Chapter 23: Adding Unnecessary Details
In summary, no matter what the external rumors said, regarding Lu Xu buying his own outfits, Xie Qingyang and the others claimed they had no knowledge of it. Lu Xu, for his part, didn’t have much evidence to prove otherwise.
As members of Verse, they were simply following the stylist’s instructions for wardrobe coordination.
[It’s obviously the company’s fault, so why blame it on his teammates?]
[+1. There were so many opportunities to speak up while they were in the group. Why wait until now? Isn’t this just trying to leech off Xie Qingyang and the others’ popularity?]
[It’s the company’s fault, and yet Xie Qingyang is still willing to take the blame. He’s truly gone above and beyond for Verse. Honestly, I don’t think anyone loves Verse more than Xie Qingyang does.]
[Maybe I’m not sensitive enough, but I really don’t think there’s much to this so-called V-school. If you overanalyze, even normal comments will seem shady.]
[+1. Lu Xu should just focus on his acting career. Why obsess over his former teammates?]
[@LuXu Can’t wait to broadcast every grievance to the world, but when it comes to taking money, not a word, huh?]
Before Lin Ge Entertainment released its statement, Lu Xu truly hadn’t known that Xie Qingyang and the others had transferred money to him. Upon checking, he found that his account did, in fact, have a new deposit.
While Lu Xu was checking his phone, hashtags like #Verse Transfers and #Xie Qingyang A True Gentleman quickly climbed the trending charts.
[Lu Xu only blames his teammates without distinguishing right from wrong, doesn’t he? Can he apologize to his uninformed teammates?]
[What else do you want after transferring the money? Can you not be so disgusting?]
Lu Xu: “…”
He could only be thankful that the crew had given them a day off today. Since his home wasn’t far from the set, he didn’t have to make a long trip back.
He had been busy until the evening, and only then did he finally have time to post a Weibo update.
Lu Xu: [Are you guys short on money lately? Do you need me to help you out a bit?]
Attached below were multiple shopping receipts, three transfer records, and a donation certificate.
Xie Qingyang and the other two teammates had each transferred him 100,000 yuan, and Lu Xu refunded all three amounts in full.
In addition to that, he directly donated 500,000 yuan to a charity organization.
Thanks to the original receipts he had kept, Lu Xu spent a long time preparing the documents to post online.
[Emmm, how should I put this? Although they gave him money, it felt like a bit too little.]
[Is this amount meant to be charity for beggars? I’m dying of laughter. They gave 300,000 yuan, and Lu Xu didn’t accept it, then he donated 500,000 on his own.]
[Is Lin Ge Entertainment trying to disgust Lu Xu on purpose? Covering the styling costs for music show stages and various event appearances out of his own pocket must have cost millions. And then, you each casually transferred him 100,000 yuan? So generous and magnanimous, huh?]
[Transferring 100,000 yuan while spending 2 million yuan to push it to the top of the trending list? Lu Xu really thanks you for that.]
[…People say Verse members made millions a day at their peak. Thank you so much for sparing one-tenth of your daily income to Lu Xu.]
Fans felt that the screenshots of the transfer records posted by Lu Xu starkly contrasted with the top two trending terms on the hot search list.
Initially, fans didn’t think Lu Xu’s situation was that miserable. However, after seeing the transfer records, they realized that Lu Xu might be in an even worse state than they had imagined.
[It’s fine if they don’t want to admit anything, but 100,000 yuan… It feels like Lu Xu was humiliated all over again.]
[How could they have the nerve to transfer only 100,000 yuan???]
[…And Yao Yuan even left a comment on Xie Qingyang’s Weibo, calling him the best idol and the most dignified captain in his heart.]
Fans became furious as soon as they saw Yao Yuan’s name—more so than they were with the other Verse members.
Back in the Verse days, it was Lu Xu who had the closest relationship with Yao Yuan. Lu Xu took such good care of him, yet after the group disbanded and Lu Xu was kicked out by Lin Ge Entertainment, Yao Yuan turned around and clung to Xie Qingyang instead.
Fortunately, fans didn’t stay angry for too long.
Because!!
Lu Xu was the kind of person who spoke his mind!
When Yao Yuan commented on Xie Qingyang’s post, praising him for transferring money to Lu Xu, Lu Xu silently made his way to the comment section and replied to Yao Yuan:
[I lent you 6 million yuan back then and didn’t even charge interest. Shouldn’t I be the best, best, best (60 times over) idol in your heart?
Come on, praise me!]
He even tagged Xie Qingyang as well:
[If you’re truly struggling, I can lend you money. It’ll definitely be more than 100,000.]
6 million = 60 times 100,000.
Lu Xu could still do the math.
[Praise, praise, praise! The best idol, Lu Xu!!]
[…This is exactly why people say small favors are cherished, while great kindness breeds resentment. Transferring 100,000 makes you the kindest, but lending 6 million earns you hate instead.]
[By the way, this isn’t Lu Xu’s first donation receipt. He’s donated many times before. It’s just that in the past, some people claimed those donations were made by the entire Verse group.]
[I’ve also heard what the commenter above said. Honestly, Lu Xu is truly dignified. He endured everything for so long before finally speaking about what he went through. If it were me, I couldn’t have held back at all!]
[Has Lin Ge Entertainment completely lost their minds? Why do they keep doing things that harm others without benefiting themselves? It’s like they’re showcasing some bizarre kind of brainstem deficiency.]
…
Yao Yuan was on the verge of losing it.
…He had only gone to Xie Qingyang’s Weibo to gloat a little when he saw Lu Xu getting into trouble. After all, the two were partners on Fog Level. Recently, Yao Yuan had lost a lot of fans due to his debts, and Xie Qingyang had subtly shown his disdain for him. But now, with revelations about how Lu Xu was mistreated during his time in Verse, Xie Qingyang’s popularity was also taking a hit.
The two of them decided they might as well stop disliking each other and continue hyping up their “CP” pairing for clout.
With the new season of Fog Level airing and both of them as permanent cast members, they had to generate fresh topics for the show.
Seeing that Xie Qingyang finally had a chance to turn things around, Yao Yuan couldn’t resist running to his Weibo to act like a sycophant. But instead of focusing on Xie Qingyang, Lu Xu turned all his attention to Yao Yuan.
[I lent you 6 million yuan, didn’t I? Praise me!]
[Come on, praise me!]
[Praise me already!]
Yao Yuan: “…”
What was wrong with this guy?
How many times had Lu Xu copy-pasted the same comment? Wasn’t it enough?
To make things worse, Lu Xu seemed to have attracted a swarm of equally eccentric fans, who started calling him adorable in Yao Yuan’s comment section.
Adorable? Seriously?
Yao Yuan: “…”
The world had officially gone mad.
But it didn’t end there.
The next day, Yao Yuan turned on his TV and switched to the entertainment channel, only to see the face he despised the most being interviewed.
In the interview, Lu Xu looked genuinely concerned as he said, “I didn’t realize Lin Ge Entertainment’s financial situation had become so dire. Is it because Rising Sun still hasn’t found a replacement director?”
“If that’s the case, I won’t bother suing over the commission my manager withheld. After all, Lin Ge Entertainment is struggling so much—I wouldn’t want to see my manager end up in jail…”
Yao Yuan: “!”
At this moment, he was certain—Lu Xu was a complete lunatic!!
However, considering that Lu Xu even kept shopping receipts from years ago, there was no guarantee he didn’t have other evidence in his hands.
…
Meanwhile, Gu Sinian and his manager, who had decided to stay low-key: “…”
This whole mess was stirred up by Xie Qingyang. The backlash from the money transfer scandal was also directed at Xie Qingyang and Yao Yuan. Gu Sinian thought he could at least avoid getting caught in this storm.
But then—Lu Xu dragged his manager into it again!
After Verse disbanded, the manager who originally handled all four members became exclusively responsible for Gu Sinian.
Gu Sinian suddenly realized that the joke “No matter who insults Lu Xu, Lu Xu only insults Gu Sinian” had somehow become a reality.
Gu Sinian glanced at his manager. The manager’s face, which had been slightly red, had now turned pale. Whatever he was thinking, it clearly wasn’t good. Though he kept muttering, “This is slander,” his expression betrayed him completely.
After a long pause, Gu Sinian finally heard his manager say, “Do you think Lu Xu might really let it go?”
“I don’t know.” Gu Sinian sighed. “Whose idea was it to only transfer 100,000 yuan?”
He had actually opposed it.
Gu Sinian might be stingy, but he had suffered at Lu Xu’s hands a few times before. While the company’s marketing strategy was supposedly for their benefit, the problem was that marketing only worked if the target followed conventional logic.
—Lu Xu was not that kind of person.
Unfortunately, Lin Ge Entertainment’s higher-ups and managers had grown dissatisfied with Gu Sinian recently, which had significantly diminished his influence. He had no say in the company’s decisions.
Even though he’d just been scolded as an “idiot” by several of the company’s higher-ups, he would never have agreed to transfer only 100,000 yuan to Lu Xu.
So, who was the real idiot here?
…
At this point, Yao Yuan actually felt a sense of relief.
Although Lu Xu had been acting like a madman, insisting he praise him, Yao Yuan took a good look at the situation and still thought the other Verse members were worse off.
People, it seems, only feel content when they have something to compare themselves to.
Yao Yuan: “…”
Since when did he become so easy to please?
He silently reminded himself that, no matter what happened in the future, it would be best to steer clear of anything and anyone related to Lu Xu.
Seriously, he suspected that Lu Xu was his personal nemesis.
…
To be honest, Lu Xu still couldn’t wrap his head around Lin Ge Entertainment’s actions. If they had transferred several hundred thousand or even millions, the gesture would have carried enough weight to be convincing.
But 100,000? They might as well have not transferred anything at all.
What Lu Xu didn’t realize was that Lin Ge Entertainment wasn’t as wealthy as he imagined. Buying trending topics, investing in dramas, securing roles for Gu Sinian, and training new talent had all drained the company’s resources.
The other three members of Verse were indeed money-makers, but they had already signed all their major contracts. Due to the recent controversies, they hadn’t landed any new deals, and a few existing contracts weren’t being renewed.
Xie Qingyang and Meng Qin didn’t even want to transfer money to Lu Xu in the first place. They felt no genuine guilt and only did it for the sake of appearances with the fans.
The bigger issue was that, back when Lu Xu was still under Lin Ge Entertainment, he had come across as naïve and foolish.
The company assumed Lu Xu hadn’t changed.
After all, even the fact that he had to buy his own performance outfits was exposed by netizens, not something Lu Xu himself had revealed.
From that perspective, Lu Xu didn’t seem all that different from before.
However, the question of clearing Verse’s reputation seemed less important now. What mattered was whether Lu Xu truly had evidence of his manager withholding his commission.
Beyond that, if the manager dared to withhold Lu Xu’s earnings—which dated back to the Verse era—was it possible that the manager had also been skimming from Xie Qingyang and the others?
If that were the case, then for Lin Ge Entertainment, it would mean endless internal and external troubles.
“Why on earth did we have to provoke Lu Xu?”
Looking back, they shouldn’t have gone the extra mile by transferring the money. It would have been simpler to deny everything and claim Xie Qingyang and the others were unaware. Fans wouldn’t have blamed them. But now, this move had handed Lu Xu ammunition on a silver platter.
Loool their PR people are sure hard at work.