Qiao Qi was still standing there. Just then, a touch of red light had begun to break across the horizon, spreading outward layer by layer into a gradient of colors.

A corner of the city took on a hue beyond the usual overcast gray; the hotel too was wrapped in color. Qiao Qi stood at the edge of the hallway, a bit of light settling on her shoulder.

Her hair had just been carelessly gathered with a hair tie, hanging loose and soft down her back, with loose strands falling in front of her eyes and at the nape of her neck. Lightly touched by the light, her whole bearing seemed soft and quiet.

The light passed through her tousled hair and settled on the side of her face; the temperature of her skin rose, and only then did she slightly come back to herself.

Her gaze focused clearly on the phone screen. Seeing Li’ang’s stiff, guilty-sounding reply of a string of ellipses, Qiao Qi tossed back a message in disbelief.

Xiao Qi: You still say you don’t like Liang Yan?!

The other side replied with an even longer string of ellipses.

Liangou: ………………

Qiao Qi felt herself getting genuinely worked up.

Xiao Qi: What’s with the silence, huh?!

Xiao Qi: Say something!

Besides, shouldn’t she be the one left speechless here?

Liangou: Why do you have such strong feelings about Liang Yan?

Qiao Qi choked, not sure how to respond.

Actually, it wasn’t that she had strong feelings about Liang Yan specifically—it was just… the feeling was subtle and hard to pin down.

She didn’t want to admit it was a kind of insecurity, but now she couldn’t help but admit it.

But admitting it to herself was one thing; admitting it in front of Li’ang was another matter entirely.

So she replied, nearly at her wit’s end.

Xiao Qi: So what if I’m his anti-fan!

The other side was silent for several seconds before replying.

Liangou: …why though?

Qiao Qi typed back irritably.

Xiao Qi: Because he lied!

Xiao Qi: Because he’s not actually 185cm tall!

Liangou: …are you really that strict with idols?

Qiao Qi suddenly recalled that Li’ang had once claimed to be 184cm tall himself, and just to needle him, she replied maliciously.

Xiao Qi: Not just idols. I’m just as strict with my partner too.

Liangou: ?

Liangou: Can’t you loosen up even a little bit?

Having successfully gotten under his skin, Qiao Qi’s lips curved into a faintly smug smile, though her eyes remained calm and unruffled, looking rather cold and detached.

Xiao Qi: No.

Then, without giving him a chance to argue back, she switched her WeChat straight to her work account. The group messages instantly showed 99+, with the latest one tagging Liang Yan by his full name.

Qiao Qi felt like her head was starting to ache just seeing the words “Liang Yan,” so she simply muted the group chat again, shoved her phone into her pocket, and walked into the pharmacy, throat still burning.

—

Liang Yan was beginning to feel he shouldn’t have taken on this drama, House of Smoke and Mist. He stared at the chat window full of his own question marks, with the other side simply ignoring him entirely. After a few seconds, he took a deep breath, suppressed his rising temper, and turned to look at Cheng Yueming, who was cowering nervously in the corner.

“Do I owe you money, sweetheart?”

That last term of endearment nearly made Cheng Yueming drop to her knees. She clapped her hands over her ears, covering them as if that would somehow help, deceiving only herself. “No, no, no, don’t call me that! I can’t handle it!”

Liang Yan shoved his phone into his pocket, the smile that usually lingered in his peach-blossom eyes completely gone. Those eyes were naturally flirtatious and alluring—but if he didn’t want them to seem that way, all it took was a slight darkening of his pupils to make people’s hearts pound with fear.

Although Cheng Yueming hadn’t grown up around Liang Yan, she’d certainly heard plenty about his less-than-decent past exploits. So when Liang Yan took a light step toward her, her first instinct was to cross her arms over her chest, her whole body bracing defensively.

Her voice stammered. “Wh-wh-what now! I just—I just have a question I want to ask you.”

Liang Yan smiled faintly, a smile that looked benevolent and kind. “Go ahead.”

His voice was extremely gentle too.

Yet somehow this was precisely what made cold sweat break out down Cheng Yueming’s back. She was nearly in tears. “I—I just wanted to ask what you think about Zhou Suiyu playing He Nianyi…”

Liang Yan actually needed a few seconds to even remember who Zhou Suiyu and He Nianyi were. He let the fake smile drop from his face, his eyes narrowing into a long, dangerous line, his thin lips uttering two words: “That’s it?”

Cheng Yueming’s voice trembled. “Th-that’s it.”

Good.

Liang Yan felt the surge of anger he’d only just managed to suppress rise up again in his chest. He shut his eyes hard, thinking back to how he’d deliberately lowered his voice to sound pleasant and sweet just moments ago, greeting the person he loved with a good-morning message under the first rays of morning sunlight—

This should have been an utterly wonderful thing, but it had been completely shattered by some random third party barging in and inserting the name “Liang Yan” out of nowhere.

He endured it, and endured it some more. When he finally opened his eyes, the corners were still red with anger.

Seeing that red tinge in his eyes, Cheng Yueming felt it was like the telltale sign of a wild beast right before it opened its bloody jaws. She was scared half to death, her eyes going wide, her back pressed hard against the wall behind her.

The chill of the wall seeped into her skin; her scalp went numb.

Just as she thought she was about to get thoroughly thrashed by Liang Yan, he instead swallowed hard, and as he walked away, gritted out through clenched teeth: “None of my business!”

Not until Liang Yan’s figure had vanished around the corner did Cheng Yueming, still shaken, pull out her phone and, fingers trembling, send a message to Xu Lu.

Cheng Yueming: Liang Yan is definitely dating someone.

Xu Lu: ?

Xu Lu: How can you tell?

Cheng Yueming: People who are dating are all moody and unpredictable like this!!

Just a moment ago she’d seen on Weibo that fans said Liang Yan was visibly in a great mood today—how had he turned into a raging lion in the span of a few minutes?

Big deal, dating someone.

Pfft!

—

The first person on set to realize Liang Yan and Qiao Qi weren’t flirting, but genuinely loathed each other, was Wu Shuang.

In the script, Wu Shuang was a fifteen-year-old girl with a lovely face—skin white as the first snow, lips red as plum blossoms, and a pair of round eyes like black pearls spat out from an oyster shell.

Yet this girl had been born into a broken home. Her father was a good-for-nothing who spent his years drifting between taverns and gambling dens; her mother, seeing no hope for a better life, had run off long ago.

Just as the girl was starting to take on the shape of an adult, her disreputable father wasted no time tying her up and selling her into the Baile Gate.

Though the Baile Gate did run a certain kind of trade, there was at least some mutual consent expected between clients and the girls there. Seeing that Wu Shuang was still young and quick-witted, they kept her on as a little maid to look after the other girls instead.

Wu Shuang liked clinging to Cheng Yanyun most of all, so in the script, whenever there was a scene with Cheng Yanyun, Wu Shuang generally appeared too.

Being close to Cheng Yanyun, she also watched her every move closely.

In the script, Wu Shuang was a shipper of Cheng Yanyun and Ming Yan as a couple; off-script, the young actress spent all day sitting in the corner too, her dark eyes darting back and forth between Qiao Qi and Liang Yan, cupping her face and grinning foolishly: “I’m shipping it, I’m shipping it so hard.”

Then came the day Qiao Qi and Liang Yan ran lines together for a scene where Cheng Yanyun takes Wu Shuang shopping at a rouge shop. During the scene, a shop clerk and Wu Shuang get into a haggling dispute, pushing a rouge box back and forth between them—during which Cheng Yanyun slips a secret message into the rouge box. Just as it’s about to be handed off, Ming Yan saunters into the shop and, with extravagant generosity, buys out every new item in the store, gifting it all to Cheng Yanyun.

Once or twice could be coincidence, but three or four times was clearly deliberate scheming.

Cheng Yanyun raised an eyebrow, her expression cool and aloof as she looked back at Ming Yan.

This young master looked as though he’d just come from some decadent, romantic gathering, still carrying a mess of perfume scents on him. His eyes and lips both held a smile, appearing pure and harmless.

“Why would Miss Yanyun need to haggle over prices? How embarrassing.” As he spoke, the young master raised a hand and ordered the lackeys behind him to buy out every new item in the rouge shop.

Seeing such a big order coming in, the shop owner immediately nodded and bowed, having the clerk wrap everything up and deliver it respectfully before Young Master Ming.

Young Master Ming leaned forward slightly, smiling as he looked at Cheng Yanyun—his eyes fixed on hers as he smiled—while his hand, with unerring precision, picked out from the pile of rouge boxes exactly the red one that Cheng Yanyun and the clerk had arranged to slip the note into.

He pinched the box between two fingers, tossing it up in the air a couple of times, idly.

The clerk standing nearby, watching Young Master Ming’s movements, felt his heart leap up and drop with every toss, biting through his own lip without even noticing.

Cheng Yanyun was of course far more composed than the clerk, but she genuinely had no idea what Ming Yan’s true identity was. So although she appeared entirely calm on the surface, a cold sweat had broken out across her back beneath the fabric of her qipao.

“This color…” Ming Yan stopped tossing the rouge box, clamping it tightly in his palm. He stared at Cheng Yanyun, and under her calm, unflinching gaze, suddenly leaned in close—

His nose nearly brushing against hers.

Cheng Yanyun remained unmoved, as composed as ever.

She neither dodged nor flinched, standing rooted in place, her spine as rigid as if a steel rod had been fitted into it.

Ming Yan was like someone teasing a cat—when the cat showed no reaction, he lost interest in the game, gave a light laugh, and tilted his head slightly.

His nose brushed lightly past Cheng Yanyun’s, his gaze, heavy with meaning, settling on her cheeks.

He curved his eyes, his lips and tongue rolling out words dripping with implication: “Too vulgar. Doesn’t suit Miss Yanyun at all.”

With that, he straightened up lazily, tucked the bright red box into his trouser pocket, and, hands in his pockets, turned and walked away.

Back in the rouge shop, the clerk was still bent over in a bow, sweat dripping down one drop at a time onto the floor.

He could see that Cheng Yanyun’s fingers, gripping her handkerchief, were trembling too, the fingertips gone white from the pressure.

After a long moment, Cheng Yanyun lightly lowered her chin, glancing down at the clerk. “Thank you for the trouble—send it over to the Baile Gate.”

The clerk’s heart lurched. “Miss Yanyun, that bright red rouge—”

Cheng Yanyun cut him off with a cold glance. “What, is what Young Master Ming spent not enough? Do I have to buy out your whole little shop myself?”

The shop owner, overhearing, smacked the clerk on the back. “Go when you’re told to go, quit your damn nonsense!”

The clerk could only mutter sheepishly, “Yes, ma’am.”

Meanwhile, on the crowded street, Young Master Ming walked along, then suddenly pulled the red rouge box back out of his pocket.

He tossed it up carelessly a couple more times, then shook it near his ear, and hearing no unusual rattling sound, tossed it with a flick of his wrist into a nearby beggar’s bowl.

The little beggar, startled by this rouge box falling from the sky, hurriedly snatched it up, and carefully opened it to find nothing inside but rouge, nothing else. Deeply disappointed, he flung it indignantly into a nearby trash can.

Beside the trash can was a narrow alley; at the end of the alley, a slender, tall figure flitted past. A second or two later, a little maid followed after her.

Wu Shuang looped her arm through Cheng Yanyun’s. “Sister Yanyun, that Young Master Ming really does have good taste—I thought that red rouge didn’t suit you either, too gaudy.”

The corners of Cheng Yanyun’s lips curved into a faint smile. She lifted her left hand slightly, resting her right hand gently on her left wrist, and after a couple of steps suddenly stopped, tilting her head toward Wu Shuang. “Go give that little beggar a coin.”

Wu Shuang was long used to this sort of behavior from her, and answered with a bright “Okay!” before turning and running back out of the alley.

The moment the girl was gone, Cheng Yanyun gave a light turn of her wrist, and with two slender fingers drew a small white note out from within her sleeve.

This note, meant to have been slipped into the rouge box, she’d never intended to take out once she heard Ming Yan’s voice. Her deliberate sparring with the clerk in front of Ming Yan had merely been an attempt to probe just what kind of background this dissolute young master really had.

It seemed now that this young master really wasn’t as useless as he appeared on the surface.

Thinking this over, Cheng Yanyun calmly tucked the note back into her bag, then lifted her gaze, expression calm, waiting for Wu Shuang to return from the little beggar.

…

This scene had few lines and not much physical action, but it was tense nonetheless, and especially demanding in terms of the actors’ handling of detail.

Liang Yan himself had no trouble with it—a full month of table reads had long since been enough for him to transform himself into Ming Yan.

What’s more, he himself was something of a young master in real life, so playing Ming Yan was practically second nature to him.

The only problem was that Qiao Qi still hadn’t become Cheng Yanyun.

Liang Yan was thoroughly displeased. He frowned, his gaze sweeping up and down over Qiao Qi, finally settling on a point at her waist.

Qiao Qi, uncomfortable under his gaze—as if she were being appraised like an object—instinctively flinched despite having nowhere to hide. “What?”

Liang Yan rolled up the script into a tube shape and gave Qiao Qi’s waist a light tap with it, his tone somewhat cutting. “You’ve nailed Cheng Yanyun’s aloofness down to a hair, so why haven’t you picked up even a shred of her feminine allure?”

Stung by his blunt mockery, Qiao Qi’s eyes widened slightly, and she shot back in disbelief: “Excuse me?”

Nearby, Director Cheng Yuzhi, a lollipop in his mouth, laughed heartily at this, nodding in enthusiastic agreement with Liang Yan’s assessment: “True enough. However aloof Cheng Yanyun may be, she’s still a pillar of the Baile Gate. However much men might want to sleep with her, none of them truly want to marry her; however much women envy her, in their hearts they still look down on her. Why? Because Cheng Yanyun carries within her that old-fashioned kind of feminine allure that could never be presentable in polite society.”

“That allure is something Cheng Yanyun had to learn, so ordinarily it shows through in little cracks—you understand, cracks?” Liang Yan pointed this out several times without seeing any look of realization dawn on Qiao Qi’s face, and finally clicked his tongue in disgust. “Just go figure it out yourself.”

Director Cheng Yuzhi went “hey,” “let her figure it out on her own time—where are you off to?”

“Off to go be in love!” Liang Yan said, walking straight toward his assistant’s spot, holding out his hand for his phone, and, eyes crinkling with a smile, climbed into his trailer.

Wu Shuang, who had watched this whole exchange, felt her heart ache terribly. She pulled out her phone and tapped into a small group chat called “Song and Dance at the Baile Gate,” sending off several crying-face stickers in a row.

Wu Shuang: My house has collapsed!!

Wu Shuang: My “Virtuous Qi and Talented Liang” ship is really fake!!

Guo Lingling: Why are you still using that ship name? It sounds terrible, so awkward to say, no wonder it was doomed to sink.

Xu Ruou: Isn’t “Achievement and Brightness” a much better ship name?

Wu Shuang: Ugh, you two don’t understand the joy of shipping real people.

Guo Lingling: ?

Guo Lingling: All I know is that shipping real people gets you beaten up by solo-loyalist fans. Qiao Qi may not have that many die-hard solo fans, but the Liang family’s fan base numbers in the millions.

Wu Shuang: …don’t rub it in. QAQ

Xu Ruou: I always knew those two were fake, but I am pretty curious how you, a shipping addict, suddenly had this epiphany.

Wu Shuang: I just heard Young Master Liang imply Qiao Qi has no feminine charm. TvT

Wu Shuang: He also told the director he was off to go be in love.

Wu Shuang: The way he smiled asking the assistant for his phone was so sweet…

Xu Ruou: Whoa, solid proof it’s just brotherly affection.

Guo Lingling: What a thoroughly dead ship.

Xu Ruou: Condolences. Let this pair go, the next one will be even better.

Guo Lingling: As long as you jump ship fast enough, the ship sinking can’t catch up to you.

Wu Shuang: …get lost!

Wu Shuang: Easy for you to say when it’s not your ship going down!

Furious, Wu Shuang silently went and unfollowed the “Virtuous Qi and Talented Liang” fan community tag she herself had created a month ago—one that, to this day, still had only herself as its sole follower.

Then, wiping away her tears, she cupped her face and stared blankly at Liang Yan’s trailer for a good while before finally going back to post in the group again.

Wu Shuang: Who’s Liang Yan’s girlfriend?

Wu Shuang: I really want to ship those two now.

Wu Shuang: It’s definitely going to be so sweet.

Guo Lingling: …truly a shipping addict through and through.

Xu Ruou: Peerless indeed. [thumbs up][thumbs up][thumbs up]

—

Once July arrived in Shanghai, the temperatures stayed persistently high. Inside the trailer, the AC was cranked up strong; Liang Yan, dressed in a long-sleeved shirt, long pants, and small leather shoes for the period drama, leaned back on the long sofa.

Since it was a Republican-era drama, his eye makeup was kept light. Combined with Liang Yan’s naturally striking peach-blossom eyes and thick, dark lashes, he hadn’t even needed basic eyeliner—just a layer of dark eyeshadow swept over the lids to deepen the look.

The weather was hot; after only a short while out in the sun, beads of sweat had already formed on the bridge of his nose. Since the makeup artist would be touching him up again soon anyway, Liang Yan didn’t bother being careful, casually wiping across the tip of his nose with a bent finger before sending a message to the person on the other end of WeChat.

Liang: So hot.

Liang: [pretending to be a thug.jpg]

It took the other side a full five minutes to reply.

Liangou’s Sweetheart: I feel plenty cool inside right now. [smile]

Something about that smiley face emoji following the message made Liang Yan’s heart skip uneasily. He asked, very carefully.

Liang: What’s wrong…?

Liangou’s Sweetheart: Nothing.

Liangou’s Sweetheart: Just heard some dirt on Liang Yan just now.

Liang Yan: “…”

What now? What kind of dirt now?

The previously carefree Liang Yan suddenly didn’t feel hot anymore; his heart went cold by a good few degrees.

He swallowed hard, and asked somewhat nervously.

Liang: What kind of dirt?

Liangou’s Sweetheart: Aren’t you not even a fan of his? Why the curiosity?

Liang Yan: “…”

Entrapment! Textbook entrapment!

He really wasn’t a fan of Liang Yan!

He was Liang Yan himself!

Of course he’d be curious about dirt on himself!

But obviously, he couldn’t say that.

Liang: I’m not curious about him.

Liang: I’m curious what content could make you feel cold like that.

Liang: Even if it has nothing to do with him, I’d still be curious.

Liang: [socialist good-boy.jpg]

Qiao Qi’s mood, in truth, hadn’t been great. She’d figured that after a month of diligent study, once she actually got into the thick of filming, she wouldn’t be so flustered—yet she kept making mistakes at every turn.

Making mistakes was one thing—but her scene partner just had to be someone who never made a single mistake.

This sense of defeat left her feeling stifled and thoroughly dejected.

She sat beneath a patch of shade, her script open flat across her knees, phone resting on top.

Seeing Li’ang’s message practically overflowing with a desperate will to survive, Qiao Qi finally allowed herself a rare smile.

Xiao Qi: It’s nothing much.

Xiao Qi: Just that he seems to be dating someone.

Liang Yan paused, narrowing his eyes slightly.

Liang: Who said that? Did he announce it officially?

Liangou’s Sweetheart: No, not that.

Liangou’s Sweetheart: A coworker heard about it.

Liang Yan, unfazed on the surface, quietly let out a breath of relief.

Liang: Don’t believe or spread rumors, sweetheart.

Qiao Qi, teased by the casual term of endearment he tossed out so effortlessly, felt her ears go red. Though she always told him on the surface not to call her that so casually, every time she saw those words, she still couldn’t stop the corners of her mouth from lifting.

It was like drinking a mouthful of rock-sugar water—giving her something to hold onto, like a lifeline, in the middle of this scorching summer.

Xiao Qi: Believe it or not.

Xiao Qi: Anyway, I’ve given you advance warning—when he does announce it, don’t come crying to me.

Liangou: ???

Xiao Qi: What?

Liang Yan looked at this message, brows furrowing, sensing intuitively that she’d misunderstood something.

And clearly, this concerned his own preferences as a grown man.

So without thinking, he called her directly—only to have the call rejected immediately.

Liang: ???

Qiao Qi hadn’t expected Li’ang to call her directly. The last time they’d talked on the phone had been the night before she lost her voice.

Afterward, he’d called a few times, and she’d declined every time. Afraid of worrying him, she hadn’t told him she’d lost her voice, just making excuses each time to dodge the calls.

After a couple of times, he’d tacitly stopped calling.

So today’s call from him was completely unexpected. Out of habit, she tapped decline—and only afterward did it register what she’d just done.

Xiao Qi: …uh.

Liangou: You’d better give me a reasonable explanation!

Liangou: [rolling up sleeves.jpg]

The exclamation point and sticker that followed felt remarkably fitting.

Qiao Qi, at a loss for how to explain, fiddled with her phone but in the end couldn’t come up with a reasonable explanation.

Just then, Director Cheng Yuzhi called her over to block a scene. Qiao Qi, grabbing at this excuse like a lifeline, hurriedly typed back: Oh, something’s suddenly come up on my end, I’ll explain when I’m free—

Before she finished typing the message, Qiao Qi suddenly paused, her thumb tapping rapidly on the screen, deleting the whole line character by character.

Then, with her left thumb, she pressed the record button and sent a voice message instead.

This was the first time she’d ever initiated a voice message to him.

“Ugh, something’s come up on my end for a bit, I’ll tell you about it later.”

Maybe because it was her first time, Qiao Qi felt a bit nervous, her voice noticeably unnatural—but she really had no time to worry about that now.

She turned back to call out to Director Cheng, “Coming!” while gently rubbing her thumb against the phone screen, waiting a little anxiously for his reply.

After Director Cheng finished hurrying her along, he sent Liang Yan’s assistant to go hurry Liang Yan out of his trailer as well. Liang Yan called back “Coming!” too. By the time the assistant returned from the trailer, Qiao Qi had already received Li’ang’s reply.

Liangou: Got it.

Liangou: I’ll deal with you tonight.

Struck by the suggestive phrasing, Qiao Qi’s face flushed red in an instant. Her skin was fair to begin with, and though her makeup covered most of the blush, the color spreading down her neck plainly gave away exactly what she was thinking.

Biting her red lips with her white teeth, she muttered “little hooligan” before tucking her phone back into her bag, a smile tugging at the corners of her eyes and brows.

She got up and headed toward Director Cheng. Just then, Liang Yan came down from his trailer too, sauntering over, humming a little tune, looking to be in a great mood.

As he passed Qiao Qi, Liang Yan glanced at her neck. “Why’s your neck so red? Are you hot?”

Qiao Qi froze, instinctively reaching up to touch her neck, quickly saying “Oh,” “maybe.”

“It shows up even more on camera—want to cool off a bit?”

Qiao Qi, thinking he was inviting her to cool off in his trailer, waved her hands hastily. “No need, no need, it’ll go away in a bit, going all the way to the trailer would waste time.”

Liang Yan paused, stopping in his tracks.

Qiao Qi: “?”

Liang Yan pressed his lips together. “You’ve misunderstood. I meant do you want a little fan to cool off with, or, just swallow some ice cubes.”

“Works fast.”

“It’s so hot out, better not delay the filming schedule.”

Qiao Qi: “…”

Gritting her teeth, she smiled. “Thanks so much.”

Wu Shuang, who happened to be passing by, was given a headache by Liang Yan’s straight-man remarks and straight-man behavior. The young girl, not yet possessing much worldly experience, silently chanted to herself as she walked away: don’t cry, don’t cry, it’s already dead, it’s already dead, happy shipwreck exit, happy shipwreck exit!

Author’s Note: Later—

Wu Shuang: Why is there another pit inside this pit? What is this, some kind of Russian nesting doll?