Chapter Fifty: A single stone stirs up a thousand waves

Gu Zhou: I have to give him a thumbs up! // Tech Yuan: You're welcome, I'm a living saint. (Attached image 1) (Attached image 2) (Attached image 3)

Image 1 is the tourist photo of Gu Yingdi and Er Jiao's rumored affair. Image 2 is a side profile of Er Jiao when she took a photo shoot after bleaching her hair to silver-gray. Image 3 is the photo that earned Er Jiao the best photo award, with Er Jiao's personal introduction attached.

Xu Jiaojiao

Age: 17

Height: 176CM

Personality: Mysterious

Special Skills: Smart

Education: Freshman at F University

Tech Yuan is Zheng Yuan's Weibo name. Because she occasionally uploads some wonderful edited videos, her account is quite popular, with tens of thousands of followers. This time, her Weibo post was forwarded by Gu Zhou, which directly made her a trending topic, and the number of people following her also increased rapidly.

The scandal involving Actor Gu continued to heat up. Even after the identity of the woman in the scandal was revealed, the public's interest only increased. Following the trail, it was also discovered that the woman had participated in the "Supermodel Contest," causing the show's viewership on video websites to surge after only one episode had aired.

The show's director was woken up by an international long-distance call while still asleep.

Seeing it was a leader from the station, she immediately woke up and answered the phone.

"Um...yes...yes...okay...understood."

After hanging up, the director called her assistant and the person in charge to her room.

"Sister Yu, what's wrong?" They were all still sleepy.

"The next plan needs to be changed."

"How?"

"The plan to cancel the overall strength ranking yesterday is scrapped. The ranking will continue until the top four. Also, the new rule set yesterday where the losing team's members vote to decide who will be eliminated is also scrapped. We will proceed as originally planned," Director Yu said.

So why did she want to change the rules yesterday? After much deliberation and debate, the final decision was cancelled before the night was even over. The others stared speechlessly at Director Yu.

Director Yu was also frustrated. Their plan was working perfectly, but then the station leaders said they needed to find a way to eliminate Xu Jiaojiao. This meant she had to cancel her exemption right first; otherwise, how could she eliminate the strongest contestant? Next, in the 8-to-7 round, they would continue to split into two groups. Their plan was to make Xu Jiaojiao's group lose, as the others in her group would immediately want to eliminate the strongest contestant, thus eliminating Xu Jiaojiao. The entire plan had already been scrapped and reworked when the station leaders called again, saying Xu Jiaojiao was currently very popular and couldn't be eliminated.

Since the station leaders had spoken, she naturally had no objections. She simply scrapped everything she had come up with yesterday and proceeded with the original plan. The reason she called everyone to the meeting was to remind them not to reveal the rule changes made yesterday.

"Sister Yu, is there anything else?" Everyone, who had already gone to bed very late, really wanted to collapse and sleep.

"Do you know what Xu Jiaojiao did yesterday?"

"No! What happened?" The others looked confused.

"Alright, alright, go to sleep!" Director Yu waved them all out of the room. She sat on the edge of the bed, picked up her phone, and went online. Her boss said Xu Jiaojiao was very popular and couldn't be eliminated. Wasn't Xu Jiaojiao always very popular? How come they said they were going to eliminate her, and now they've changed their minds? Something must have happened.

When she saw the breaking news on the entertainment headlines, she was shocked.

Xu Jiaojiao was Gu Zhou's mysterious girlfriend?

No wonder her boss wouldn't let her eliminate Xu Jiaojiao. If Xu Jiaojiao really was Gu Zhou's girlfriend, wouldn't she offend Gu Zhou by doing this?

To be honest, Director Yu also admired Xu Jiaojiao. These days, people with real talent and no ostentation are rare.

Okay, now she didn't have to do things against her conscience. Finally, she could get a good night's sleep.

Director Yu tossed her phone aside, lay down, and quickly fell asleep.

Back in China, several hours earlier, in a private room, someone shouted at a guy drinking with someone, "Wei Yang, your girlfriend cheated on you!"

The room fell silent. The girl sitting to Wei Yang's left said coldly, "Liu Bin, don't talk nonsense. Wei Yang doesn't have a girlfriend."

"It's that one called... Xu Jiaojiao!" Liu Bin said.

Wei Yang's expression was also bad. He remembered being stood up by Xu Jiaojiao last time. He had completely lost face that time, and the group of people who came out to hang out laughed at him for a long time, saying he had been played by an ugly duckling.

"Nonsense! Wei Yang dumped her a long time ago," the girl retorted.

"I think Xu Jiaojiao dumped Wei Yang. She stood him up last time. She's really something now, she's hooked up with Gu Zhou. You know Gu Zhou, right? He gets tens of millions a year just for endorsements, and he's a big star!" Liu Bin waved his phone, glancing at Wei Yang with a hint of schadenfreude.

The person next to him snatched his phone, glanced at it, and read aloud in surprise: "A tourist saw Gu Zhou sitting intimately with a young girl while traveling in Rome, suspected of dating a mysterious girlfriend. Netizens have revealed that the girl's name is Xu Jiaojiao, seventeen years old, a freshman at F University, and currently participating in the XX TV's 'Supermodel Competition'..."

Everyone else looked surprised and crowded around to watch.

"But honestly, the current Xu Jiaojiao is completely different from that ugly duckling she used to be," the person remarked after reading the gossip.

"Just a vain, plastic-surgery girl!" the girl scoffed.

Liu Bin chuckled and said, "It hasn't even been two months since graduation. Where did she get plastic surgery? She recovered so quickly? Liang Shuangyi, are you just jealous? She's much prettier than you now."

"You!" The girl glared at Liu Bin.

"Alright, let's eat. After we eat, we'll go racing!" Wei Yang said.

At the Xu family home, the family had just finished eating and were sitting on the sofa discussing the two young people's marriage.

Xu Qi was answering his mother's question about their engagement when he suddenly heard his girlfriend's exclamation. The whole family looked over.

"What's wrong?" they asked, startled.

Zhang Aiyan held her phone up to Xu Qi's face, excitedly saying, "Look, look! It's your cousin!"

Xu Qi looked at it, completely bewildered.

"Has something happened to Jiao Jiao? Why didn't Xiao Qing tell us?" Grandma Xu was a little anxious. Although the child wasn't close to them, she was still her only granddaughter.

"She's doing very well!" She was living a much more carefree life than him, even dating a big star.

“No wonder her phone was off when I called her to go shopping earlier. Turns out she was participating in a supermodel competition. Xu Qi, didn’t your cousin tell you she was going to the competition? She even knows Gu Zhou! If she really is Gu Zhou’s girlfriend, do you think Gu Zhou will come when we invite them to our engagement party?” Zhang Aiyan blinked, excited at the thought of Gu Zhou attending her engagement party. How prestigious that would be!

“What are you talking about?” Xu Qi’s mother asked, frowning.

“Jiaojiao, Xu Qi’s cousin! She’s really something now! She’s found a big star as her boyfriend!” Zhang Aiyan replied excitedly.

“It’s not confirmed yet…” Xu Qi said weakly.

“Call and confirm it, and tell them about our engagement next month. Oh, and if you can’t get through to her, call your aunt. Jiaojiao is her daughter; she definitely knows whether her daughter has a boyfriend or not.” After saying that, Zhang Aiyan urged Xu Qi to make the call.

Xu Qi, looking embarrassed, called each number, but both phones were switched off.

"Can't get through..."

Xu Qi's mother said coldly, thinking that Xu Qing was a heartless ingrate. When things were tough, she thought of them, but now that she'd climbed the social ladder, she couldn't even get through to them.

Xu Qing was also quite wronged. Her phone had been changed by Jiao Jiao. After leaving with the tour group, she remembered she needed to call the Xu family to let them know, only to find that the SIM card had also been changed, and only Jiao Jiao's number was saved on it. She had tried calling Jiao Jiao to ask about the old SIM card, but it was no longer working. She knew Jiao Jiao's phone had been given to the production team again. Since that was the case, she decided to let her daughter have fun! While

hiking, Xu Qing sneezed. A casually dressed man wearing a baseball cap, walking on the outside, asked in broken Mandarin, "Are you feeling unwell?"

Xu Qing shook her head and smiled at the man.

The man smiled back.