DLWAV CH68

Kaoshan Village blew up in popularity.

Even though the road leading into the village hadn’t been fully repaired yet, and the villagers’ houses hadn’t been fully renovated yet, thousands of tourists were already swarming into Kaoshan Village, scrambling to be first.

Although at the very beginning, those who went to support the village were all Xia Ruize’s die-hard fans, along with some uncles and aunties living nearby who had an abundance of curiosity.

But unfortunately for the skeptics, in the short span of just three days, six people successively received pearl mussels gifted by the giant grass carp.

And the people of this era, especially the middle-aged and elderly, were almost all veteran users of a certain short-video app (Douyin/TikTok). So the very first thing they did after getting a pearl mussel was open their phones, shoot a video, and upload it.

The key point was that the pearl mussels they received all actually contained pearls.

Although the quality of these pearls was far inferior to the ones Ao Ruize had extracted earlier, one little girl managed to extract a black pearl of absolutely exceptional quality. Subsequently, this black pearl was purchased by a jewelry store for 170,000 yuan.

Then, she turned right around and used that 170,000 yuan, plus the hundred-something thousand she had saved up over the years, to put a down payment on a house for herself.

Once this news came out, naturally even more tourists—especially young people—couldn’t wait to run to Kaoshan Village.

Although in the end, 99% of people didn’t receive a gift from the giant grass carp, the scenery in Kaoshan Village truly was quite beautiful. Furthermore, although Kaoshan Village prohibited tourists from bringing in outside food for the sake of the giant grass carp and the other fishes’ safety, the fruits and steamed buns they sold to tourists, as well as the dried mushrooms, bamboo shoots, and cured chickens and ducks they had sun-dried themselves, were only slightly higher than market prices. And this slight markup was perfectly reasonable considering Kaoshan Village’s remote location and inconvenient transportation.

So in the end, the vast majority of these tourists were still quite satisfied with their trip, especially the tourist who bought fifty pounds of steamed buns in one breath to take back home.

A couple of days later, another piece of news about Kaoshan Village hit the hot search trends.

It turned out that a gang of thieves had set their sights on the giant grass carp and its group.
—After all, the giant grass carp was now an internet celebrity fish, and its value had risen accordingly. Furthermore, the thieves had actually managed to bypass the surveillance system Kaoshan Village had just installed, as well as the village’s patrol teams, and sneaked right up to the edge of the Fish God Pool.

As a result, before they could even get close to the giant grass carp, they were sent flying directly backwards.

Smacked by the giant grass carp’s tail.

The most seriously injured one had eight ribs broken straight off.

The key issue was that the families of that gang of thieves subsequently sued the villagers of Kaoshan Village in court, demanding they pay for medical expenses and lost wages.

【A thief actually dares to ask for lost wages?】

【You’re so greedy, how about we burn some paper money for you, do you want it?】

【Truly, weird things happen every year, but this year there are especially many.】

…

【But to be completely honest—a spicy grilled fish actually broke a thief’s eight ribs with one smack of its tail?】

【Can’t afford to eat it, can’t afford to eat it!!】

…

Setting aside the question of who would ultimately win or lose this lawsuit, everyone knew that Kaoshan Village’s rice bowl was now held firmly in their hands.

Naturally, Xia Ruize’s fans became spirited once again.

【I’d like to see who still dares to scold our Ruize for looking down on rural people now! If he really looked down on rural people, could he have gone this far for Kaoshan Village???】

【Shouldn’t we @ that group of “wise” fans of Xia Lewen and Best Actor Chen? You guys shouldn’t have the face to say that our Ruize caused Kaoshan Village to lose an opportunity to shake off poverty and get rich anymore, right?】

【Thinking about it this way, your Lele and Best Actor Chen, who have such high educational backgrounds, are actually inferior to our junior college student!】

【After all, our junior college student does what he says he’s going to do, and his ideas are endless. Meanwhile, what are your guys doing? Busy buying hot searches every day, busy creating hype, but we haven’t seen a single bit of action.】

【Bringing it back to the original topic—so now I’m genuinely a little suspicious that the long string of incidents that happened to Xia Ruize before were all tricks played by Xia Lewen behind the scenes.】

【Think about it, if Xia Ruize’s crimes were really confirmed in the end, who would be the biggest beneficiary?】

【Wouldn’t it be Xia Lewen?】

【This is a textbook scheming bitch right here.】

…

Seeing this, Xia Lewen’s face instantly went completely black.

In all the years he had lived, this was the first time he had tasted the feeling of lifting a rock only to drop it on his own foot.

Best Actor Chen had rarely ever seen him looking so gloomy, so much so that he couldn’t help but call out: “Lewen?”

Only then did Xia Lewen snap back to reality. The anger on his face instantly completely transformed into guilt. He directly grabbed Best Actor Chen’s hand: “Brother Chen, I’m sorry. You originally just wanted to kindly speak a fair word for me, but as a result, I’ve dragged you into this storm as well.”

Best Actor Chen’s attention, sure enough, shifted entirely to Xia Lewen’s hand. His expression instantly softened: “It’s fine, because I know you definitely wouldn’t do such a thing…”

Xia Lewen raised a smile: “Don’t worry, I will go explain this matter clearly to Ruize. Then I’ll have his side issue a statement, and those netizens naturally won’t misunderstand us anymore.”

Best Actor Chen immediately nodded: “Alright.”

After sending Best Actor Chen off, the smile on Xia Lewen’s face instantly vanished without a trace again.

Of course he knew that Best Actor Chen was interested in him.

It was just a pity that Best Actor Chen was still unworthy of him.

Even though he came from the Chen family of Hai City, and barring any accidents, after his parents passed away, as the youngest son of the Chen family he should be able to inherit over a billion in family assets. Furthermore, he had become a Best Actor at a young age, sat on tens of millions of fans, and was even dubbed the ‘National Husband’. However, in front of the Xia family, he was nothing.

Because, barring any accidents, he (Xia Lewen) would inherit the Xia family’s hundreds of billions in family assets.

After all, he was the Xia family patriarch’s only son in this world. Sooner or later, the Xia family patriarch would pass the Xia family down to him.

And the only reason the Xia family patriarch indulged Xia Ruize jumping up and down causing trouble was simply because he wanted to use Xia Ruize to hone his (Xia Lewen’s) mental fortitude.

There was only one problem: in his previous life, by the time he learned of this fact, it was already too late—

The reason he had chosen to enter the entertainment industry back then was, on one hand, to create the illusion that he didn’t covet the Xia family’s assets, thereby lowering the guard of the Xia family’s side branches; on the other hand, it was also because he felt that entering the entertainment industry would allow him to get acquainted with more wealthy families.

But what he never expected was that he fundamentally lacked the potential to become a star. So much so that a few years later, Xia Ruize, who had chased him into the entertainment industry, had leaped to become a top-tier traffic star, while he was still lingering around the fifth tier.

And on the very night Xia Ruize won the Best Actor award, he was run over and killed by a drunk-driving bastard.

Fortunately, the heavens treated him well and actually allowed him to be reborn.

The only pity was that the point in time he was reborn to was after he had already entered the entertainment industry.

He had originally wanted to directly quit the entertainment industry and charge into the Xia Corporation.

But then he thought about it—if he quit the entertainment industry at this time, wouldn’t that be admitting that his journey into the entertainment industry was an utter failure?

So why shouldn’t he first become a massive, blazing-red mega-star, and then, riding a massive wave of public opinion, enter and take control of the Xia Corporation?

One could easily imagine how much prestige and assistance the latter path would bring him.

Anyway, he knew all the movies and TV shows that would explode in popularity over the next two years. So reaching the peak of the entertainment industry within these few years would be an absolute breeze for him.

Not to mention, wasn’t there a ready-made stepping stone right here?

What he never expected, however, was that he had only just taken the very first step on his road to fame, yet that stepping stone, Xia Ruize—whom he hadn’t even put in his eyes anymore—had caused him to take such a massive tumble.

But fortunately, resolving this storm wasn’t difficult.

Xia Lewen subsequently made a phone call to his mother, Su Yiyue.

And so, a few minutes later, Ao Ruize received a phone call from Su Yiyue.

Before Ao Ruize could even speak, she directly started cursing at him loudly.

“Xia Ruize, have you caused enough trouble yet?!”

“Brothers fighting at the wall, mutually slaughtering each other! You’ve almost completely thrown away the Xia family’s face and my face, do you know that?!”

“…Stop it! Stop it immediately! Then post a Weibo saying that all the previous incidents were a misunderstanding…”

She cursed continuously for several minutes before her voice slowly lowered: “Ruize, your dad is also very unhappy, you know this. Although I am the wife of the Xia family patriarch in name, to put it plainly, the three of us, mother and sons, are still living under someone else’s roof. Not to mention, don’t you still want to inherit the Xia family’s assets? At a time like this, you absolutely cannot make your dad unhappy…”

Hearing this, Ao Ruize couldn’t help but laugh out loud.

So much so that Su Yiyue was momentarily stunned.

“What are you laughing at?”

“Nothing.”

Ao Ruize said, “Just thought of something.”

Su Yiyue: “Thought of what?”

Ao Ruize: “Just the fact that back when I was being mocked by the entire internet, you didn’t even bother to ask me a single question about it.”

He couldn’t help but laugh again, and then said lightly, “At the time, I actually thought you were already dead, you know?”

On the other end of the phone, Su Yiyue, who was currently getting her hair done, instantly froze in place.

But Ao Ruize was still continuing: “But now that it’s Xia Lewen’s turn to be mocked by the masses, you couldn’t wait to call and reprimand me.”

“The feeling it gives me is that—you’ve seemingly resurrected like a fraudulent corpse!”

Su Yiyue’s face completely cracked open.

But in the next second, Ao Ruize directly hung up the phone.

“Scolded her perfectly.”

The milk dumpling (system) couldn’t help but say, “This Su Yiyue is no good thing…”

In short, back before the Xia family patriarch had inherited the Xia family, he was a hedonistic second-generation rich kid. Su Yiyue happened to be a vain woman, and seeing that he had money, she hooked up with him.

She didn’t expect that later, when the Xia family patriarch was about to get married, he would just kick her away.

Su Yiyue was naturally unwilling to accept this, but she also knew that although the Xia family patriarch seemed unreliable on the surface, he was actually ruthless and merciless. If he knew she was playing little tricks behind his back, he definitely wouldn’t let her off.

So she could only first take the child she happened to be pregnant with in her belly and marry an honest man named Xia Zhou—that is, Xia Ruize’s father—and then slowly plan her next moves.

She never expected that over a decade later, she would actually wait until a massive, heaven-sent opportunity arrived—

Xia Zhou fell ill and died.

And the Xia family patriarch was diagnosed with infertility. The son she had given birth to later, Xia Lewen, became the Xia family patriarch’s only child.

According to the milk dumpling’s deductions, regardless of whether Xia Lewen had been reborn or not, Xia Ruize only ever had one ending: being played to death by Su Yiyue’s family of three.

So their mission this time was to get revenge for Xia Ruize.

However, right after saying this, the milk dumpling regretted it.

Because right now, their forces were weak and thin; it clearly wasn’t the time to fall out with the Xia family yet.

“It’s fine.”

Ao Ruize said, “Because even if the Xia family doesn’t make a move against me, I was preparing to make a move against the Xia family anyway.”

The milk dumpling: “???”

Have you forgotten that you’re just a tiny little star right now? What kind of move can you make against the Xia family?

No, rather, even if you were already a household-name mega-star right now, you still couldn’t shake the Xia family in the slightest.

Ao Ruize directly turned his head to look at his manager beside him, who was currently introducing several new scripts she had received recently: “Sister Liang, no need to go to all that trouble. Actually, I’m already preparing to quit the industry.”

Since being a star couldn’t shake the Xia family’s power, changing industries would do, wouldn’t it?

The manager, who was currently overjoyed because she had just fought a beautiful turnaround battle for Ao Ruize, and his recent trending topics were rivaling second-tier stars, allowing the company to suddenly receive several excellent scripts: “…”

She put down the scripts in her hand and said with a completely serious face: “Say that one more time?”

Ao Ruize: “…”

The milk dumpling: “…”

They had the illusion that in the next second, the manager would charge up and murder them directly.

And right at this moment, a flurry of footsteps suddenly came from outside the conference room.

Following closely, the main doors were pushed open.

Ao Ruize turned his head to look.

Leading the group was a young man around twenty-seven or twenty-eight years old.

He wore a white shirt on his upper body, a black suit jacket draped over his arm, and straight suit pants that accentuated his two long legs to the fullest.

Looking further up… or rather, before Ao Ruize could look further up, the milk dumpling’s voice rang out: “These beautiful eyes, this high-bridged nose, these delicate and charming lips… I’ve decided, this is my new wife.”

Ao Ruize: “…”

What else could he say?

He could only nod and say, “As long as you’re happy now.”

The manager, meanwhile, instantly stood up straight: “Little President Qin.”

Seeing Ao Ruize and the others in the conference room, the middle-aged man who pushed the door open hurriedly said, “So someone is using this conference room.”

“You guys continue.”

Finishing his words, he turned to look at the young man beside him: “Little President Qin, let’s switch to the conference room upstairs.”

Qin Xiuyan nodded.

He cast one final glance at the people in the conference room, then turned and left.

Ao Ruize subsequently turned his head back and said, “Just joking.”

“What I meant is, it’s just too difficult to make it big in the entertainment industry. How about you find me a sugar daddy?”

After all, wasn’t this what management companies in novels loved doing the most?
He felt Sister Liang should also drift with the tide and adapt to the customs.
Just like he was doing right now.

The manager: “…”

The manager said expressionlessly: “You should still just quit the industry directly.”

Did she look like a pimp?
Most importantly, she was only receiving one salary, yet he wanted her to do two jobs?!

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