Chapter 14

Chu Yan was the male lead of Mistook the Boss for My Boyfriend, while the man on stage, Ji Yanting, was the male lead of another book: The Film Emperor’s White Moonlight Stand-In.
She’d read both in college and only remembered the rough outlines. Compared to Mistook the Boss for My Boyfriend, the latter was pure dog blood from the title on. The first was a gentle, soft little romance; the second was thunder and melodrama from start to finish.
Ji Yanting was the eldest son of Beicheng’s powerful Ji family. His younger brother, Ji Yujing, was the supporting male lead in the story. Ji Yanting had a first love, his white moonlight, Yue Ling, the treasured only daughter of the Yue family and, in that book, the villainess.
To chase her dreams, his white moonlight had gone abroad for further studies and stayed away for three full years. During those three years, Ji Yanting, following his own interests, entered the entertainment industry.
Without relying on the Ji family, he’d soared on his devastatingly good looks and acting skill worthy of a veteran, becoming an overnight sensation. Later he moved into film, racking up tens of billions at the box office and finally taking home the Film Emperor trophy.
Once crowned film emperor, he withdrew from the industry, returned to the family, took over the corporation, and waited for Yue Ling to come home.
But when those three years were up, Yue Ling didn’t appear at the celebratory banquet. Instead, his younger brother Ji Yujing told him Yue Ling had decided to settle abroad and had a boyfriend there already. Their relationship was steady; rumor had it they would marry soon.
Ji Yanting was a smart man, but when it came to his white moonlight, his brain just… walked off a cliff.
Instead of treating such an outrageous claim with suspicion, after several unanswered calls to Yue Ling, he actually believed it.
As the banquet wound down and guests drifted away, he sat there drinking alone, drowning his sorrows, and poured himself a glass from the drugged bottle. Having sent his brother away earlier, he staggered out under the influence, only to be “rescued” by the heroine, Wen Ling.
Half-conscious and muddle-headed, the two of them ended up sleeping together.
That was how the story began, and Wen Jiu remembered it vividly.
Back then, in that era of webnovels, the opening was almost always the male lead drugged, the heroine drugged, or someone drugging someone, usually the villainess, so the male and female leads could do the deed. It was the trend at the time, and she’d been fully invested, never seeing an issue with it. She’d read them blushing and breathless, following along nervously and gleefully.
Looking back now, it was… not normal at all.
Picking up some random man off the street and taking him home for a one-night stand, was she not afraid of dying?
In that story, Wen Ling was an eighteenth-tier actress who’d just entered the industry and had only ever seen Ji Yanting on the big screen.
She just thought he was stunning and looked like her idol. After their one-night stand, he handed her a black card.
Ji Yanting wanted to keep her.
Wen Ling had no idea why, but having accidentally slept with her idol, she agreed on the spot.
To him, her back looked like Yue Ling’s. Her eyes were like hers, her face shape like hers, her lips like hers… He kept her by his side as a substitute.
He showered Wen Ling with resources and more money than she could spend. With him quietly supporting her, she shot up to become a top-tier actress and eventually took both TV and film queen titles.
When his white moonlight finally returned to China, she also entered the entertainment circle. Wen Ling was already a third-line actress by then; as a nobody, she was mocked by Wen Ling’s fans for “copying” her idol’s looks. Once Yue Ling discovered Wen Ling’s relationship with Ji Yanting, and that he had no intention of discarding Wen Ling, even going so far as to protect her, she blackened, targeting Wen Ling at every turn.
Ji Yanting’s younger brother Ji Yujing, who also loved Yue Ling, kept helping her. But as incident after incident piled up, he somehow ended up falling for the little girl who wore her likes and dislikes openly on her face.
In the end, the two brothers joined forces to shield Wen Ling, while the once-treasured white moonlight was despised by all, left as nothing more than a muddy reflection in a ditch. Finally she left and disappeared without a trace.
Wen Jiu: …
She’d been young back then and really had liked those dog-blood stories.
Now, when she looked back down from the stage, Ji Yanting had already finished… whatever he’d been mumbling up there and stepped down.
Wen Jiu tracked him with her eyes and noticed: he hadn’t touched a drop of alcohol.
Wen Jiu: ??
What happened to the heartbroken, drunken bender?
She watched him take out his phone, his already gentle expression softening until it looked like it could drip water. Whoever he was calling, his voice was all warm acquiescence as he answered several times in a row.
Right then, her own phone chimed.
Qin Yao: Chu Yan and I are heading back first. Wen Jiu, you can go home later on your own.
Qin Yao: Transferred you 1000 yuan for transport.
Qin Yao: Don’t call me tonight. Also, make sure Li Xuan doesn’t disturb Chu Yan.
Dragged out of her detour into the second book’s plot, she suddenly remembered: she’d been sprinting around just now trying to find Chu Yan and Miss.
Heaven above could testify, she absolutely had not drugged Chu Yan!
Still clutching the wineglass, Wen Jiu hurriedly waved Assistant Li over and laid out everything that had happened.
You didn’t get to work in the president’s office without a few brain cells to spare; Assistant Li had some ability.
He quickly went to pull up the security footage and track down the culprit behind the spiked drink.
He was so busy he never had time to bother the president that night.
When the banquet ended and the guests dispersed, Wen Jiu circled out through the front gates toward the parking area. Just before getting into her car, she hesitated, turned around, and went back.
Curiosity kills the cat, but she really wanted to know if Ji Yanting would end up “picked up” like in the novel.
She remembered clearly: tonight, Ji Yanting hadn’t had a single drink.
Unlike this story, where she, a minor cannon-fodder, had to worry constantly about the villainess Miss Qin’s safety and whether her pursuit of the male lead would push her into doing something horribly irreversible in a hysterical fit…
In Film Emperor’s White Moonlight Stand-In, Wen Jiu didn’t exist at all. She was just passing through, pure onlooker.
Different status, completely different mood.
Eating melon makes people happy.
But after wandering back and forth several times, she still didn’t see Ji Yanting anywhere.
Had the heroine already taken him home?
“What are you doing, walking around in circles like that?” A familiar voice cut in.
Wen Jiu looked up and met Shen Xingzhou’s gaze through a half-lowered car window.
They’d only exchanged a handful of words earlier, but somehow they both remembered each other.
“I… ate too much. Walking it off,” Wen Jiu said. She couldn’t exactly admit she was here for the drama.
Shen Xingzhou gave her a once-over. All he saw was a round, soft goose-egg face with a little baby fat along the cheeks, quite cute, the kind that made your fingers itch to pinch. Above that were a pair of wide, glossy almond eyes, darting around with mischief and brightness, eyes that screamed I am absolutely lying.
“Brother Yanting, you go on home first. I’m going to walk my food off, too.”
“Don’t wait up. I might have just gotten back to the country, but I can use a ride-hailing app. Worst case I’ll call the driver.”
Once Shen Xingzhou got out of the car, Wen Jiu could see the man sitting inside more clearly.
Ji Yanting.
The film emperor male lead.
Wait a second, why was he just driving himself home?
“Why are you staring at my cousin like that? Don’t tell me you’ve been circling around for him?” Shen Xingzhou was pure, high-energy social battery. He strode over, his steps light in the night breeze, his voice clear as a plucked string.
Nice voice, terrible boundary sense. They’d barely met once; they weren’t nearly that close.
So the film emperor male lead was his cousin. Great.
Wen Jiu felt her cheeks heat. She scuffed her shoe against the ground a few times, eyes on the sparkling-clean pavement, as if looking for somewhere to crawl into.
“I… I’m his fan. I never thought I’d run into him here today. But there were too many people inside, and I, um… didn’t dare go over and ask for an autograph.”
Shen Xingzhou believed every word. He caught the topic and ran with it immediately.
“What’s there to be shy about? I’ll go get one for you. Did you bring a photo? Give it to me.”
Wen Jiu, holding absolutely nothing: “…I didn’t bring one.”
They walked in silence side by side for a bit, big eyes and small eyes both trying to pretend this wasn’t awkward.
Wen Jiu cringed on the inside and started looking for an excuse to slip away. Distracted, she didn’t see the person coming from the opposite direction and bumped straight into them.
It was a gently pretty girl, her features cool and delicate like an orchid blooming in a quiet valley, her whole presence like a handful of cold moonlight.
She was in a rush. After the collision, she didn’t respond to Wen Jiu’s apology at all, just got to her feet, glanced around anxiously, and hurried off.
Just now, when the two of them bumped heads, they’d ended up close enough that Wen Jiu had clearly heard the girl muttering under her breath:
“That’s impossible… it should be here. How can I not find the film emperor anywhere…”
She walked a few more steps with Shen Xingzhou before she finally connected that girl with Ji Yanting.
Could she be… the heroine from that book?
Film emperor = Ji Yanting = male lead.
Same time, same place, appearing here, plus that gentle, pretty face, she matched the heroine’s description perfectly.
But why did it feel like the heroine had some kind of prophetic spoiler sheet, knowing in advance she was supposed to come here and “pick up” the male lead?
“Shen Xingzhou,” Wen Jiu pressed a hand over her heart and put on her best wounded expression, “I really do want your cousin’s autograph. If I don’t get the film emperor’s personal signature tonight, I won’t be able to sleep.”
Shen Xingzhou instantly went full heroic mode.
“I’ll take you to him. He doesn’t have a girlfriend, we won’t be interrupting anything.”
Guilt pricked at Wen Jiu, like she’d just tricked a pure-hearted big puppy.
But she really wanted to know why the male lead hadn’t been picked up by the heroine like in the book.
Curiosity won. If Shen Xingzhou dared to bring her back, she dared to get in the car.
The two of them headed to the Ji estate, leaving heroine Wen Ling still circling the hotel inside and out. She kept searching until deep into the night and never did find the man she was looking for.
By the time they arrived, the Ji house was brightly lit. Ji Yanting was on the phone dealing with business. Father Ji and Mother Ji sat on the sofa; the younger Ji brother still wasn’t home.
“There was contaminated wine at the banquet. Our Ji family will get to the bottom of it…”
Wen Jiu’s eyes were sharp; when Ji Yanting hung up, she caught the caller ID.
It was Assistant Li.
A spark went off in her head; realization flooded through her all at once.
The spiked wine that should have gone into Ji Yanting had been carried away by her and handed to Chu Yan instead. The one who got drugged had shifted from Ji Yanting to Chu Yan. Of course Ji Yanting was fine and simply went home, no being picked up by the heroine, no one-night stand.
She really had, completely by accident, wrecked the male and female leads’ first meeting from that book and turned it into total strangers passing by each other.
“Xingzhou, it’s late. Why are you bringing a girl home?” Father or Mother Ji asked.
“Oh, oh, cousin, I came to get your autograph.”
Shen Xingzhou pushed Wen Jiu forward, leaving her standing there, tongue-tied.
Now that she understood what had happened, she wasn’t curious anymore. She could absolutely go home now.
Please let her go. She was really an introvert, pure, premium-grade I-type.