FLME Ch38

With the help of Xiao Zhou and Xiao Zhong, Yu Wen quickly packed up his belongings and set off toward his magnificent villa—rumored to come with a private pool and a gym~

Chu Han and Xi Su had already moved in two days earlier. Chu Han had a scheduled engagement today and wasn’t home, leaving the villa dead silent. When Yu Wen walked into the living room, the grin on his face vanished in an instant.

The living room was an enormous landfill.

Worn clothes and dirty socks were tossed carelessly across the sofa; the coffee table was in utter disarray, littered with the corpses of four or five potato chip bags; dried dirty footprints tracked across the floor; leftover takeout boxes sat abandoned on the dining table nearby; and taking a peek further, the kitchen looked as if it had been bombed, an unspeakable disaster zone…

Yu Wen turned right back around with his suitcase and headed for the door.

He ran straight into Xie Heyu, who had just parked the car and was walking in. “Where are you going?”

With a solemn face, Yu Wen replied, “Gold and silver nests are nowhere near as cozy as one’s own doghouse. I think I prefer my studio apartment with no swimming pool or gym after all.”

Xie Heyu glanced inside, his brow twitching in shock at the chaos before his eyes.

That shouldn’t be. Xie Jiamao had mentioned that a cleaning lady came by every other day.

Could they really have wrecked the place to this extent in just a single day…?

“Your lease over there has already been terminated…” Xie Heyu caught the brim of his hood, letting his gaze sweep over the trash heap with a slight frown. “I’ll help you tidy up first.”

Resigning himself to his fate, Yu Wen set down his suitcase, picked up a feather duster, and looked left and right, completely at a loss for where to start. Finally, he wandered into the kitchen and casually swung open the refrigerator.

“…”

With just a single glance, he felt as if his mental sanity had suffered a critical hit.

Coldly shutting the fridge door, Yu Wen stopped Teacher Xie from gathering trash and said gently, “To untie the bell, you need the one who tied it. Let’s wait until the other two residents assemble. I will personally give them a thorough lesson on the code of sanitation for public common areas…”

Xie Heyu sorted the food waste into categories, shoving them into a plastic bag. “Let me just finish dealing with these, it won’t take long—”

“Put it down!”

Xie Heyu snapped his hands to an immediate halt; his posture had never been so ramrod-straight in his life.

He looked toward Yu Wen with a half-beat delay, his expression completely blank and stunned from having just been snapped at out of the blue.

Yu Wen said with deep, earnest gravity, “You can clean up for them this once, but can you clean up after them for a lifetime? Your diligence is precisely what fuels these unhealthy, corrupt tendencies in society…”

“‘A civilized society starts with you and me; public hygiene depends on everyone.'” He pointed the feather duster at the messy debris littering the floor. “Today, Xiao Yu is going to teach Chu Han and Xi Su this lesson.”

Xi Su didn’t have many public engagements recently. The controversy surrounding him being an illegitimate son hadn’t blown over yet. Although it wasn’t a moral failing on his part, any public appearance inevitably ignited a wave of online debate. Xie Jiamao’s advice was to reduce exposure for the time being and prioritize long-term acting roles and variety shows; by the time they aired, the public would have mostly forgotten about such trivial drama.

After all, solid work was the only true currency.

Xi Su felt that whatever the boss said made sense. After all, the boss was a godlike figure who owned property in a billionaire-studded luxury district. If he said it was the right move, it was definitely the right move—big shots always saw further ahead than people like them.

With fewer gigs, his self-discipline had slackened. Having gamed until after five in the morning, he slept straight through the afternoon before crawling out of bed to scavenge for food. Shuffling downstairs in his slippers, Xi Su noticed that the living room curtains were drawn shut. Only a faint trace of light filtered in from the entryway, plunging the grand hall into a hazy, gloomy darkness.

“Did I draw the curtains last night? Shouldn’t have, I’m usually too lazy to bother…” Muttoning to himself, he was just about to head for the windows when a voice suddenly rang out—ethereal, eerie, sounding just like King Yama arriving to reap a soul.

“Xi-mou, do you know your crime?”

“Aaaaah, holy shit! What demon dares run amok here?!”

A head slowly peered out from behind the sofa. The ghastly white beam of a flashlight illuminated an exquisite face. If Xi Su hadn’t been intimately familiar with that face, he really might have believed a vengeful spirit had come for his life.

Shining the flashlight straight under his own chin, Yu Wen dangled a smelly sock from the corner of the sofa with a chillingly detached expression. “I ask you: is this yours?”

Panting violently, Xi Su stared at Yu Wen, horror slowly creeping across his features. “Yu Wen, did you… did you die filming Battle Royale?”

Holy shit! If you died filming, why come looking for me?! Go demand compensation from Battle Royale! Wait no… demand hell money!

Click! Another flashlight snapped on.

Under the glare of the flashlight beam, Xie Heyu’s pupils were intensely deep and pitch-black, exuding a chill that went straight to the bone.

He said, “You’re the one who died.”

Yu Wen clicked his tongue in reproach. “Teacher Xie, it’s not your turn to appear yet.”

Click! Xie Heyu switched the flashlight right back off.

Xi Su froze in place for a full two minutes. Whatever Yu Wen had interrogated him about in the meantime didn’t register at all. Two minutes later, he bellowed in fury, “Are you two sick in the head?!”

“Who’s sick?” Yu Wen speared the smelly sock with the tip of his feather duster, thrusting it right in front of his face as he repeated, “Who is sick?”

With the curtains flung wide open, Xi Su was made to kneel on a floor cushion, looking thoroughly crestfallen. By instinct, he wanted to talk back, but the moment he looked up, Xie Heyu was standing behind Yu Wen with his hands in his pockets like a human ice sculpture, casting a chilling glare down at him. Xi Su swallowed his words immediately.

Xie Heyu was Xie Jiamao’s nephew; Xie Jiamao was the owner of this villa and their big boss. Pissing off Xie Heyu meant getting kicked out of the villa by Xie Jiamao, which meant being dropped by the agency, which meant being blacklisted from showbiz, which meant having to open a barbecue joint, and if the barbecue joint failed, he’d be left picking up trash on the side of the road…

In a mere thirty seconds, Xi Su felt as if he had already previewed his tragic future of scavenging for garbage.

And so, shaking his head, he obediently conceded: “I am.”

Yu Wen: “Sick with what?”

Xi Su: “…Slovenliness.”

Yu Wen: “How do you cure it?”

Xi Su: “Be diligent and active, uphold hygiene, sweep and dust, return things to their proper places…”

Yu Wen nodded with satisfaction.

Holding it in once, holding it in twice, Xi Su still felt indignant. “Why am I the only one getting scolded? Chu Han had a hand in this too…”

Yu Wen broke into a sinister, spine-chilling grin.

“Do you honestly think he’ll escape?”

At nine that evening, Chu Han finished his schedule and was driven back to the villa by the new assistant assigned by the company.

The assistant said, “Teacher Chu, you don’t have any other activities lined up for the near future. You can get plenty of rest at home. Please call if you need anything.”

This was Chu Han’s first time experiencing what it was like to be looked after by an assistant. After a week, he had transitioned from feeling awkward and flustered to handling it with ease. Smiling, he said, “You’ve worked hard lately. Make sure you get some good rest too.”

The assistant parked the car in the underground garage and took his leave.

Chu Han punched in the security code and stepped through the door, only to find the hall pitch-black with not a single light on.

Frowning, he felt his way to turn on the entryway light. As he walked inside, a voice suddenly drifted down from directly overhead.

“Chu-mou, do you know your error?”

Assuming it was one of Xi Su’s pranks, Chu Han paid it no mind. “Don’t you have anything better to do?”

Before the words had completely left his mouth, a face turned around from the dimly lit sofa—the mop of bright blue hair extraordinarily eye-catching even in the gloom.

Xi Su said slowly, “Are you talking to me?”

Chu Han’s steps halted dead in their tracks, caution flaring up.

“If you’re right here, then who was talking upstairs?”

“Upstairs?” Xi Su slowly shifted his gaze toward the upper floor. “There’s no one up there.”

Chu Han looked up. The edge of the balustrade was completely deserted, without a single speck of light.

He asked hesitantly, “Just now… did you hear any voice speaking?”

Xi Su stared at him for a long, drawn-out moment before a grin slowly split across his face—grotesque and exaggerated, like a clown straight out of a horror film.

“A voice speaking…? I didn’t… hear anything.”

Chu Han drew in a sharp breath of cold air!

Holy fuck! This villa! It’s haunted!!!

He turned on his heel to bolt!

At that moment, Xie Heyu appeared at the living room entrance, resting a hand against the wall panel, and abruptly flipped the master light switch.

The prank came to an immediate halt.

“Hahahahahahaha, Teacher Chu, you’re scared too?!” Slouching over the sofa, Xi Su was practically doubled over with laughter. “You’re always so calm, I honestly thought you weren’t afraid of ghosts, hahahahaha…”

With the lights blazing, the villa was as bright as day. The blue-haired culprit before him felt not an ounce of guilt, laughing unabashedly at his momentary display of cowardice.

Chu Han stood frozen in place. After catching his breath for a few seconds, his fists gradually clenched hard.

Grabbing a cushion, he charged over with gritted teeth. “Are you sick in the head?! Are you out of your mind?! How bored can you get?! A grown adult—”

Under the torrential barrage of cushion blows, Xi Su threw up his hands in surrender. “It wasn’t me! It was Yu Wen—”

“Chu Han!” The protagonist of the conversation barked out a stern reprimand from the second floor. Wearing his slippers, Yu Wen came thumping furiously down the stairs, his indignation unmasked. “Are the clothes soaking in the bucket in the second-floor bathroom yours?!”

Chu Han denied it flat out: “No…”

Yu Wen: “They are yours! I’ve seen you wear them! They’ve soaked in the water so long they’ve gone sour!”

To think he had actually worried about falsely accusing Chu Han—believing Chu Han seemed far more reliable than Xi Su—and had deliberately gone upstairs to inspect the cleanliness of the second floor.

Turns out neither of these two clowns was any better than the other!

Chu Han blinked, utterly bewildered. “The cleaning auntie is coming tomorrow anyway. Doesn’t soaking them beforehand make them easier to wash?”

Like a weathered old man struck by thunder at his unfilial son’s outrageous remarks, Yu Wen clutched his chest and staggered back three paces in pure desolation.

After taking a long moment to compose himself, he calmed down.

Teacher Xiao Yu stood on the stairs clutching a feather duster, looking down coldly and mercilessly as his gaze swept between the two.

“Stop dreaming about the cleaning auntie. I just got off the phone with Xie Jiamao. The boss said the auntie resigned because she couldn’t handle this absurd amount of workload.”

Xie Heyu raised an eyebrow.

To successfully drive away a professional cleaner… these two really were absolute prodigies of chaos.

“The boss is currently vetting new talent in the job market, and conservative estimates say it will take a week. During this week, we have no domestic helper; we must maintain the basic cleanliness of this villa ourselves.”

“What?!” Xi Su was the first to let out a wail. “Me clean?! Do you really think I have that kind of talent?!”

Chu Han froze for two seconds. “I cleaned before too, why would the workload be too heavy…”

“During this week, socialist successor Xiao Yu will teach you what it means to build a harmonious society and jointly create a sanitary home…” Yu Wen spread his arms, an eerie expression blending sacred righteousness and menacing ferocity crossing his face.

Having finished delivering his inspirational sermon, he beamed down at the two culprits below.

“If you two cannot learn to turn over a new leaf and rehabilitate yourselves this week, then following that, you can both roll out to the streets as volunteers… and pick up trash.”

Xi Su turned his head slowly, and the moment he met his gaze, his whole body shuddered.

Holy shit, what do I do when my coworker suddenly turns terrifying? Urgent.

Chu Han also shuddered slightly, muttering under his breath, “Has he been possessed by the God of Hygiene…”

So nitpicky.

The house was clearly pretty clean.

“Teacher Yu, do we really have to throw out this bowl of spicy hot pot? It looks totally fine…”

Yu Wen: “…Can’t you see the mold growing on it?!”

“Why can’t clothes soak in water for a whole day? There’s an oil stain on my sleeve; doesn’t soaking it longer make it cleaner?”

Yu Wen: “The detergent bottle recommends a soaking time of thirty minutes. Who authorized you to multiply that by forty-eight on your own?!”

Yu Wen couldn’t tolerate living in this massive landfill for another second. While it wasn’t practical to do a deep-clean at this late hour, the trash sitting around had to be cleared out immediately.

He directed Xi Su and Chu Han to sort out the kitchen waste and ferry it out bag by bag. By the time all the garbage was cleared away, they had burned through an entire roll of trash bags.

Next, he made them claim their respective clothes and sort them properly into the washing machine.

By the time the laundry was washed and hung up to dry, it was already midnight.

Chu Han and Xi Su were like two lifeless salted fish, collapsed limp across the sofa. But clearly, the ordeal wasn’t over yet, as Yu Wen pulled up a small stool and sat down right in front of them.

Xie Heyu stood behind him holding a wooden clothes-drying pole, tapping it lightly against the floor. The sound carried all the solemnity of an imperial court being called to order.

And Yu Wen, with his taut, dignified face, was the incorruptible judge presiding over the court.

Judge Yu laid down the law: “Sit up straight!”

With the lingering terror of being dominated still fresh, Chu Han and Xi Su both jumped and reflexively snapped upright.

Yu Wen pointed at Chu Han: “First, clothes must not soak in water for more than thirty minutes. Second, discarded clothes are not to be thrown around haphazardly—those to be washed go into the hamper, those that aren’t get hung up. Third, do not set foot in the kitchen, and do not attempt to level up your culinary skills.”

The kitchen had turned into an explosion site precisely because of Chu Han’s sudden whim to fry an egg to go with his river snail rice noodles.

Chu Han found this incomprehensible. “Didn’t you say labor is the most glorious endeavor? If I don’t enter the kitchen, how am I supposed to labor?”

Yu Wen paused briefly. “Teacher Chu, do you know you have a special constitution?”

Chu Han: “Huh?”

Yu Wen: “You were born with an Explosion-Attracting Physique. You must not get close to any place with an open flame, or else it will trigger a blast. Although you possess exceptional talent in the culinary arts, for the sake of your personal safety, I strongly advise against stepping into the kitchen ever again.”

Xi Su: “…”

Xie Heyu: “…”

Chu Han was completely bewildered. After wrinkling his brow in thought for a long time, he finally asked, “How do you know about this… Explosion-Attracting Physique?”

Yu Wen said with an air of profound mystery, “Ever since I was little, my eyesight has been unusually sharp. I can spot hidden masters among ordinary mortals. I have verified your Explosion-Attracting Physique two or three times now, and only officially confirmed it today. There is zero doubt.”

“…Alright then.” After wrestling with the thought for a while, Chu Han actually bought the explanation, sighing with regret: “I quite liked being in the kitchen. Every time, I felt like I was making progress. I should have been able to pull off that fried egg today.”

Xi Su stared at him as if looking at a total idiot, thoroughly stunned: “No, buddy, even this you—”

Even this you believe?!

“You, shut your mouth!” Yu Wen barked sharply.

He wasn’t about to be nearly as polite with Xi Su. “Takeout boxes get thrown out right after eating—at most they can sit for one day. Food with mold cannot be eaten. Rotting fruit is not allowed to go back into the fridge; putting it back won’t bring it back to life! Items must be returned to their places after use. Unfinished chips cannot be left on the coffee table; either seal them up or throw them away. Chip crumbs are not allowed on the floor; when eating, hold a trash can underneath yourself…”

Xi Su was hammered senseless by the endless barrage of rules.

He felt like Sun Wukong being subjected to the Tight-Fillet Incantation, his head pounding with excruciating pain. Desperately, he turned toward an outside lifeline: “Teacher Xie, Teacher Xie… do you hear this? Does this sound like human words to you? We’re all in the same agency… save me, quick!”

Yu Wen: “Ha, you still dare plead grievance?” He spun his head toward Xie Heyu. “Teacher Xie! You tell him! Who is in the right?!”

Xie Heyu tapped the drying pole against the floor. “You.”

Xi Su: “…”

Yu Wen: “If you can’t even manage basic personal hygiene, how do you expect to be an artist?! How do you expect to become the dream of thousands of young girls?! How do you expect to be a role model for humanity?!”

Xi Su parted his mouth to speak, but before a word could escape, Yu Wen pressed: “Teacher Xie, does what I say make sense?!”

Xie Heyu: “Golden rules and jade precepts.”

Yu Wen: “Nobody expects you to be spotless, but at the very least, don’t inconvenience others! Look at this! In an environment like this, how is our Teacher Chu supposed to get proper rest after a long day of work?! If Teacher Chu can’t rest well, the company earns no revenue. If the company earns no revenue, it goes bankrupt! Teacher Xie, am I right?”

Xie Heyu: “Perceptive of the subtlest details, discerning down to the finest hair.”

“Teacher Chu, am I right?!”

Suddenly called out, Chu Han thought it over for a moment, then nodded gravely.

He was an Explosion-Attracting Physique after all; he had to be exceedingly careful. In an environment too filthy and chaotic, an accidental explosion might just go off.

Watching him nod, Xi Su felt his vision go black.

“Three esteemed magistrates—”

Why is this company playing favorites and forming cliques?!

Early the next morning, Yu Wen woke up feeling completely refreshed. Although he had strongly contemplated dragging the other two out of bed to launch a deep-clean, considering how hard Chu Han had been working lately, the kind-hearted Xiao Yu decided to spare him, pushing the deep-clean plan back by a day.

The villa had six floors in total: two underground and four above ground. Xi Su occupied the master bedroom on the third floor all to himself—don’t ask, because before Yu Wen moved in, Xi Su had won it against Chu Han in rock-paper-scissors.

Yu Wen and Chu Han both lived on the second floor. Changing into sportswear and bursting with vigor, Yu Wen headed down to go jogging. As he passed Chu Han’s door, he could hear Teacher Chu’s snores through the wood; it was clear he was genuinely exhausted.

That had been the main reason Yu Wen gave him a pass.

The gym was on the basement level. Chu Han and Xi Su hadn’t gotten around to wrecking this area yet, so it remained just as clean and bright as when the cleaning lady had left.

Walking over to the treadmill, Yu Wen confidently dialed in the incline and hit start.

Fifteen minutes later, feeling a bit out of breath, he pressed pause.

A core foundation of dialogue delivery was lung capacity, and an effective method to expand lung capacity was aerobic exercise—such as power walking, incline climbing, swimming…

Yu Wen stared at the treadmill for thirty seconds, then thought optimistically: Forget it, let’s go swim.

If one road was blocked, he could just switch to another!

Standing at the edge of the pool, Yu Wen sank into deep contemplation.

He… didn’t know how to swim.

Did he need to hire a swimming coach?

He wouldn’t be able to find one right away.

What about today’s workout quota, then?

After wrestling with it for a brief moment, Yu Wen thought cheerfully: Forget it, fifteen minutes is already fantastic.

There is nothing difficult in this world, as long as you’re willing to give up!

Draping a bone-dry towel without a drop of sweat over his neck, he headed back to the living room. To his surprise, Xi Su was already up, sitting on the sofa playing on his phone.

The second Yu Wen walked in, Xi Su guiltily locked his screen.

“Y-You went out?…” he greeted dryly.

Yu Wen: “Yeah. Have you eaten breakfast yet? I’m going out to eat; want me to bring something back for you?”

“No need.” Still harboring a grudge over being ganged up on last night, Xi Su quickly recovered from his momentary guilt, put on a cold face, and said haughtily, “I’m not in the habit of eating breakfast.”

Hmph.

Don’t eat then.

Yu Wen curled his lip and bounded upstairs without the slightest psychological burden.

Once he was gone, Xi Su finally unlocked his phone again.

Playing on the screen was the newly released trailer for Yu Wen’s upcoming drama, Legend of the Immortal Sect. Set to premiere in three days, the official trailer had dropped right on the dot at nine this morning. Last night, the production team and streaming platform had begun generating buzz, landing a few low-tier trending searches. As a habitual night owl, Xi Su had caught wind of it by chance.

Having just been “oppressed” by Yu Wen, he stared at that trending topic with malicious intent blossoming in his chest. He resolved to act as Yu Wen’s anti-fan for a day, determined to whip out a magnifying glass and tear Yu Wen apart from acting to emotion, from line delivery to screen presence… leaving him entirely shredded to pieces!

Hahaha! Yu Wen! Prepare to face my tempestuous vengeance!

Xi Su looked over his shoulder to confirm nobody was around. With a victorious smirk tugging at his lips, he tapped play on the video, which was just under three minutes long.

The first cut was the lighthearted teaser.

The perspective opened with the male lead, Puyang Xi, sneaking onto Mount Yunxiao. The male lead, played by Jian Heng, pretended to be a peasant chased by ruffians, stumbling into the dense perimeter forest of Mount Yunxiao, where he crossed paths with Chu Zhiyao, played by Yu Wen.

The youth stood poised high among the branches, bathed in dappled morning light, hair tied in a high ponytail, a smile playing at the corners of his lips.

He asked, “Who are you?”

Startled for a moment, the male lead scrambled to recite his fabricated identity.

With a crisp snap of fingers, a long sword swept out from behind the youth. He formed a hand seal with effortless nonchalance, and a gust of sword wind slashed through the sleeves of every single ruffian with a sharp hiss.

“Scram.”

The tone was indifferent, yet the sound resonated through the forest.

That was Yu Wen’s very first shot in the trailer.

Afterward, relying on his tragic backstory, the male lead successfully gained everyone’s trust, only to suffer frequent setbacks while snooping for information, eventually losing all his martial arts.

Yu Wen’s second shot was a wink.

“In all of vast Mount Yunxiao, you may wander anywhere you please, except for one single place.” Set in a dining hall, Chu Zhiyao spoke with deliberate mystery, naturally piquing the male lead’s curiosity.

Under Puyang Xi’s persistent questioning, he burst into laughter and winked slyly: “It’s Da-shijie’s peach blossom grove!”

The youth’s spirited brilliance was on full display—pure and radiant as white jade, lively and unrestrained.

In the entire trailer, Yu Wen had only those two shots. Yet with just those two shots, his presence was already overwhelmingly powerful.