Carrying a Suitcase, He Ran Away Overnight
At eight in the morning, it started to rain.
Wen Ci sat in a convenience store eating oden, looking out at the rain getting heavier and heavier. His face showed very little expression, while his mind kept running through his next steps.
The convenience store door was pushed open, and a man walked in to the sound of “Welcome.”
He put away his umbrella, picked up a bottle of yogurt under the cashier’s stunned, burning gaze, paid, and was about to leave.
“Sir, you forgot your item,” the cashier hurriedly called after him.
The man looked toward the person sitting lazily in the corner watching the rain, his voice flat. “It’s for him.”
The cashier froze. By then, the man had already stepped out with his umbrella, and his figure quickly vanished into the fine, misty rain.
If not for the lingering chill he had brought in with him, the cashier would almost have thought it had been a dream.
Wen Ci had eaten a little too fast and felt something stuck in his throat. Just as he was about to go buy some water, a bottle of yogurt appeared beside him, and by coincidence it was exactly his favorite, 100% Sweet.
“How much?” Wen Ci smiled and asked. He had not expected the cashier to be so considerate, even proactively giving customers yogurt.
The cashier shook her head. “Someone already paid for it for you.”
Wen Ci took out money and handed it to her, a little surprised. “Who? I can pay for it myself.”
The cashier refused to take the money.
Wen Ci said a few more things to her, but once he realized there was no way to reason with her and she would not tell him who it was, he bought another bottle of yogurt and left.
He deliberately picked a hotel far from the Wen house, booked a room with a king bed, and dragged his suitcase into the elevator, yawning.
Because he was exhausted, Wen Ci did not pay much attention to the other person in the elevator. After pressing his floor, he half-closed his eyes and nearly fell asleep several times.
It was too quiet.
The eerie silence in the elevator quickly chased away Wen Ci’s drowsiness.
His blurred vision gradually cleared, and he saw a pair of spotless black leather shoes. Farther up were two long legs.
Before he could see the face of the person those legs belonged to, the other party had already stepped out of the elevator, taking the strange atmosphere with him.
Once the man was gone, Wen Ci felt sleepy again and nodded off with his head tilted to one side.
The elevator finally reached the seventeenth floor. Wen Ci opened the door with his key card, grabbed some clothes and showered, and after barely managing to blow-dry his hair, flopped onto the bed and quickly fell asleep.
Those chaotic memories appeared again in his dream. Unlike last time, when it had felt like watching a movie, this time Wen Ci experienced death from the first-person perspective, from beginning to end.
The moment he died and closed his eyes, he suddenly sat up in bed.
The sense of humiliation that had nearly drowned him in the dream had not yet gone away. Wen Ci breathed somewhat quickly and wiped the cold sweat from his forehead.
He and Wen Sheng did not look alike at all, so the novel had written that he imitated Wen Sheng in every possible way in order to become his stand-in. Not only that, he had also become like a stalker, following Wen Sheng, collecting information and researching him, all to resemble Wen Sheng more closely and win Shen Hexu’s heart.
Once, after he was discovered, he came home bruised and battered, and Shen Hexu even mocked him for being completely useless.
Beyond that, there was someone else who weighed heavily on Wen Ci’s mind: the villain.
He could no longer remember the face clearly, but the suffocating feeling every time the villain appeared still had not faded. It made him unable to stop himself from trying to recall the villain’s face in detail.
Outside, the sky was already bright. After thinking for a long time and still not remembering, Wen Ci ran a hand through his hair, went into the bathroom to wash up, and prepared to go out and find a place to live.
Just after he finished wiping his face, Li Shengcheng called.
“Come out, Ci’er,” Li Shengcheng said.
“No,” Wen Ci said. “I’m starting to look for work.”
Li Shengcheng was baffled. “What work are you looking for? Aren’t you taking over your family company?”
Wen Ci said, “The company has a better candidate now.”
Li Shengcheng took it as a joke. “What are you talking about? Who doesn’t know the company heir is you? Stop lying to me. Come out and sing with us already.”
“Not going,” Wen Ci said. “Say another word and I’ll come over and kick your head off.”
Li Shengcheng heard that he was not joking at all and, afraid Wen Ci might really come kick him, hung up immediately.
Wen Ci packed up, took his résumé, and stepped into the elevator.
A man was standing in the elevator, turned slightly away from Wen Ci.
At first, Wen Ci did not notice him. He only took out his phone to check rental listings. It was not until he smelled a pleasant mint scent spreading around him that he realized the smell was coming from the man beside him, and he sneaked a glance at him.
Very tall, a full head taller than him, probably over 1.9 meters.
His face was not visible, only a smooth jawline and a prominent Adam’s apple. The cold, distant aura he gave off made it impossible to get close.
As if noticing Wen Ci’s gaze, the man turned slightly to look over. The moment the man moved, Wen Ci hurriedly looked away and stared somewhere else, ignoring the strange, nervous heat in his own face.
As soon as the elevator doors opened, he quickly walked out of the hotel, hailed a taxi, and gave the address for the apartment viewing.
After looking all morning, he finally signed for a place with a reasonable price. After paying half a year’s rent in advance, he had almost nothing left on his bank card.
Wen Ci withdrew some cash, ate lunch, and then went for interviews.
Because his major did not match, he was rejected every time. One HR officer even looked him over a few times and questioned him, “With a face like yours, and a major in acting too, why don’t you go into the entertainment industry instead of coming here to look for work? Tsk, what a waste.”
Wen Ci ignored the suggestive look in the HR officer’s eyes, took back his résumé, and prepared to leave.
The HR officer stopped him and reached out to stroke his face. “Hey, why are you so anxious? I’ve suddenly decided you’re actually pretty suitable for our company. How about you let me…”
Before the HR officer could finish, Wen Ci directly caught his fingers, grinned at him, and under the man’s lecherous gaze, bent them down hard. “Let you what? Let you become disabled? That’s not impossible.”
The bend in his fingers was beyond what a normal person’s hand could do. The HR officer let out a miserable howl in pain, which alerted the people outside.
By the time the employees crowded over, the office door had already been opened, and the man who had come for the interview was elegantly dusting off his hands as he left.
The HR officer lying inside the office looked miserable indeed.
Wen Ci went to more than ten companies that afternoon, but he still failed every interview, and he kept running into a few assholes. He went back to the hotel, took his things to the rented apartment, and by the time he settled in there, it was already very late.
He took a shower and came out to get his phone, planning to order takeout, when he found someone had added him on WeChat.
Because the message attached to the request was just the two words “Hello,” Wen Ci was afraid they might need something from him, so he tapped accept.
“The drama we’re about to start filming is missing a first male lead. The first male lead’s image fits you especially well. Are you interested? 【Image】 This is the information. You can take a look.”
This sounded familiar.
Wen Ci thought for a few seconds, then suddenly remembered. After Wen Sheng came back, someone had added him on WeChat and asked him to play the first male lead. But not long after the contract was signed, the role changed from him to Wen Sheng. He was unwilling to accept it, so he fought for the third male lead instead. During filming, he tried every possible way to set Wen Sheng up, but none of it worked. Instead, after someone secretly filmed a video of him targeting Wen Sheng, he successfully sent himself onto the Weibo hot search and got cursed at by more than a hundred thousand people.
Even though he had studied acting in college, Wen Ci had never thought of entering the entertainment industry. On top of that, he knew what would happen later, so he refused decisively.
“You really are very suitable. You can come take a look first, try an audition,” the other party persisted. “And we’re not scammers. Our director is Li Xiao. You should know him. Also, we came through a classmate of yours. He plays the second male lead in the drama. He was the one who said you were very suitable for the first male lead, so I added you.”
Wen Ci knew who the introducer was, his college roommate. They had gotten along pretty well, but after graduation they had not kept in much contact.
He also knew the director. Li Xiao was indeed very famous. His works were all huge hits, and he was extremely strict in casting. He never looked at so-called traffic or popularity, only choosing people who matched the persona.
“No need. I’m not interested in acting. Thank you.” After this refusal, no matter what the other party said, he did not reply again.
Wen Ci ordered takeout. While he was waiting, his phone received a text message, a streamer recruitment notice sent by a streaming app to every user.
This streaming app had only come out a short while ago. Wen Ci had downloaded it as soon as it was released. Because the interface was simple, he liked it very much, and when he was bored he would go watch game streams.
Wen Ci opened the recruitment notice. There was no requirement for streaming hours. It only said the platform took thirty percent of gifts and the streamer got seventy, and after signing, there was a guaranteed minimum of ten thousand.
Signing was also fairly difficult. There were fan requirements, with a minimum of thirty thousand.
The button to register as a streamer was below, bouncing up and down over and over, very obvious.
Wen Ci was short on money, and finding a job was extremely difficult for him right now.
Thinking of this, Wen Ci tapped the registration button, planning to keep looking for work during the day and try livestreaming at night to see whether it could solve his current crisis.
The moment registration succeeded, his phone suddenly rang. Wen Ci picked it up and saw it was Mother Wen calling.
He hesitated for a second, then answered.
“Where are you now? Can you come back? Mom has something she wants to tell you,” Mother Wen said. She thought Wen Ci did not know about the situation with Wen Sheng, and after thinking for a long time, she decided it would be better to tell Wen Ci first.
“I’m staying outside for a while before I go back. Mom, if you have something to say, just tell me over the phone,” Wen Ci said with a smile.
Mother Wen was silent for a moment. She did not know how to begin, and in the end it was Father Wen who took the phone and explained the matter from start to finish.
“I understand,” Wen Ci said calmly.
Father Wen froze. He had not expected Wen Ci to react so calmly and accept it so readily. After a moment of hesitation, he said, “Ah Ci, your biological parents have been missing for a long time. We sent people to look, but we still couldn’t find them. Your mom and I have always treated you like our biological son, and we both hope you won’t leave and will continue staying in the Wen family. Also, Ah Sheng has just come home, and he’s unfamiliar with a lot of things and not used to them yet. If possible, come back and take him around the neighborhood, help him get familiar with things. We don’t feel at ease letting other people do it. And Ah Sheng is a little timid. I think if you two got along, you’d probably do quite well together. Your mom and I are getting old, and there’s a big generation gap between us. What do you think?”
Although his tone was one of discussion, Wen Ci could still hear from Father Wen’s words that he really wanted him to go back.
The novel had also written that after Wen Sheng finished junior high, Wen Ci’s biological parents had mysteriously gone missing, and there was no way to find them at all.
Not long after that, out of necessity, Wen Sheng had to sell the house and began the days of working while studying in a rented apartment.
If not for that, Wen Ci would already have returned to the home that belonged to him.
Thinking of Wen Sheng, whom he had run into when he went out earlier, Wen Ci did not believe for a second that Wen Sheng was a timid person. “I’m out of town right now. I can’t make it back.”
Father Wen could only give up, then said, “Ah Ci, from now on Ah Sheng is your younger brother. You’re both Mom and Dad’s children.”
As if afraid Wen Ci would overthink it, he added, “Don’t worry. Your mom and I absolutely will not play favorites. Absolutely not.”
“Dad, are you calling Brother?” Before Wen Ci could say anything, a soft voice came from the other end, full of nervousness, and even stammering at the end.
“Yes. The clothes suit you very well,” Father Wen said with a smile, turning to glance at the clothes Wen Sheng was wearing.
“B-but these clothes are Brother’s… If I wear them, will Brother mind, will he hate me because of it? I should go take them off. I don’t want Brother to hate me…” Wen Sheng clutched at the clothes, his gaze flickering away, his voice full of panic.