Chapter 56 Numb.56 The Stalker

Xu Wu sat lazily in the armchair, glanced at her face in the makeup mirror in front of her after removing her makeup, and then lowered her head to scroll through her phone again, occasionally replying to a few messages that popped up.

The staff behind her were busy walking back and forth. The other actors in the play sat around her, some with assistants helping her remove her makeup, others chatting in twos and threes. Interspersed among them was the distant voice of someone who was concerned about her improper posture.

"I've already received an offer from Star Entertainment, and if all goes well, I'll be able to sign the contract this week."

"Wow, that's great! You signed with such a big company right after graduation, that's really smooth sailing."

She heard the chatter of several actors who had performed on stage with her. Xu Wu glanced at them and saw that the male actor being complimented was her classmate, graduating this year just like her.

She didn't know much about this person, but many classmates who had worked with him said he was a nice guy, just a bit preachy. Xu Wu, who was in the same group as him for her graduation project this year, had a lot to say about this, so the rumors were true.

"Not at all, you just need an opportunity to appear on screen. Once you show a little talent, entertainment companies will definitely come knocking on your door." Chen Yunrang's tone was humble, but his arrogant expression remained unchanged. He glanced at the people in front of him who were full of admiration for him, smiled, and said, "However, I also noticed your performance on stage just now. There were some parts where your acting skills were indeed not good enough and needed improvement. This made the audience lose immersion in the story, and it's easy for the company to pass you over."

"Understood, understood." Someone nodded without stopping.

As he spoke, Chen Yunrang turned to Xu Wu and said, "Hey—"

Xu Wu replied to the group chat mentions without looking up: "What?"

He jokingly asked, "Didn't you sign with a company too? Why don't you come and chat with us?"

Upon hearing his words, Xu Wu's brows furrowed, only to be interrupted by a gasp from his side.

The voice came from a baby-faced boy. He stared wide-eyed at Xu Wu in disbelief: "Really? I've never heard you mention this before. You're so fast!"

"Yeah, that's too formal," the man agreed, then asked curiously, "Which company did Xu Wu sign with?"

Although she knew the group meant no harm, Xu Wu was still not very good at handling this kind of atmosphere. She adjusted her posture slightly uncomfortably, licked her lips, and looked away: "It's nothing important, there's no need to talk about it."

"No, it's absolutely necessary." Chen Yunrang disagreed. Seeing Xu Wu's dismissive attitude, he felt exasperated for her and turned to explain to them, "Do you know YM? She's the company she signed with. They even came to the school specifically to find her when she was a freshman."

"Wow, Xu Wu is amazing!"

"Good acting skills, and good luck too."

Xu Wu pursed her lips, awkwardly fidgeting with her hands. Actually, she really wanted them to stop talking, but she didn't know how they suddenly started discussing her.

After hesitating for a while, a slightly sour female voice came: "If everyone who gets into college makes it to the trending topics, they could all sign with a company."

After these words were spoken, a hush fell over the surroundings, and many people looked at each other in bewilderment.

Xu Wu glanced at the girl who spoke. She was not familiar with this person, but she had heard that this person was originally the actress for her role, but was later replaced with a minor role with few scenes.

Xu Wu withdrew his gaze, propped his head up with his left hand on the back of the chair, and said meaningfully, "If the conditions aren't right, no matter how many trending topics you get, it won't help."

The girl was clearly hit where it hurt and immediately jumped up, yelling, "You—!"

"Never mind, never mind," someone quickly pulled her back.

She glared fiercely at Xu Wu before reluctantly sitting down.

Xu Wu shrugged, not caring.

"Hey," after a moment, someone couldn't resist quietly poking Chen Yunrang's arm and asked gossipy, "What's this about the trending topic she mentioned?"

"You don't know?" Chen Yunrang asked in surprise.

“Hehe,” he scratched his head, “I haven’t downloaded Weibo.”

"She was the most famous among our freshmen back then." Chen Yunrang nodded towards Xu Wu, then continued to explain to the boy in front of him who was seriously watching the drama unfold.

He and Xu Wu were students who entered the university in the same year, and they were briefly seen together in the group of new students who came to the school to register.

At that time, Xu Wu wore very light makeup, which highlighted her bone structure. In addition, she simply tied her hair in a ponytail and wore a white shirt. Just standing there, she could easily attract a lot of attention, like a snow lotus growing on the top of Tianshan Mountain.

He clearly saw that many people were secretly taking pictures of her. He originally wanted to do the same, but when he saw the barely perceptible furrow of her brow, he realized that she might find it offensive, so he reluctantly gave up the idea.

Two hours later, the hashtag #ShanghaiOperaMostBeautifulNewStudent# suddenly appeared on the trending topics list and firmly held the number one spot.

Chen Yunrang flooded the live square with comments, all of which were praising her beauty. Netizens were even quick enough to dig up Xu Wu's admission documents and name.

It spread rapidly like a virus, and within two days, not only the entire school, but also most of the students and teachers in the same department knew about this person.

“Her social media accounts have all been exposed,” Chen Yunrang said mysteriously, rubbing his arms. “Her account value increased by 300,000 in seven days.”

"Ah—" the boy exclaimed, opening his mouth wide in response. "This is terrifying!"

"That's right!" Chen Yunrang slapped his thigh excitedly, "And also, let me tell you..."

Xu Wu couldn't listen anymore. She touched her slightly flushed cheeks, glanced at the time on her phone screen, and stood up expressionlessly, saying, "It's time to go home. I'm leaving now."

"Hey, I haven't finished yet." Chen Yunrang was dumbfounded. He was about to stop her when he saw Xu Wu running away so fast that she disappeared from sight in just over ten seconds.

After turning the corner, Xu Wu walked quickly and arrived at the underground parking lot in almost no time. She looked up to find the license plate number, locked onto the target, walked over, opened the car door, and got in.

The door was closed.

Xu Wu sat in the back seat, pinching his neck, his bones creaking.

"How can it run so fast?" A clear, questioning female voice came from the driver's seat.

Xu Wu looked over, took the bottle of mineral water handed to him, unscrewed the cap, took a sip, and swelled his cheeks to the brim.

She swallowed, screwed the cap back on, tossed the water aside, leaned against the car door like a boneless creature, closed her eyes, and said wearily, "If I don't run faster, they'll keep talking about me forever."

"She's just curious," the woman teased, asking, "What did you think of the play?"

“It’s great,” Xu Wu said softly, “I can learn a lot.”

Although she signed a contract with YM during her freshman year, she only really appeared in the public eye this year with this play. Before freshman year, she would sometimes play small roles in art films directed by a few familiar seniors, sometimes with lines and sometimes without. There was nothing wrong with accumulating experience.

Initially, the company wanted to capitalize on her popularity by having her take on acting roles and make quick money, but Xu Wu objected to this approach. The condition they discussed later was to wait until she graduated.

This year, the company also assigned her an agent, Xu Jingshi, who is 28 years old and works in the driver's seat. In addition to her, she also manages four other artists.

"Here you go," Xu Jingshi said, holding the steering wheel with one hand and handing the phone to Xu Wu with the other. She glanced at Xu Wu's face in the rearview mirror, then looked away and said, "The play is doing pretty well. You have quite a few fans, but they're all pretty good. I've set up a fan group for you these past few days. Go in and start doing some promotions."

It's just one of the methods for solidifying powder, and Xu Wu doesn't reject it.

She obediently took it, clicked on Weibo, and saw that the number of private messages in the background kept increasing. She glanced at them briefly, picked out a few of the top replies, and then scrolled down, her gaze pausing.

This person's profile picture is a photo of Xu Wu, and their ID is Ying.

Xu Wu recognized this ID; it seemed she had been following her since her freshman year of college, sending her messages every day without fail, mostly just mundane and innocuous words.

She would occasionally reply when she was bored, but most of the time the other person was just talking to themselves, like a time clock.

"Ying: You must be tired after get off work ww. I watched Fog's performance, it was really great!"

Ying: I also really love, really love, really love this kind of fog ^^

wack.

Xu Wu stared intently at the emoticon at the end of the latest sentence, not even noticing that her hand was gripping the edge of the phone so tightly that it turned white. Her breathing became rapid and she felt like she couldn't breathe, and her heart was pounding so hard that she couldn't even hear her manager's incessant nagging. She closed her eyes in a disheveled state.

Why this expression? Why this particular expression of all?

Xu Wu was in a daze; how long had it been since she had thought of that person?

After her senior year of high school, she was so busy that she broke up with Fang Rumei over their differing aspirations. After entering university, she was either studying or traveling around, and she had no time to spare.

She thought... he should have forgotten it long ago.

How could someone like that deserve a place in her memory?

Xu Wu bit her lower lip tightly, her hands clenched into fists on her lap, the pain of her nails digging into her flesh did not bring her to her senses.

Suddenly, the car stopped.

Xu Wu snapped out of her daze and heard her agent say, "I've delivered it to you, you can go now."

She looked out the window and saw that it was indeed the gate of her residential complex.

So she composed herself, let out a breath, and was about to get out of the car when her agent called out to her, "Wait a minute."

Xu Wu looked over: "What's wrong?"

The agent frowned: "I heard from your neighborhood security guard the other day that there's a stalker around here. Be careful, and call the police if anything happens."

"Understood." Xu Wu nodded and got out of the car.

The agent was still worried and gave a few more instructions before stepping on the gas and leaving.

Xu Wu watched the car disappear from sight, then turned and walked towards Building No. 3.

It was only 8 p.m., and there were still quite a few people interacting in the neighborhood, but the further you went, the fewer people you saw.

Building No. 3 was built at the back, which may be why the rent was a bit cheaper than other buildings, and this was the main reason why Xu Wu chose it.

bite-

The elevator doors opened.

Xu Wu went inside and habitually leaned against a corner.

Just as the doors were about to close slowly, a hand suddenly reached in from the outside and blocked the middle, forcing the elevator doors to open to both sides again.

Xu Wumei's heart skipped a beat, and a bad premonition suddenly arose.

Just as my hand was about to touch the phone, the next second—

A clean, salty sea salt scent wafted over.

It subtly tantalized her senses.

Xu Wu was stunned.

He looked at the person who came in with a somewhat stiff expression.