Chapter 45
At the entrance of the student activity center, two exceptionally good-looking men stood on either side, each holding an umbrella.
Because of its eye-catching appearance, passersby, whether students or faculty, would glance at it more or less.
When Xiang Wan came out, she saw this melodramatic scene, which was even more exciting than an eight o'clock drama in a TV series, provided that she wasn't the protagonist.
The students who were passing by glanced at her twice when they saw her come out.
Xiang Wan suppressed the embarrassment of her toes digging into the ground, and faced with the occasional stares from others, she chose to facepalm.
Without much hesitation, she quickly walked to Chen Yan's umbrella: "Let's go."
Seeing Xiang Wan walk under his umbrella, Chen Yan, though he had expected it, couldn't help but feel a little pleased: "Mm."
The rain wasn't heavy, but it was coming down suddenly, and the two of them sharing an umbrella inevitably got wet.
To minimize Xiang Wan's exposure to the rain, Chen Yan instinctively tilted the umbrella towards her. However, this resulted in his shoulders getting wet even more.
Feeling embarrassed, Xiang Wan walked a little too fast. When she realized that despite the heavy rain, she hadn't gotten wet at all, she looked back and saw that Chen Yan's shoulder was soaked by at least half of his clothes.
She frowned and looked up at him, until she met his beautiful phoenix eyes. She gave him a half-smile and realized for the first time that Chen Yan seemed to have the potential to be a green tea bitch.
She gripped the middle of the umbrella handle and straightened it without any room for argument: "The umbrella is big, you don't need to get wet."
On the rest of the way, Xiang Wan stopped walking very fast and slowed down her pace.
She didn't look at Zhou Chengze following behind them, nor did she say a word to him.
Suddenly, her phone vibrated in her pocket. Xiang Wan took it out and glanced at it. It was a text message from Che Nanbei. She opened it and read it.
Which umbrella did you ultimately choose?
Xiang Wan pursed her lips and replied with only a string of ellipses.
When the three of them returned to the small auditorium, everyone pretended not to know anything, except for the occasional subtle glances from the trio.
Xiang Wan pretended not to see it and ignored it all.
During rehearsals, she tried to avoid eye contact with Zhou Chengze, but whether it was her imagination or not, his gaze would always seem to sweep over her.
It carried a slight hint of resentment, or perhaps a sense of grievance.
It was like a young wife silently coaxing her husband; this analogy that suddenly came to mind sent a chill down Xiang Wan's spine.
But remembering the good deeds Zhou Chengze had committed in her previous life, her expression turned cold, blocking all his gazes...
*
A small incident occurred the day before the school anniversary gala.
Their waltz rehearsed in the small auditorium was filmed by students who were watching and uploaded to the internet.
Although it gained popularity immediately upon uploading, it only circulated within a small circle until someone in the comments recognized the woman in the princess dress as President Xiang of the Xiang Group, at which point the video went viral.
That very evening, it became a trending topic, with its popularity soaring to unprecedented heights. Within a minute of trending, it garnered tens of thousands of comments.
If I'm not mistaken, this is the eldest daughter of the Xiang family...
[You're so out of touch, the person upstairs was already General Manager Xiang two years ago.]
Am I the only one whose attention is drawn to their court attire?
[It looks like a Cinderella princess dress, so is this a stage play?]
[Oh my god!! A 1993 graduate passing by, this is the small auditorium of Beiyi University, I'm absolutely sure I'm not mistaken.]
…
Soon, even the list of performers for Beiyi University's anniversary celebration was uncovered by resourceful netizens, and the stage play "Cinderella's Dancing Shoes" on the list was quickly identified by netizens.
It's no secret that Xiang Wan is a student at Bei Yi University. Combined with the tweet that Bei Yi University's official Weibo account reposted a couple of days ago, even Bei Yi University's anniversary gala became a trending topic in just a few hours.
The top three trending search terms on Weibo are:
#WaltzTowardsDongguan
#List of performers for Beiyi University's Anniversary Gala
#Stage play "Cinderella's Dancing Shoes"
Netizens loudly called for a live broadcast of the anniversary celebration. Within just one night, the buzz exploded, even attracting the attention of the president of Beiyi University and high-ranking officials from the Ministry of Education.
Meanwhile, a group of people, completely unaware of what was happening online, were rehearsing in the small auditorium.
Tomorrow is the school anniversary, and today is the last day of rehearsals. Time is tight and the task is heavy. Everyone changed into their heavy court costumes and put on their makeup. Just as they pulled back the curtain, they saw the principal and a group of leaders sitting in the audience.
"..."
"..."
The group was somewhat bewildered, and even Xiang Wan, who was waiting backstage, was a little confused.
The distance was quite far, but if she wasn't mistaken, the person in the center position should be the district party secretary of Beiyi City.
Although Beiyi University is a well-known university, does a university's anniversary celebration, especially one that is just a rehearsal, really need the district party secretary to come and inspect it personally?
Offstage, the leader gestured for them to relax and just rehearse as usual, saying that they were just there to watch. Only then did the group grit their teeth and finish the performance.
The audience was quite a distance from the stage, so it was impossible to tell whether they were male or female. In addition, since it was just a rehearsal and no loudspeakers were used, the leaders didn't notice anything amiss.
Even after the rehearsal ended and the curtain was lowered again, they were all still cheerful, discussing that tomorrow's performance should be good.
However, Shi Sheng, the student council president who accompanied the leader, kept wiping cold sweat from her forehead. She remembered that when she looked at the application list, Xiang Wan was supposed to play Cinderella, so how did Chen Yan become the one playing the role?
When the rehearsal ended, the leaders wanted to say a few words to the lead actors, but Shi Sheng quickly took them away to inspect the next program, saying that it might make them too nervous.
Meanwhile, the people in the small auditorium, having guessed that Shi Sheng would return, all waited for her without removing their makeup. Sure enough, she arrived within minutes.
She came alone again. Looking at the group of four, she felt like crying but couldn't. She remembered that in the waltz video, everything seemed normal.
Shi Sheng walked over quickly and put her arms around Xiang Wan and Che Nanbei's shoulders: "You guys really gave me a big surprise."
In the entire small auditorium, only Che Nanbei failed to grasp the hidden meaning in her words, and even said with some pride, "We came up with it later."
Shi Sheng: "..."
Everyone: "..."
Xiang Wan put her hand to her forehead, thinking it was just a charity performance, and Shi Sheng's reaction seemed a bit unusual. What she was more concerned about was why the district party secretary would come to Beiyi University for an inspection.
Not wanting to dampen her friend's enthusiasm, she casually explained on behalf of Che Nanbei, "Cross-dressing is more attention-grabbing."
More than just trending topics.
The comments from netizens will be a hot topic during tomorrow's live broadcast.
The internet is flooded with trending topics!!
Shi Sheng looked at the group, her expression indescribable. If even one of them knew how to use the internet, they wouldn't be in such a predicament now.
Her gaze swept over the eight people in front of her, still somewhat incredulous: "By the way, are you all on 2G networks?"
"..."
All eight of them were somewhat out of the loop, but from what they heard, it seemed that something big was happening online, but they were unaware of it.
The group exchanged glances and started scrolling through their phones. The trio opened Weibo, while Chen Yan and his sister Zhou Chengze opened the news headlines.
As for Xiang Wan, she opened Secretary Huang's chat window. She remembered that Secretary Huang had sent her a video in the morning and asked her to watch it.
She had a gut feeling that it might be related to this video, so she opened it and glanced at it, and roughly understood Shi Sheng's unusual behavior.
The trio opposite them also found the trending topic, and everyone was gathered around Jiang Zhuochun's phone, watching the video.
After the video finished playing, all eight people looked at Shi Sheng, who put one hand to her forehead and smiled bitterly: "Is it possible for you to rehearse the initial version in 21 hours?"
Even if they don't eat, drink, or sleep, they only have 21 hours left.
Starting over within 21 hours means that not only will Xiang Wan and Chen Yan's dresses need to be re-customized, but it's also uncertain whether the characters' lines will be mixed up.
"..."
Faced with the unanimous silence of the eight people, Shi Sheng knew it was impossible, so she simply gave up and comforted herself by saying, "Maybe the netizens will forget about it tomorrow."
"Besides, your show was scheduled as the grand finale, so maybe not many people will watch until the end..."
Shi Sheng kept muttering to herself, while the eight people opposite her, seeing the trending topic still at number one, tacitly refrained from adding fuel to the fire...
*
Time flew by and the day of the school's anniversary arrived.
This school anniversary celebration was a large-scale event, with not only school leaders and senior officials in attendance, but also district-level officials.
The number of attendees far exceeded expectations, so they temporarily moved to a large auditorium that could accommodate 4,000 people.
Even so, some people still didn't have seats.
Perhaps because of the trending topic, many media outlets and reporters also came to the school anniversary celebration, carrying cameras and photography equipment and standing in the middle of the aisle.
The gala started quickly, beginning with some dance performances as an opening act, followed by skits, singing performances, and creative programs.
As the gala drew to a close, it was finally time for the grand finale stage play.
The host's voice was enthusiastic: "Let's give a round of applause to the Class of 2018 and Class of 2020 for their stage play 'Cinderella's Dancing Shoes'."
"The director is Che Nanbei from the 2018 Animation class, the screenwriter is Jiang Nan from the 2018 Chemistry class, and the cast includes Xiang Wan, Shen Feiyang, and Jiang Zhuochun from the 2018 Finance class, and Chen Yan, Zhou Chengze, and Zhou Xinyi from the 2020 Finance class."
The host was still reading out a long list of performers, while in the live stream on the other side, the barrage of comments was nonstop.
[It's here! I was getting sleepy, but I've finally waited for it!]
[Addendum to the comment above; older people tend to get sleepy watching these kinds of variety shows.]
Did I come to the wrong place? Is this the waltz stage play?
[It is it, it is it, it is... please continue from downstairs.]
Our hero—Little Nezha!
[Here for President Xiang, looking forward to it...]
As the stage curtain slowly rose, the comments section finally quieted down for a while.
In the front row of the audience, several leaders were also discussing in hushed tones:
"Is this the one we saw in the small auditorium the other day?"
The principal adjusted his glasses, a hint of pride in his voice: "These are all students from our school's top-tier programs, specifically finance."
Jiang Juncang sat next to the principal. He was also a sponsor of the school's anniversary celebration, so he sat in the first row with several other leaders.
Although he, as a junior, didn't interrupt much during their conversation, he still smiled along. Then his phone vibrated in his pocket, and Jiang Juncang took it out and glanced at it.
It was a message from Jiang Zhuochun. He raised an eyebrow, just about to ask how his younger brother could still have time to send him a message when his stage play was about to start.
Zhuo Chun: "Brother, don't be too shocked when you watch it."
After reading the text message from his younger brother, Jiang Juncang raised an eyebrow and looked at the curtain gradually rising on the stage, without saying a word.
Although he didn't speak, a hint of expectation appeared in his eyes...
The curtain was completely pulled up, revealing Cinderella's full appearance on the stage.
Because the auditorium is very large and far from the audience seating, there are high-definition screens on both sides of the auditorium that magnify the people on the stage to ensure that even people in the last row can see them clearly.
On the huge stage, Chen Yan, dressed in women's clothing, is pretending to clean in a Western-style palace bedroom set.
At the same time, his full view on stage was also simultaneously transmitted to the official live broadcast room of Beiyi University through high-definition cameras.
In the live stream room, a barrage of comments scrolled by rapidly:
[Hahahaha, what the heck is this?! A 186cm Cinderella?! Is this for real?!]
If I'm not mistaken, the actress playing Cinderella is a boy...
[I'm telling you, with my 24k pure gold titanium alloy eyes, it's absolutely, unequivocally, a boy.]
So is this a case of cross-dressing? People are here because of Mr. Xiang's good looks!
[And this isn't Xiang Wan, is it?]
In just one minute, the number of viewers in Beiyi University's official live stream surged from over 50,000 to over 60,000...
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