QTMWSFC Chapter 27.1

The designated meeting time was 6:45 AM. Coupled with the fact that the meeting place was unfamiliar and required over half an hour of driving, the one hour and forty-five minutes of preparation time was actually a bit tight.

Xia Qingmeng didn’t get enough sleep at all. Xu Xinghe told her to sleep in the car and even took a blanket out of their luggage to cover her with. Still very drowsy, Xia Qingmeng softly thanked him in a sleepy muffled voice and went back to sleep. The viewers, without asking for it, were force-fed a mouthful of dog food.

If anyone dared say they weren’t sweet, there would be a fight!

What were all those black materials even talking about?

If a chairman of a group was going to put on an act to this extent, what was he getting out of it?

A man like him with money and looks had no shortage of people eager to please him. He didn’t need to be the one serving someone else.

Neither of them liked being late, so they basically rushed to the meeting place as quickly as possible. As it turned out, they were surprised to find that they were the first to arrive.

The host was already waiting there, greeting them warmly. He recorded their arrival time and arranged for them to rest and wait.

It wasn’t long before the athlete couple arrived. Both of them had been athletes for many years. Although they were now retired, their ingrained sense of punctuality meant they follow the rules strictly and arrive twenty minutes early.

Although Xu Xinghe had a cold personality, that didn’t mean he was impolite. He shook hands and exchanged greetings with Fang Chengle and Qin Xuan. He also knew his boundaries, didn’t pry into anything, and didn’t force small talk. This made Fang Chengle and his wife feel very comfortable around him.

Xia Qingmeng took out some snacks to share. After all, they would be spending three weeks together, constantly running into each other. It wouldn’t be good to be too awkward. Xu Xinghe’s personality clearly wasn’t the one to take the initiative, so it was better that she handled it, even though Xia Qingmeng herself was a bit introverted.

Seeing Xia Qingmeng share food, Qin Xuan also brought out some small snacks. The two chatted casually, and to their surprise, got along quite well.

Qin Xuan didn’t know much about Xia Qingmeng. Her understanding only came from all kinds of messy black materials. Now that she had met her in person, she felt that rumors were truly terrifying and harmful.

The couple’s relationship seemed perfectly fine. The marketing accounts were clearly just bored and making things up. They were probably paid by someone. She noticed that although Xu Xinghe wasn’t doing anything obvious at the moment, he was probably just biding his time. Wasn’t participating in this variety show itself a form of counterattack?

What normal man would tolerate his girlfriend being constantly slandered like that? He would definitely want to clear things up.

The four of them waited for a while, and then the third couple arrived. For Xia Qingmeng, Wang Zhengzheng and Deng Yuanli were definitely respected, highly esteemed seniors. She greeted them very respectfully.

Wang Zhengzheng and Deng Yuanli were at the age where they had long since let go of such formalities. They smiled and told her not to be so reserved, to treat it as making friends.

Wang Zhengzheng had always been known for his keen judgment. Seeing Xu Xinghe standing beside Xia Qingmeng and politely greeting them with her, he could tell that this young man was no ordinary person.

He looked young, but his mind was on a different level from others his age. But that made sense. How many people his age could reach his position? Most people in such high positions were either over fifty or already halfway in the grave.

The Xu Group’s current rapid rise was thanks to this young man. Anyone who treated him like an ordinary young person would be the real fool.

He wondered how Xia Qingmeng ended up with such a young man. He was a sly old fox! Fortunately, it seemed like he genuinely had feelings for her. If he were just playing around, the naive Xia Qingmeng would probably be counting his money for him after being sold with no idea how badly she’d been deceived.

After registering, the three couples briefly chatted and got to know each other in the waiting area while they waited for the last couple to arrive.

Surprisingly, nearly twenty minutes passed, and they still hadn’t shown up.

In the end, even the director’s team couldn’t take it anymore. The most pressing problem was that if they delayed any further, they would miss their ticket times!

The production team held an emergency meeting and then decided on the travel methods for the three couples based on their order of arrival.

Xu Xinghe and Xia Qingmeng were the first to arrive, so they could take a direct flight. Fang Chengle and Qin Xuan, who arrived second, would take a direct high-speed train. Wang Zhengzheng and Deng Yuanli, who arrived third, would also take a high-speed train, but unfortunately theirs was not a direct route. But making stops along the way suited them just fine.

When Xiang Ran and Shen Xichun finally arrived, they found the meeting place completely empty. They had no choice but to accept their punishment: driving themselves to the travel destination. It was a long journey. Even without stopping for rest, it would take most of the day.

Xiang Ran didn’t have much of a problem with it, but Shen Xichun pouted, visibly unhappy. This drew a wave of scolding in the live chat. Her fans immediately rushed to defend their “older sister.” In doing so, they inevitably dragged Xiang Ran into it, blaming him for taking too long to pack and making them late. Xiang Ran’s fans weren’t pushovers. They started to fight back immediately!

Then the two groups of fans started attacking each other. In the end, the only injured were the CP fans, who found themselves caught in the middle. No matter how much they tried to stay in their lane, they couldn’t please either side and got grief from both. Frustrated, many of them dropped the ship altogether.

In the TV series, with its filters, they seemed quite sweet. But in reality, it didn’t look sweet at all. It felt like artificial saccharine¹excessively, sickeningly sweet, or overly sentimental to the point of being insincere. Viewers figured that they might as well go to other livestreams and watch real married couples. Even Xia Qingmeng and Xu Xinghe seemed far sweeter than these two! What were they doing? Shipping was supposed to be for fun and happiness. Why bear with this kind of grievance?

The truth was, Xiang Ran and Shen Xichun were just a publicity stunt CP. Xiang Ran had been popular for a while before, but his company was terrible. His follow-up resources were lacking. He was constantly being used to promote newbies. This Shen Xichun was indeed a newcomer, and the higher-ups had indeed ordered him to promote her. But what could he do? If he refused, he would be blacklisted. So he had no choice but to grit his teeth and agree.

Then as he kept promoting her, things ended up like this. Although he had gained a bit of popularity again, it was purely through marketing and hype. Xiang Ran himself couldn’t guarantee how many real and active fans he actually attracted.

The two fanbases kept fighting fiercely, to the point that it was starting to turn off passersby.

There was also a reason why their luggage wasn’t packed properly that morning. Shen Xichun didn’t actually live with him. But because their CP hype was so intense, she had come over in the middle of the night with a bunch of random stuff and moved into his place.

His apartment wasn’t just his alone either. To be honest, although Xiang Ran was a celebrity, he also grew up in an ordinary family. He didn’t have a habit of spending recklessly, so he shared the apartment with a childhood friend.

His friend knew about all the difficult situations Xiang Ran was in. These past couple of days, the friend had specially moved his things out and stayed elsewhere. That was why the live chat commented that they looked more like roommates than a couple.

But most people didn’t pay attention to those details, especially since his friend, trying to cover his tracks, had made the already messy apartment even messier.

Xiang Ran was really frustrated. Shen Xichun was delicate and high-maintenance. She wasn’t very famous but had an attitude. Word on the street was that she had some powerful sugar daddy backing her. Xiang Ran was just an ordinary guy with no connections. How could he compete with that?

He was starting to wonder why he even signed up for this variety show in the first place.

Was he here to suffer?

Everyone else was a loving couple taking the opportunity to travel and have fun. Only he felt like he was here to endure a tribulation.