Chapter 58 (2/3): A heroine saves a beauty

Cameraman: “…”

That hedgehog is barely the size of your fist.

Prick you?

Just push it aside.

Could it possibly outrun you?

Finally, Ruan Nian gritted her teeth, put on a determined expression, crouched, and stepped over as if making a huge sacrifice, reaching out to pick the mushroom blocked by the hedgehog.

A drop of blood.

At that moment, the hedgehog moved, and it seemed its quills pricked her hand.

Ruan Nian let out a scream, waving her hand as blood appeared on the back of it.

The production team received her distress call, and everyone perked up, thinking something major had happened.

They rushed over to check.

It was Ruan Nian.

Gu Zhaoye’s pupils constricted.

He immediately ran toward her, his clothes flapping dramatically in the wind, looking extremely worried and frantic.

When he arrived and saw Ruan Nian crouching on the ground with blood on her hand, his expression darkened even further.

“I told you, without my permission, you can’t do anything that hurts yourself. Why are you still like this? Are you not listening to me?”

Ruan Nian, holding back her grievances, said,

“I’m sorry, I thought it wasn’t a big deal.”

Cameraman: Have you two had enough?

If you’d come any later, her wound would’ve healed already.

Can I go film another group?

The entire morning, Ruan Nian’s side had a string of minor incidents.

Other groups also needed help occasionally—some lacked tools and needed deliveries, others were short on manpower and couldn’t carry what they’d collected, or some got lost and needed directions.

But those were all resolved quickly.

By nearly noon, the production team finally remembered to check in with Liang Zhiwei’s cameraman: “Where’s Zhiwei? Has she reached the mountaintop? Is she in line? Has she started sliding?”

All they heard was the howling wind.

Due to the high altitude, it took a while for the cameraman to respond.

When he did, his voice was frantic and panicked, shouting hysterically at the director: “Director!! You finally contacted me!! I lost Liang Zhiwei—she’s gone somewhere, I don’t know where!!”

The director shot to his feet, his voice cracking: “What!?”

Everyone in the production team turned to look.

The director’s face looked worse than if he’d been dead for three days.

He screeched,

“You’re not joking, are you? Where are you? How could you lose her?”

“We’re at the mountaintop. We were sliding down the route as planned, but somehow there was a fork in the path that didn’t match the map. Liang Zhiwei went down the fork, and then I couldn’t see her anymore. I tried to follow, but there are several paths ahead, and I don’t know which one she took!”

The sky had fallen!

It felt like a bolt of lightning had struck.

The director could barely stand.

This course was already highly dangerous.

If you followed the set route, it was manageable, but accidents usually happened to those trying to show off their skills.

But going off-route?

They’d all studied the map and been trained.

How could Liang Zhiwei, who didn’t seem careless, get lost like this?

“Hurry, hurry, contact the rescue team now!”

The director’s legs were weak.

He steadied himself on the table, stood up, and slammed it, shouting.

The staff around him finally realized what was happening.

“What? Liang Zhiwei’s missing?”

The production team erupted into chaos.

The director suddenly remembered to question the cameraman: “Why are you only telling me now? How long has she been missing?”

The cameraman, struggling with a pile of equipment, pleaded,

“I sent a distress call to the production team earlier! I only just got your response. Director, you reacted too slowly!”

What distress call?

He hadn’t contacted him because of a distress call…

The director froze, then suddenly turned to Gu Zhaoye.

Gu Zhaoye was busy tending to Ruan Nian’s hand, applying medicine with a look of heartache, while the WeChat phone assigned to him sat ignored nearby.

The director’s pupils constricted.

Realizing something, he strode over in disbelief, grabbed the phone, and saw a slew of missed calls.

The sky really had fallen.

Looking at these two show-offs, the director suddenly wanted to slap them both, maybe even unleash a full Eighteen Dragon-Subduing Palms.

“Mr. Gu, why didn’t you answer the phone?!”

The director was on the verge of collapse, but there was no time to waste.

He quickly organized people to contact the rescue team, then geared up to head up the mountain himself.

He couldn’t stay here any longer—his heart couldn’t take it.

If something went wrong with the show, he’d be the first to go down.

Gu Zhaoye finally looked up from Ruan Nian’s wound, frowning.

“Ruan Nian is injured. She needs care. Other people’s issues can wait. Her wound can’t get worse.”

A domineering CEO would drop everything for the woman he loves, rushing to her side.

Such devotion was so sweet, something countless people dreamed of.

But at this moment, it made the director’s vision go black.

Wound getting worse?

Was there even room for it to get worse?

A Band-Aid would’ve solved it.

It probably wouldn’t even outlast the Band-Aid!

“Forget it. Don’t move. Just stay here and don’t cause any more trouble, please, I’m begging you.”

The director had no energy left to say anything else.

He turned and rushed out with the team.

Gu Zhaoye froze, his pupils shrinking, not fully processing what he’d heard.

He quickly tossed aside the cotton swab, knocking over the medicine bottle nearby, and stood up, grabbing the director’s shoulder.

“What did you say? Who’s in trouble?”

Interrupted again by Gu Zhaoye, the director wanted to punch him.

He snapped,

“Liang Zhiwei, Liang Zhiwei! She went down a fork and got lost! We’re contacting the rescue team to find her. Got it, Mr. Gu? Now go back to your medicine!”

Gu Zhaoye tried to grab him for more questions, but they were already gone.

He turned back, quickly picking up the phone.

There were indeed a ton of missed calls.

In that moment, it felt like an electric shock coursed through his body.

Something intense surged within him, a wave of panic gripping him.

How could this happen?

Was that her distress call?

Had something happened earlier, and he hadn’t noticed?

Why was this happening?

He looked up at Ruan Nian again.

She seemed stunned, then showed a hint of guilt, as if she hadn’t expected this.

But in that instant, Gu Zhaoye’s head spun, dizzy.

Looking at Ruan Nian, she suddenly felt unfamiliar.

What was going on?

Why, in that moment, was he suddenly so worried about Liang Zhiwei?

Didn’t he not even like her?

Just when they’re filming a skiing show, someone goes missing, and it just happens to be Liang Zhiwei, and it just happens to be because he didn’t answer the phone.

How could such a coincidence happen?

It couldn’t possibly come true.

Coincidences in this world have a certain probability.

It’s impossible for so many coincidences to pile up at this exact moment—

Ruan Nian was in a panic.

She hurriedly asked the system: [System, what’s going on? How could Liang Zhiwei suddenly disappear? Was her task really that dangerous? How could it be so coincidental?]

The system was silent for a moment before replying: [Nian Nian, do you remember what I told you? All energy is constant. Just like when someone’s favorability toward you increases, you gain charm points, which can enhance yourself. But correspondingly, if their favorability drops, your charm points drop too. Not only do you lose what you had, but it might even deduct further. The same applies to luck.]

Ruan Nian didn’t quite catch on: [How does luck work the same way? What could I possibly lose?]

[Luck is conserved. If you gain luck, someone else has to bear the cost of your share. Suppose the total luck is 10, and you both originally had 5 each. If you get 8, the other person is left with 2. If you were to get 12, they’d be left with -2.]

The system calmly explained: [This ensures energy balance. I’ve always said I’m a fair exchange system. You can trade for anything you want.]

Ruan Nian’s pupils constricted, unable to believe it.

So, it was because she boosted her luck that she was the culprit?

Her gained luck came at the cost of someone else?

She didn’t know what to do.

Though she wasn’t sure if Liang Zhiwei’s disappearance was definitely her fault, and though she wanted Liang Zhiwei to lose to her completely, if it meant bearing the weight of someone’s life, she absolutely couldn’t accept it!

Especially…

Ruan Nian shuddered, suddenly recalling that Gu Zhaoye missed the call because he was tending to her wound.

She had thought it would be a moment that thrilled their shippers, but if it caused them to miss Liang Zhiwei’s distress call, the consequences were too terrifying to imagine.

Absolutely, absolutely, absolutely horrifying.

Ruan Nian’s legs went weak.

She looked up and shouted,

“Hurry, go find Liang Zhiwei!”

At that moment, Gu Zhaoye had no spare attention for her.

He stood for a moment, then threw everything aside and rushed out.

Meanwhile, at Huaxing Entertainment.

Sister Li brought her things and settled into her desk.

The first thing she did was meet with the boss.

The boss shook her hand: “So, now that you’re with our company, what area do you want to focus on?”

“Liang Zhiwei.”

Sister Li answered without hesitation.

Before he could react, she swiftly placed a stack of documents on the boss’s desk, including her observations and research on Liang Zhiwei, her future career plans, and even, at the end, a full proposal.

The boss was stunned as he picked up the documents.

He wasn’t even that familiar with Liang Zhiwei.

She had only become one of his artists after he recently acquired her agency.

He looked through the materials in shock, feeling that Sister Li knew Liang Zhiwei better than Liang Zhiwei knew herself.

Some of the data went back years—how could she have gathered all this in such a short time?

Was she the FBI or something?

Sister Li smiled faintly.

The person who understands you might not be your parents.

Some parents and children have barriers, knowing only the surface of their child’s true self.

It might not be your friends, before whom you might hold back or put on a facade, showing only the parts that align with them.

It might not be your lover, your child, or anyone close to you, but rather…someone who’s always watching you.

Your enemy.

As Ruan Nian’s biggest competitor over the years, Sister Li had collected an exhaustive amount of information on Liang Zhiwei, the most detailed in the industry.

Even Liang Zhiwei’s own agency, which didn’t pay much attention to her, likely didn’t know her as well as Sister Li did.

Because she feared Liang Zhiwei’s career path might block Ruan Nian’s, Sister Li had designed various routes for Liang Zhiwei, simulating how her career might unfold.

But Liang Zhiwei’s luck was poor, and her agency was incompetent, always managing to produce outcomes even worse than the worst Sister Li had imagined.

The boss looked up, dumbfounded.

Sister Li handed him another document: “Right now, Liang Zhiwei is in the spotlight, with many people spreading rumors that she’s interfering with Gu Zhaoye and Ruan Nian, right?”

“I can turn this around immediately.”

“Just trust me.”

The boss was floored.

He stared at the documents for a long time before finally asking Sister Li,

“What’s in it for you?”

Their company didn’t even offer the best terms, and Sister Li had no other demands.

“I’m not after anything. I just feel like I’ve been on the wrong path for the past ten years,”

Sister Li said calmly.

“I want to get back on the right track.”

To help myself, and to help her.

At that moment, while the boss was still dazed, his phone buzzed.

He picked it up and saw a message from a subordinate about Liang Zhiwei.

The assistant following Liang Zhiwei to the shoot was now in a panic.