The Entertainment Industry's Famous Fraud Couple - Chapter 24

As Shen Guai expected, the gossip surrounding Qin Chaomu and that “scumbag” quickly climbed the trending charts.

In less than half an hour, Qin Chaomu dominated the rankings, dragging Shen Guai along with her. It had only been half a month since the two of them had officially announced their relationship to the public.

Mumu: It’s just a meal, haven’t you guys ever eaten with a friend?

Libala: Qin Chaomu has always been a player, cheating is way too common for her.

juju: Wait, who is this guy? Does anyone even know him?

An overwhelming flood of comments ignited the topic’s heat, with opinions flying in every direction. Shen Guai scrolled through her phone continuously, waiting half an hour, one hour, three hours…

She waited until the sky began to pale with the first light of dawn, signaling it was time for her to start filming.

She still hadn’t seen a response from Qin Chaomu.

Shen Guai didn’t know how she was supposed to feel. Should she feel the fury of being deceived? The heartbreak of the person she liked falling for someone else?

It was neither. Shen Guai had only one thought: she wanted to wait for Qin Chaomu to respond. She believed that Qin Chaomu wouldn’t do something like that.

On the set, the temperature soared to 36°C. Shen Guai pinched the skin on her arm, hoping to pull herself together.

“Cut” Xin Shang took off his headphones. “Teacher Shen, do you have something on your mind?”

Shen Guai shook her head. “I’m fine. Sorry, Director Xin, let’s go again.”

Xin Shang patted her shoulder and handed her a bottle of mineral water. He turned to the staff and announced, “Everyone, take a twenty-minute break.”

Watching the girl beside him absentmindedly rubbing the water bottle, Xin Shang smiled. “This kind of thing is very common in the entertainment industry. Especially for Teacher Qin, she’s always had constant rumors.”

“The outside world says Teacher Qin ‘plays hard.’ Perhaps it’s because she appeared in the public eye so suddenly. People would rather believe she achieved success through dirty means than acknowledge a decade of hard work.”

Shen Guai looked at Xin Shang, her brow relaxing into a smile. “Thank you, Director Xin.”

Was it fake?

But the photos and the romantic restaurant, were those fake too?

Qin Chaomu had never asked her out for a meal, let alone at a damn romantic restaurant!

Shen Guai had a smile on her face, but her heart was exploding with jealousy.

Why isn’t she responding? Why isn’t she denying it? Why hasn’t she come back to the set to film?

Why is it that after knowing each other for over a year, she hasn’t sent me a single message on WeChat…

Going out with some scumbag in the middle of the night just to eat? Eat, eat, eat…go ahead and eat yourself to death!

There weren’t many scenes today, and Shen Guai finished work before 8:00 PM. As usual, she opened her phone to check the production schedule.

Qin Chaomu had scenes tomorrow, which meant she would be returning to the set.

“So she actually knows how to come back.” Shen Guai tossed her phone aside and lay on the bed for a long time. Then, she rolled over and began searching for the main menu of that romantic restaurant.

She took a taxi to a nearby supermarket and returned to the hotel carrying two large plastic bags.

“Beautiful sister, could I borrow the hotel kitchen for a bit?” Shen Guai gave the front desk clerk a wink. Seeing her hesitate, Shen Guai quickly added, “I won’t use it for free; I’ll pay for it…”

“The chefs have already left for the day, so it should be fine, but I have to check with the manager.”

The receptionist’s eyes sparkled. Seeing the adorable Shen Guai standing before her and even getting a wink, she nearly fainted.

“The manager said yes! Teacher Shen Guai, can I take a picture with you?”

After hanging up, the receptionist saw Shen Guai jumping for joy and started jumping along with her. After the photo, the receptionist watched Shen Guai’s retreating back and screamed internally with excitement.

“First, turn on the stove, pour the oil into the pan… minced garlic… breadcrumbs…” Shen Guai followed a tutorial video, her hands trembling as she ignited the flame.

She let out a long breath and wiped the sweat from her forehead. Forget cooking, Shen Guai had never even touched a pan before. This decision to enter the kitchen was born purely out of spite.

The restaurant Qin Chaomu went to was a Cantonese-style place, famous for its Typhoon Shelter Fried Crab and Hakka Salt Baked Chicken.

As the saying goes, “newborn calves fear no tigers.” Shen Guai had never even fried an egg, so she naturally didn’t realize how challenging these two famous Hong Kong dishes were.

Oil splattered and hissed. Shen Guai jumped back and shielded herself with her hands. She suddenly slapped her forehead, realizing she hadn’t prepped the crab yet.

She quickly turned off the heat.

A large, greenish-blue female crab, bigger than her palm, lay quietly on the cutting board. Shen Guai remembered that when she usually ate crab, the people around her would help crack the shell, so she tried to do it by hand.

But she overlooked the fact that she had never cracked a shell herself and didn’t know the proper technique.

“Ah..”

The sharp shell quickly sliced a small cut into her fingertip. Shen Guai frowned and bit her lip. Ignoring the pain, she used brute force to pry the shell open.

Cheering herself on, she spent over six hours busy in the kitchen before two dark, unidentifiable heaps emerged.

One was the fried crab, the other was the salt-baked chicken.

Shen Guai couldn’t control the heat, so the crab was burnt. As for the chicken…

She couldn’t tell the difference between sugar and salt. Salt-baked chicken requires rubbing fried salt over the skin after steaming. Salt doesn’t change color much when heated, but sugar undergoes a caramelization reaction and turns black instantly.

So, Shen Guai had smeared black, sticky sugar all over the steamed chicken.

She felt like something was wrong with the results, but she couldn’t put her finger on what. However, she had tried so many times that she had run out of ingredients.

Discouraged, she packed the two heaps into a bento box. She then grabbed a ketchup bottle and squeezed a wobbly heart shape onto the rice.

She had originally wanted to draw a smiley face, but a smiley face was too complicated.

Dragging her exhausted body back to her room, she looked at the milky-white bento box. She found some wrapping paper and wrapped it in three layers of pink packaging.

Qin Chaomu’s call time was 10:00 AM. Shen Guai pursed her lips, thinking that in just six more hours, she would see her.

Shen Guai opened Weibo to check Qin Chaomu’s profile. Most of the posts were business promotions; the only personal content was the announcement of her relationship with Shen Guai.

The corners of Shen Guai’s mouth curled up. Then she went to check the rookie actor’s Weibo, and her brow furrowed.

His second to last post was a selfie taken at that romantic restaurant. The photo was strategically framed to show half of Qin Chaomu’s face while she was looking down at her phone.

His most recent post, just uploaded, was another selfie with the caption: “I heard Big Sis likes sweets, so I’ve been drinking carbonated drinks every day.”

The scumbag posted a nine photo grid. The drink he was holding happened to be the one Qin Chaomu endorsed. The implication was clear.

The comments below tens of thousands of them, were all trashing him.

“Heh.” Shen Guai stood up, threw the lunch box into the trash can, and lay on the bed for half an hour. Eventually, she got back up, fished the lunch box out, and placed it on the TV stand.

Qin Chaomu arrived right on time. Today, she wore a simple pink camisole with khaki denim jeans. Combined with her long, black wavy hair, she looked like a character straight out of an anime.

Her appearance immediately drew cheers from the crew. Staff members swarmed her, leaving Shen Guai in the corner, looking completely out of place.

“Tch.”

Shen Guai hesitated before taking the lunch box out of her bag. She quietly placed it on Qin Chaomu’s chair.

Qin Chaomu spent a long time exchanging pleasantries with the crew before finally walking toward Shen Guai. Shen Guai held her breath.

To her surprise, Qin Chaomu walked straight past her and said coldly, “Annie, in half an hour, get the makeup artist to the dressing room.”

Shen Guai pouted, let out a cold huff, and her cheeks puffed out with anger. She reached out her pale arm and snatched the bento box back from the chair.

“Your boyfriend made that?”

Qin Chaomu wiped her hands as she pulled out the chair to sit. She wore a soft smile that made it impossible to guess her true thoughts.

But Shen Guai saw through it, that smile was a mockery.

Sure enough, a second later, Qin Chaomu squinted and said, “What era is this? Using pink wrapping paper… so tacky.”

Shen Guai grit her teeth in anger. She tore the wrapping paper to shreds, threw it in the trash, and with a loud snap, broke her disposable chopsticks apart.

She opened the box, deciding to eat the food she had intended for Qin Chaomu herself.

“With these skills? I could do better with my eyes closed.”

Qin Chaomu glanced at the heart on the rice, her frown deepening. “What a mess. Disgusting.”

Shen Guai slammed her chopsticks into the salt-baked chicken. She stuffed a piece of cold, hard, and bitter meat into her mouth, her cheeks bulging like an angry hamster.

Swallowing the chicken with difficulty, she forced down the undercooked rice. Even though it tasted bad enough to make her gag, she squeezed out a triumphant smile and looked at Qin Chaomu. “It’s delicious. Aren’t you jealous?~”

“Heh.” Qin Chaomu gave a cold, knowing laugh. She stood up abruptly and frowned. “Annie, why isn’t the makeup artist here yet?”

“Boss Qin, wasn’t it scheduled for half an hour from..”

“I changed my mind. I want to see her right now.”

In the dressing room, a group of Qin Chaomu’s staff members stood in a line, hardly daring to breathe.

While Qin Chaomu had always had a bit of a temper, she rarely took it out on her inner circle. But over the last two days, even the smallest mistake from the staff would trigger a massive outburst.

They were all walking on eggshells.

Qin Chaomu took a puff from her e-cigarette and asked Annie, “How has that Yi Feng you’re managing been doing the last couple of days?”

Annie shook her head. “He’s been getting trashed on the trending searches for two days. He’s a bit depressed right now.”

“Did I ask about his mood?” Qin Chaomu slammed the e-cigarette onto the vanity. “The entertainment industry lacks many things, but people aren’t one of them. If he can’t handle this little bit of pressure, tell him to pack up and go back to his hometown.”

“I’m asking about business. Any inquiries?”

“Yes. I’ll have my assistant compile them and send them to you.” Annie wiped away a bead of sweat.

Three months ago, Qin Chaomu had split from Jiayun Media to establish her own studio. Yi Feng was the first artist she had signed.

As the second-largest shareholder of Jiayun Media, the split wasn’t a falling out, but a strategic move to dominate the entertainment market from multiple angles.

Jiayun Media and Qin Chaomu had kept their secrets well. The public thought she was bound by a restrictive contract, unaware that she was actually the boss.

“What about that guy named ‘Ah Ken’ I asked you to look into?”

“I only found one ‘Ah Ken,'” Annie said, looking confused. “This Ah Ken is a floor manager at Lehao KTV. He’s thirty-six, got married ten years ago, and has a seven-year-old child in second grade.”

Annie couldn’t understand why the great Boss Qin would be interested in a minor KTV manager.

A manager? KTV?

Qin Chaomu rested her chin on her hand. Was he not the boyfriend?

If not… why did Shen Guai lie to her? Why did she go to see him in the middle of the night? Why would she have any connection to a KTV manager?

“Bring this scumbag to see me.”