I Found A Planet

January 28th, on the Lunar Spring festival, after dinner, Chen Jin’s family of three wore cold-proof windbreaker jackets, wrapped a scarf around their necks, and armed themselves with thick clothing. They headed towards the Wanda shopping complex located not far from the community and took the lift to the movie theater located on the third floor of the shopping complex.

He took out his phone, opened a QR code, and swiped it over the ticket machine. Four movie tickets spat out from the ticket dispenser. He gave two of them to his parents. For the other ticket, he gave it to Su Yun, who was currently buying popcorn. That’s right, Su Yun tagged along. She was wearing a brown overcoat that was specially designed to express her wonderful feminine curves; a knitted white high-collar woolen sweater which covered her long alluring neck; a draped checkerbox scarf that embodied her cold and elegant temperament; black leggings to cover her stunning legs; and round leather boots that made her look rather petite. The woman in sight was at least a nine out of ten beauty. Especially for her cold and elegant temperament, more than 80% of people would turn their heads over to look at her on the streets.

Today, however, she tagged along Chen Jin and his family to watch a movie. This was what Chen Jin was most perplexed and puzzled about. He even directly questioned her, “Su Yun, you are already in your thirties, why are you not spending the lunar new year at home? Is it that you don’t want to go home?”

“The tax bureau has a lot of work to be done at the end of the year. This is our busiest time. I can only go back after the new year.” Su Yun explained herself, but how could she have not wanted to go home? No matter how busy her department was, they would still give holidays during the lunar new year. But, her manager asked her to stay for another two days. First, the traffic would be less congested. Secondly, she could really do some things and find one or two opportunities or so. After finishing, her manager madly gave hints to her with her eyes.

“Alright.” Su Yun nodded her head gently as her pretty face turned red. Her manager even allowed her to spend two nights in her guest room for her to learn some accounting knowledge. Sleeping at the manager’s house? She got stunned listening to these few words. Her heart was beating rapidly, her face blushed until the back of her ear, even a large portion of her snow-white neck turned red. Without knowing what was going on, she actually nodded her head. She was mumbling the few words: learn accounting, learn accounting… It was all just for the sake of learning!

Putting learning aside, being able to see him every day, always at his opposite when taking a meal and including today’s movie time with him… it was all just methods to release stress from learning.

I never had thought about this too much before. Anyways… it was all the director’s idea, and my parents also want me to have a good relationship with my superiors.

Su Yun felt that her train of thought was getting all over the place. She felt embarrassed to the extent that she wanted to dig a hole and hide inside. As a woman, she had never felt so panicked and confused as she was at that moment. But towards her directors’ arrangements, her heart never once showed any sign of defiance.

…

About the complex fluctuations in a woman’s heart, Chen Jin knew nothing, and was not interested to explore it either. They entered the movie theater and sat down in their seats. What Chen Jin was more concerned about was the turn-up rate in the movie theater. Viewers entered the cinema one after another. Before the show, he quietly calculated the turn-up rate within the theater. “Aside from the first two rows, all the other seats are basically filled, so the turn-up rate should be… above 85%.”

At that time, the music sounded, and the movie officially began. Chattering could be heard coming from the entrance.

“Quick, the movie is starting.”

“The queue is too long at the elevator downstairs, the movie has already been going for almost a minute, if we are late for another few minutes, we will need to ask people beside us to fill us in.”

“Quickly take your seat and watch the movie.”

People that came in later almost filled the seats at the two front rows. The turn-up rate was at least at 95% or above. Immediately, Chen Jin took out his phone. Using his data, which was clearly laggier than it used to be, he inquired to his friends about the turn-up rate in other movie theaters via WeChat.

“Yuan Li, the movie theater you are in, is the turn-up rate okay? What are your estimations?”

“Shi Xiaotao, are you in the movie theaters? How was the turn-up rate at your side?”

“Zhang Nan, did you and Zhao Xin manage to grab two tickets for yourselves? Are you in the cinema?”

“Assistant Zhen, are you in the cinema watching the anime movie based on our company’s product? How was the turn-up rate over there?”

After the messages were sent, he got successive replies fairly quickly.

‘Director Dong’s daughter’ said, “I’m in the movie theater, my gosh, there are so many people here, all seats are basically filled, I don’t recall seeing an empty seat, the turn-up rate here should be 100%.”

Shi Xiaotao said, “I am a hundred percent sure that the turn-up rate over here is a hundred percent. Actually, I’ve already watched this move over a hundred times and have already memorized every line. Now, I’m just watching the people that show up, according to my observations on the age composition of the audiences that entered the theater… ahahah, just as I expected, this is a family movie that is meant to be enjoyed with the whole family. There are elderly, kids, parents, those who came in were mostly families.”

Zhan Nan replied, “Me and Zhao Xin didn’t get to enter the cinema, currently being slapped by the cold winds outside. I told him to buy the tickets earlier, but he just wouldn’t listen. He told me we can get the tickets on the spot, I chided him and now he’s not talking. We bought tickets for the second screening at 8 pm, we’ll just chill around in the mall for a while.”

Assistant Zhen replied, “I’m watching the movie now. The seats are all filled. By the way, I don’t know what happened back there when I bought the tickets. I bought tickets for ‘Wa-wah Robot: A Brilliant and Brave Rescue’ but on the receipt, it was written ‘Dream Era’. I told the staff that there was a problem. They told me it was some minor fault with the equipment, and it won’t affect normal viewing.”

Upon seeing assistant Zhen’s reply, a phrase popped out in Chen Jin’s mind — box office fraud. He asked assistant Zhen to use his phone to take a photo of his tickets and send it to him. He then forwarded the photo to Shi Xiaotao and informed her about the situation.

“Shameless thief!” Shi Xiaotao ground her teeth out of immense rage. “A lot of people shared a similar situation with me. They told me that our movie tickets were stolen by theaters all over the country! Even those unknown, low tiered cinemas want a piece of us, just how much will our box office get dragged down? I won’t let them get off with this easily, I will call the police and sue them! I’ll make them spit out everything that was ours.”

Chen Jin said, “Calm down. On this matter, as long as we have evidence, SARFT and the cinema alliance will handle them. It is said that there are exclusive legal punishments on this… they won’t be able to steal too much of our box office.” After consoling Shi Xiaotao, a burst of laughter came to his ears.

In the movie, punchlines were always there for the laughs and giggles. The character Wa-wah in the movie subjugated every audience with its cuteness. Moreover, the exquisite animation had the people’s eyes stuck onto the big screen as they fully indulged in the movie. As the story deepened, the chaotic fight scene between the Wa-wah robot and the human trafficker rendered the audience hysterical.

‘Wa-wah Robot: A Brilliant and Brave Rescue’ could be described as a zero pee-break movie. After an hour and a half, the movie ended. The audience stood up and left the cinema with something inside of them that was yearning for more.

Chen Jin overheard the conversation between a family of three.

“Hubby, this movie is really good, it’s hilarious and touching at the same time.”

“Yea, world-class pictures and perfection in every single frame. Just watching those will be worth our tickets.”

“Daddy, mommy, I want a Wa-wah robot, buy one for me please!” said a little girl with her tender voice.

“Don’t worry my sweetheart, daddy is trying eagerly to buy one every day, I promise I’ll get you one sweetheart!” said a man towards his daughter in his arms.

“Yay! That’s great, we are going to have a Wa-wah in our home, thank you daddy!” The little girl was elated and pecked her father on the cheek many times.