Chapter 127.1: The Variety Show Ends
Shen Xiu: “Zroscat kitten food.”
Xu Qingchen: “…” What the heck?
Hearing that name, Xu Qingchen’s mind went completely blank. He stared for a few seconds before finally saying, “Haha, yeah, sounds good, sounds good.”
[Z brand’s pellets are so different from all the other brands—how is this even a question? Speechless.]
[The moment Boss Xiu said the answer, Xu Qingchen had that classic look of dumb confusion all over him.]
Seeing Xu Qingchen speechless, Shen Xiu suddenly blurted out—thinking about the bag of cat food that Lucky and Wang Cai nearly ate: “What kind of cat food do you feed Wang Cai?”
Right after he said it, the heat in Shen Xiu’s head—sparked by irritation—cooled down, and he snapped back to his senses.
Realizing how passive-aggressive that question had sounded, Shen Xiu: “…”
Even though once again his mouth had acted faster than his brain, this time Shen Xiu didn’t feel like taking it back at all. Since he’d already asked, he just stared directly at Xu Qingchen, determined to see how he’d answer.
[Boss Xiu is 100% laying a trap here!]
[Calm on the outside while digging a verbal pitfall—good luck, Xu Qingchen.]
Xu Qingchen hadn’t expected Shen Xiu to turn the question back on him, and a flicker of surprise passed through his eyes.
Shen Xiu initiating a conversation with him—wasn’t that a sign of reconciliation?
The tension in Xu Qingchen’s body slowly eased. He recalled how last night, while rolling up the cat food bag and stuffing it into a box, he’d seen the brand name on the packaging. After thinking for a few seconds, he finally remembered and answered: “I’ve always been feeding Moe.”
Even though everyone already knew the answer, hearing Xu Qingchen say it out loud still made them furious.
Xu Qingchen’s fans had tried to defend him before, but now that he had admitted it himself, they couldn’t say a word in his defense.
Shen Xiu: “You’ve been feeding that for over three years?”
Xu Qingchen nodded: “Of course. Wang Cai loves it. He’s super picky—only eats this brand, won’t touch anything else. It’s a real headache.”
Even now, Xu Qingchen didn’t forget to shape Wang Cai’s image in the public eye as a “difficult to please” cat.
He waited a few seconds, saw that Shen Xiu was just staring at him without speaking, and asked with a puzzled look, “What’s wrong?”
Shen Xiu’s anger hit its peak. His head buzzed with fury, and he blurted out without thinking: “Nothing. I just wanted to ask—what about the previous Wang Cai?”
Cases of cats dying after eating M-brand food were all too common. According to Xu Qingchen, he’d adopted Wang Cai over three years ago, and it had been eating Moe this whole time. No matter how strong a cat was, it couldn’t survive that.
[Boss Xiu doesn’t disappoint—so blunt, so ruthless. I love it!]
[Anyone who paid any attention would know that Moe is toxic. Xu Qingchen clearly never cared about Wang Cai. He never treated it as a living being—just a prop for show, one he could swap out whenever he wanted.]
[Thinking about how this Wang Cai isn’t even the first one makes me want to vomit. All these years, I was a fan of a literal monster. Disgusting!]
[No wonder every Wang Cai attacked him. Any cat would. Cats don’t just randomly lash out at people—if all the Wang Cais were so aggressive, Xu Qingchen had to have been abusing them!]
Hearing Shen Xiu’s words, a crack appeared in Xu Qingchen’s expression. A flash of panic crossed his eyes, and he instinctively glanced over at Jiang Rong.
Jiang Rong, however, had already taken out her phone the moment Shen Xiu began talking. She was focused on scrolling through her photo album, paying no attention to Xu Qingchen’s look.
Xu Qingchen withdrew his gaze, swallowed hard, and spoke: “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
He didn’t understand how Shen Xiu could possibly know that this wasn’t the original Wang Cai. That was something only he and his assistant knew.
Right then, Jiang Rong happened to find the video she was looking for and shoved her phone in front of Xu Qingchen’s face. As she flipped through the comparison clips she had made, she spoke up:
“Starting two years ago, some of the Wang Cais that appeared didn’t have the same coat colors or markings as the current one. Even the ones that did look similar—same fur pattern and everything—still had different gazes when facing the camera, and gave off completely different vibes.”
The more Xu Qingchen watched, the more guilty he felt. His heart was pounding wildly in his chest.
Even though he couldn’t tell any difference.
He had come here for Jiang Rong, yet she’d come prepared—targeting him. Xu Qingchen was overwhelmed with the feeling of betrayal and rage, like he’d been stabbed in the back.
If it weren’t for Jiang Rong’s love of cats, would he have even bothered adopting a stray?
Panic made it hard to breathe. Gasping, Xu Qingchen suddenly stood up. “You all—”
Qi Chao broke past the crew trying to stop him and rushed over. Seeing that Xu Qingchen was about to speak, he immediately shouted, “Xu Qingchen!”
Seeing his manager charge in, Xu Qingchen looked like he’d just spotted a lifeline. He stood up hopefully: “Brother Qi …”
“Sorry, there’s been an issue on our end. Qingchen needs to leave with us. Goodbye,” Qi Chao said curtly, grabbing Xu Qingchen and dragging him away.
The whole thing took less than a minute. In the gazebo, the guests and the livestream audience were left watching nothing but Xu Qingchen and Qi Chao’s retreating backs.
They fled in a panic—without even thinking to take Wang Cai with them.
“Tch.” Jiang Rong let out a disdainful scoff, then turned to Shen Xiu with a smile. “Pleasure working with you.”
Shen Xiu had dug the pit, and together, the two of them had buried Xu Qingchen in it.
A slow, confused “?” popped up in Shen Xiu’s mind.
When did we ever “work together”?
Not knowing what was going on and feeling awkward about asking, Shen Xiu gave a dry reply: “Mm.”
“Phew…” Jiang Yanxi patted his chest. With Xu Qingchen now confirmed to be an abuser—both physically and through the toxic cat food—he wasn’t afraid of him anymore and bluntly complained to his friends.
“Now that Xu Qingchen’s gone, I can finally relax. Without him around, my sister’s taste in men has to reset!”
Jiang Rong: “?”
“Jiang Yanxi, what do you mean by that?”
Jiang Yanxi looked innocent: “Didn’t you say you didn’t bring your cat here just because of Xu Qingchen?”
“When did I ever say it was because of Xu Qingchen? Are you insulting my taste?!” Jiang Rong had to resist the urge to strangle him.
That single sentence was more than enough to clearly show just how much Jiang Rong disliked Xu Qingchen.
Everyone here was in the entertainment industry, and it wasn’t that big of a world. Fans might not know the inside scoop, but the people in the circle—whether directly involved or not—usually heard at least some of the rumors.
Seeing Jiang Yanxi’s confused face, Jiang Rong ground her teeth and clarified: “I said it was because of Xu Qingchen’s cat!”
Jiang Yanxi: “…Sorry, Sis. My bad.”
Turns out, hearing something doesn’t always mean you’ve heard the whole thing.
Shen Xiu had no siblings. He’d never experienced the kind of fierce bickering between brothers and sisters that, while sounding aggressive, was actually lighthearted teasing—something outsiders couldn’t quite insert themselves into, a form of intimacy reserved just for family.
Amused and intrigued, Shen Xiu couldn’t help but feel a bit envious.
Zhuang Yi, thinking of the abandoned Wang Cai, asked sadly, “What about Wang Cai? What should we do?”
Jiang Rong responded without a moment’s hesitation: “I’ll adopt him.”
Before anyone else could speak, Jiang Rong cut in directly: “You don’t need to get all emotional. No need to thank me or anything like that. Like I said before—I came here specifically to adopt Wang Cai.”
“Starting today, Wang Cai will be my 17th cat.”
Sun Qi clapped: “Even if you say that, I still want to say thank you!”
Shen Xiu nodded in agreement: “Sister Rong, you’re really a good person.”
After saying that, Shen Xiu thought about how Wang Cai was Lucky’s first animal companion. Emboldening himself, he asked, “Would it be okay if I bring Lucky over to visit Wang Cai sometimes?”
He didn’t want Lucky to go through what he had—growing up without friends until he joined a boy group competition.
The things he didn’t have back then, Shen Xiu wanted Lucky to have. He didn’t mind asking, even if it meant swallowing his pride.
“Of course! All my cats have really good temperaments.”
“Thank you.”
In that moment, Shen Xiu thought of Xiang Yueting. Xiang Yueting had been like Wang Cai—his first friend. It was through him that Shen Xiu gradually got closer to the rest of his group.
Lucky was already way more socially gifted than he had ever been. He’d definitely be able to make more friends than Shen Xiu did.
[I can’t even imagine how Lucky will react when he sees Jiang Rong’s 16—wait, no, now 17 cats.]
[Lucky: I’m surrounded!!]
[Maybe… he’ll even try to groom all 17 of them?!]
[LMAO even if the kittens agree, Lucky’s gonna pass out from exhaustion.]
With Xu Qingchen gone, most of his fans quietly exited the livestream. Only a small group of Wang Cai’s fans remained watching.
From the audience’s point of view, the sequence was damning: first, Xu Qingchen personally admitted to feeding Wang Cai toxic cat food. Then Shen Xiu smoothly led him into a trap, and Jiang Rong followed up with video analysis showing there had been multiple “Wang Cais” over time.
Rational fans went back and dug through Xu Qingchen’s old posts, just to completely break any remaining illusions they had.
Jiang Rong sighed. “I didn’t bring any cat food.”
Originally, her only plan had been to expose Xu Qingchen for abusing his cat. She never imagined he was even worse than she’d thought—feeding toxic cat food? That was pure malice.
Now, Wang Cai didn’t even have anything to eat.
Shen Xiu, relieved, offered, “I brought some.”
[I’m starting to suspect that Boss Xiu already knew the truth about Xu Qingchen before coming here. Why else would he bring so much food?]
[Sister upstairs, have more faith. With Lucky’s size, even a pinky toe could tell he wouldn’t eat that much. Boss Xiu definitely knew what kind of person Xu Qingchen was. That whole trap earlier? Totally planned in advance.]
[If Xu Qingchen had even cared a little about Wang Cai, he wouldn’t have fallen into that trap. He totally deserved the backlash. Wang Cai going to Boss Xiu was clearly a cry for help—he knew Boss Xiu was cold but not someone to mess with.]
[What if Xu Qingchen tries to take Wang Cai back? I don’t even want to imagine what would happen to him if he did…]
Originally planning to host Lucky, Wang Cai didn’t realize he’d become the one being hosted. And during this brief mealtime, he had, unknowingly, changed owners.
Half an hour later, the observation period for the pets ended. Next came the segment for direct interaction between pet and owner.
Jiang Rong headed off to pick up Wang Cai and her belongings, walking behind Shen Xiu.
Shen Xiu led the way, feeling awkward. But knowing that according to the show’s setup, he was considered the “host” and Jiang Rong the “guest,” there was no way he could let the guest walk ahead to guide him. So he braced himself and walked in front, even if it felt unnatural.
As the host, Shen Xiu knew it was his job to make conversation with the guest.
But honestly, he had no idea what to say. So the entire walk was filled with awkward silence.
When their destination finally came into view, Shen Xiu nearly teared up with relief—and at last, he found a topic: “We’re here.”
Walking behind him, Jiang Rong observed the tall figure radiating “stranger, stay away” vibes, and thought to herself, ‘As expected—just like Jiang Yanxi said. The Galaxy’s Captain Xiu is cool, aloof, and barely speaks a word.’
Hearing Shen Xiu’s calm voice, Jiang Rong simply replied, “Mm.”
Click.
As Shen Xiu twisted the doorknob from the outside, both Wang Cai and Lucky looked toward the door.
The moment he saw Shen Xiu, Lucky ran over joyfully with a soft meow: “Meow~”
Shen Xiu crouched down and expertly scooped Lucky into his arms. The little guy immediately nestled in close, using his paw to cling onto Shen Xiu, rubbing his head against Shen Xiu’s cheek and chin while letting out affectionate, whiny meows.
