FLME Ch39

After watching it the first time, Xi Su was silent. After watching it the second time, he tried very hard to brainstorm some critical remarks, but remembering that he was even worse, he couldn’t bring himself to say them and swallowed them back down. After watching it the third time; after watching it the fourth time…

After watching it n times, Xi Su thought with indignant grief: Damn it, why does it actually look pretty decent?!

Wasn’t this Yu Wen’s very first acting gig?!

Aren’t first-time actors supposed to be awkward, stiff, inhibited, and a total trainwreck?! — That’s exactly how he was.

How on earth did Yu Wen’s acting manage to look so weirdly full of natural spirit?!

Xi Su checked online, and sure enough, aside from discussions about the drama itself, topics about Yu Wen dominated the hashtag feeds.

[Awoooo, I just love this kind of silly, goofy vibe! Drop it now, drop it now!]

[Is my internet comedian baby finally going to be discovered? Jian Heng, come out quick and let Mama kiss you!]

[Xinyi, Xinyi, we can’t do without you!]

[What’s the name of the handsome guy standing in the tree in the very first scene?]

[Lol, I thought I was the only one who noticed! That whip of his high ponytail struck straight into my heart.]

[So brimming with youthfulness! In this life, I will forever have a soft spot for kids who exude that youthful aura.]

[And that scene where he controls the sword with hand seals, that effortless relaxation…]

[I swear he genuinely knows how to cultivate immortality (convinced).]

Yu Wen’s fans arrived swiftly. After all, they were folks who actively lingered on the front lines of eating melon year-round. However, regarding the news of this new drama, they appeared even more bewildered than the regular netizens in the search feed.

[Wait, what? A new drama?]

[Let me see, let me see… Holy crap, sisters! So handsome! Yu-bao looks just like the high-spirited little shidi in xianxia dramas (babbling incoherently)…]

[What?! The Melon King secretly took on an acting gig behind our backs?!]

[Can you bunch of crazy ladies stop losing your minds here? It’s an old drama Yu-bao filmed months ago! Also, this is a xianxia drama, and he is literally the little shidi.]

[Holy crap, holy crap! He winked at me! He has a secret crush on me! He’s trying to get my attention! Fine, I agree to marry him. (Blissful)]

[If only you had a single peanut to sober up with—]

Passersby were cracking up at their reactions: [Do you fans not even keep track of your own idol’s promotional material?]

[Ahem, ahem… Teacher Yu has been indulging in work lately, so there hasn’t been much melon to eat, leading to lax monitoring…]

[Our Teacher Yu actually has this side to him? (Shocked) I thought he only knew how to munch, munch, munch and eat melon everywhere…]

[What kind of talk is that?! Our Yu-bao is an actor after all! I’ll smack you crazy ladies silly!]

[Alright babies, let’s head home to do data promotion! Yu-bao is working so hard, we can’t drag his feet—]

[Reporting in!]

[Speak.]

[How do we do data promotion?]

[…I don’t know either. Tell you what, wait until I infiltrate another fandom’s group chat to steal a few tricks, then I’ll come back and teach everyone.]

[Teacher, smooth sailing! Don’t forget the hopes of the Party and the people!]

[Yes! Mission guaranteed to be accomplished!]

Watching the fans’ exchanges, passersby were thoroughly amused. A few kind-hearted fandom veterans even reached out via DM, organizing their own tips into spreadsheets to share generously without holding anything back.

Xi Su scrolled through his phone for half an hour, confirming that the internet was completely flooded with praise, without a trace of criticism.

Grief-stricken and in denial, he stubbornly concluded that the trailer had simply cherry-picked Yu Wen’s two finest highlights. Even if the rest of his scenes weren’t riddled with blunders, there would at least be flaws to criticize!

In the official episodes airing three days later, he would watch Yu Wen have nowhere left to hide!

Just wait! For a gentleman, ten years is not too late for revenge!

It was Xie Heyu who reminded Yu Wen about the trailer’s release.

As a manager, Xie Heyu was far more reliable than Xie Jiamao. Not only did he keep timely track of every single piece of promotional material dropped, but he also monitored online public sentiment in real time, summarizing it neatly before reporting back to Yu Wen himself.

One line in the report read: [Public sentiment is favorable; you possess abundant praise.]

Yu Wen had no idea what struck his funny bone, but he found that sentence inexplicably hilarious.

After chatting with Xie Heyu, Yu Wen sank into a brand-new dilemma: Legend of the Immortal Sect was set to premiere in three days, and the first teaser for Battle Royale was dropping on that very same day.

Normally, artists with ongoing or upcoming projects needed to cooperate with promotional campaigns. But with two productions airing simultaneously, he only had one Weibo account…

The one caught in this dilemma wasn’t just him, but Jian Heng as well.

Teacher Jian was the male lead of Legend of the Immortal Sect and also a guest star on the first episode of Battle Royale. He was just as conflicted, wishing he could snap his account in half to give equal share to both sides.

In the end, the two decided to play the ultimate balancing act.

On the day Legend of the Immortal Sect premiered, viewers witnessed an unprecedented spectacle in domestic showbiz: both the first male lead and the third male lead split their profile pictures right down the middle—one half featured a historical costume character poster, while the other half showcased dark western fantasy.

Yu Wen’s version was even funnier: a hand had been cropped out from each side, so right along the dividing line, he photoshopped a bowl brimming with water, embodying the phrase “carrying a bowl level” with absolute literal perfection.

Jian Heng praised him: “A flat-out genius.”

Yi Ming and the others laughed hysterically in the group chat.

The release schedules of both productions were also remarkably close. Legend of the Immortal Sect updated at 9:00 PM, with the streaming platform releasing four episodes on premiere day out of a 24-episode run, expected to finish in a month. Battle Royale’s teaser dropped just half an hour later during the 9:30 PM prime-time slot; its premiere was tentatively set for the week after next, utilizing a shoot-and-air format.

Yu Wen counted on his fingers and realized the two productions would clash for at least half a month. He felt like dying right then and there.

Worried whether either director might take offense, he tested the waters obliquely. Fortunately, both directors were wonderful people; not only did they have no objections, but they also told him to set his mind at ease.

Thinking about having to balance both sides for half a month, Yu Wen found it very hard to ease his mind.

After retweeting promotional posts for both sides, he hesitated between the two before deciding to watch the Battle Royale teaser first.

A teaser was shorter than four episodes after all.

The teaser ran for a full seven minutes—the longest he had ever seen in all his years of watching previews. Furthermore, the progress bar adopted a countdown format.

Instead of showing minutes and seconds like a standard progress bar, the counter read: Countdown XX:XX.

At the mention of a countdown, Yu Wen immediately thought of the seven-day time limit, as well as the “Day X of Countdown” entries in the Hero’s journal. He instantly understood this was a clever touch by the production crew.

Without seeing the full episode, however, the viewers in the bullet comments were clearly baffled.

[What does countdown mean? Is it foreshadowing?]

[Such a weird progress bar…]

[What happens when the countdown ends? Why does it start from seven?]

[Forget it, based on my understanding of Battle Royale, this damn preview can only be dissected after watching the full episode. You can’t tell much right now, let’s just gorge on their visuals.]

The bullet comments debated the progress bar for a bit to no avail, but attention was quickly captured by the ensuing plot.

It opened with a peculiar piano tune. Yu Wen had heard it before; the original melody was light and gentle, but the production team had arranged a variation here, stretching the serene notes into something slow, ethereal, and drenched in eerie menace.

A cavernous, quiet corridor; portraits hanging along both sides of the grand hall bearing ambiguous smirks; a dripping sink; a creaking, swaying door reflected in the mirror above the basin… and perched on both sides of the balustrade, brass ornaments with blood-red pupils.

Accompanied by the sound effect of flapping wings, the screen went dark. When it lit up again, the brass sparrow on the handrail had vanished.

The piano melody abruptly ceased.

One by one, the guests woke up in their respective spots, warily taking in their surroundings.

An intermittent, raspy, distorted announcement sounded: “This is the Castle of the Evil Dragon. Honored guests, welcome…”

Under the bizarre broadcast, the guests reacted in varied ways.

The camera provided a few close-ups before the pacing accelerated drastically.

“Ghosts lurk everywhere… Hero, draw your sword countless times more…”

“He wished for me to play Greensleeves for him; it was a song from his homeland…”

“I think… I must kill it.”

“I am a cowardly elf, yet this time, I stand before them.”

“You are hope…”

“I must forge it; this time, it must succeed—”

Fragmented lines coalesced as the frames flashed rapidly across the guests, finally freezing on a single sentence spoken in unison:

“I can’t get out.”

The primary focus of this first teaser was the overarching plot, so there weren’t many extended solo shots of individual guests. Even so, Yu Wen had a few remarkably striking close-ups.

In one shot, he stepped out of a room and strolled leisurely down the eerie corridor, holding a sword in one hand while casually twirling it twice with fluid grace.

He had truly been marinated in the habits of the Immortal Sect set; the moment his fingers touched a long, slender prop, they moved instinctively without him even noticing. If he hadn’t seen the close-up in the teaser, he wouldn’t have known his hands were that restless.

In another shot, right before kneeling down after piercing through the curse magic with his sword, he also twirled the blade around with practiced ease. The unsheathed cruciform holy sword wasn’t heavy, spinning with nimble precision between his fair fingers.

Yu Wen scrubbed through the progress bar carefully, breathing a sigh of relief when he felt the action didn’t create too much dissonance.

Then again, if it felt out of place, the director wouldn’t have edited it in, let alone spotlighted it as a featured close-up in the teaser.

The simultaneous rollout of both projects stirred up waves far larger than anticipated.

Battle Royale was a wildly popular national variety show boasting immense attention, complete with a dedicated, gentle core fanbase. On the very day the regular cast for Season 3 was announced, a new Super Topic had been established, just waiting for the core storyline of the first episode to drop so shipping could commence.

Yu Wen’s performance in the teaser, while perhaps not showstopping, was eye-catching enough to convert a sizable portion of variety show viewers into casual fans.

As it happened, Legend of the Immortal Sect was currently airing, prompting many people to quietly sneak over to check it out.

Legend of the Immortal Sect was a quintessential light comedy tailored for fast-surfing young netizens—fluent in pacing, slightly nonsensical, and perfect for kicking back over a meal.

The two productions shared overlapping audiences while sporting vastly distinct styles, bouncing off each other to generate unexpected buzz.

[Came from Teardrop Mole Teacher’s Weibo! A Battle Royale fan here to support Teacher’s new drama.]

[Xian-ou (immortal romance)? Fine, let this palace evaluate it.]

[It’s not xian-ou, it’s xianxia; check the tags.]

[What’s the difference?]

[Standard definition: Xian-ou is pretty people dating against a xianxia backdrop; xianxia’s core theme is chivalric heroism—the greatest hero fights for country and people.]

[What kind of chivalric heroism could a goofy drama like this have? The director must’ve tagged it wrong.]

[Hahahaha, people always die in xianxia dramas, but I refuse to believe anyone dies in this one.]

[Refuse to believe +1.]

The four premiere episodes were neither too long nor too short, but they clearly established the drama’s overarching tone.

Viewers who trickled over with the mindset of casually killing time found themselves unable to tear away after the very first episode.

[Holy shit, the plot doesn’t even feel exaggerated, so why is it so damn funny?!]

[It’s not the wacky, clownish type of light comedy, it’s more like… how should I put it…]

[Contrast! Every single character is dead serious, and the more serious they act, the funnier it gets!]

[Hahahaha yes, contrast!]

[I’m dead, Er-shixiong appeared so cold and stern at first, I thought he was the mature, sensible one. Turns out he sleeps holding a chicken at night, hahahaha I’m losing it.]

[You can’t blame Er-shixiong; if he didn’t sleep hugging the chicken, Jiang Qiuyue might sneak in and steal it at night.]

[Why would she steal a chicken?!]

[Da-shijie is nocturnal! She comes out foraging at night and stews whatever crosses her path.]

[What an unhinged drama, what an unhinged me.]

Yu Wen had plenty of screen time in the first four episodes. As the third male lead, he played a crucial role: when the male lead initially snuck onto Mount Yunxiao with an unverified identity, everyone was suspicious and cold toward him, and only Chu Zhiyao firmly believed he was a good person.

Even after the male lead’s hidden cultivation was sniffed out by Er-shixiong, forcing him to feign internal injuries and spin yet another tragic backstory, Chu Zhiyao remained the only one who trusted his every word.

When asked why, he would merely arch an eyebrow with a grin: “I have great luck, so anyone I run into is bound to be a good person.”

From there, in order to heal the male lead’s internal injuries, Chu Zhiyao kicked off a series of utterly runaway, unhinged antics.

[Lmao, this half-baked amateur trying to brew medicine for Puyang Xi—brewing a whole hammer more like!]

[Every time he brews a dose, the male lead loses half his life.]

[Lao Liu, please let him go, he honestly looks like he’s about to die.]

[He even drank it himself to prove it wasn’t poisoned! Don’t you know what kind of freak constitution you have?!]

[Through our Lao Liu’s relentless efforts, he successfully caused the Demon King to lose all his cultivation. No need to elaborate on his power (cyber prayer).]

[Blessed by the Koi, defies all logic.]

[Hahahaha, I was wondering why Lao San called him ‘Little Koi’.]

The cheerful, warmhearted, yet terrifyingly jinx-like koi successfully drove Puyang Xi to total breakdown, leading to that iconic line sent to his left and right guardians:

[The intel was wrong! This place is bizarre! My cultivation is completely gone, come save me at once!]

One could tell he was desperate.

The female lead had very little screen time in the first four episodes, mostly existing through dialogue. Yet the other characters’ descriptions made her quirks abundantly clear; she was like the final boss of a dungeon who never showed her face, but could sweep the floor the moment she made a move. Viewers grew boundlessly intrigued by her character, itching for her to make her grand entrance.

The Spicy Teachers had recently compiled a “Hall of Fame Acting Performances in Showbiz” compilation for him, which Yu Wen binge-watched three times over. In the past, training classes only taught him basic blocking and camera angles. Having devoured those clips, his horizons had broadened significantly, making him feel that his debut performance lacked polish.

Yet relying on his uniquely blind self-confidence (which netizens dubbed “effortless relaxation”), he never once looked timid, even delivering several spiritually vibrant, memorable scenes.

Take that wink, for instance.

The Battle Royale teaser sat at number one on the trending searches followed by an “Exploding” tag, while the storyline of Legend of the Immortal Sect held the fourth spot. Clicking into it, the feed was completely flooded by that wink.

When filming that scene, the director had merely instructed Yu Wen to look a bit mischievous, maybe adding a subtle gesture like a blink. Yu Wen had taken a shortcut by closing only one eye.

His eyelashes were long, his skin fair, a lingering smile still dancing across his face. Right before the wink, the tip of his tongue lightly grazed his canine tooth, looking just like a cat plotting some mischievous scheme.

Handsome, beautiful—two entirely distinct charms harmoniously intertwined.

People were screaming all sorts of things across the trending feed, frantically calling him husband and wife alike.

[Oh oh oh oh, Chu Zhiyao is my newly appointed husband!]

[My intuition is razor-sharp; I can tell at first glance that he’s my boyfriend.]

[Let us congratulate the Melon King on unlocking a new skin!]

[Retweet this Melon King to receive a one-month Koi blessing.]

[Wuwuwu, wifey, wifey, my teardrop mole wifey…]

[Let me copy, let me copy.]

[Dame! Hands off Chu Zhiyao’s butt!]

Yu Wen watched his follower count surge by over a hundred thousand, and this was only the beginning. Adding his previous tally, he was on the verge of breaking four million.

Staring at that figure, he felt quite a novel sensation.

So many people, wow.

After browsing Weibo for a bit, he headed downstairs to grab water. Xi Su was sitting on the sofa, clutching his phone and browsing who-knew-what, bursting into fits of laughter every now and then like he was having spasms.

With his sharp eyes, Yu Wen caught him picking up a dried banana chip from the floor. Without even finishing his descent down the stairs, he barked sharply: “Xi Su! Do not pick up things from the floor to eat!”

Xi Su shot upright like a launched missile, his phone describing an elegant parabolic arc before clattering onto the staircase.

Yu Wen trotted swiftly downstairs. Passing the phone, he kindly picked it up. He didn’t know what brand Xi Su was using, but despite taking such a tumble, the screen hadn’t shattered at all.

Standing before him with a deadpan face, Yu Wen commanded, “Housemate Rule Number Ten. Recite it.”

Xi Su glanced at his still-lit phone screen in Yu Wen’s hand, cringing so hard with embarrassment that his toes curled. “No dropping food debris on the floor; if dropped, clean it up promptly…”

Yu Wen: “Do you admit your mistake?”

Xi Su stood his ground, lacking reason but brimming with attitude: “I did clean it up!”

Yu Wen: “I didn’t tell you to eat the garbage off the floor!”

Xi Su: “My grandma said if you pick it up within three seconds of hitting the floor, it’s edible!”

Yu Wen: “It was already on the floor when I spotted it, at least half a minute ago!”

Xi Su: “…”

What sane person actually times it?!

“Don’t do it again,” Yu Wen warned sternly, handing the phone back. As he turned it over, a glance at the screen struck him into instant silence.

Paused on the display was episode four of Legend of the Immortal Sect.

Half a typed sentence lingered in the bullet comment box, not yet sent:

[Brothers! Did everyone catch that subtle gesture Chu Zhiyao just made?! The delivery was so freaking brilliant!]

Yu Wen: “…”

Xi Su: “…”

Silence stretched for roughly half a century before Xi Su forced himself to speak: “We’re coworkers after all, I was just supporting you…”

Just buy it, bro. Seriously, save me some face this once.

Looking at the content in the draft box, Yu Wen suddenly hit upon the ultimate weapon to deal with Xi Su.

He asked, “Can you mop the living room floor right now, immediately, this instant?”

Xi Su: “Huh? Why should—”

Yu Wen: “If you don’t mop it, something horrifying will happen.”

“…Tch.”

Seeing him unmoved, Yu Wen knew he wouldn’t comply without getting a taste of real ruthlessness.

Yu Wen flashed him a radiant, beaming smile.

“Do you like Chu Zhiyao? He dies in the end.”

“…”

Like a little robot powering down and rebooting, Xi Su froze stiff on the spot for four or five minutes.

Once the reboot finished, Yu Wen’s words processed through his brain once more.

A piercing, shrill shriek erupted through the villa.

“Aaaaaah—!”