The generous Song Qichen, riding his generous electric scooter, traveled along generous streets, carrying the generous Jiang Mian. He stopped in front of a generous high-rise building and went into a generous elevator.
Inside the elevator, Song Qichen kept his eyes on his nose and his nose on his heart. In reality, his mind was rapidly calculating all of Jiang Mian’s expenses from just now.
Shaxian: 147, cake: 51, milk tea: 12, skewers: 40.
Altogether… 250.
That number.
Song Qichen felt as if he were being mocked.
Through the mirror in the elevator, Jiang Mian saw Song Qichen’s lips pressed tightly together, his eyes lowered. His long, curled eyelashes cast a faint shadow directly over his eyelids. From head to toe, he seemed to be spelling out four big words: I am unhappy.
This made Jiang Mian unable to hold back, and she burst into silent laughter in her heart.
In all her years, she had never seen someone this entertaining. He really, really loved money!
Thinking this to herself, Jiang Mian did not let a single hint show on her face. Instead, she quietly shuffled a little closer to Song Qichen.
By the time Song Qichen finally recovered from the blow of having lost a full 250 yuan, he tilted his head slightly. What he caught sight of was Jiang Mian’s small head, which had somehow edged close to him without him noticing.
“What’s wrong? You’re unhappy?”
Song Qichen: “……” And you still have the nerve to ask.
“Weren’t you happy just a moment ago? Why are you suddenly unhappy?”
Jiang Mian frowned slightly. “Ah, is it because I spent your money, so you…”
“No.”
Before Jiang Mian could finish her sentence, Song Qichen immediately denied it.
Jiang Mian held back her laughter. “Is that so? Then… are you happy spending money on me?”
Song Qichen: “……” ‘Heh.’
“Say it, say it. Are you happy or not?” Jiang Mian tugged at his sleeve, her voice deliberately sweet and coaxing.
“…Happy.”
Listening to the miserable protest coming from his sleeve, Song Qichen spoke those insincere words with particular difficulty.
“Really? That’s good then. But that makes sense too. What sponsor wouldn’t be happy to spend money on his canary? As long as you’re happy, that’s all that matters. How about this then? To make you even happier, I’ll spend even more of your money from now on, so you can fully enjoy the joy of being a sponsor, alright?”
Song Qichen: “……”
“…………” ‘Alright my ass.’
“Say something, Chenchen. Why aren’t you saying anything? If you don’t speak, how am I supposed to know whether you agree or disagree?”
Jiang Mian shook his arm even faster.
Ding!
To Song Qichen at this moment, the sound of the elevator arriving was nothing short of heavenly music.
“We’re here.”
Song Qichen strode straight ahead without even turning his head back, his steps so long it was as if something behind him were chasing him.
Jiang Mian watched this and had to suppress her laughter so hard her stomach was about to hurt.
It was not until she sat down in front of the vanity mirror and saw Song Qichen standing behind her, both hands placed on her hair, that the smile on Jiang Mian’s face slowly faded.
‘No, wait a second…’
“Why are you the one doing my hair? Isn’t there someone over there?”
Jiang Mian was startled.
She knew they might be a little pressed for time. It was already 6:38. Gatherings among rich people like this usually started around seven or eight.
But this was not rushing it to this extent!
‘Brother, have you learned how to do this? And you’re already starting on my hair.’ She was still a girl, after all, and she did care about her appearance!
She might not know about others, but how could she not know about Song Qichen?
Making money, he was top-tier. The plot had never mentioned that he also knew beauty and hair styling.
“Pfft!”
Jiang Mian’s refusal reached the ears of a long-haired young man who was pretending to walk past them, and it directly made him unable to hold back, laughing out loud.
Jiang Mian turned her head to look at him.
She had already noticed earlier that the people in this styling studio seemed to all know Song Qichen. Ever since Jiang Mian followed behind Song Qichen and came in, the looks this group cast her way had been somewhat strange. After Song Qichen led her into the innermost room, they even began pretending to be casual, opening the door again and again to sneak glances at her.
Seeing that Jiang Mian had already noticed him, the young man knew there was no point in continuing to pretend. He simply pulled over a chair openly and sat down beside Jiang Mian.
The young man looked very delicate and refined, with a baby face and puppy-like eyes. His chin rested on the leather chair, and just by smiling like this and looking at you, he could make a wave of goodwill rise from the bottom of your heart.
“Hey, boss, is this one our future sis-in-law…”
Before the young man could finish his sentence, Song Qichen shot him a light glance, directly forcing the rest of his words back down.
Even after being shut down like that, the smile still hung on the young man’s face.
Taking advantage of the moment when Song Qichen was quickly working on Jiang Mian’s styling, the young man seized the opportunity and reached out his hand toward her. “Hello, Ye Zhou.”
‘Ye Zhou. Wasn’t that the celebrity stylist who appeared more than once in the plot?’
Because the novel’s female lead Jiang Mian, the supporting female character Lin Qian, and even the male lead Xu Xingming were all graduates of a film academy, most of the plot revolved around the entertainment industry. Naturally, the role of a stylist was impossible to avoid.
But what made Jiang Mian remember Ye Zhou was not his professional skills, nor was it because he played any particularly important role in the plot. It was because three years later, he would end up behind bars.
By that time, the story was already nearing its end. Xu Xingming fell seriously ill and was hospitalized, urgently needing someone to donate a liver. Everyone around him went to get tested for compatibility. By sheer coincidence, only the female lead Jiang Mian and the supporting female character Lin Qian turned out to be compatible with Xu Xingming.
What was this called? This was what you called ill-fated entanglement.
Who would have thought that after learning about the successful match, Lin Qian would disappear without a trace at the first opportunity, leaving only the foolish Jiang Mian, driven by love, wholeheartedly determined to donate her liver to Xu Xingming.
She remembered that when Jiang Mian was lying on the hospital bed back then, a piece of news playing on the television was about the top stylist Ye Zhou, who had once styled her hair. He had recently been arrested for intentional homicide. Because the circumstances were especially severe, he was sentenced to death, with a two-year reprieve.
She vaguely recalled that the person Ye Zhou killed also seemed to have the surname Song, the same Song as Song Qichen.
That person’s identity also appeared to be the new president of the Song Group who took office after Song Qichen died in a car accident.
Song Qichen died in a car accident. Later, the new President Song who was killed took the position. In her impression, he even had business dealings with the male lead Xu Xingming. After that, this Ye Zhou, who seemed to have an unusually close relationship with Song Qichen, went to prison for killing that new President Song.
When she put all of this together, Jiang Mian could not help feeling that there seemed to be something very deep and murky beneath the surface.
You really could not tell that the original work, that brainless little angst novel, was actually hiding such a conspiracy!
She glanced at Song Qichen’s exquisitely handsome face in the mirror, so perfect it looked like a character model, then looked to the side at Ye Zhou. Jiang Mian, who had long been accustomed to risk and danger deep down, instantly grew excited.
She extended her fair, soft little hand toward Ye Zhou, the corner of her lips lifting slightly. “Jiang Mian.”
Two words, crisp and decisive.
‘Cool!’
Ye Zhou praised her outright in his heart.
He remembered that the boss had always been extremely unreceptive to girls as a species. When someone confessed to him, he found it a waste of time that interfered with his money-making, and as a result, he directly drove away wave after wave of young girls in anger.
‘So it turned out that his rigid and stingy boss actually liked this kind of girl!’
Perhaps sensing what Ye Zhou was thinking, Song Qichen turned his head and shot him a glance, speaking sparingly. “No. If you keep letting your thoughts run wild…”
Before the threatening words could be finished, Ye Zhou had already conscientiously zipped his own mouth shut.
But he only managed to hold it in for two minutes before the young man, whose natural attribute was clearly being a chatterbox, started rambling again.
“Miss, when did you meet the boss? How did you meet? Why haven’t I heard the boss mention you before?”
“Oh, it was like this. One day a week ago, he and I ran into each other by accident. He saw that I was pretty and wanted to keep me. I saw that he was rich and agreed to his unreasonable request. He’s my sugar dadd… hiss.”
Jiang Mian did not even finish the rest of her sentence before she suddenly felt a sharp pain on her scalp.
Before she could lodge a complaint, she heard several loud thuds.
The few men who had originally been plastered outside the door eavesdropping all fell in together, like dumplings being dropped into a pot.
When they looked up, they immediately met Song Qichen’s ice-cold gaze.
Before the people who had fallen to the ground could think of any words to patch things up, they heard Ye Zhou to the side letting out puffing, hissing sounds, like air leaking from a tire.
In order to hold back his laughter, the young man curled his entire body into the leather chair, shaking so hard that even the chair trembled along with him.
“Make even one more sound, and this month’s leave is all canceled. Your games will be confiscated.”
As he helped Jiang Mian curl her hair, Song Qichen issued the threat.
“No, no, no, Brother Chen, I was wrong, really wrong. I won’t dare do it again next time. Don’t confiscate my games. I rely on them to stay alive.”
Ye Zhou, laughing so hard his face was completely red, hurriedly pleaded.
Meanwhile, the few people who had fallen to the ground on the other side saw that Song Qichen was not paying attention to them. They quietly tried to retreat toward the door. Who would have thought they had not even straightened their backs yet.
Song Qichen’s steady voice sounded, his eyes never leaving his reflection in the mirror. “The few of you, all stay behind to work overtime this weekend. You’re not allowed to go anywhere.”
“Ah, boss…”
In an instant, wails filled the room.
It was enough to make Jiang Mian forget all about how Song Qichen had deliberately tugged her hair painfully just now.
“Huh? Why do you all call Song Qichen ‘boss’? I remember he’s the president of the Song Group. Since when did he have ties with your EU studio too?” Don’t tell me this guy opened every kind of shop imaginable just to make money.”
Jiang Mian was a little surprised.
“Miss, you don’t know? EU was started from scratch by our Brother Chen before he was taken back into the Song family. We’re all his employees. Back then, Brother Chen was only seventeen…”
“Ye Zhou!”
Song Qichen cut him off directly.
Seeing this, with just a single look, Ye Zhou understood that Song Qichen had no intention of letting this pretty young lady in front of him learn about his past. He immediately got the message and shut his mouth.
Jiang Mian’s curiosity, on the other hand, was completely stirred up.
That was because in the plot, Song Qichen was nothing more than a background figure, merely a catalyst for the relationship between the male and female leads. He was not described in much detail at all.
But judging from what Ye Zhou had just said, quite a few interesting things must have happened to this man.
Even his death seemed so shrouded in mystery.
Jiang Mian was unbearably curious.
Still, since he was unwilling to talk about it, she would not force the issue in matters like this. Somehow, she felt that sooner or later, she would come to know these things anyway.
After waiting for about twenty minutes, eyes closed as she let Song Qichen do her makeup, to the point where she almost actually fell asleep, Jiang Mian finally heard—
“All done.”
Song Qichen’s voice sounded extremely close to her.
When she opened her eyes, Jiang Mian met the man’s gaze, deep and dark like a well.
Only when he was this close did Jiang Mian notice that his irises were not a pure black, but carried a faint hint of purple. It was irresistibly captivating. When he looked at you with such focus, it was as if you were the most precious treasure in the world.
Just from that look alone, if this man were not so stingy, so stingy that he was unwilling to even get a girlfriend, Jiang Mian would dare to guarantee that his girlfriends would definitely be like chives in a field, cut down one batch and another would grow right back. He could fool around from youth to old age, fool around for a lifetime.
Stepping a little to the side, Song Qichen revealed the mirror behind him.
In the mirror, Jiang Mian tilted her head slightly. She had originally thought that with the original host’s top-tier pure and delicate looks, light makeup was the absolute best. Only after Song Qichen’s work did Jiang Mian realize that this face had a different kind of charm with heavy makeup as well.
Sure enough, when someone is beautiful, light makeup or heavy makeup both suit them.
Her originally jet-black long hair had been curled slightly by Song Qichen and was casually draped over her shoulders. She did not know what kind of accessory he had clipped behind her head. A bright, slender chain intertwined with her hair, as if adding several extra touches of luster to her already glossy black hair.
Red lips and bold brows. On her ears were a pair of white double-petaled earrings. The white of the earrings, the white of her neck, and the black of her hair complemented one another perfectly.
Just this face alone, even without changing into an evening gown, was enough to captivate all beings.
Ah, how could she be this beautiful? It was utterly mesmerizing.
After finishing her inward admiration, Jiang Mian turned her head, eyes sparkling, and looked toward Song Qichen at her side.
After spending a long time in the studio, Ye Zhou had developed a sharp eye. Naturally, he could tell that when Jiang Mian walked in earlier, everything she had on her combined probably did not even add up to a hundred yuan.
Girls like this were not unheard of for them. Those young masters sometimes liked to play the poor-girl-turns-into-a-phoenix routine, bringing their girlfriends from humble backgrounds over. After getting them all dolled up, those girls would basically say the same line every time: “Standing in front of the mirror, I do not even know who the girl inside is. Is that really me?”
So now, Ye Zhou smiled as he looked at Jiang Mian, and then watched as she clenched her fist and punched Song Qichen once in the chest beside her.
“You brat, turns out you’ve got some skills after all. Do I look pretty?”
Song Qichen: “……” ‘Cough. This woman really has a lot of strength.’
Ye Zhou: “……”
“…………”
“Pfft, pfft hahahahaha!”