CH 1

Lu Bai clenched his fist as he stood in front of a high-rise apartment building in Jinghai City. The corners of his mouth seemed to twitch as he stared at the dark brown door. After a while, he took a deep breath- as if finally making up his mind- and pounded the door in front of him— after all, pounding against the door instead of respectably ringing the doorbell was more in line with his character.

Soon, the door opened from the inside and a handsome roguish appeared. It was a young man with a pair of black eyes as sharp as a blade. The man was dressed sloppily. He was currently barefoot, wore a silk flower patterned shirt along with a mismatching pair of jeans. He yawned lazily, leaning on the door frame. He looked at Lu Bai with a raised eyebrow and spoke: “Why are you here?”

“Qin Gu-ge1” Lu Bai exposed his white teeth. The smile on his face was so bright it was almost blinding. “I missed you so much when you went abroad.”

Qin Gu ‘tsked’ and looked at Lu Bai with a cold smile. His raised eyebrow revealed a hint of disdain: “But I however, don’t want to see you.”

Lu Bai thought in his head, I am a villainous character, it would be frightening if you actually wanted to see me. While on the surface his face fell as if he was wronged and looked almost about to cry. “Qin Gu-ge…”

Seeing the look on Lu Bai’s face, Qin Gu’s brows furrowed slightly. The playful and careless smile grazing his eyes disappeared. His face cooled down completely as he spoke, “Your hypocritical appearance is still so disgusting.”

Lu Bai inwardly let out a helpless sigh upon hearing his words: He also didn’t want to do this ah…he thought in his mind. On the surface though, he pretended to be sad as his eyes reddened looking like he wanted to cry. Lu Bai thought that this was truly too difficult. Thinking of that, the stiffened corners of his lips twitched slightly—what was harder was that he had to continue acting as a villain and do horrible things to — the book’s protagonist shou, Qu Xueyu. Meanwhile, at Qin Gu’s house, Qu Xueyu would come out after a while, having heard the commotion outside. As a vicious supporting character, he had to angrily throw a tantrum and furiously warn Qu Xueyu to stay away from Qin Gu.

“Qin Gu-ge” Although at the moment, the other’s face was so cold that icicles could almost hang from it, Lu Bai braved himself to proceed in accordance with the plot. He looked at Qin Gu with reddened eyes full of expectation and said, “There is an auto show today. Would you go there with me? There’s this car I particularly like. If you want, I can buy it for you ah.” It’s the ignorant and incompetent dandies that are most fond of luxurious cars and watches. These same dandies also naturally think that others would like those too. But what Qin Gu hated the most were hypocritical people whose outside appearance never match what they feel within. Next, he hated superficial and vulgar people. The villainous supporting male, Lu Bai, unfortunately was exactly both of those.

Sure enough, Qin Gu’s expression became even more colder and he directly said, “Get out.”

“Qin Gu, what’s going on?”

At this moment, a voice came through from inside. The voice was clear and cold like winter. It sounded pleasant like ancient jade clinking against each other. Lu Bai was stunned when he heard the voice that his brows faintly twitched. A streak of light seemed to flash across his mind but he couldn’t catch it. When he came back to his senses, a man had already stood beside Qin Gu. With a pair of exquisitely clear phoenix eyes, the man subtly glanced towards Lu Bai.

Lu Bai looked at the good-looking man who seemed to be made of winter and his throat unconsciously bobbed. This was Qu Xueyu, the protagonist shou of the book 《Gu Xue》. He swore that the real person was at least a hundred times better looking than on the big screen. It was no wonder that those little fangirls were crazy like that. Thinking of that, he glanced at Qin Gu quite vaguely: With such a good-looking lover, the protagonist gong was really the author’s son.

In the book, the protagonist shou, Qu Xueyu and Qin Gu have known each other since childhood. He, like Qin Gu, was also born with a noble temperament and was proud and ambitious. In their youth, they were sworn enemies who were at each other’s throats. Later in the end, they had a mutual attraction and became very close friends. Still, even if they had developed feelings for each other, neither of them was willing to make the first move and yield to the other. They had to go through many twists and turns before they finally fell in love and had a happy ending. The ending of the story was perfectly beautiful and cliché. If it wasn’t for the fact that he was in this story, Lu Bai would be easily willing to give them loud cheers and applause. But it so happened that he was villainous supporting male who was determined to go between the two lovers2.

Thinking of that, Lu Bai secretly pinched his thigh and showed a hurt expression of disbelief. After his tears finally came out, his expression morphed into a fierce look as he pointed at Qu Xueyu and shouted: “Stay away from Qin Gu-ge! If I see you around him again, I will—” Originally the line after should have been that cliché and vicious ‘find someone to cut your face!’. But somehow, Lu Bai looked at those pair of clear piercing phoenix eyes and couldn’t utter those words. He could only end up weakly saying: “—will…will find someone to teach you a lesson!” cutting his succeeding momentum by half.

In the original text, the villanous supporting male Lu Bai, stepped forward to shove Qu Xueyu after saying those lines only for Qin Gu to stop him and ruthlessly throw him to the ground. Lu Bai then left heartbroken and embarrassed, menacingly vowing in his heart to teach Qu Xueyu a nice lesson.

Although, according to the plot, he wouldn’t hit Qu Xueyu, Lu Bai’s eyes still held a trace of apology. He then took a few steps forward. He clenched his teeth, closed his eyes and raised his hand towards Qu Xueyu. He also prepared himself to be thrown down to the ground by Qin Gu—in a moment the pain should hurt but he had to endure it for the sake of the plot.

Strangely, the expected pain didn’t come but the faint cold fragrance of peppermint filled his nose followed by his wrist being held by a pair of cold and frosty hands. Lu Bai was stunned. He opened his eyes and met a pair of eyes as clear as the night sky.

Qu Xueyu looked indifferently at the boy who was one head shorter than himself. He held the boy’s thin wrist in his grasp while his face revealed some suspicion: “Have I met you somewhere?”

Lu Bai’s eyes widened, struck dumb by Qu Xueyu’s question. He almost couldn’t even maintain his malicious expression: “Ah?”

Qu Xueyu pensively gazed at Lu Bai’s face, seemingly recalling something as his brows faintly creased. Lu Bai’s wrist was held by the other and he couldn’t get rid of his hold. His scalp tingled as he looked towards Qin Gu only to see him idly standing aside and crossing his arms, looking back at him with a smile that wasn’t a smile. He completely had no intention of defending Qu Xueyu nor helping him teach himself, the vicious supporting character, a lesson.

What’s going on with the plot?!

Lu Bai suffered a heavy blow in an instant. He closely looked at Qin Gu and desperately trying to hint at him: The vicious supporting character is provoking the protagonist shou. Such a great opportunity to show off, what the hell are you doing?

Qin Gu looked at the young man whose wrist was caught by his close friend and was looking towards him with reddened eyes. His eyes were filled with grievances. It seemed that the tip of Qin Gu was suddenly pricked by something in his heart. Something strange brewed inside him and Qin Gu’s brows slightly furrowed. He was just about to say something when he saw his close friend already releasing the hand. The young man then staggered back a few steps before immediately turning to flee without looking back.

“Who was that kid?” When the figure of the youth disappeared at the corner of the street, Qu Xueyu raised an eyebrow towards Qin Gu and asked.

Qin Gu suppressed the strange feeling in his heart and indifferently shrugged: “From the Lu Family. My follower3 that had been annoying me to death since childhood. He loves to act pitiful.”

He patted Qu Xueyu’s shoulder: “You know I hate those kinds of people the most.” saying that, he added, “But the new term at the university is about to start so even if he’s ignorant and incompetent, his father watches him closely. He won’t likely have the time to come here again. In any case, since you don’t like to stay at the main house, you can live here at ease.”

“No thanks.” Qu Xueyu smiled and said: “I came to Jing Hai to shoot a film. I just passed by here to see you. I still have something to do in a couple of days.”

“It’s okay.” Qin Gu nodded. “Tell me if you need help with anything.”

Qu Xueyu smiled: “Okay.”

At that moment, a “zi la4” sound was heard nearby. A blinding pink sports car stopped by the curb. The door opened and a young girl wearing a high ponytail and sunglasses that covered half her face briskly alighted the car. She hurried towards Qin Gu. Her lips were fiery red as she took a deep breath and said: “Has my brother5 been here?”

Qin Gu slovenly nodded his head.

The girl fiercely clenched her fist, her scarlet nails digging into her palm. She appeared somewhat angry and anxious as she spoke: “Surnamed Qin, if you don’t like my brother then stay away from him!” After saying this, she noticed Qu Xueyu watching passively by Qin Gu’s side. The girl’s eyes widened as she looked at Qu Xueyu and she abruptly faced Qin Gu.

“I’m warning you, surnamed Qin. If you already have someone then don’t play with my brother again! I’m warning you. If you dare hurt my brother, our Lu Family won’t let you off!”

Qin Gu sneered. He looked at the girl and stressed: “Lu Guanguan, your brother is the one chasing me. He has been chasing me since we were children. No matter how much I drive him away, I can’t get rid of him.”

“You……you……” the girl was so angry that she was rendered speechless. She ferociously glared at Qin Gu before turning around hurriedly walking away.

When the girl’s figure disappeared, Qu Xueyu eyed Qin Gu: “It’s rare to see you speaking so ruthlessly to a girl.”

Qin Gu coldly snorted in disdain: “What does Lu Bai’s matter have to do with her? He isn’t even her actual brother.”

“So that child’s name is Lu Bai?”

Qin Gu paused but nonetheless nodded, “Yes. Lu Bai. From ‘Tonight sees dew turn to frost’6. Contrary to him, the name is actually not bad. Unfortunately, only the name is not bad.” He then continued: “Aren’t you filming in Jing Hai? What’s your role?”

Qu Xueyu raised his eyebrows, a gleam of light flashing in his eyes, and said “A poor student with a warped mentality.”

Footnotes

ge means older brother, honorific for someone older than you and not necessarily related Literally 棒打鸳鸯 – break the pair of mandarin ducks (lovers) with a stick 跟屁虫 – someone who tags along sound of car engine she uses ge which means Lu Bai is her elder brother Lu Bai’s name comes from the Bai (白) in 露从今夜白 from Du Fu’s (杜甫) Thinking of My Younger Brothers on a Moonlit Night (月夜憶舍弟)