Among fans, there’s a very popular “idol collapse observation manual.” If your favorite idol shows several of the following signs, there’s a high probability they’re secretly dating—ninety-nine percent chance your idol’s “house has collapsed.”
One: Social media updates slowly, but compared to before, there are more sweet nothings.
Two: The content of updates changes from “you all” directed at fans to the singular “you.”
Three: The songs shared usually have implied meanings.
Four: Their ideal type becomes very specific.
Five: …
Wu Man hadn’t followed He Huiyu—they only had each other on WeChat. But she rarely scrolled through her Moments, and since the first recording session ended until now, they’d had no interaction, so she wasn’t clear about what was happening with her.
Now, opening He Huiyu’s Weibo and looking through it, every post really did match up.
Her last update was three days ago, when she shared some song lyrics on Weibo.
“Beautiful moments pass by unappreciated, and I’ve already caught a chill for you.”
The update before that was on the day they finished recording the first episode of “The Acting School.” She posted a selfie with a heart emoji and the caption: “Do you like it?”
Wu Man then opened He Huiyu’s Moments. Because it was set to show only the last three days, she could only see one posted photo.
But the content of that photo was even more obvious than her Weibo posts.
“What do young guys like these days? (This post has blocked certain people)”
Their mutual friends all popped up in the comments.
“Dating again?”
“Is it that guy? Girl, you’re incredibly amazing.”
“Why don’t you just wrap yourself up as a gift!”
Wu Man acted like a voyeur demon, secretly spying on all of He Huiyu’s social media activity. She could basically confirm that He Huiyu had successfully pursued Zhui Ye.
At this moment, she somewhat regretted deleting Zhui Ye. She didn’t know if he had any posts showing off their relationship.
She felt this kind of tacky behavior was something he would disdain doing, but love changes a person—everyone becomes unbearably vulgar when in love. Especially a young boy experiencing his first love.
She quietly scrolled through Zhui Ye’s Weibo. It was still as silent as before, with nothing except system-generated birthday wishes.
If he were Mount Fuji, then even the snow at the summit would melt for someone he liked, right? Just because there’s nothing now doesn’t mean there won’t be changes in the coming days, weeks, or months. His sun had arrived; disappearance was just a matter of time.
Wu Man walked to the balcony, took out her lighter and lit a Su cigarette, blowing a smoke ring toward the sky.
Ever since that recording session was disrupted, she’d given up on persisting. She secretly started smoking again behind Yu Jiaze’s back. Anyway, he had to stay in the hospital for a while and deal with a pile of matters—he temporarily had no time to manage her.
At worst, she’d quit again later.
Just like how she’d been somewhat immersed in “Spring Night” back then, she had now ruthlessly cut herself off from it. Though she still couldn’t achieve one hundred percent detachment—seeing this news still gave her an indescribable feeling of depression.
But this was undoubtedly a good thing. This was the clarion call of Zhui Ye breaking character, indirectly proving that her speculations were correct.
He had substituted himself as Chen Nan, and those seemingly ambiguous moments were all extensions from within the drama toward Deng Lizhi.
As for Wu Man—no one would come to bestow love upon her.
Such a selfish, cold, unapproachable person.
She tilted her head back, blowing another long, lonely smoke ring toward the night sky.
*
The second episode recording of “The Acting School” had a different competition format compared to the first episode.
Actors within each group would pair up and compete against each other, ultimately determining the winning group.
The difficulty this time was that they couldn’t pick ready-made scripts for their paired scenes—they had to create them themselves. Actors also had to take on the screenwriter’s responsibility, though there would be a mother theme, with each director separately proposing one.
The mentor Wu Man ultimately chose was Fang Zheng, winner of the Best Director at the Golden Image Awards. He and Wang Cheng were classmates at film school, though compared to Wang Cheng, he was more of a late bloomer type, only making a name for himself in recent years. While his talent didn’t match Wang Cheng’s, he was also a director with a very personal style.
She had heard his acceptance speech at the Golden Image Awards ceremony—he was someone who had perseverance regarding film.
So she chose him.
Regarding the fact that Wei Jinghua didn’t choose her, she naturally felt regret, but her unyielding spirit surged up even more. Since you don’t recognize me, then I’ll work hard to the point where you’ll regret not choosing me.
Unfortunately, things started badly. When drawing lots to select partners, she drew a low-value card.
—Ji Zhou.
He had also entered Fang Zheng’s camp and was one of the few traffic idols among all these actors. The program group invited him purely for heat consideration.
To speak honestly, this type of traffic idol could at most handle idol dramas. This was also why Ji Zhou had previously wanted to know Wang Cheng through her and why she rejected him.
This time, drawing him meant Wu Man’s good luck had completely run out.
But even more troublesome than this was the mother theme Fang Zheng proposed: “Too Late to Meet.”
How were they supposed to write about this?
Wu Man and Ji Zhou both had major headaches. Huddled together in the rehearsal room, they spent a long time without discussing a good direction.
They studied Fang Zheng’s personal background, and Ji Zhou proposed: “He suggested this topic definitely because his personal experiences gave him this complex. How about we use a young director as the protagonist, telling the story of how he was underappreciated when young, met a woman he liked but ultimately missed his chance with her?”
Wu Man pondered for a while, frowning as she said: “This would inevitably have the suspicion of opportunism, and the implication is so strong—if we don’t portray this character well, it’s hard to guarantee Fang Zheng won’t reject it.”
“…What you’re saying also makes sense.”
“Moreover, I think the other group might think the same way, because this is the most straightforward line of thinking.”
Ji Zhou sighed: “Then how do we write it? I’ve been bad at composition since I was little.”
Wu Man suddenly had an epiphany: “Then what are you good at?”
“Singing and dancing, and I can also play instruments—I’m very proficient at guitar and piano.”
“Then let’s approach it from this angle. It can also showcase your strengths.”
Ji Zhou couldn’t help but feel moved, his eyes bright as he looked at her and said: “Sister Man, you’re really considerate of me.”
Isn’t it because your acting is really not good—I can only compensate from other areas to keep you from dragging me down?
Wu Man smiled while complaining inwardly.
*
Ji Zhou couldn’t be relied upon, so Wu Man could only shoulder the screenwriting task herself.
As an actress, she’d read countless scripts over the years—she still had the basic skills of drama. Sometimes when scripts weren’t quite right, she would also propose suggestions and discuss changes with the director and screenwriter.
However, this time she had to handle everything herself, building a tower from nothing on flat ground—this was completely different from just changing interior decorations.
Wu Man took down “Story” from her bookshelf, which had been gathering dust, and stayed up all night to digest it again. Finding it still hard to absorb, she had Zhao Boyu help her register for a screenwriting advanced class in the Literature Department at the Film Academy.
Zhao Boyu was shocked by this momentum and said helplessly: “It’s just a variety show—there’s no need to waste so much time, right?”
Wu Man was very resolute: “Learning more is never wrong. Even if I get eliminated this round, I’ll still persist in finishing this course.”
She put on her mask and hat and sneaked into the university campus to attend classes like this, at a very inappropriate age and in an inappropriate capacity.
During the most suitable age for this, she had been single-handedly breaking into the entertainment industry.
It wasn’t that she hadn’t experienced university life—just that it was in dramas. Attending large public lectures in huge classrooms, going to the cafeteria with friends to eat, singing all night, returning to the dorm at sunrise, sleeping until she woke naturally.
Back then, she was just the “friend” who went singing with the female lead and her friends.
Then when the camera stopped rolling, she was knocked back to her original form. Meals were boxed lunches provided by the crew, eaten sitting in a shabby tent under scorching sun. Afraid of looking bad on camera, she didn’t dare eat much, only eating the vegetables on the side, so hungry she felt dizzy. She didn’t dare drink much water either, afraid of looking puffy on camera or of running to the bathroom and delaying everyone. As for sleeping enough—that was impossible. They often pulled all-nighters filming continuously. Even when exhausted beyond belief in front of the camera, she didn’t dare yawn, afraid of being scolded by the director.
Afraid of this, afraid of that—in the end, when the actual episode aired after waiting excitedly, she only had one out-of-focus shot.
The initial passion for acting was trampled in such day-after-day hopeless disappointment, fading along with that out-of-focus shot.
…
Wu Man heard someone calling her name from behind. Pulling herself from her memories, she turned around to see a young girl standing not far away.
“Is that Wu Man?”
She didn’t immediately answer, but this brief hesitation gave the other party confirmation.
The girl couldn’t contain herself, stammering for a long time before clumsily and loudly saying: “I really love you so much!”
Wu Man froze for a moment, made a shushing gesture, then quietly gave her an encouraging gesture.
This scene was secretly recorded by a passerby and posted online. Inexplicably, it made the hot search.
The comments below were hotly debated.
“What’s she doing at the Film Academy?”
“My friend says she went to class.”
“Is she finally aware that she needs to take some acting classes?”
“Seems like not… apparently it’s a screenwriting advanced class.”
“Wu Man wants to switch careers to become a screenwriter? Is her brain broken?”
“Any tiny thing gets on the hot search, and this clip obviously looks staged. Wu Man’s team, have some shame—finding an extra to create what warm big sister persona?”
Wu Man also saw that hot search, but laughed off those cursing at her, her mind full of how to write the story.
But just because she didn’t care didn’t mean others didn’t care.
The girl who had called out to Wu Man quickly came forward on Weibo with her real name to repost it.
“I’m Yang Meng from the Recording Department Class of 2017 at the Film Academy, currently interning at Daocaoren’s post-production company. Those baselessly accusing me of being Wu Man’s team without apologizing—come out, won’t you? I just happened to run into Wu Man at school today, had no idea why she was there, just got too excited and instinctively called out to her. After calling out I also regretted it, never imagined it would cause such big trouble. Here I apologize to Miss Wu Man. It was her private schedule—she could have completely turned and walked away, but she still responded to me. Why must gentle people always be judged with the greatest malice?”
Netizens clicked into Yang Meng’s Weibo and discovered she’d been posting Wu Man-related content since four years ago, never missing the like-repost-comment trifecta on any post. A genuine die-hard fan.
The rumor about team staging immediately collapsed and disintegrated.
Many people couldn’t help but feel sympathy for Wu Man being smeared with dirty water, but more people just treated it as a farce, ate some melon, and scrolled past.
Zhao Boyu’s anxious heart slowly settled, though he couldn’t help nagging at Wu Man.
“Why did you have to attend some advanced class, and attending it is one thing but you got recognized on the first day, and being recognized is one thing but you had to greet people—creating trouble for yourself out of nothing!”
“Someone who could recognize me just from my back must be someone who really likes me. Should I maintain my diva image and make my fan sad?”
“…Well, not exactly that.”
Wu Man dismissed it: “I did nothing wrong in this matter. I don’t think there’s anything to reflect on. Instead of worrying about these things, you might as well help me look at whether this script I wrote works or not.”
Zhao Boyu had no great expectations for her story at all, accepting her outline with gritted teeth.
She had named the story “Aftershock.”
The story background took place after a major earthquake. A woman had just gotten married not long ago but lost her husband in the earthquake. In utter despair, she met a young musician who came to perform charity concerts. The musician had become famous at a young age, but as he grew older his inspiration gradually dimmed, and no one sought him out for performances anymore.
The two people carrying their respective traumas met during the most turbulent period after the earthquake and healed each other. Before they could even express their feelings, the woman discovered her husband was still alive. The body previously confirmed as dead had been misidentified.
Zhao Boyu was very surprised. After roughly scanning through it once, he carefully read it again.
This female lead was a character somewhat similar to Deng Lizhi, likewise having to experience inner torment, questioning her heart while caught between her husband and her younger lover.
This character was indeed inspired by Wu Man’s experience with “Spring Night.”
No melodramatic conflicts, just humanity’s choice regarding emotions under the double assault of life and accidents. What was thought to be salvation in the darkest moment turned out to be another case of meeting too late in life.
Zhao Boyu put down the script, his face serious as he said: “I think you have quite some potential in transitioning to behind-the-scenes work.”
“Really?”
“Not bad. I think this story is quite interesting.”
Wu Man also sent the outline to Ji Zhou. After reading it, at a loss for words, he sent a strawberry emoji shaped like a thumbs-up.
Thus, the story was settled. After Wu Man refined the script, they began formal rehearsals. During rehearsals, the program crew kept filming—this part would all be broadcast as behind-the-scenes footage in the actual show.
This was another regular rehearsal session. The scene being tried was the pianist teaching the woman to play piano. What needed to be presented between them was a kind of ambiguity on the verge of bursting forth, yet mutually restrained and suppressed.
This scene was already their fourth rehearsal. Ji Zhou kept failing to grasp the emotional balance, so they could only go through it repeatedly.
Ji Zhou once again walked to the piano and sat down. Wu Man walked over and sat beside him.
Just as the two were about to start again, the rehearsal room door was pushed open. Zhui Ye walked in with his hands in his pockets, standing in a corner, forming a diagonal line with them.
This was the program’s competition format arrangement—during rehearsals, the Big Devil would randomly appear in various rehearsal rooms and give scores.
Because his scores would also become an indicator the mentors weighed when making final choices.
Wu Man and Ji Zhou had been rehearsing in the room for quite a while, but the Big Devil Zhui Ye had never visited them. They hadn’t expected him to appear during this part.
Zhui Ye said expressionlessly: “Continue. Just pretend I’m not here.”
Ji Zhou was very nervous. He quietly raised his gaze—behind the piano was a floor-to-ceiling mirror that could reflect Zhui Ye’s figure opposite them, standing motionless with arms crossed watching their performance.
Wu Man actually wasn’t any more relaxed than Ji Zhou. She ignored the gaze from behind, pretending to be calm as she reminded him: “Don’t get distracted.”
Ji Zhou steadied his mind, took a deep breath and said: “Don’t worry, this time I definitely won’t drop the ball.”
He was the type who tended to perform exceptionally well under greater pressure—years of stage experience had shaped this mentality. Under Zhui Ye’s intense gaze, Ji Zhou felt himself entering the zone. His slender fingers began dancing across the keys. Wu Man clumsily yet stubbornly followed his finger rhythm, wandering randomly on the keys.
Their two hands were like disordered traffic, unexpectedly colliding, then bouncing apart from each other.
However, the next moment, Ji Zhou nonchalantly pressed over again, covering the back of Wu Man’s hand.
His earlobes flushed red as he quietly said according to the script: “I played wrong.” But the hand pressing hers didn’t move away—instead reversing to clasp it, their two hands holding together. Wu Man froze, hesitating before withdrawing her fingers in return.
The rehearsal segment ended there.
Seeing that Zhui Ye had no comments and just stood there silently, Ji Zhou asked somewhat anxiously: “Did I perform badly again just now?”
Wu Man patted his shoulder: “It was quite good. Remember this feeling when you go on stage.”
“Then why does his face look a bit… dark?”
Ji Zhou gestured with his mouth toward Zhui Ye’s direction. Zhui Ye’s expression was as if what he’d just watched wasn’t a literary romance but a horror scene rehearsal—his face showing shock mixed with speechlessness.
After a moment of silence, he said frankly to Ji Zhou: “Your performance just now had quite big problems.”
Ji Zhou’s shoulders slumped as he muttered: “So he was rendered speechless by my performance, which is why his expression looked so awful?”
Wu Man comforted: “That take just now was okay.”
“Your standards for your own performances are this low?”
Ji Zhou was startled by Zhui Ye’s words and quickly shook his head: “What’s the problem? Bro, just tell me directly!”
Even though he was two years older than Zhui Ye, calling him “bro” came incredibly smoothly.
Zhui Ye walked toward the piano, saying to Ji Zhou: “Move over.”
Ji Zhou quickly made way with trepidation.
“I won’t lecture you with big theories—I’ll just perform it for you to see.”
He clearly didn’t know music theory, but just by observing Ji Zhou’s hand posture while playing once, he could perfectly replicate it.
However, when it came to actually playing, his true colors showed—the music he played was incredibly awful.
But the confidence displayed on Zhui Ye’s face would only make people wonder if their own ears had problems, definitely not that his playing was the issue.
Wu Man sat beside him, repeating the previous actions, following his chaotic fingers in equal chaos.
Their two fingers collided together even faster.
Zhui Ye’s fingers bounced away as if scalded. He lowered his gaze, making it impossible to guess what he was thinking.
A moment later, he straightened his back, and his hands seemingly accidentally bumped into hers again.
“…Played wrong again.”
Under his annoyed tone, his hand didn’t move away but instead invaded between each of her finger joints.
His five fingers like crawling creatures, carrying a layer of sticky, thin sweat, penetrated into the moist depths. Finally covering the back of her hand and interlocking.
Wu Man somewhat frantically tried to withdraw her hand. At this moment, she couldn’t distinguish whether it was the character’s panic or her own. That bewitchment completely different from Ji Zhou’s left her unable to resist.
Her fingers were firmly pinned between the piano and his hand, pressing out a low reverberation on the keys.
Ji Zhou on the side murmured: “Truly worthy of a Best Actor… Sister Man can’t even catch the scene anymore.”
Zhui Ye, while maintaining the hand-clasping position, looked toward Ji Zhou, though his gaze swept past her as he said: “Do you understand now? What it means to desperately suppress yet can’t help drawing closer—this is what liking someone looks like.”