Any regrets?

It wasn't that Ye Qing was deliberately finding fault. Those words really did sound like that famous line.

They also made it sound as though Gu Ze was a scumbag. After all, Ziwei had gone looking for her biological father.

Oh, men can't get pregnant anyway.

Gu Ze had no idea where his mind had wandered this time. By now, he understood that Ye Qing's thoughts sometimes went off on the wildest tangents.

Without waiting for a response, Yu Hang began talking on his own.

He still remembered how he had been just a small-time extra back then. In the entertainment industry, fawning over the powerful and trampling on the weak was commonplace. Though he was only an extra, that time he had actually managed to land a role as roughly the seventh male lead.

For someone who had previously played nothing but servants and corpses, that role had been a tremendous leap forward.

His acting had never been bad, and to do justice to this hard-won role, he performed even better than usual.

Precisely because he performed so well, he attracted the envy of certain people. The big stars certainly wouldn't care about a minor actor like him, so the ones who wanted to bring him down were the fifth and sixth male leads, whose roles weren't much bigger than his.

At first, he thought he could just endure it until it passed, until he overheard the two of them planning to have him replaced.

At the time, he really had struggled to resist beating them both up. But he had neither power nor influence, while the two of them had their own financial backers.

Fortunately, their backers weren't powerful enough to sway the director, and he kept his role.

But the two of them only grew more brazen. During that stretch of filming, he also had to endure their torment. Occasionally, he managed to avoid them, but the set was only so big, and he couldn't simply stop filming. Most of the time, there was no escaping them.

The two were clever, too. They never gave him trouble in public and even acted as though they were his best buddies.

Eventually, he felt that life held no hope. He even began thinking about suicide.

But the saying was true: just when there seemed to be no way forward, a new path opened up.

They were bullying him again, but that time, by sheer coincidence, Gu Ze happened to walk past.

Once Gu Ze saw what was happening, he drove the two away without hesitation. The next day, Yu Hang learned that they were no longer part of the production.

He knew it was all because Gu Ze had helped him, and it showed him that there were still good people in the entertainment industry.

Even now, he still remembered Gu Ze's words of comfort. "Your acting is good. With a little more practice, you can do even better. You don't need to worry so much about what other people think."

That single act of kindness and those words restored his confidence. From then on, he kept working hard.

Without a doubt, that was his first encounter with Gu Ze, but it left a profound impression on him.

Back then, the gap between his status and Gu Ze's was like heaven and earth. To catch up with Gu Ze, and to thank him, he threw everything he had into acting.

He gained a little popularity and felt that he was getting closer and closer to Gu Ze. His thoughts had been simple then: he wanted to thank Gu Ze in person and tell him he had made it.

Later, at some point, that wish changed. Perhaps it was because he had watched too many of the dramas Gu Ze starred in, or perhaps because he had watched too many of his interviews.

Whatever the reason, his feelings for Gu Ze changed. He wanted to have him. He wanted to be the only person Gu Ze saw.

For that, he worked even harder at acting, because he understood that only by reaching the same heights would he have the right to say those things.

He grew increasingly popular and felt that he was getting closer and closer to his goal.

Now that he had finally joined the same production as Gu Ze, he thought he could at last tell him how he felt.

He believed Gu Ze remembered him. More precisely, he believed Gu Ze liked him. Otherwise, who would help someone for no reason?

He couldn't think of any explanation other than affection.

At that point, Ye Qing couldn't bear to listen anymore. "What do you mean, he likes you? Couldn't Brother Gu have simply helped because he couldn't stand what he saw? How does that count as liking you?"

Yu Hang glared at him, his eyes nearly bulging. "What do you know? If it weren't for you, I wouldn't have done anything like this."

He hadn't intended to do this at first, either. But watching Ye Qing and Gu Ze interact on set had made him panic. Apart from Gu Ze's friends whom he already knew about, Ye Qing was the only person he knew nothing about.

And Ye Qing seemed so close to Gu Ze. How could he stand it?

"If you think Brother Gu helping someone means he likes them, wouldn't that mean he likes a whole lot of people?"

"He helped you that one time, and you decided he liked you. Well, Brother Gu helped me too. Does that mean I can say he likes me?"

"Besides, you say you like Brother Gu, but you're willing to share him with someone else. What kind of love is that?"

"If you truly love someone, how could you share them with anyone else?"

"Ye Qing, shut up! What gives you the right to say any of this? Didn't you only get your role because of Best Actor Gu?"

Besides, he hadn't really intended to cooperate with Tong Ru. He had only wanted to get Gu Ze to come out first. He had never seen Tong Ru as anything but someone to use.

"No." Gu Ze, who had remained silent until now, spoke. "Ye Qing earned his role himself."

"I really didn't recognize you at first, because I thought I'd only done something perfectly ordinary. I didn't think those words of mine could have helped you much."

"I think you've come this far entirely through your own hard work. If you hadn't resorted to these methods today, I think I would have admired you."

"People who work hard deserve respect. But what you've done now doesn't live up to that hard work."

Knowing that there was no getting through to Yu Hang, who would only cling to his own beliefs, Gu Ze didn't want to say anything more. He had originally planned to have him leave the production, but then he suddenly remembered that he had no idea how Yu Hang had obtained the sedative. Without hesitation, he took him to the police station instead.

Because of the incident, the director specifically gave everyone a day off. The rest of the cast and crew didn't know exactly what had happened, but they were still happy to have a break.

After they walked out of the police station, Ye Qing asked the question he had been wanting to ask. "Brother Gu, do you regret helping him?"

"If you hadn't helped him back then, perhaps none of this would have happened."

Gu Ze gave him a firm answer. "No. Helping him was my choice at the time. Whatever happened afterward, I should be the one to bear it."

"I don't think things turned out this way because I helped him, and I don't think everyone in the world is like Yu Hang."

Gu Ze wouldn't regret it. Did he regret helping Yu Hang? No, because Yu Hang hadn't been like this back then.

He was still a good judge of people. Back then, Yu Hang had been resilient and exceptionally hardworking.

Still, all he could say was that the entertainment industry was a corrupting place. After spending so long in it, it was truly hard to stay true to who you had been.

He looked at Ye Qing. Standing in the sunlight, the young man was clearly pondering his answer. Then, as though something had occurred to him, his eyes suddenly lit up, sparkling like stars.

At least Ye Qing would never become someone like that, Gu Ze thought.