478
After making sure that Jiang Ran had left, I thought of an even more important thing, hurriedly opening my phone and logging into Zhihu, a Q&A forum.
Ah, omnipotent netizens, please answer my questions for me!
479
I strenuously and shamefacedly searched the question of how to determine sexual orientation, but what I received was a whole chunk of baseless responses.
> Higher probability among people who like to play badminton or basketball.
> Men who like to wear skinny jeans might be the shou.
…and suchlike.
The hell? Laozi doesn’t even like to exercise, does this mean that I’m asexual?
Someone also replied, the line between friendship and romance is whether or not you want to sleep with him.
“……” Me, tactically silent.
480
I swear to god, I really don’t want to sleep with Jiang Ran. Really, I don’t.
If any half of this sentence is a lie I’ll livestream myself eating shit!
481
After seriously contemplating it for a moment, it dawned on me—
I must have entered a new height for humanity, ascending to a universe where nothing exists outside the mind.
The mind takes precedence, for the mind is reason. As long as I don’t want to sleep with Jiang Ran in my mind, then I must be straight! [confident face]
Mr. Wang Yangming, o’ great philosopher, from hereon please accept me as your disciple!
482
I continued to scroll down, by chance coming upon an anonymous reply from two and a half years ago.
I first skimmed through the gist of it. His reply was very long, I’d reckon a few thousand words at least. It was basically the equivalent of a miniature essay. Further, the logic of the whole text was clear; not only giving his experience, but also considering it from a biological and psychological perspective to more comprehensively analyse the problem of sexual orientation.
Among which, there was a section which really moved me.
The netizen wrote this:
I am male. My personality is more introverted. I’ve never dated anyone, nor have I examined my sexual orientation. Then, I met another man. He is much braver than me, giving me a lot of advice and inspiration. His personality bewitched me like a moth to a flame, and since then I’ve never been able to forget him.
He’s someone with very strong self-esteem. I know that there was a period of time when he was financially distressed, so I kept thinking up ways to secretly stuff him some money. Fortunately, he has a steady income now.
It was also from that moment on that I understood that I like him. His happiness, anger, grief and joy are all inextricably tied to my own.
……
Until today, I am still very sure that I like him, the type of like wherein I want to sleep with and live out the rest of my days with him.
483
Holy, is there such a divine writer?
I am humbled.
We’re sorry for MTLers or people who like using reading mode, but our translations keep getting stolen by aggregators so we’re going to bring back the copy protection. If you need to MTL please retype the gibberish parts.
When I was in university, my professor said that literary works must create a sense of immersion. Seeing his last line, laozi almost teared up at their pure love.
Vb mbwlcu bea bo atf mibrfa mjc jirb yf atlr yfjealoei?
484
Ca atf fcv bo la, P obecv atja atlr cfalhfc jirb ifoa jc bcilcf qgbofrrlbcji afralcu rlaf. P bqfcfv la jcv ogluulcu tfii fnfgsatlcu kjr lc Scuilrt.
Pa tjv yffc j ibcu alwf rlcmf ws ijcuejuf uege vjsr. Vfflcu atfrf mgbbxfv jiqtjyfar cbk gfjiis delaf ujnf wf atf tfjvjmtf.
However, I still raised my trembling hand, using my awkwardly crude English to answer the questions.
Heh, is there anything under the skies that I, Mo Shuyao, can’t do?
485
Ten minutes later, I stared at the result of the test in meditative silence.
I even started to suspect that my command of English was too atrocious, causing me to mistranslate it. Then, I sought enlightenment from the prestigious Baidu Powerword CN-EN dictionary. The result was exactly the same—
Laozi is bent.
WTF? I clearly reported the facts as they were?!!
Was it because I had written crispy ducks before, so when it came to the question asking whether I had read/watched homosexual content before, I honestly picked ‘True’?
Fudge this garbage test! It cheated my feelings!
486
I angrily flung my phone away. Unfortunately, my hand didn’t have any strength. The moment the phone left my grip, it scraped my wound again.
“AH—” I shouted in despair.
A few seconds later, Jiang Ran bolted to the scene, pushing the door open. “Mo Shuyao, are you alright?”
I frowned in pain. “I’m, I’m fine…”
However, my expression betrayed me.
487
Jiang Ran visibly became angry. He measured me for a long time, sternly asking, “Didn’t I get you to rest? Is your hand or your phone more important?”
“……” I shrank back into the quilts in fright, blinking helplessly.
He picked up my phone…
“Hey!” It occurred to me that I hadn’t closed the forum interface, yelling in my anxiousness, “Return that to me!”
Jiang Ran seemed to glance down at the screen, then placed it face down on the table. “Don’t worry, I won’t invade your privacy.”
With that, he turned around to take the first-aid kit, leisurely walking towards me. “Were you playing with your phone with that hand just now?”
Why do I feel like the air pressure has dropped because of him?
As I quaked, Jiang Ran turned back over, holding a large pair of scissors.
“Are you going to murder me?!” I almost leapt out of bed in shock.
Jiang Ran put a hand to my shoulder. “Just checking if your wound had split again.”
488
After saying this, he deftly cut open the bandages, using a pair of tweezers to clamp a round, rolly iodine-drenched cotton.
I shifted my body, wanting to look at my wound.
And suddenly, Jiang Ran raised his hand, blocking my eyes. “Don’t look, it’s ugly.”
My heart stuttered.
489
“I’m sorry for injuring you, it’s my fault.” As Jiang Ran cleaned the wound for me, he spoke sincerely, “After the wound has closed for some time, I’ll take you out of the country for scar removal surgery.”
The space between my brows creased. “What?”
“No matter who it is, no one would want their own hand to have such a big scar, right?” Jiang Ran’s tone sounded remorseful.
490
Speaking of scars, I thought of the old wound on Jiang Ran’s shoulder.
Why didn’t he think of going for surgery himself?
Seeing his dead earnest expression, I suddenly had the ominous premonition of being sold and even pitifully helping him count the money.
491
So I asked, “Don’t you have one too? Why didn’t you get it fixed?”
“I once mentioned to you; my management company at that time didn’t allow me to.” He started to bandage my hand. “The first company I signed with had a sketchy background. You can’t imagine some of the stuff that happened.”
The motions of his hands were very light. His breathing was muted, and even his voice had softened significantly.
Ha, laozi had also been under the payroll of the dogshit company that Jiang Ran used to be in.
They couldn’t see eye to eye with me and directly pulled me into the blacklist of the screenwriting circle; from that day on, not a single company was willing to take me in.
Bleeping hell. I’ll bear this grudge with me to the day I die!
Listening to Jiang Ran’s even tone, I actually felt quite sympathetic for him.
“But things are different now.” After taking care of the wound, he raised his head, looking at me. “Here, I have relatively better resources. And I can give you the best now.”
His words prodded me in the heart.
Yeah, that’s right. In these three years, laozi had sent out so many resumes; in the end, this was the only company that signed me on.
492
The room was washed in silence. Jiang Ran tidied up the area and sat back to the side of my bed.
He studied me for a moment, slowly saying, “Brother Cheng has helped you handle the news that you are Mo Ji. Your novel fans conversely are very excited, it doesn’t seem to be anything bad. He said that when you get better, you should prepare to do a livestream.”
“A livestream?” I whipped my head over, staring at him in trepidation. “That’s too embarrassing, no?”
Jiang Ran’s expression didn’t flinch. He said, “Is there anything embarrassing about literary creation? Besides, there are so many of your novel fans supporting you.”
Still, it felt very mocking to me. All my friends now knew that I was a crispy duck writer.
After a while, I softly said, “Can you do the livestream with me?”
“Hm?” Jiang Ran’s eyebrows subtly drew together. “What do you mean?”
“I’ve never done a livestream before, I don’t have any experience.”
However, he gave an awkward laugh when he heard this. “Actually, I’ve never done a livestream before too.”
For real?? You’re the revered film emperor who is already seven years past debut; how did you bluff your way and gain recognition without having done a single livestream in these many years?
493
After mulling it over for a few seconds, I asked, curious, “Jiang Ran, you aren’t acting the senior civil servant image, are you?”
“What’s a senior civil servant?” Jiang Ran was very curious as well. “Do you mean a longstanding Communist Party member?”
“……”
I looked at the way Jiang Ran sat up properly in front of the bed. His suit was neat and pressed, and his two hands were clenched into fists on his thighs. Clearly written on his staid face—Sorry, we’re chatting across different servers.
“Don’t you keep track of fandom lingo?”
Jiang Ran shook his head.
I reckon that he might not even have heard of the term ‘fandom’.
I could only patiently tell him my understanding of it. “Senior civil servant, those that have an ascetic aura and don’t seek fame and glory. They have upstanding morals and a tendency to take care of and teach others. The type who rarely engage in social networking; it has nothing to do with age.”
Hearing this, Jiang Ran lowered his head, seriously contemplating it. After a long spell of silence, the corners of his lips suddenly cocked up and he didn’t restrain the chuckle that came. “I do match your description quite well. But this is really who I am, the company has never set a celebrity image for me before.”
I blinked at him suspiciously. I’ve never seen Jiang Ran laugh so happily before.
494
“Your company is probably letting you run freely in the wild, I guess. How can any celebrity debut without having a set image?” I casually quipped.
Jiang Ran continued to smile, shaking his head. “Maybe it’s because I was very introverted when I first stepped into the entertainment circle, so they believed that I couldn’t act well.”
“You? Introverted?”
“Yeah. My parents brought me up with a stern hand. Since young, I was kept at home and made to study, thus never really getting much chance to hang out with my classmates. I was a little scared of strangers.” As Jiang Ran fell into his memories, his voice turned chilly. “However, my father is well-connected. Under a recommendation, I ultimately chose to study acting.”
From the way Jiang Ran spoke, I guessed that he came from a scholarly family.
495
“That’s great…” I couldn’t help but sigh deeply. “You’re much braver than me.”
Jiang Ran glanced over at me, a wry smile in his eyes. “What’s the use? I got on the bad side of that company around three years back. But they withheld my salary and I didn’t have enough money to pay the termination fee. Then, they gave me a lot of poor-quality films…”
Here, he gave a pause. Then he softly sighed. “The scar you scorned before was an injury from one of those films. At that time, I was cut by a wire and laid in my blood for a few minutes before anyone came to show concern. The director said that I had to beg them to staunch my bleeding…”
“Fuck! Didn’t your parents care that something like this happened?” I was so pissed that an expletive slipped out.
How much pain must he have been in at that time?
This horseassery was practically trampling on his dignity!
But Jiang Ran stopped at this point. I looked at his slightly lowered eyes and the faintly reddened rims of his eyes.
My heart twinged.
496
A while later, I hesitantly said, “Jiang Ran, I didn’t mean to sound scornful before. I’m sorry… I shouldn’t have brought up your scar.”
He shook his head, his voice sounding a little wan. “It’s fine, I’m the one who spoke too much. But some things are unbearable when kept to yourself for too long.”
I didn’t know how to respond to this.
“I will accompany you for the livestream in a few days.” He stood up then looked at me. “Just get more rest for now.”
After this, he strode out of the room.
I stared at his back as he left, a particular emotion stifling my heart.
noooo jiang ran qaq
My poor baby… Hurry up Mo shao and offer up yourself so little ran can cheer up 😆😆
Thank you for the chapter😍😍
thanks for the chapter ♡
Sheesh. What kind of company is that?
Thanks for the chapter <3
Jiang Ran is sad and need a kiss :3
Thank you for the chapter 🤍
Hahah wait… so that post… did Jiang Ran do it??
Thanks for the chapter ♡♡♡♡♡
Poor Baby Jiang Ran😭😭😞
Why do I get the feeling he is being led by the mind ,body and soul
🙄 shameless and black belly gong.😅
Why.. do I get the feeling that he’s shamelessly playing w his emotions so he softens him up a lot more easier. A literal wolf lol
What in the helll?? THEY LET HIM BLEEDING FOR A FEW MINUTES?? AND HE HAS TO BEG?? WHAT THE ACTUAL FAK?? SUE THOSE BIIITCCHHH!!! SUE THEEEEMM!!