinely wanted to jump off a building.

Looking at the endless stream of memes, he wanted to cry but had no tears. "...How many sins did I commit in my past life to end up knowing these netizens?"

Xu Ling comforted him. "Look on the bright side. You're famous now."

Ning Luo was about to lose his mind. How was this any different from a public execution?

"Can I post on Weibo saying my account was hacked and those things weren't posted by me?"

Xu Ling nodded approvingly. "Good idea. What about the videos?"

Ning Luo said, "AI face-swapping."

Xu Ling applauded. "Nothing can stump you."

Ning Luo heard the sarcasm in her voice, but he dared to be angry without daring to speak.

[You provoking me? Then you've provoked the easiest person to provoke within a hundred miles! The result of provoking me is that you provoked me once, because I have no power to fight back. If you provoke me, you can knead me round and flatten me, then turn me into soft, springy noodles!]

Xu Ling sneered.

After initially being annoyed that he had casually replied to netizens without caring about his public image, she quickly calmed down and keenly sensed an opportunity for Ning Luo to become popular again. Looking at him kicking his legs as though he wanted to die, she whispered like a devil.

"Ning Luo, do you still want to become a Best Actor?"

Ning Luo felt that there was something strange about that wording, but he cautiously nodded. "I... guess so."

"Then do nothing. Once the buzz rises, your popularity will rise too. I'll log into your account later and post a statement saying you've been too tired and under too much pressure lately." Xu Ling affectionately ruffled his hair as if she were looking at a flourishing money tree.

"What does a little public embarrassment matter? How can you give up money over a little face?"

Ning Luo had been struck directly in his weak spot. "..."

It sounded so reasonable that he could not refute it.

-

The determination he had only just managed to build instantly wavered when he saw the rest of the crew.

The first thing Shen Wenyu said when he saw him was, "Yo, the compliment machine is here."

Ning Luo turned around and left.

Shen Wenyu hurriedly grabbed him. He wanted to laugh but was afraid Ning Luo would be thin-skinned and embarrassed, so he endured it with great difficulty. "Why are you leaving? Hurry up and get changed. We're waiting for you."

Ning Luo pulled up the corners of his mouth expressionlessly. "With Brother Wenyu acting like this, it seems I'm the one in the wrong. It makes me look petty."

Shen Wenyu was practically choked by the scent of green tea. Half annoyed and half amused, he grabbed Ning Luo by the back of the neck and hauled him into the makeup room. "A few days without seeing you, and you've turned into a little green tea."

Ning Luo sat upright in his seat and looked at himself in the mirror. "What green tea? I'm chrysanthemum tea."

Shen Wenyu became interested. "Oh?"

Celestial music seemed to drift around Ning Luo's head. "Serene as a chrysanthemum. Don't cue me, don't disturb me."

Shen Wenyu said, "..."

Very good. They had not seen each other for a few days, and Ning Luo had gone even crazier.

Even if Ning Luo wanted to fake his death and flee Earth, he still had to work for a living.

The moment he stepped out of the makeup room after getting his styling done, everyone's eyes fell on him.

Faint laughter came from all around.

Ning Luo took a deep breath and told himself to stay calm.

[Isn't it just being mocked by the entire internet? What's the big deal? I can live no matter what. If I can't live, I can die. Dying early or late is still dying. My grave is Bali! Bali, Double G Burger, who wants to sell this stupid burger! Hahaha, Bali!]

Wang Lin said, "..."

He solemnly wiped his face.

This was an investor. He could not offend him.

This was an investor who had put in ten million. He had to treat him carefully.

After silently repeating that several times, he finally felt his mental state stabilize somewhat. "Quick, let's start this scene."

In this scene, the second male lead played by Ning Luo saw the female lead at the boxing gym, where she had accompanied a client to work out over the weekend. Looking at her back, he remembered the person who had pulled him out of the mud back then. She had been the first ray of sunlight to shine into his dark corner.

She had also been the beginning of his fall into an even darker abyss.

The first half of the shot focused on Sun Shaoyi. Ning Luo wore boxing gloves below as he watched Sun Shaoyi enter the ring.

Xu Ling moved quickly. She had said she would find him an assistant, and she immediately found one.

She was a female assistant named Taozi. Besides taking care of his daily life with Xiao Song, she was also responsible for helping him manage his Weibo, posting daily updates, and maintaining his fanbase.

Thanks to the trending searches these past few days, Ning Luo had gained more than five hundred thousand fans, and the number was still rising.

They were all active fans too. The supertopic's daily activity ranking had even made it into the top ten.

It was simply a cause for universal celebration.

Ning Luo lowered his head to wrap his hands. Taozi called out to him, "Brother Luo, look over here."

Ning Luo looked over instinctively and was greeted by several rapid clicks.

Taozi looked at the finished shots with great satisfaction. "Brother Luo's face must be a 3D model. There isn't a single flaw. I wonder what the person you like in the future would have to look like to be worthy of you."

Ning Luo finished wrapping his hands and put on his boxing gloves. "Oh. I already have a boyfriend."

"Huh? Brother, that's not something you can say out in public!" Taozi was startled and immediately looked around.

Sure enough, she met several pairs of gossip-hungry eyes that had lit up.

Ning Luo said, "Oh, it's fine. Our relationship isn't very stable anyway."

"What do you mean?" Taozi instantly became curious and lowered her voice to ask.

Ning Luo beat his chest and sighed. "Sometimes I can't dream about him."

Taozi and the gossiping crowd: "..."

Watching him walk away, Taozi turned to Xiao Song and asked, "Is Brother Luo usually like this too?"

Xiao Song asked back, "Haven't you been following the trending searches lately?"

Taozi said, "...Seeing it once is better than hearing about it a hundred times."

Crazy. He was truly crazy.

Filming began soon after. The female lead played by Sun Shaoyi had spent a long time researching the client's preferences in order to secure the deal and win the client's favor, which was why she had come to the boxing gym today.

"Lawyer Yin likes boxing too?"

Sun Shaoyi tied her hair into a high ponytail with an elastic band. "I treat it as a way to relax when I'm bored. I didn't expect Miss Gu to like it too."

The celebrity addressed as Miss Gu was the target client this time. She stepped down from the ring and gestured for her to enter. "Want to try?"

Sun Shaoyi vaulted into the middle of the ring and crooked a finger at the other sparring partners. "Come on."

The female lead was supposed to have practiced taekwondo since childhood, and Sun Shaoyi worked out year-round as well. After guidance from the martial arts director, her movements were graceful and dashing as she overwhelmed the other sparring partners.

Ning Luo's blood began to boil as he watched.

[The moment Sun Shaoyi appeared, she went fierce, forgot herself, risked her life! Her hundred shifting moves were like a hundred stones repeatedly thrown up by a powerful quake, wildly dancing before your eyes. Like a black tiger seizing a heart, they were urgent drumbeats; like a monkey stealing peaches, they were bouncing footsteps; like an elephant kicking its legs, they were powerful, vigorous bearing! Upon this sacred boxing ring erupted a duel so magnificent, so bold, so blazing—Sun Shaoyi!]

Sun Shaoyi's foot slipped, and she nearly did the splits.

She had strained her thigh muscle and sucked in a breath from the pain. Her lips trembled as she cursed him with her face, and cursed him viciously.

Could someone please control Ning Luo!

Outside the shot, Wang Lin laughed with great delight.

The wheel of karma turned, and retribution never failed. Sun Shaoyi, your day had finally come!