FIMA Ch34: Injustice

Xie Jinzhao stood up and stretched lazily, his bones popping with crack sounds: “I want to see who the murderer is.”

After the two went downstairs, at a glance, they saw Gu Siyuan sitting in a chair. His posture was straight, his demeanor cold and composed, as noble as an emperor ruling over the world.

At this moment, a thought spontaneously arose in their hearts: Losing to a person like this doesn’t seem too shameful after all.

However, before they could think further, a burst of intense, roaring laughter suddenly erupted from the live audience section on the right, and mixed within the laughter were comments…

“Hahaha, I’m dying of laughter. The dead-weight group is here.”

“I really hand it to those two. The dead-weights truly provide the most joy; they actually managed to survive to the very end by sheer dumb luck.”

“How can they be so funny? Those two spent the entire process either screaming their heads off in fear or daydreaming and praying for others to be unlucky…”

“Don’t say it, the dreams those two had actually did manifest in alternative ways. It’s just a pity they encountered a king-level killing machine like Big Boss Gu, so nothing they wished for worked…”

Xie Jinzhao and Xi Shuang: “…”

Are they talking about us?

One of us is an aloof B-King, the other is a little green tea fairy. Are our images just gone like that?

…

“Why is the murderer Master Bai? Isn’t it the Eldest Young Master? The moment he heard you ask about the murderer—good heavens—he directly pulled out a gun!” Looking at the final announced results, Xi Shuang asked Gu Siyuan, extremely puzzled.

It was evident how big of a shock a gun was to them, people living in the peaceful nation of the 21st century.

Xie Jinzhao also blinked: “Why would Master Bai kill his own youngest son? Could it be…”

As a male, he was always relatively more sensitive in certain aspects.

Gu Siyuan nodded: “Your guess is correct. That child completely wasn’t Master Bai’s. But his reason for killing wasn’t because of this.”

“This is actually quite a complex story. Master Bai went to the hospital for a physical checkup and discovered he had lost his reproductive function. But because of his pride, he didn’t dare let others know. So, he secretly drugged his wives, setting them up to have relations with wild men. Once he confirmed they were pregnant, he would act innocent and ‘catch them in bed’ red-handed.”

“In that era, for a woman to encounter such a thing and be caught by her husband was almost no different from dying on the spot. But at that moment, when she discovers her husband actually doesn’t blame her and instead gently comforts her, wouldn’t that push their guilt and sorrow to the extreme?”

Staring with his beautiful eyes, Xie Jinzhao said hurriedly: “This is PUA (Pick-Up Artist manipulation), right? He definitely wanted to control them better.”

Gu Siyuan nodded: “Yes. Through this guilt and leverage, Master Bai firmly controlled these women in the palm of his hand, body and soul. He is the king of this castle, and everyone is incomparably obedient to his words. The Eldest Miss called him the Tathagata Buddha because everyone in the castle cannot escape his palm. Actually… heh, he knew about the Eldest Miss secretly practicing ballet every night long ago. He just couldn’t be bothered to expose her and found her trembling appearance very amusing.”

“Wait, how did you know about this?” Wang Xue was extremely surprised. The three of us in the Yellow Team stayed together the entire time.

She asked again: “Could it be written in the diary? No, I looked at it too. Not a single entry in his diary exceeded twenty words. What could be clearly written in that?”

Gu Siyuan shook his head: “I didn’t think of this initially either. But coincidentally, by working backward from the respective birth dates of the two young masters to about ten months prior, Master Bai wrote two diary entries with similar emotions. The feeling of both pride and anger revealed in the words and handwriting practically pierced through the paper.”

“Wait, what you’re saying is, you just looked through it that one time, and you memorized the contents of the entire diary flawlessly, including the dates and handwriting corresponding to every single entry.” Xi Shuang raised her hand with a shocked face.

The three members of the Red Team and Xie Jinzhao also cast their gazes toward Gu Siyuan.

The two members of the Yellow Team gave a “haha,” casting a glance at them with the smug expression of prophets.

Haha, it’s finally your turn to be shocked.

Ignoring these people, Gu Siyuan continued: “But this manipulation method ran into a bit of a problem with the Third Wife. She was a new-age student who had attended a girls’ high school, only marrying Master Bai as a concubine because her family owed debts. I guess that after being treated like this, she was unwilling to just numbly pretend nothing had happened. She probably wanted a divorce, wanted to leave the Bai family. But how could Master Bai, who was accustomed to controlling others, agree? Thus, she ‘contracted’ leprosy and was locked up, her world reduced to that tiny space from then on.”

“As for the Fourth Wife, it was because she got pregnant too early. The First and Second Wives both got pregnant over a year after entering the household. That is to say, the wild man who got the Fourth Wife pregnant wasn’t arranged by Master Bai. The Fourth Wife truly, actively cheated on him. And this was undoubtedly a blatant provocation to Master Bai’s authority. How could he let those two off?”

“Under the circumstances of the calculating versus the unwitting, he very easily discovered that wild man. It was his nominal eldest son, the Eldest Young Master of the Bai family. Thus, his anger grew even stronger, and he came up with a method to torture the two of them that he considered brilliant.”

Everyone widened their eyes: “What method?”

Gu Siyuan pondered for a moment before answering slowly: “For example, waiting until the child was born, and then suddenly telling the Eldest Young Master that the Fourth Wife was actually his illegitimate daughter. Merely because the Fourth Wife’s maternal family offended government officials, he didn’t dare publicly reveal her identity, so he took her in under the pretense of taking a concubine to take care of her, but had never touched her.”

“Holy shit, pervert.” Everyone was shocked to the extreme.

“If the Eldest Young Master didn’t know about the filthy deeds between the elders, wouldn’t he think he had slept with his own biological sister? Then the child born… my god, if the Eldest Young Master couldn’t think it through, he really might take action to kill the child.”

“Wait, then if that’s the case, why is Master Bai the murderer?”

Xie Jinzhao suddenly spoke up: “Perhaps it’s because of this.”

He pointed to the profile card on the large screen not far away, which showed that the Eldest Young Master was a sculptor who had injured his wrist a week ago, yet the infant had died from a crushed windpipe.

Although Xie Jinzhao was timid, under normal circumstances, his brain was very clear.

A pervert like Master Bai might have been hiding outside the door, watching with his own eyes as the Eldest Young Master moved to kill his own child.

However, the Eldest Young Master’s wrist was injured, and he was panicked and pained. The child didn’t die at the time, only temporarily stopping breathing, but the Eldest Young Master didn’t notice.

But Master Bai, who was tailing him, clearly realized this, so he went in and finished the job.

This way, he could successfully watch the Fourth Wife and the Eldest Young Master spend the rest of their lives in painful torment.

After hearing this story, Wang Xue and Xi Shuang spontaneously glanced at Gu Siyuan and the others: “You men are truly vicious and perverted.”

Gu Siyuan shrugged; this was just a rough story.

However, he narrowed his eyes. Although this was just a story, it actually also showed that people wouldn’t stay foolish their whole lives.

Spending day and night with Master Bai, the First and Second Wives must have slowly grown suspicious in their hearts. That was why earlier, one had lured Master Bai away, and the other had come out to ostensibly warn them off but actually remind Gu Siyuan that there was important information in the study.

And the Second Young Master was a rare clear-headed person in the family, which was why he carefully considered and told him that the suspect was a male.

…

By the time their group came out of the old castle, the sky was completely dark.

The colorful, dazzling lights in the amusement park contrasted with the scattered, lonely stars hanging on the horizon, making the night sky appear even higher and further away.

This atmosphere was very suitable for parting.

After surviving a catastrophe together, the frenemies Xi Shuang and Xie Jinzhao added each other on WeChat.

Wang Xue and Ji Haoying were saying their goodbyes to Gu Siyuan, joking: “Boss, your skills and brains are both so incredible. What kind of work do you do in real life? Are you a special forces soldier? Why would you come to this amusement park to play?”

Gu Siyuan shook his head: “Just came over for work. Today’s black technology was developed by our company.”

Everyone looked shocked: “Damn.”

So the thing that scared them into crying out for their parents was entirely his doing? Then they are very dissatisfied with the results of this game!

Just kidding.

Qi Ran cast a deep, heavy look at Gu Siyuan. He confirmed that the person in front of him was completely different from before.

Thinking of Gu Siyuan’s powerful and wise appearance earlier, and thinking of his natural closeness with Xie Jinzhao, an incredibly uncomfortable emotion surged in his heart.

After a long time, he forced out a smile and asked: “Brother Siyuan, you opened a company outside, why didn’t you tell Auntie, Uncle, and us?”

Gu Siyuan shot him a glance and said coldly: “It’s just playing around casually, there’s no need.”

Qi Ran’s expression changed slightly.

The atmosphere instantly became awkward.

Seeing this, the others quickly voiced their goodbyes.

Seeing that everyone had left, Xie Jinzhao tugged at Gu Siyuan: “Let’s go too. It’s getting a bit cold.”

Gu Siyuan nodded: “Mn.”

“You two live together?” Qi Ran widened his eyes.

Xie Jinzhao slanted his beautiful phoenix eyes and said softly to Gu Siyuan: “Did you not tell him?”

“…” Gu Siyuan.

What is he talking about? Why don’t I understand?

However, Gu Siyuan clearly had no intention of paying attention to Qi Ran either, simply following Xie Jinzhao’s words: “What’s there to say? We’re not close anyway. Let’s go!”

“Oh,” Xie Jinzhao pursed his lips and nodded vigorously.

Watching the receding figures of the two—one tall and upright, the other slender and flexible—Qi Ran’s gaze was bottomlessly deep.

…

Gu Siyuan and Xie Jinzhao walked side-by-side to the nanny van in the parking lot.

These past few days, he didn’t have much to do at Yuanzhi Technology, so he would mainly be responsible for managing Xie Jinzhao’s affairs.

Seeing them, the new assistant Little Wang immediately smiled and asked: “Brother Xie, I heard you and Brother Gu were opponents on the variety show this time. What was the final result?”

Xie Jinzhao pondered for a moment and said honestly: “Not bad, we both survived to the end.”

Little Wang smiled excitedly: “I thought this program looked awfully hard before, but you both actually survived to the end. Your performance must have been very good then… and you definitely got enough screen time.”

Xie Jinzhao nodded: “Mn.”

Leaning against his seat, Gu Siyuan shot him a sidelong glance: “If my memory serves me correctly, aside from Teacher Li being held hostage, only Lu Yanyan and Qi Ran died in action this time. But it seems two minutes after Qi Ran died, I won the victory. Which means, you only outlived them by less than three minutes?”

“…” Xie Jinzhao.

Would you die if you didn’t tear down my stage? Gu Siyuan acted as a B-King for the entire variety show; what’s wrong with letting me have a moment?

At 8:00 PM that very night, the official account of Who is the Adventure King publicly announced the recording guests for this episode simultaneously across several social media platforms, directly tagging the individuals.

This was completely out of control; it was simply poking a hornet’s nest.

As the most popular variety show in recent years, never mind other platforms, Who is the Adventure King had over six million followers on its Weibo account alone.

However, besides them, there were also many black fans belonging to Xie Jinzhao and Xi Shuang rushing in from all directions.

They directly cursed up a storm under the official announcement on Weibo. The top comment cursing them directly received over ten thousand likes, which inevitably included many likes from casual passersby.

To the point where Xie Jinzhao’s fans didn’t even dare try to control the comments, because at this time, trying to control the comments was no different from adding fuel to the fire.

“Is there something wrong with the director of this episode?”
“Is our Adventure King about to be cancelled? How come anyone can go on it now?”
“Wasn’t it enough for Xie Jinzhao to ruin so many TV dramas, does he have to come ruin our variety show too? What did I ever do to wrong him?”
“This is truly too much. Out of the three, two are complete poison. Xie Jinzhao has a ten-thousand-year unchanging dead face, and Xi Shuang is the number one green tea in history. I really feel sorry for Qi Ran, having to share the stage with these two?”
“Having these two on our variety show, are they here to do a live-action performance of what ‘shameful’ means?”
…

However, just cursing simply wasn’t enough to satisfy the black fans and rival fans of the two. They decided to go to the variety show’s Super Topic to start threads, determined to turn the entire Super Topic into a hate hub for Xie Jinzhao and Xi Shuang.

The Super Topic for Who is the Adventure King basically consisted of die-hard fans of the program. They discussed actively every day, which was why it ranked first on the variety show charts year-round and was very easy to find.

However, after the black fans clicked into the Super Topic, they felt something wasn’t quite right.

Unlike the sea of curses under the official Weibo post, the variety show Super Topic was actually a picture of peaceful and quiet days. One must know, the fans of this program were usually the most caustic and mean-spirited. What was going on today?

The current entertainment circle was both closed and open.

No matter what TV drama or variety show it was, there would always suddenly appear a few self-proclaimed “insiders.”

Who is the Adventure King was the same. After every episode was recorded, these few insiders would come to the Super Topic in advance to reveal a tiny bit of news to arouse everyone’s enthusiasm for chasing the variety show.

Naturally, today was no different. Long before the official Weibo announcement, several people had already started threads one after another.

A Level 14 Super Topic user with the ID “Forever Loving Adventure” posted a thread that was bumped very high: “Holy shit, holy shit, today I finally truly understood what a ‘Game Demon King’ means!”

“Are the guest stars this time really awesome?” a fresh ‘passerby’ account immediately asked in the comments section.

“Is it Qi Ran?” A ‘passerby’ account asked hypocritically: “I heard before that Qi Ran seems to have studied at a famous overseas university, has a very good brain, and is especially amazing at clearing game levels.”

Another ‘passerby’ account appeared: “If it’s not Qi Ran, could it really be Xie Jinzhao? Looking at his blockhead appearance… Hehe, if he can do it, I’ll chop my head off and use it as a stool…”

In the past, when Xie Jinzhao and Qi Ran’s relationship was still quite good, the relationship between their two fanbases was extremely bad, tearing into each other at the drop of a hat.

Xie Jinzhao’s fans despised Qi Ran for sucking their idol’s blood. Initially, Qi Ran was a completely unknown amateur with nothing to his name. If it weren’t for hyping up some “fairy-like friendship” with Xie Jinzhao, no one would have cared about him at all. Yet his fans refused to admit it and loved to run their mouths.

Qi Ran’s fans couldn’t stand this kind of rhetoric the most, arguing that their Qi Ran had a good family background, was a wealthy young master, and that his starting point in life was Xie Jinzhao’s endpoint; it was Xie Jinzhao who wanted to cling to his coattails.

Especially this year, the reputation of Xie Jinzhao’s broadcasted drama was incredibly poor, while Qi Ran’s movie with Yun Yan became a hit. After that, Qi Ran’s fans “turned from serfs to masters” and started singing, taking every opportunity to sarcastically mock Xie Jinzhao.

However, with his persona as a “resource star” whose journey was smooth sailing, Qi Ran naturally couldn’t attract enough die-hard fans, so they were never as strong in a fight as Xie Jinzhao’s fans.

But Qi Ran’s fans had a method: raising a large number of ‘passerby’ accounts to praise Qi Ran indirectly while secretly stepping on Xie Jinzhao at the same time.

In this variety show’s Super Topic, Qi Ran’s fans habitually performed their act of pretending to be passersby, discussing heatedly.

The original poster seemingly saw the reply above at a glance and immediately replied: “Hahaha, rest assured, bro, you can definitely keep your head. Whoever the Demon King in this program is, it will never be Xie Jinzhao. He… no, I’m dying of laughter, just thinking about it makes me laugh!”

Seeing this answer, the ‘passerby’ account from Qi Ran’s camp felt slightly relieved. Hmph, I knew Xie Jinzhao couldn’t do it.

But looking at the poster’s subsequent replies, they felt something wasn’t quite right again.

At this time, the original poster started replying seriously: “The guest stars this time are all pretty good, but the Demon King has nothing to do with them.”

An old fan of the program asked: “If it’s not a guest, could it be an amateur? Is there an amateur providing off-site assistance this episode? But the amateurs in previous seasons were all very useless…”

The poster replied: “The amateur this time is very different.”

The old fans got curious: “How is he different?”

The poster kept them in suspense: “In short, he’s just different. You’ll see when the time comes. If you don’t call him ‘hubby’, then I lose. God, he’s simply perfect.”

“An amateur being hyped up this much, does he want to debut? Or is he a plant arranged by the program?” At this time, a ‘passerby’ account suddenly spoke up.

“Nowadays, everyone wants to debut.”

“Before, there were also amateurs who were hyped to the heavens under beauty filters, but the moment they appeared on camera, they died a ‘light-exposing death’.”

“Really knows how to hype. Qi Ran and Wang Xue, who share the stage in this variety show, are both considered top-tier in looks, right? This amateur is truly bold, actually daring to boast about his looks in front of them…”

The poster was also someone who had rolled and crawled their way through fan circles. At a glance, they knew what skin these people were wearing underneath these replies.

And who knew better than those of them who had watched the entire process on-site just what Gu Siyuan was truly like?

The poster continued: “Alright, replying to the last one. This episode is really very fun. Our live audience practically laughed till we passed out the entire time. It can be said that even adding up all five seasons, this episode can be considered one of the most interesting. Everyone must watch it next Saturday night. Oh wait, it’s already past midnight into Monday, so it’s this coming Saturday…”

Watching the rhetoric in the Super Topic, Qi Ran threw down his phone and silently lay face down on his bed.

Although the few dramas he had participated in so far had good results, he hadn’t single-handedly carried any of them.

Therefore, everyone praised him for having potential, but his status was still not solid.

And very soon, his first drama where he was the top-billed lead was going to air on satellite TV. It was for this that he came on the variety show to promote. Yet looking at the feedback from the online posts, the mentions of him were merely trivial fragments.

Whether it was positive or negative, everyone was focusing on Xie Jinzhao, or Xi Shuang.

Even Gu Siyuan received more attention than he did.

He couldn’t help but think back to the interaction between Gu Siyuan and Xie Jinzhao earlier. When did these two hook up together? And both of them suddenly had a massive change in attitude towards me.

After a while, his eyes darkened, seemingly having made some decision.

He picked up his phone and called his Second Brother. Almost the instant it rang, the call was connected.

“Ranran, did you miss Second Brother?” A doting male voice came from the other side.

Qi Ran smiled: “Yeah.”

Pausing for a moment, appearing somewhat hesitant to speak, he said slowly: “Second Brother, did you have a conflict with Jinzhao? Recently, several times, I’ve seen Jinzhao acting very intimate with others, and his attitude towards me has also become…”

Qi Run’s eyes narrowed slightly: “Is that so? Xie Jinzhao is acting ambiguous with others, and has a bad attitude towards you?”

Qi Ran choked his voice: “I don’t know why either. Second Brother, are you going to break up with Jinzhao? If that’s not the case, then maybe I misunderstood something and unintentionally made him angry. Help me put in a good word, I’ll go apologize to Jinzhao. After all… he’s Second Sister-in-Law. We might all have to live together for a long time in the future…”

Qi Run directly interrupted his words, scolding softly: “What nonsense are you spouting? No one can make Ranran suffer grievances, let alone make you lower your head for no reason. Since Ranran can’t get along with him, then Second Brother will simply break up with him.”

Qi Ran’s eyes flashed, but his mouth continued to say pitifully: “Second Brother, I just want you to be happy. Don’t wrong yourself for my sake.”

Qi Run continued: “For Ranran’s sake, how could Second Brother be wronged? We are the closest family.”

On this side, Xie Jinzhao was currently discussing upcoming work arrangements with Gu Siyuan.

Now that the variety show recording was finished…

It had been a full five months since his last drama wrapped up.

Although he talked about fading out of the audience’s sight, with such an indefinite fading method, his fans probably wouldn’t be able to stand it. He was a traffic male actor, after all.

Right at this moment, he suddenly received a call from Qi Run.

And for some reason, upon seeing the name on the incoming call, his first reaction was to secretly sneak a glance at Gu Siyuan, as if he were doing something shameful.

Gu Siyuan raised his eyes from his tablet and shot him a glance: “Why are you looking at me? Answer the phone.”

“Oh…” Xie Jinzhao obediently responded and clicked answer: “Hello.”

On the other end, Qi Run frowned: “I’m Qi Run.”

Xie Jinzhao’s tone was cold: “I hear you, is there something you need?”

Qi Run seemed unable to react for a moment. He narrowed his eyes and said: “What wrong medicine did you take?”

“…” Xie Jinzhao.

Who exactly took the wrong medicine? Everything was fine, I only said one sentence, and this guy actually starts cursing at me?

“If you have something to say, say it. If not, I’m hanging up.”

Qi Run gave a cold snort: “Since you don’t want face, then I won’t beat around the bush either. Let’s break up.”

“Mn…” Xie Jinzhao’s expression changed slightly.

Break up? We were still dating?

Thinking of this, he couldn’t help but secretly sneak another glance at Gu Siyuan opposite him.

Seeing no response for a long time, Qi Run said coldly: “My being together with you in the first place was merely to coax Ranran and make him happy. In our family, no one can make Ranran suffer grievances.”

Grievances?

Xie Jinzhao thought for a moment. How did I make Qi Ran suffer grievances? I can’t even be bothered to speak to him.

Could it be… that before leaving the amusement park tonight, I deliberately pulled Gu Siyuan away so Qi Ran couldn’t speak to him?

…Oh, if that’s the case, then there will be plenty more of these grievances in the future, won’t there?

He would definitely stop it every single time he saw it.

The corners of Xie Jinzhao’s mouth curved slightly, his smile alluring.

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