Rebirth of an Idle Noblewoman

Gu Xiqiao was already used to reactions on Weibo, or more accurately, even if there was a big reaction, she wasn’t really concerned anymore. But the system was too bored today, and gave a live broadcast of the happening of Weibo’s grand occasion to Gu Xiqiao, showing her all the relevant information.

The reason was because of two Weibo posts that had been posted. Thanks to Yu Ning and his team’s effort, ‘River’s Lake’ had been completely edited. Even though they hadn’t scheduled the premiere, Cheng Zhou had sent the film to the film festival. Adding on ‘Empire Under Siege’, Gu Xiqiao was nominated for two awards.

One nomination was for Best Newcomer Award, and the other was Best Female Supporting Award.

When the news came out, Gu Xiqiao’s fans exploded. A newcomer who performed in two movies, and was nominated for two awards in both in the film festival. This was a testament to her talents. The news announcement coincided with a popularity poll on Weibo, in which the winner would receive an invitation to the New Year’s Eve party of Mango TV.

Since Gu Xiqiao had not shown her face for a long time, her fans saw the opportunity to cast their votes. They were extremely hardworking at it, and her rank quickly surpassed the top ranking popular star, a female in Chinese opera, occupying the top spot with a large margin.

This made the fans of the young female Chinese opera unhappy. Where there were fans, there were ponds, and you could never have too little trolls.

“Here I was thinking what kind of famous person it was, but Gu Xiqiao? Who the heck is she? I’ve never even heard of her! The votes are rigged for sure, I strongly request the official Weibo to clear it!”

“Yo, let me explain the comment above. She’s someone who specializes in acting as supporting female roles, third female leads and n numbers (smiley)”

“No matter how high the votes are, she’s just a support! (smiley) (smiley) (smiley)”

“I heard that she was nominated for best supporting actress, it really suits her.”

“If you have the ability to take first place, then use your ability and be a female lead in a movie!”

The trolls and keyboard warriors were in full swing with their ridiculing, and the more they talked, the more sense they made. To the point that there was a topic named ‘Let’s talk about that actress who only played a third female lead and is winning the popularity contest’ that made it to the hot topic list. Some had even commented on Gu Xiqiao’s Weibo, and her fans were in a frenzy, not knowing what to say to stop the slew of insults.

Just as the trolls were having the time of their life, the official Weibo of ‘Divergent Paths’ posted a Weibo.

(Verified) Divergent Paths Official Crew: Feng Qiqi, please take care of us too. @ (Verified) For A Millenium [JPEG] [JPEG] [JPEG]

‘Divergent Paths’ was a movie that was adapted from a game that had been popular on the internet. Cheng Zou had bluntly said before that ‘Divergent Paths’ would be an amazingly expensive Xianxia movie, as he wanted to make sure that the scenery from the game was as close to the original as possible, and was also diligent in choosing his cast. The male lead and supporting roles in the movie were all top tier actors, and while the second female lead fell a little short, the third female lead was Song Guanjing!

The line up of the cast was not in the least inferior to ‘Empire Under Siege’ and ‘River’s Lake’, and had even far surpassed the two movies. It was also an anticipated blockbuster film by millions of netizens.

Only, the female lead had yet to be decided, and the netizens were also anticipating the news. Everyone had voted for who they thought was the most suitable candidate, but most of the votes were almost equal. Because the role was difficult to play, the netizens couldn’t think of anyone who could actually take on the role.

The crew released three pictures. The first one was her in plain clothes, with white fox fur wrapped around her. Sunlight shone on her snow-white face, and her chin was lifted slightly, a malevolent gaze in her eyes. Her lips were curved upwards in a sinister smile, which was extremely attractive.

The image of both righteous and evil was portrayed perfectly by her.

Li Yu and Song Guanjing both reposted this Weibo silently.

(Verified) Li Yu: @Cheng Zhou Remember to leave me a role, otherwise we’re no longer friends! // @ (Verified) Divergent Paths Official Crew: Feng Qiqi, please take care of us too. @ (Verified) For A Millenium [JPEG] [JPEG] [JPEG]

(Verified) Song Guangjing: My Beauty Gu’s movie, please look forward to it ^_^ // @ (Verified) Divergent Paths Official Crew: Feng Qiqi, please take care of us too. @ (Verified) For A Millenium [JPEG] [JPEG] [JPEG]

After these Weibo posts, the clamoring of those trolls and keyboard warriors came to an abrupt end.

Gu Xiqiao’s fans immediately gained confidence from their silence. As expected from Beauty Gu, to be able to amaze the world with a single brilliant feat!

To those who said Beauty Gu didn’t have a single leading role, was the weight of ‘Divergent Paths’ enough? Isn’t it stronger than you Huadan? Do you have anything better to say? Oh, that’s right, isn’t your Chinese opera girl a second female lead in the movie? Are your brains alright?

The trolls wanted to continue, but they couldn’t find a single thing to refute it. They didn’t think that Gu Xiqiao would be able to become the female lead of ‘Divergent Paths’ without saying anything, and even if they wanted to slander her, they couldn’t say that the weight of ‘Divergent Paths’ wasn’t enough. How could they say that? It was more than enough!

They wanted to try to slander Gu Xiqiao’s acting, but looking at the three pictures, there was hardly a thing they could criticize about. From her pose to her face, every single thing was flawless and made people’s heart beat while looking at it, what was there to say about it?! Also, can you not be so beautiful, they had to resist! They were here to slander her! As the troll silently tried to calm himself, his fingers had already tapped the ‘follow’ button.

The system gave Gu Xiqiao each and every one of those comments, laughing joyously in the void space as it did so. [Beauty Qiao, these comments are making me laugh so hard. Your fans really have such venomous mouths. Those pitiful trolls, they were clearly here to slander you in the beginning hehehe!]

[But everything really is going viral. Both your films have been nominated. Look at this Weibo, it’s a famous international judge at the International Film Festival. He’s quite a queer person, and he’s the one who announced the news of your nomination. He also admires you alot, being that he watched ‘Empire Under Siege’ a few times.]

‘It’s only a nomination, not that I’ve gotten the award.” Gu Xiqiao swiped open her phone to look at Weibo, after silently staring at the panel in front of her for a while.

The latest Weibo on the homepage has reached nearly two million comments, and the number of her fans had increased by two hundred thousand, and was continuing to increase.

(Verified) For A Millenium: … // @ (Verified) Divergent Path Official Crew: Feng Qiqi, please take care of us too. @ (Verified) For A Millenium [JPEG] [JPEG] [JPEG]

She didn’t bother typing any comments while reposting, but just ‘…’.

And the comments to her post was like this:

“I think I cried at the last picture. Can you not tease me like this every time 😥”

“I’m licking the screen, don’t disturb me!”

“I don’t care, when I saw this, there weren’t any comments!”

“Although I’m happy that beautiful, you’re acting once again, why the h*ll is it another tragic film! 😭”

“D*mnit, I foresee another death scene that will start the waterworks. When will you stay alive, beautiful?! 😭”

“I’m definitely not normal, even my phantom limbs are hard after seeing the first picture 👋”

“… silently +1”

“+10086”

The list of hot topics on Weibo was firmly dominated by Gu Xiqiao, and it wasn’t like the other topics were not related to her either! This kind of limelight overtook every other artists and crew who were becoming popular in the same timing as her, and it felt like sh*t. Could you at least leave one hot topic spot for them!

When Cheng Zhou saw the popularity it had garnered, he felt like he was on cloud nine. It was nice to have Little Gu. Apart from having fantastic acting skills, he didn’t even need to buy any spots on Weibo, or hire any Internet Water Army for the movie that he was making.

***

Du Yixin was off today, and he was home, reading over the script in hand. Trying to sort through his emotions, he even gave Li Yu a call, wanting to ask advice from the other on ways to deal with the fighting scenes with Gu Xiqiao. That’s right, after yesterday’s blunder, he already knew that his acting skills were not up to par. She was the one who was leading every time they shot together, and she had even made him stumble more than a few times!

He was still an actor at the end of the day, and although his acting skills were not as great as Li Yun, he wouldn’t be suppressed by Li Yu. If someone had told Du Yixin a few days ago that he would meet someone who could shock him and made him screw up, he would have laughed them off. But after going through yesterday, he believed that he really was being pressured, and that was after the other party had deliberately held back.

Du Yixin knew that something was wrong with himself, and so he gave a call to Li Yu for advice on how to overcome this. Li Yu was overjoyed when he heard.

“Sigh, if you can’t do it, then let me do it instead. I actually sparred with her everyday…”

Before he could finish speaking, Du Yixin hung up the call. He opened Weibo and stared at it blankly, and then he remembered that Cheng Zhou had mentioned that he would be releasing some makeup photos today. But when Weibo loaded, he was taken aback. Why were there so many comments tagging him?

Before he could collect himself, he was once again shocked at the hot topic lists. The first thought in his mind was that Cheng Zhou had bought an Internet Water Army to bump the topic up to the hot topics, but when he scrolled through the comments, it was all discussion of the fans, and there were even popular bloggers among them.

At this point, you can clearly tell that these were all legit fans, and not Internet Water Armies that have been paid!

And then he turned to the official crew’s Weibo, reposting the post immediately before tapping into the profile of ‘For A Millenium’. After silently clicking ‘follow’, he was surprised once again by the number of fans in this account. He knew that the other was just a newcomer, and this was the first time they were working together. However, looking at the number of fans that were close to twenty million, his cold facade almost cracked under the revelation. Was this really a newbie’s Weibo?!

There were so many other first-rate stars that didn’t even have as many fans as her, right?

Everyone in the crew had reposted this Weibo, and only a few were unable to. Du Yixin studied the list for a while, and noted that Sheng Yin was one of them that had not reposted it. Her last logged in for Weibo was three days ago, and he frowned. But he didn’t concern himself with it for long.

***

Gu Xiqiao didn’t pay attention to the happenings in Weibo, but the system kept broadcasting everything to her, and up till they reached home, it had yet to stop.

Mrs. Zhang had already returned, and was cleaning up the house when the two came in. When she saw them, she immediately brought out a plate stacked with fruits.

Jiang Shuxuan took off his coat, silently sitting down on the sofa as he reposted the same Weibo post that she had done, and continued down to read through the comments.

His own Weibo had reached nearly a million fans, and he was considered to be a small internet celebrity. Gu Xiqiao was once again hot, and as soon as his Weibo had been posted, it received dozens of comments.

Gu Xiqiao brought the laptop down from upstairs, and was typing away on it with Jiang Shuxuan by her side. His hand was on the sofa, his head lowered and his attention on his phone. His lips were pursed, as he swiped on his phone. The dim yellow light from the window reflected on his white shirt, making it look slightly golden.

After typing a page, she raised her head suddenly, looking at Jiang Shuxuan. Then she took her phone, sneakily taking a picture of him.

The next day morning, when Gu Xiqiao woke up, Mrs. Zhang had yet to. Only, Jiang Shuxuan had already left.

It was still early, the sun had yet to rise, and even the street lights were still on.

Gu XIqiao couldn’t go back to sleep, so she decided to just wake up. She turned on her phone, and found the picture that she had taken yesterday in secret, and posted a Weibo.

(Verified) For A Millenium: Harmonious passing, silent mountain rivers. [JPEG] (T/N: It’s a Chinese saying that vaguely means the good years have passed and the mountains and rivers have returned to silence. It means to describe how youth has gone and life has lost its color and passion.)

The figure in the picture was a bit blurry, but you could still see his outline. Fans who woke up early in the morning were immediately stunned by the picture.

“F*ck, what is this? Did you find this picture on the net, Beauty Gu?”

“Although I can’t see it clearly, with my professional eyesight, this guy is really really handsome!”

“Harmonious passing, silent mountain rivers. This is the most sadistic saying in ‘Divergent Paths’ 😭”

“The person in the picture should be a male model, he really has the feel! I can also feel the mysterious aura radiating from him, but I just can’t see his face clearly! Bad one!”

“Am I the only who thinks that it’s @ A Flowing River?”

“Up there, you’re not the only one!”

“There should be some photoshop masters around right @ psgreatgod 😀”

There were also photoshop masters among Gu Xiqiao’s fans, and for the sake of seeing who the person in the picture was, they immediately downloaded the picture and made to sharpen and clear the filter on it. They had accepted the task with confidence and said that they would immediately restore the picture for the other fans to see.

A few minutes later, the photoshop masters came back with a comment.

“Goddess, you’re actually the real photoshop great god, right? What kind of blur filter did you use, that none of us are able to remove it with the various methods that we tried using? ┭┮﹏┭┮”

This comment made it to the top immediately.

***

On the set of ‘Divergent Paths’, Gu Xiqiao walked towards Cheng Zhou once she was done filming a fight scene with one of the other male supporting roles. “Director Cheng, my next scene is scheduled at after two in the afternoon. I have something to do at noon, so I will leave for a while.”

“Go ahead.” Cheng Zhou was tolerant of Gu Xiqiao. He knew that while she was lazy, she was also very responsible. She wouldn’t ask to leave if it was just for something minor. “Remember to come back on time.”

Having said that, he smiled again. If even Gu Xiqiao wasn’t on time, there wasn’t anyone who would be more punctual than her in this world.

After getting the permission, Gu Xiqiao immediately went to change out of her clothes and makeup.

Du Yixin, who was holding the script in hand and was about to ask her something: “…”

It wasn’t until she left for her dressing room that he silently looked at Cheng Zhou and asked, “Li Yu told me yesterday, that he sparred with Miss Gu every day, was that true?”

“Yes.” Cheng Zhou sighed when the matter was brought up, and he sighed again. “Little Du, you have to work hard.”

Du Yixin went silent for a moment. Li Yu’s acting skills were at the pinnacle of the entire entertainment industry circle right now, and his talent was way too high. He initially thought that Li Yu had been joking yesterday, but he didn’t expect that there was no exaggeration to his words at all.

He looked at the direction of the dressing room, and let out a deep sigh.

***

Sheng Yin was also in the dressing room, touching up her makeup. When she saw Gu Xiqiao coming in and removing her clothes and makeup, she was surprised. “Miss Gu, you still have some scenes in the afternoon, right?”

“Yeah,” As she let the makeup assistant remove her makeup, she replied faintly. “I’ll be back in the afternoon.”

“I see.” Sheng Yin smiled, but said nothing.

After Gu Xiqiao went out, only did Sheng Yin’s assistant speak, ” What the heck, she only got two nominations, and that’s not even the awards yet and she’s being so big-headed. Even Brother Du stays with the crew during his idle time, can’t she wait also?”

The costumes and makeup for this movie were extremely cumbersome, and it took at least two hours to put on. The artists would come in the morning and put everything on, and go through the entire day without removing it to save time. Only when everything was done for the day did they change out, and so none of them would leave the set during the day.

That was what prompted Sheng Yin’s assistant to say those words when she saw Gu Xiqiao’s behavior. With such a self-important attitude, they wouldn’t receive any favors no matter which crew they were placed in, especially towards the makeup artists. However, the crews were still all smiles as they said goodbye to Gu Xiqiao, some also telling her to be careful and remember to come back early and so on.

Sheng Yin studied the makeup artists’ face closely, noting that there was no discomfort or unhappiness on her face. However, although there was none on her face, it didn’t mean that she didn’t feel anything on the inside. Thinking of this, she chastised her assistant, “Enough, stop it.”

The assistant felt indignant, but she held it in, turning the topic to something else. “I haven’t seen Miss Fu today, I heard from the others that she’s quite the crew. But that can’t be, right?”

“It’s about there.” Sheng Yin looked at herself in the mirror, a cryptic flash in her eyes. Outside, the director was calling for her, so she stood up and left the room.

***

On the other side, Gu Xiqiao had already reached Nine Heavens.

At this time, Luo Wenlang was meeting Fu Dongyi in the parlor. Fu Dongyi didn’t know why Luo Wenlang was looking for him, but it was for the sake of Fu Enterprise, so he came.

“Mr. Luo, why in the world are you looking for me?” Fu Dongyi asked the question for the hundredth and one time.

Luo Wenlang was about to explain again, but then he raised his eyes, seeing a figure slowly approaching through the glass door. He stood up with a bang, and exclaimed, “She’s here!”