Chapter 157

Gu Yanqiu wore a polite smile. “Sorry.”

The girl didn’t press the issue. The light in her eyes only grew brighter. After stepping back two paces, she gave Gu Yanqiu a slight bow and said, with what sounded like both admiration and reverence, “You’re my idol. I really like you. It’s such an honor to meet you.”

Gu Yanqiu merely nodded again.

The girl then walked away. She didn’t ask for a photo or anything else, just went back to eating with the friend she’d come with, murmuring to her in a low voice. Every so often, she would glance over.

Lin Yuewei’s confusion was written all over her face. She looked at Gu Yanqiu with unmistakable implication: What’s going on here?

Gu Yanqiu unhurriedly served her a bowl of soup. “Drink some soup first.”

Lin Yuewei obediently took a sip, set it down at once, and blinked at her. “Spill.”

Gu Yanqiu glanced around. “This isn’t the place to talk.”

Lin Yuewei thought about it and agreed. They hurried through the rest of the meal, gave up on going shopping, and dragged Gu Yanqiu straight back to the hotel. Gu Yanqiu wasn’t particularly attached to shopping anyway; she just liked being with Lin Yuewei. The place didn’t matter.

On the way, Lin Yuewei passed a roasted-sunflower-seed shop, bought some seeds by weight, then picked up some watermelon from a fruit stall. Once they were back in the room, she laid everything out on the table and began grilling Gu Yanqiu in detail.

Gu Yanqiu told her the whole story.

This was the age of information. Tianrui Group had an official Weibo account, and not long after Gu Yanqiu joined the company, she had suggested to Gu Huai that they shouldn’t ignore the power of the internet and should make an effort to run the company’s official account. She even proposed several specific plans for the staff below to carry out. Tianrui was a fairly well-known domestic appliance company, so of course it had an official account; but like most corporate accounts, aside from announcing new products and the like, it had little else going on. It was just a graveyard of zombie followers. After nearly a year of operation, the account had managed to build up a little presence, but as expected, the progress wasn’t great. What could one corporate Weibo possibly do? Unless it turned into a marketing account; but that was impossible.

At the beginning of this year, Gu Yanqiu became chairwoman of the company. The official account posted the news and also released a photo of Gu Yanqiu—a full-body shot. She was dressed very formally, in a black suit and white shirt, one button at the collar undone. She sat at the head of the conference table, one hand resting on the dark wood surface with slender fingers slightly curved, her face turned faintly to the side as she listened carelessly to the person speaking below.

A shaft of sunlight streamed in through the window behind her and fell across her cheek and shoulder. The contours of her features were so beautiful they couldn’t be described in words.

The comments below the official post exploded:

Holy shit, that’s the chairwoman? That’s really not a celebrity? This has to be a fake chairwoman.

—Holy shit, it really is someone else’s company chairwoman.

—I rubbed my eyes eight hundred times. That really is the chairwoman, not some daughter of the board or whatever, right? No offense intended.

—If my boss looked that good, I’d go to work early every day.

—Oh my god!

—Breaking! A young woman does this one thing on top of a conference table!

—Why is my screen suddenly so wet, Mom?

After a day, the comments slowly fermented.

The post spread outside the original circle, and several marketing accounts all used the same shocked tone. People followed the trail and searched for Gu Yanqiu’s private Weibo account; sure enough, they found it.

Her private account wasn’t something she had registered herself; the company had set it up for her. She didn’t post often, and there were no photos. It had originally been prepared for emergencies, but after seeing how the official account was developing, she simply let things ride and asked for the account and password.

Curiosity was human nature, especially when it came to a young and beautiful chairwoman like Gu Yanqiu. Overnight, her follower count broke ten thousand, and people began leaving comments. Gu Yanqiu picked a few to reply to.

- Are you really Tianrui’s chairwoman?

This sort of verification question.

- Yes.

Gu Yanqiu posted a screenshot Lin Zhi had prepared for her, showing the company information that clearly listed her position.

- Why did Tianrui suddenly change chairwomen? And she’s so young?

This was just someone who didn’t know and was asking casually.

Gu Yanqiu replied: My father got sick, so I took over.

- Post a photo?

This was a blatant flirt, and Gu Yanqiu didn’t reply to any of those.

That even trended on the hot search, under the title: Those Entrepreneurs Who Could Debut as Celebrities.

It ranked pretty high. A lot of passersby clicked in and found lists of many good-looking entrepreneurs. The standards for looks in business and in entertainment weren’t the same; in the business world, even an upper-mid appearance was enough to make passersby gasp, like certain top students who, once they looked merely decent, were immediately hyped up as gods and goddesses of the male or female variety. That was the halo effect. Top students had the halo of top students; entrepreneurs had the halo of entrepreneurs. Beneath that halo came the filter, and Gu Yanqiu certainly wasn’t merely upper-mid in looks. She had the kind of face that could stand toe-to-toe with celebrities. She was instantly stunning.

—Holy shit, is the last one for real?

—Tianrui—is that the Tianrui I know? I bought their microwave oven just last week.

—My god, what kind of celestial being is Tianrui’s last one?

—I hereby declare Tianrui has debuted center position!

—So handsome, ahhhhhhh! I’m Chairwoman Gu’s girlfriend fan now!

—Above, Chairwoman Gu is mine!!!

Gu Yanqiu thus made her celebrity-style debut among entrepreneurs purely on looks, not only on Weibo but across forums, groups, and every other gathering place for gossip. Her Weibo followers shot up like crazy. If a celebrity had done this, it would certainly have drawn backlash, but entrepreneurs were different, especially since Tianrui was a brand everyone had at least vaguely heard of when decorating their homes or buying appliances. Even people who weren’t decorating would still see the appliances every day and naturally remember the brand, so it came with a wave of built-in goodwill.

The psychology was basically: Huh, that brand sounds familiar—The chairwoman is really pretty? Let me take a look—Damn, I’m not lying to myself, let me stare—Okay, followed!

And that was only the appetizer. Gu Yanqiu had no intention of overexposing herself. Even though her follower count had surged because of the buzz, she didn’t post photos. It would have looked too much like hype, and for her, besides making the chairwoman herself look kind of tacky, it brought no benefit at all.

A few days passed, and Gu Yanqiu posted another update.

[Heading to a meeting [photo]]

The attached image was the broadcast center in Yanning.

A comment asked:

- What meeting?

Gu Yanqiu replied:

- The Industrial Summit.

This Industrial Summit was a big deal. It was spearheaded by the relevant authorities, organized by a certain CCTV channel, and was going to be recorded for television. In addition to government officials, more than forty industry leaders from across the domestic manufacturing sector had been specially invited to attend. Originally, Gu Yanqiu wasn’t qualified to speak; there were plenty of heavyweights ahead of her, and the program’s runtime didn’t allow each person to speak individually, so they were only supposed to sit below the stage. But before filming, Gu Yanqiu received a call from the TV station asking her to prepare a speech, and even asking whether she could manage it. Of course she could. She promptly wrote a full and substantial piece and turned it in, and the station was very satisfied.

Gu Yanqiu only learned later that the show’s director had decided her image was too good to waste, so he wanted to use it in coordination with the higher authorities for some publicity. Whether people admitted it or not, this was the age of traffic. They intended to turn Gu Yanqiu into a “traffic” entrepreneur in the manufacturing sector, someone who could attract more public attention to the field, help revitalize the real economy, and promote the spirit of industry.

Gu Yanqiu thought it was rather coincidental, but the whole thing was a win-win. She had no reason to refuse.

After the industrial revitalization summit ended, the official media used a photo of Gu Yanqiu speaking onstage as the standard image for their reports.

Gu Yanqiu wore a light gray pinstriped suit. Her figure was straight and elegant as she stood behind the lectern, leaning slightly toward the microphone with a serious, attentive expression. One hand rested casually on the tabletop, while the other was lifted slightly, gesturing in sync with her speech. Her movements were graceful, and the gold-rimmed glasses she wore added even more poise to her.

The number of readers the official media had was not something a few marketing accounts could compete with.

When the general public saw the accompanying image, the comments nearly hit a new record.

- Did the official account post the wrong picture? Huh???

- AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH where did this girl come from???

- Within three minutes, I need this girl’s full information.

- Is the retouching too extreme??? Face swap???

A small group of people who knew Gu Yanqiu emerged.

- This is Tianrui’s newly appointed chairwoman, Gu Yanqiu. You people don’t know her?

- My god, Chairwoman Gu looks even more handsome in this shot.

- Chairwoman Gu is my husband ahhhhhhh!

Who? Who was Gu Yanqiu? Who was Gu Yanqiu? They seemed to have bought Tianrui appliances, but they had no idea the chairwoman looked like this. Was it real or fake?

The official media had also attached a video link to the program. After watching the episode and coming back, the netizens were stunned. The young and beautiful Gu Yanqiu, compared with a room full of middle-aged and elderly businesspeople, had an especially powerful visual impact.

—I hereby declare that this kind of peerless beauty is a real thing in the human world.

—I only just discovered that meetings like this can actually be so interesting. It had my blood pumping. And and and Chairwoman Gu’s speaking time was way too short, I’m crying; I strongly demand an extension of the runtime QAQ

- Gu Yanqiu, female, twenty-six, newly appointed chairwoman of Tianrui Group. I used to be sick of seeing “you can make a living off your face, but you insist on relying on talent” until I was nauseous; now I finally know what it really means to “make a living off your face”!!!

- Someone else’s twenty-six versus my twenty-six: I’ve got neither their face nor their money. I’m dead. How about you?

- Chairwoman Gu, step on me!!!

- Move aside, Chairwoman Gu, look at me once, ahhhhhhh!!!

Those who had watched the video all came back with feedback, and the wildly exaggerated descriptions made even the people who had planned to brush it off in passing curious enough to go watch it.

Gu Yanqiu’s segment from the program was separately clipped out by netizens and began being uploaded to various video platforms. It also spread wildly on Weibo, the home base of gossip, and the three characters “Gu Yanqiu” trended with her full name attached.

Within a day, Gu Yanqiu’s followers broke one hundred thousand. They were real followers too, not bought zombie accounts. She had become a hot new kind of “internet celebrity.”

It wasn’t as if no discordant voices appeared, but first, Gu Yanqiu had been promoted by the official media, so the authorities themselves backed her up. Second, Gu Yanqiu wasn’t a celebrity; she was an entrepreneur, and not just any entrepreneur, but one in manufacturing. The huge halo inherent to that identity itself gave her a shield. Those discordant voices were drowned in the public’s reactions and didn’t cause much of a stir.

Lin Yuewei listened silently through the entire sequence of events, never expecting that in just the little more than a month she’d been away from home, so many things had happened on Gu Yanqiu’s side.

She asked, “Why didn’t you tell me any of this?”

Gu Yanqiu answered, “It wasn’t a big deal.”

Lin Yuewei’s expression was impossible to describe.

This wasn’t a big deal? Someone had even asked for her autograph at dinner. And that still wasn’t a big deal? As an actress, her office-bound wife had somehow become famous before she did? If she said that out loud… Lin Yuewei didn’t even dare say it aloud; it was too embarrassing.

Gu Yanqiu looked at the ever-changing expressions on her face and even smiled as she comforted her. “You’ll get famous sooner or later too.”

Lin Yuewei was sure Gu Yanqiu was doing it on purpose. She lunged at her and pinched her face. “You’re still saying it? You got famous quietly, and in a couple of days you’ll probably even have an official fan club.”

Gu Yanqiu frowned and gave a soft, “Mm?”

Lin Yuewei stared. “No way. You really already have a fan club?”

Gu Yanqiu nodded.

Before Gu Yanqiu could say anything else, Lin Yuewei went online to look it up herself. The moment she checked, her eyes nearly popped out of her head. Not only did it exist, there were several: the Gu Chairwoman National Fan Support Club, the Gu Yanqiu Wife Group, the Gu Yanqiu Fangirl Support Squad…

Judging by the names, most of them were female fans. It was true that most people who followed celebrities were girls, but Lin Yuewei was still mad enough to burst.

She clicked into those fan club homepages; they were all full of Gu Yanqiu’s publicly available schedule photos, screenshots from that program, frames captured one by one from the video, blurry pixels and all, but still unable to hide the overwhelming beauty. There were also photos from the meeting itself, some officially taken, some clearly candid shots.

Then she scrolled down to the comments; it was all shrieking and flooding.

- AHHHHHHHHHH Chairwoman Gu, I can do it

Can do what? Only she could do it. Lin Yuewei closed the Weibo interface in exasperation.

Gu Yanqiu watched her expression and smiled. “Actually, it’s only like this online. In real life, it’s still pretty quiet.”

Lin Yuewei puffed up. “But someone just asked you for an autograph.”

Gu Yanqiu said, “Didn’t I not give it? She didn’t say anything after that.”

Lin Yuewei thought about it and that was true. Gu Yanqiu, after all, wasn’t a celebrity; something like a crowd surrounding her and causing a blockage probably wouldn’t happen.

Gu Yanqiu said, “The people who recognize me usually just take a curious look from far away. Someone like today who came up to ask for an autograph is already very rare.”

“Mm.” Lin Yuewei still didn’t relax her brow.

Gu Yanqiu studied her with amusement. “You’re jealous?”

Lin Yuewei snorted. “Jealous? What do I have to be jealous of? The fact that so many people like you just proves my taste is good. Look at them, saying every day that I can do it and I can do it. Who can?”

Gu Yanqiu smiled and replied, “You. You can do anything.”

Lin Yuewei arched her brows. “Can I change to a new car and drive it around?”

Gu Yanqiu was especially good-tempered, especially gentle. “Sure. You can change as many cars as you want.”

Lin Yuewei blinked and hinted at her, “I meant that kind of… car.”

Gu Yanqiu thought for two seconds this time too, then still nodded. “Sure.”

Lin Yuewei looked eager to try.

Gu Yanqiu looked at her reaching over with her little claw of a hand and backed up a little. “Shower first.”

“Together.” Lin Yuewei tugged her up.

Afterward, Gu Yanqiu massaged Lin Yuewei’s wrists. Lin Yuewei rested her head on Gu Yanqiu’s lap and chatted with her absentmindedly.

“Do you often get a lot of confessions online?”

“Pretty much,” Gu Yanqiu said, suppressing the corners of her mouth that kept trying to lift.

“There are a lot of trolls online. Do you read your DMs?”

“Sometimes.” In truth, almost never. Gu Yanqiu was busy managing the company, and busy chatting with Lin Yuewei; being able to pick and reply to a few comments was already good enough. Where would she have the leisure to check private messages?

“Does anyone insult you?”

“Not that I’ve seen so far.”

“That’s good.” Lin Yuewei thought of her own past and said, “I always turn my DMs off. If I open them, it’s all insults, and looking too much is bad for my mood.”

Gu Yanqiu recalled how she’d felt when Lin Yuewei had been blacklisted across the internet, and empathized. “It is bad for your mood.”

“Didn’t you say you don’t read them?”

“I’ve seen people insulting you.”

“Ah?” Lin Yuewei sat up. “Then what?”

Gu Yanqiu pushed her back down so she couldn’t see her expression. “I argued with those haters a couple of times.”

“You would?” Lin Yuewei laughed. The answer didn’t even seem to require thinking.

“No.” Gu Yanqiu flicked her forehead with a bent finger. “Later I stopped looking. Besides getting angry, it was useless.”

“Exactly, that’s why I never look.” Lin Yuewei steered the conversation back around and finally got to her real purpose. “You should turn your DMs off too.”

“But no one insults me.”

“What if they do?” Lin Yuewei looked up at her. “You know?”

Gu Yanqiu listened and smiled, not exposing her. “Mm.”

Lin Yuewei spread her hand out in front of her. She was lying down, and being able to raise her hand up to this position was really quite determined of her. “Give me your phone. I’ll turn it off for you so you don’t forget.”

Gu Yanqiu reached over her head, took her phone from the bedside table, logged into Weibo, and handed it to her.

Lin Yuewei first turned off the private messages, then scrolled through her homepage and clicked her tongue nonstop.

“Not bad, Chairwoman Gu. These comments are practically on the level of a minor celebrity, aren’t they?”

“Thanks to you.”

“What thanks to me?”

“You are my good fortune.”

Lin Yuewei was teased into smiling nonstop by her. She shifted into another position, lying on her side, and scrolled through the comments on Gu Yanqiu’s newest post. These were much more proper.

- From now on, I’m only buying Tianrui appliances; support domestic brands.

- Chairwoman Gu, is your company still hiring? I want to apply.

- If I work at your company, can I see you?

- Chairwoman Gu, you’re a breath of fresh air in the business world, hahaha.

- Chairwoman Gu single-handedly raised the average appearance level of entrepreneurs, hahahahaha.

- Chairwoman Gu, what do you have coming up next? Will you keep filming the show? I want to see you.

- Chinese industry, thriving and prosperous, going out into the world and toward the globe [fighting]

Lin Yuewei felt much better looking at these.

She rolled over and looked at Gu Yanqiu. “Being an entrepreneur really is better than being a celebrity, huh? You have so many fangirls; outside it’s a flood, but under this Weibo post everyone’s writing such proper things.”

Gu Yanqiu pretended to think. “There were people calling me husband before; I corrected them.”

Lin Yuewei perked up. “What did you say?”

Gu Yanqiu said, “I told the truth. I said I was married, and my wife would be unhappy.”

Lin Yuewei couldn’t hold it in and broke into a grin.

Gu Yanqiu said honestly, “You look silly and cute when you smile like that.”

Lin Yuewei stopped smiling at once. She set the phone aside, took Gu Yanqiu’s hand in hers instead, and caressed it back and forth. She felt a little moved and wanted to say something, but after holding it in for a long time, she still couldn’t squeeze out a single sentence.

Gu Yanqiu looked at her; she looked back at Gu Yanqiu.

Gu Yanqiu lifted a brow. “Hmm?”

Lin Yuewei laughed again.

This was really too inconvenient. It was awkward to talk, and even eye contact required her to tilt her head up. She crawled up again so their gazes were level. She looked at Gu Yanqiu for a long while, then suddenly sighed softly. “Doesn’t this feel unfair to you?”

“What?”

“I mean…” Lin Yuewei sighed again and tightened her grip on the soft hand in hers. “You’ve openly said you’re married, and you won’t even let people call you husband. I don’t have that. My comments are all…”

Gu Yanqiu gently finished for her, “Mom and Dad, Mumu, Mom loves you, charge!”

Lin Yuewei snorted, all the mood she’d been building collapsing under that one sentence.

When she’d finally laughed enough, Lin Yuewei looked at her seriously and said, “You know that’s not what I meant.”

Gu Yanqiu met her eyes just as seriously. “I know what you really mean.”

Lin Yuewei said, “So what do you think? You’re the jealous type, wouldn’t you be jealous? If you want to make it public, I can make it public, really. I’ll post our marriage certificate on Weibo tomorrow.”

Gu Yanqiu lowered her lashes, her brows drawing together slightly. After a moment, she gently shook her head. “Forget it.”

“Why?” Lin Yuewei was surprised. She had thought Gu Yanqiu would be very happy.

Gu Yanqiu’s gaze was steady. “Going public doesn’t seem to have any benefits, does it?”

Lin Yuewei said, “It does. We can show our love.”

“...” Gu Yanqiu said quietly, “I don’t like showing off our relationship online. Isn’t it enough that we know?”

Lin Yuewei tilted her head and said, “And cut down on the flowers and willows?”

Gu Yanqiu analyzed it for her. “I think the disadvantages outweigh the advantages if we go public. First, I’d just built up a little heat online, and then you suddenly came out and posted our marriage certificate. Wouldn’t that look like hype? And joint hype at that. I used the official media to push myself out only because I wanted to save on publicity and marketing costs, boost the brand’s visibility a little, and, for future purposes, go with the flow when the official media promoted me. If you come out now, not only would it disrupt the plan, the official media might stop pushing me altogether, so as not to be seen spreading unhealthy trends again. Second, the image you originally built should be that of an ordinary girl from an ordinary family, not that you can’t change your public persona, but you can’t do that now, when you don’t even really have any name recognition yet…”

Lin Yuewei objected, “I was pretty popular for a while last year.”

Gu Yanqiu was merciless. “Aren’t you past your peak now?”

The faded Lin Yuewei: “...”

Gu Yanqiu said, “People in this world admire the strong. If you go public now, netizens will still scold you and call you a liar full of lies. Once that image takes deep root in other people’s minds, it’ll be even harder to shake it off later. But if you went public when you were truly hot, people would say, ah, what a match made in heaven. By then I’d have stabilized too and wouldn’t need any other help. Even if there were some bad voices, your fans would be able to suppress them.”

Lin Yuewei laughed from listening and even applauded her. “Chairwoman Gu, you really are crafty now. Is this how all businesspeople are?”

Gu Yanqiu laughed too, narrowing her eyes dangerously at her. “This is how businesspeople are. Are you scared?”

Lin Yuewei pretended to tremble. “Scared to death.”

Gu Yanqiu moved in on her with two wicked chuckles.

Lin Yuewei could already smell her fragrance, drifting over and slowly surrounding her. She licked her lips. Somehow, this was kind of thrilling?

So the phoenix turned over again.

Lin Yuewei was sore in both directions this time; she was truly unable to move even one finger. She had more exhalation than inhalation left in her. She coughed twice and cleared her throat. Gu Yanqiu got out of bed and poured her a glass of water. After Lin Yuewei took a big gulp, Gu Yanqiu slowly fed it into her mouth.

Gu Yanqiu touched the corner of her brow and saw her yawn twice in a row. In a soft voice, she asked, “Not sleeping?”

Lin Yuewei shook her head. “No. Talk to me a little longer.” Tomorrow she had to get up and film again, and Gu Yanqiu would be going back. They only had this one night together; fortunately, there were still half a month left before wrapping.

Gu Yanqiu pulled her up a little and stacked two pillows behind her back. “What do you want to talk about?”

Lin Yuewei thought about it and started a topic. “You’re this exposed online, and you debuted purely on looks. Does it ever make you feel bad?”

“No.” Gu Yanqiu was engaged in a rather socialist core-values kind of meeting lately.

Lin Yuewei laughed. After laughing, she pressed her lips together and said, “Actually, I have a question. I’ve been thinking about it ever since you first told me about all the stuff that happened online after you blew up.”

Gu Yanqiu smiled. “Go on.”

Lin Yuewei was, after all, someone from the industry. From Gu Yanqiu’s description, everything had seemed a little too much of a coincidence, and the whole setup with all the different sides working together had a vaguely professional feel.

She looked at Gu Yanqiu. “Did you… buy professional water armies?”

“Yes.” Gu Yanqiu admitted it very frankly.

Lin Yuewei blinked in surprise, then laughed. “Really?” It wasn’t that unusual, but it was still a little unusual coming from Gu Yanqiu.

Gu Yanqiu said, “Of course it’s real. I even contacted them myself. Old customer discount.”

Lin Yuewei: “!!!”

Gu Yanqiu suddenly smiled. “When you were filming last year, I saw you getting cursed at so badly that I bought you a water army once. You definitely didn’t know.”

Lin Yuewei frowned in thought. A flash of insight suddenly struck her, and she pointed at Gu Yanqiu. “Did you say your surname was Lin?”

Gu Yanqiu was also stunned. “You knew?”

Lin Yuewei blurted out, “Sugar daddy!”

Gu Yanqiu: “...”

Author’s note: Chairwoman Gu has first dropped one mysterious sugar-daddy alias, hahahaha.

Later the alternate account will fall too; the main account will fall too; everything will come crashing out in a mess, and it’ll all be public before you know it.