Chapter 55.2: An Unconventional Group Variety Show (5)
Hearing the noise, Shen Xiu instinctively looked over at him, only to realize—he’d completely forgotten to remind his teammates not to eat too fast or they’d burn their throats.
After being burned, Song Chengwang had made such a commotion—everyone must have noticed by now, right?
Shen Xiu averted his gaze from Song Chengwang and quietly scanned the group. As expected, everyone was looking at him. Good, he thought, no need for me to say anything.
With sweet potato embarrassingly spit into his hand, Song Chengwang looked up—only to meet Shen Xiu’s cool, indifferent gaze, and immediately felt even more mortified.
Even though Shen Xiu had only glanced at him, Song Chengwang somehow felt like that calm, chilly look conveyed a clear message: ‘How do you even manage to burn your mouth eating sweet potato?’
The guests, team leads, and coaches were all seated in a circle. After eating a couple of pieces to fill his stomach, Hu Jiayan began following the program’s schedule and started asking questions in turn.
Hu Jiayan turned to the team leads: “As the two leads who followed the group leaders from start to finish—Teacher Qiao and Teacher Xuan—do you have any questions you’d like to ask your respective group leaders?”
Qiao Pengyi seemed like he’d been holding back for a while. He eagerly turned to ask Shen Xiu:
“Shen Xiu, based on what you said during the trip, does that mean you’d already figured out in advance exactly when you’d arrive at each location?”
Shen Xiu nodded slightly. “Yes.”
He didn’t mention that he had a bit of OCD. Before doing anything, he liked to break the task down into small, detailed segments—down to the exact time he should arrive at each location. Hitting each small milestone gave him a sense of accomplishment and made him secretly happy.
Qiao Pengyi gave Shen Xiu a big thumbs-up. “Impressive!”
“But I’m still curious—how were you so sure we’d be able to appear at the exact times and places you had in mind?”
The question was a bit long. Shen Xiu paused for two seconds to organize his thoughts before replying:
“By calculating based on everyone’s walking speed.”
Qiao Pengyi was momentarily speechless. It was just a forest-crossing task—who would’ve thought Shen Xiu would take it so seriously, even going so far as to calculate everything based on their walking pace?
No one disliked someone who took things seriously. The look everyone gave Shen Xiu now was filled not just with admiration, but unmistakable appreciation.
Xuan Yushu couldn’t help but speak up. “Old Qiao, stop hogging the questions—let me ask one.”
Hearing that his idol was about to ask him something, Shen Xiu instinctively straightened up. Despite his nerves, he couldn’t help but look at Xuan Yushu with hopeful eyes, anxiously waiting for the question.
As soon as Xuan Yushu spoke, he met Shen Xiu’s cool gaze, which made him sit up straighter. “My question is simple.”
“Please, go ahead!”
Xuan Yushu asked, “If you had taken the same route that Xiao Duan and I took from the beginning, would you have completed the task even faster?”
Oh, so that’s the question. Shen Xiu breathed a quiet sigh of relief and nodded. “Yes.”
“Route A is shorter than Route B.”
Duan Mingfei finally saw a chance to chime in. “It may be shorter, but it crosses a big river—that wastes a lot of time.”
Shen Xiu wasn’t thrilled that Duan Mingfei had interrupted his conversation with his idol—and he also found the comment odd. “There were three help opportunities. Getting airlifted across by helicopter isn’t exactly complicated, is it?”
While planning Route A, Shen Xiu had already decided to use one of the help options there. After all, he wasn’t sure if he’d be able to cut through the bamboo forest by the river, so in that uncertainty, it made perfect sense to just call for help without hesitation.
Duan Mingfei was stunned into silence. “……”
That had to be deliberate, he thought. Was Shen Xiu trying to make him look like a fool, wandering by the river, attempting to build a bamboo raft, and only calling for help as a last resort?
Xuan Yushu made no attempt to rescue Duan Mingfei from the awkwardness. Instead, he turned to Shen Xiu curiously. “What if you came across a steep slope? Would you call for help then too?”
Shen Xiu shook his head and repeated what he had already thought through in his mind: “The map was very detailed, with small on-site pictures. The slope wasn’t that steep—it would’ve been easy to descend using a rope.”
There was no need to call for help.
After hearing that, Xuan Yushu couldn’t even be bothered to spare Duan Mingfei’s dignity. He blurted out, “Why wasn’t I in Group A?!”
When Shen Xiu mentioned the rope, the livestream viewers suddenly remembered that Duan Mingfei hadn’t used his rope even once.
[Genuine question: what purpose did Duan Mingfei’s rope serve in this episode?]
[Uh… it added to his carry weight?]
[Hahaha. Gotta love those savage online neighbors.]
[Just like we Xiu Scholars guessed from the start—every step was within Captain Shen’s calculations!]
Qiao Pengyi suddenly seemed to remember something. “Oh right, Old Xuan—what did you guys eat the past two days?”
Qiao Pengyi couldn’t have hit a worse nerve. Xuan Yushu muttered dejectedly, “We drank river water.”
Qiao Pengyi: “…Hahaha—don’t glare at me like that, Old Xuan! I couldn’t help it! I didn’t even dare tell you we were eating wild loquats and chestnuts that were insanely delicious!”
As for water—they did come across small mountain streams, but Shen Xiu didn’t let them drink from them. He was worried they’d get sick.
Hearing Qiao Pengyi’s words, Xuan Yushu felt the urge to hit someone.
From these snippets of conversation, it wasn’t hard for Duan Mingfei to figure out that Group A’s life over the past two days had been worlds apart from Group B’s. He no longer had the heart to force his way into the conversation and instead lowered his head in silence, swallowing his humiliation while trying to project the image of someone feeling isolated, miserable, and pitiful.
At 2 p.m., the discussion session ended, and the production team escorted the guests out of Wolong Mountain.
Once outside, Shen Xiu and the others boarded the shuttle sent by the “Youth Unstoppable” production team to pick them up. After another bumpy journey—from off-road vehicles to planes—they finally landed at 9 a.m. the following day.
To avoid unnecessary congestion at the airport and delaying others’ schedules, the nine members, fully equipped, exited the airport separately and secretly got into the production team’s vehicle, heading to the training camp.
In the car, as it started moving, Xiang Yueting kept turning around to look behind. “I think I just saw the assistant director?”
The driver remained expressionless. “You saw wrong.”
—
Duan Mingfei landed later than the other nine, arriving at the airport at noon. As soon as he stepped out, he saw a large group of fans waiting for him, which gave him some comfort.
He thought to himself that playing the sympathy card had worked—quite a few fans had come to welcome him. Looking over the crowd, it was packed, and there were even cameras—seemed like a lot of fan site managers had come too.
Adjusting his facial expression, Duan Mingfei walked toward his fans looking dejected.
“He’s here, he’s here!”
“Hey, don’t push me!”
“You stepped on my foot…”
As Duan Mingfei was about to reach the fans, he frowned and tried to calm them: “Ming babies, don’t—”
Before he could finish, microphones suddenly popped out in unison from behind the so-called “fans” and were shoved in his face.
A barrage of questions bombarded Duan Mingfei.
“The fake sandbag video your former assistant exposed—was that real? Did you really use fake sandbags to deceive your fans? Is it true, like your assistant said, that you can’t even lift an 80-pound actress?”
“In the recording where you called your fans brain-dead—those are your true thoughts, aren’t they?”
“You can’t even carry a bucket of water—was your princess carry of the female lead in That Summer’s behind-the-scenes footage also staged?”
“What do you have to say about Lin Jiashi speaking out in your defense? Did you know each other before?”
“It’s said that Lin Jiashi has also signed with your agency. Were you aware of that?”
“Duan Mingfei, look over here—many of my fans want to take a photo with you.”
One question after another left Duan Mingfei completely confused. He never expected that, in addition to the entertainment journalists, there were also live-streamers. It was truly… a group of lunatics!
“Everyone, step aside, step aside. The truth will come out eventually. Those are all rumors and fake news. Media friends, don’t believe them…”
Du Heng, struggling with his assistant, pushed through the crowd and pulled the bewildered Duan Mingfei away.
Du Heng also didn’t understand what was going on. The so-called fans he had brought to welcome Duan Mingfei, intending to cheer him up, had transformed into a group of journalists.
And on top of that, when he and his assistant had entered, they were accidentally splashed with milk tea, so they had to go back and change their clothes, which delayed them just a little, and that was when Duan Mingfei got blocked.
Everything seemed too coincidental. Du Heng didn’t believe it wasn’t planned, but seeing that Duan Mingfei was upset, he didn’t dare to bring it up, only apologizing and saying it was his mistake.
Ten minutes later, in the underground parking lot.
In the car, Duan Mingfei was staring at his phone with a dark expression. After checking the trending topics about himself over the past two days, especially seeing his name alongside Lin Jiashi trending, his mood soured even more.
“What the hell, who is this Lin Jiashi?” Duan Mingfei muttered, staring at the Weibo post Lin Jiashi had made, feeling completely lost.
After years in the industry, he had always been the one feeding off others, but this was the first time he felt like he was the one being drained.
Du Heng whispered, “He’s the eliminated trainee from Youth Unstoppable who was cut during the first round of public voting.”
While Duan Mingfei was filming, Du Heng had watched Youth Unstoppable’s live streams from the beginning all the way to the present, especially because of Shen Xiu, so he was naturally familiar with Lin Jiashi’s story.
“He’s trying to replicate your success on Youth Unstoppable, but he failed and got eliminated.”
As Du Heng saw it, Lin Jiashi was just unlucky to have encountered Shen Xiu. Shen Xiu was strong and competitive, driving the whole production team like they’d been injected with adrenaline. Every time there was a vote, they stirred up trouble. There was no way to stay in the show by slacking off or manipulating behind the scenes.
Duan Mingfei suddenly blew up.
“What’s he even worth? Who does he think he is, trying to copy me?”
“Brother Ming, you’re right. That’s why he got eliminated.”
Duan Mingfei was still furious. He picked up his phone again and scrolled through the trending topics, seeing that many of his fans had gone to support Lin Jiashi. Thinking back to the awkward moment at the airport when he mistook the journalists for fans, his anger flared again.
He cursed aloud, “A bunch of idiots!”
“Brother Ming, please don’t be angry. We’ve already issued a statement saying that the money wasn’t enough, and that the former assistant deliberately edited the audio to smear you. That Summer’s production team has also been contacted and will cooperate with us to clarify everything.”
“But we still need you to reshoot the scene where you carry the female lead. This time, we’ll use a stunt double. The double is very light, so there won’t be any problems.”
一
In another car, the assistant director tossed aside his empty milk tea cup and climbed into the front passenger seat, gently removing his mask and sunglasses.
Inside the soundproofed car, the assistant director heard the familiar voice of the director coming from the back seat: “Did you hear that? Now, you should believe me that I didn’t leak any fake news, right?”
