Chapter 10: Sharing a Restart Ritual
"Huh?" Song Yu was taken aback, but quickly realized, "Senior sister, you mean this? It's because Shen Yuheng forwarded a lucky koi fish on the Lantern Festival."
As Song Yu spoke, she took out her phone and showed the page to Jiang Xinglan. "Although his post was a bit out of the blue, I thought it looked pretty good, so I used it as my profile picture."
Jiang Xinglan looked at the post Shen Yuheng made on her phone screen, then looked up at Song Yu, "You mean the fifteenth of the first lunar month?"
“Yes,” Song Yu said, pulling her arm back. “We were all stunned when he posted it. Everyone was guessing that he had encountered some bad luck recently, and we even went to ask the studio.”
"Well," Jiang Xinglan lowered her head slightly, "did you receive a reply?"
“No,” Song Yu said, “but those big fan sisters said it’s nothing, Shen Yuheng just thought it was a holiday and fun, so he forwarded it.”
Jiang Xinglan withdrew her gaze and looked at the health pot steaming on her left, and said with a smile, "So that's how it is."
"It's good that you're alright."
"Yes, it's good that you're alright!" Song Yu nodded emphatically. "Then, Senior Sister, I'll go and get back to work."
"good."
After Song Yu left, the office returned to its usual quiet, with only the sound of the health pot slowly boiling.
Jiang Xinglan minimized the document page, opened the topic list, and clicked on Shen Yuheng's homepage.
Looking at the Weibo post he made on the fifteenth day of the first lunar month, and the various replies in the comments section.
As if possessed, Jiang Xinglan moved the mouse cursor to the orange button and then moved her index finger.
While saying that netizens' answers were unreliable, Shen Yuheng was actually browsing other replies. He received a notification and clicked on it without thinking.
J_Stella has become your new fan.
Shen Yuheng's mind went blank for a moment, then a huge wave of joy overwhelmed him. He stood up abruptly, startling Wei Yu who had just arrived. Wei Yu patted his chest, still shaken.
Why are you so startled!
Shen Yuheng had no interest in paying attention to him. After the immense joy came a sense of unreality. He cautiously clicked into his fan list, afraid that everything that had just happened was just an illusion.
But he breathed a sigh of relief when he saw the ID he had watched countless times sitting steadily in his follower list.
"Brother Wei! So forwarding lucky koi fish actually works!" Shen Yuheng still felt a little dazed, clutching his phone tightly, an uncontrollable smile on his lips.
"Hey! How did you know I came here with good news?" Wei Yu took out a stack of documents from his briefcase. "These are the notebooks that were recently handed to me. Take a look."
"Huh?" Shen Yuheng was taken aback for a moment, then reached out and took the script, looking at it seriously.
“It’s a film related to scientific research,” Wei Yu poured himself a glass of water. “Recently, the authorities have been paying more attention to scientific research and hope that the public can learn more about researchers.”
"Because you performed well at the gala, and given your good reputation and influence over the years, plus the added boost from your social media activity, we sent you an invitation to play a scientist dedicated to biology."
“I’ve seen it. It’s a bit like a documentary, with many segments. It might not be a big box office hit, but it’s very meaningful, and,” Wei Yu paused for a moment, “it coincides with your thoughts.”
Shen Yuheng hummed in response, but did not reply immediately. After reading his part, he cleared his throat and said, "Isn't this too professional?"
Shen Yuheng was somewhat worried. It involved various experimental techniques and equipment, and it seemed to be a realistic recreation of scientific research scenarios. Although he had read a few papers, that was all he knew.
“Training will be arranged in advance,” Wei Yu showed Shen Yuheng the invitation page, “and professionals will be invited to provide guidance during filming.”
Shen Yuheng remained silent, stroking the cover of the script with his palm—"Starlight Never Fails".
This script is indeed of great benefit to me, from any perspective.
But can I really shoulder such a significant responsibility?
Seeing that Shen Yuheng was still hesitating, Wei Yu asked incredulously, "Yuheng, you're not going to turn it down, are you?!"
Shen Yuheng remained silent. Wei Yu grew anxious, stood up, and explained to Shen Yuheng, "This is a rare opportunity! You can't possibly not understand what it means for you to star in this film, can you?"
"This means mainstream recognition, and it means an improvement in your image from now on!"
"Besides, haven't you been thinking about how to spend more time with her these past few days? Now that you've taken this role, you have a reason!"
Shen Yuheng sighed, looked up, and said with a complicated expression, "Brother Wei, you can't calculate it like that."
Shen Yuheng turned to a page in the script and said, "Look, it says that Lin Yuan experimented hundreds of times but still couldn't find the optimal conditions."
"This is just a brief line in the script, but it is based on the real experiences of researchers."
"They are focused, persistent, and willing to do anything for scientific research. They are constantly driving the world forward. The quiet strength they possess is difficult to express through acting."
Wei Yu paused for a moment, then softened his tone, "I understand. But it's precisely because you have these concerns that you'll be more attentive during filming, resulting in a more authentic and convincing final product, isn't it?"
"Um."
"Besides, you know Dr. Jiang, and you can learn about researchers from her, which will be helpful for your filming, right?"
"Um."
"so?"
“Brother Wei,” Shen Yuheng raised his head, his eyes becoming firm, “I’ve accepted this role. Could you please help me make some connections? I’d like to audit some courses at any school, online courses are fine too.”
“Okay, I’ll arrange this,” Wei Yu reassured him. “Don’t feel too much pressure. This is just in the preparation stage. There’s still some time before filming starts. Besides, we’ll arrange training once all the personnel are confirmed.”
Nevertheless, Shen Yuheng put aside everything else for the next two months and focused on studying the script.
Thanks to my communication with Jiang Xinglan over the past few months, I'm not completely clueless when I encounter more technical parts.
Compared to Shen Yuheng's experiment, Jiang Xinglan's experiment was not going as smoothly.
The laboratory lights were particularly glaring in the early hours of the morning, unintentionally creating a restless atmosphere.
Jiang Xinglan stared at the experimental data on the computer screen—the fluorescence content at the neuronal synapse cells was 0, like a silent mockery, disturbing her thoughts.
Since assigning Song Yu her next task, Jiang Xinglan has been trying to deliver the SER3-expressed protein into the neural synapse cell region.
For the past two months, Jiang Xinglan has tried various delivery methods to cross the blood-brain barrier, but all have failed.
An inner restlessness arose, like a finely woven spider web, tightly binding Jiang Xinglan.
She closed her eyes, took a deep breath, leaned back in her chair, and pondered her next move.
But what comes to mind is—koi fish.
Jiang Xinglan picked up her phone, went to Shen Yuheng's profile, and found the koi fish's post.
Her finger hovered over the "share" button, but she hesitated to press it.
"Actually, this is completely useless."
Jiang Xinglan told herself this.
"But I need a sense of ritual, a sense of restarting."
At that moment, Jiang Xinglan's rationality seemed to have run away from home, and her sensibility, which had almost disappeared in the laboratory, resurfaced—prompting her to press the button.
"Just once," Jiang Xinglan said to herself silently. "Just treat it as an instruction to clear my mind."
Press your finger to forward successfully.
Almost instantly, a "forwarded successfully" notification appeared, unlike the previous frustration.
A huge sense of incongruity, even absurdity, enveloped her.
"Jiang Xinglan, are you crazy?" Jiang Xinglan's rationality prevailed. Without a moment's hesitation, she found the post and deleted it decisively.
It was as if nothing had happened.
---
In another location, Shen Yuheng was leaning back on the sofa checking his fans' comments when a notification suddenly popped up on his phone screen:
"@J_Stella retweeted your post: 【@沈聿珩: Retweet this lucky koi...】"
Before his brain could process it, Shen Yuheng quickly took a screenshot.
Then, before the notification disappeared, I clicked on it.
But then I saw a glaring notification: This post does not exist.
Shen Yuheng quickly checked the album, and the screenshot clearly proved that she had forwarded it, but... then immediately deleted it.
Complex emotions surged within Shen Yuheng, but in the end, they all turned into heartache.
He naturally thought that Jiang Xinglan hadn't shared any new research findings on her WeChat Moments for almost two months.
Moreover, during this period, she stopped including links to her papers in her replies, and the intervals between her replies also became longer.
Shen Yuheng knew very well that Jiang Xinglan was a very rational person.
What kind of thing happened that made her, who is usually rational, do such an irrational thing?
The image that flashed before his eyes was Jiang Xinglan in the laboratory, frowning slightly as she looked at the failed experimental data.
Shen Yuheng switched to the chat software, and the cursor blinked silently in the input box.
He wanted to post something, but didn't know what he could post.
Firstly, he had no position, and he felt powerless, not only because he had no solution at this moment, but also because he had been powerless in every similar moment over the past eight years.
Secondly, he also knew very well that Jiang Xinglan did not want anyone to capture this moment of vulnerability in her.
A wave of intense, bittersweet emotion washed over Shen Yuheng; at this moment, he truly felt it—
Unbeknownst to him, someone was bearing an immense burden.
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