Third-floor conference room, Blazing Star Entertainment headquarters.
Song Yunxing and Meng Ruo pushed open the conference room door and walked in. Jiang Huaizhi was sitting on the conference table, his hands clasped, watching Song Yunxing with a teasing look.
"Little Xing, how did your night of passion with Shen Yanci feel?"
Song Yunxing frowned, grabbed a cushion from beside him, and hurled it at his face.
"Jiang Huaizhi! Whose side are you on? You've got some nerve! Why did you invite Shen Yanci to your birthday party? How did paparazzi even get into a private venue that big?"
Jiang Huaizhi nimbly dodged his attack and gave an awkward laugh. "I didn't know you were such a lightweight. I was hosting, so I had other guests to look after. All I did was ask Shen Yanci to take you upstairs first. Who knew you'd..."
Under Song Yunxing's death glare, Jiang Huaizhi wisely shut his mouth.
Used to this, Meng Ruo calmly took out her phone to check the live comments.
After Song Yunxing returned to the country, plenty of domestic entertainment companies had offered him contracts worth astronomical sums, including the entertainment company owned by the Shen Group.
Song Yunxing had chosen none of them. Instead, he had taken his manager to an obscure little company-Blazing Star Entertainment, the entertainment company Jiang Huaizhi had founded himself.
In other words, Blazing Star Entertainment's rise to become one of the country's four biggest entertainment companies within a year owed no small part to Song Yunxing's hands-on involvement in everything.
"Before you get mad, our PR department put together two plans for you yesterday. Take a look." Jiang Huaizhi brought out the data analysis charts and proposed solutions the PR department had stayed up all night preparing.
"You've lost a few followers on Weibo, but the overall impact isn't that big. Even if you explain that this was all a misunderstanding, I doubt it'll do much. The video is in high definition, and whoever secretly filmed it had some skill. Plenty of directors couldn't capture that kind of chemistry."
Jiang Huaizhi raised his eyebrows at him. "If you insist on explaining it away, it won't go over well. You'll lose more than you gain."
"Then what do you want to do?" Song Yunxing asked with a frown.
Jiang Huaizhi's lips curved into a smile. "It's not about what I want. Your fans are already calling each other in-laws, and this is getting far more attention than we ever imagined."
"Why leave easy money on the table? I suggest you ride the hype and do some promotion!"
Meng Ruo took the analysis report and read it. Even she looked surprised at the soaring real-time popularity figures highlighted in red.
"Huh... you want to promote them as a couple?"
"Exactly, exactly!" Jiang Huaizhi rubbed his hands together excitedly.
"Promote us as a couple? I'll rip your head off and stir-fry your pig brains!" Song Yunxing couldn't hold back his curses. He glared at him. "Clear it up! Or I'm dumping every share I own! You know perfectly well Shen Yanci and I don't get along! If you expect me to bow my head to him, forget it!"
"Bro, bro, bro! Calm down!" Jiang Huaizhi panicked. "I'm not asking you to bow to them! But you do owe your fans an explanation."
"That whole feud between you two isn't something you can explain in a few words. If you rush out with an explanation like this, won't you just keep making your fans look foolish and lose even more followers?"
"I've got a special variety show called 'True or False Lovers.' It's a dating observation show where we invite several popular rumored couples and have the audience figure out which couples are real and which are fake. Once a fake couple gets exposed, they don't have to film the next episode."
"If you two go on the show and let the audience and fans discover your relationship for themselves, it'll work much better than you trying to clear things up. Besides, you haven't been on a variety show in ages. Your fans keep asking you to do one or something, to appear on camera more instead of spending all day composing behind the scenes."
Song Yunxing valued his fans. Even on his days off, he made time to respond to their gifts and letters, and he generally listened whenever they offered reasonable suggestions.
Normally, Song Yunxing was gentle-tempered. He wouldn't have been this angry if Shen Yanci hadn't been involved.
"...Do we really have to do this?" Song Yunxing tapped irritably on the table. "How many episodes are we supposed to film? We can be done after one, right? Will that guy Shen Yanci even agree to appear?"
"Hey, you don't need to worry about that. I'll talk to his manager myself in a bit. He won't refuse!" Jiang Huaizhi patted his chest, looking thoroughly confident.
Watching Jiang Huaizhi's excellent mood, Song Yunxing couldn't shake the feeling that something was off.
At the same time, in the top-floor CEO's office at Shen Xing Entertainment.
An elegantly dressed woman with her hair pinned up sat on the sofa. The phone beside her suddenly lit up.
The woman carefully scanned the contract document sent to her, printed out the electronic contract, and placed it on the man's desk.
"Jiang Huaizhi sent over a contract for a variety show collaboration. They're also holding off on issuing a clarification statement for now."
Shen Yanci sat behind his desk, lowered his eyes, and flipped through a couple of pages.
"Why send me a contract for a variety show their company is producing? I'm not interested in these things."
The woman put the chat history directly in front of him. "Their top star, Song Yunxing, has already signed. If you don't go, they have a backup contract. Apparently, they'll pick a member of a third-tier domestic Omega boy band who's had dating rumors with Song Yunxing to appear on the show. I hear he only debuted recently, an eighteen-year-old boy."
"Everyone knows about the rumors involving you two now, but it's their company's show, after all. Going on it would only drive traffic their way. I'll turn it down." The woman started to pull the contract away.
Shen Yanci's hand paused, then immediately pressed down on the contract. "Wait. Let me take a look."
The woman gave him a surprised glance and let go of the contract.
Yin Yuan had hardly ever interacted with Shen Yanci like this. Although she was nominally his manager, in reality, she only saw him a few times a year.
Shen Yanci had been born at the top of the pyramid. Acting in films was merely a way for him to pass the time. But some people were simply like that: not only did they come from privileged backgrounds, they could effortlessly accomplish things others couldn't.
In all the years since his debut, he had averaged only one film a year, yet every single one had become a breakout hit and remained popular.
He had even claimed the best actor titles at all three major film awards.
He treated everyone with the same cold, impersonal, strictly business attitude.
That happened to fit the villainous roles he played on screen, and the more his fans dwelled on it, the more hooked they became.
Although countless dating rumors surrounded him, they were all groundless speculation. No one had ever managed to get close to him, and this incident was clearly different.
With that indisputable high-definition video and its intimate, lingering atmosphere, even she had thought the two were a couple deeply in love.
Yet the other man was the popular singer who had always been at odds with him. If Shen Yanci hadn't personally said there was nothing between them, she would have believed the netizens were right-that the two were in a love-hate relationship.
Yin Yuan raised her eyebrows. For once, she was interested in seeing how her heartless boss would react.
"...I'll take this variety show."
His large, well-defined hand held a solid black fountain pen as he signed his name at the bottom with bold, sweeping strokes.
"Tell them my partner can only be Song Yunxing." The man pushed the contract toward the woman, a dark glint flickering in his black eyes.
"He still owes me an explanation for what happened yesterday. If he thinks he can weasel out of it, it won't be that easy."
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