Chapter 173 - 164: Clashing with Premieres

February 14th was a Sunday, and also Valentine’s Day. The premiere of the movie *Breakup* was conveniently scheduled for the early hours of the morning.

This was a purely commercial film, so for maximum promotional effect, the premiere was naturally a grand affair. Not only were many celebrity guests invited to show their support, but there was also a red carpet segment. The traditional audience Q&A and media interviews were the main event.

After the screening, the audience’s reaction was positive, and the smiles on the director’s and producer’s faces became much more genuine.

Things proceeded according to the traditional schedule, and by the halfway point of the premiere, there had been no mishaps. The main creative team felt a great sense of relief.

As the second female lead, with her senior, An Xin, and the Film Emperor, Zhou Dawei, taking the lead, Ni Bingyan had thought she was just there to go through the motions. To avoid stealing the spotlight from An Xin, the female lead, she had even worn a simple white mermaid dress.

Unexpectedly, during the audience interaction segment, when it was her turn to take a question, someone stood up and cut straight to the chase, giving her no time to prepare:

"I just saw a paparazzi exposé online saying you were in a secret relationship with the Jiang Family’s Second Young Master. It claims you lived together for years, broke up last year, and even bought a house overnight to move out of your love nest. Is that true?"

The question was so packed with bombshells that it immediately sent the venue into an uproar!

Even the ever-composed An Xin couldn’t help but widen her eyes in surprise. Ultimately, though, she restrained herself and didn’t turn to look at Ni Bingyan.

Among the guests, a few starlets failed to control their expressions, some even flashing schadenfreude-filled smirks at the camera. One could imagine another round of online brawls was sure to follow.

Ni Bingyan watched all of this, a headache already starting to form!

’I must be cursed when it comes to premieres!’ she thought.

At the last premiere for *Big Mountain*, she was nearly swarmed by Hu Zhenning’s fans online. Now, at the premiere for *Breakup*, someone had exposed the original owner’s business with Jiang Sheng.

Fortunately, Ni Bingyan had strong mental fortitude and excellent control over her expression. She remained calm after hearing the question and even smiled as she reminded the person, "Please refrain from asking questions unrelated to the movie."

The person tried to ask another question, but the microphone had already been taken away by a staff member.

With so many people watching, the man couldn’t very well make a scene by refusing to let go of the microphone, so he had to drop it.

Down in the audience, hearing there was fresh gossip, everyone immediately looked down at their phones.

It was late at night and the lighting in the audience was already dim. Now, it was as if a swarm of giant fireflies had appeared, illuminating a field of excited prairie dogs.

Ni Bingyan forcibly suppressed her irritation and passed the microphone to someone else.

After that, to prevent anyone else from cluelessly poking where it hurts, the microphone was no longer passed to the audience, circulating only among familiar media personnel.

When asked questions related to the movie, Ni Bingyan answered them all brilliantly. The minor hiccup from before seemed to have passed.

But everyone present knew that for her, the storm was just beginning.

After barely making it through the rest of the premiere, Ni Bingyan returned to the car. Seeing Wei Shuojie already waiting for her inside, she instantly felt a sense of calm.

She had reported her situation with Jiang Sheng to Sister Wei long ago, so Sister Wei had surely already devised a countermeasure. That was why she had avoided answering the question at the premiere.

Sure enough, as soon as Wei Shuojie saw her hurriedly jump into the car, wrapped in her overcoat, she immediately offered words of comfort:

"It’s fine, it’s fine. President Jiang isn’t a married man, and you’ve been an adult for a long time. The two of you dating violated no laws or morals. You don’t rely on maintaining a specific persona to make a living, and besides, this is all in the past. We won’t respond. We’ll have the trending topic taken down, and soon no one will be talking about it."

Clearly, she already knew about the paparazzi’s exposé.

"Is it really okay not to respond?"

Wei Shuojie signaled for Duanmu Li to drive. Only after the car had left the parking garage did she say nonchalantly:

"With this kind of thing, the more you respond, the more excited uninvolved people get. They’ll end up wanting to dig up every single detail of your past relationship. You’re busy with the promotional tour right now and can’t afford to delay your filming. You’re already swamped, so how could you have the energy to deal with this? Just leave it to me."

Wei Shuojie was worried that, being young and inexperienced, Ni Bingyan’s morale would collapse. She was about to offer more words of encouragement when she turned her head and saw that she had already torn open a bag of pineapple buns and started eating.

"This is the worst part about attending events. You’re so worried about looking bad in the dress that you can’t eat your fill. I’ve been holding out until now, I almost starved to death!"

Ni Bingyan took a large bite of the bun and felt it was a bit dry, so she took out a carton of milk. She had just poked the straw in when she saw Wei Shuojie turn to look at her, and she quickly flashed her a smile.

"And here I was worried about you. Turns out you’re even more carefree than I am."

Seeing that Ni Bingyan had only mentioned it once after getting in the car and showed no intention of even logging into Weibo to check, it was clear she wasn’t too affected. Wei Shuojie relaxed and couldn’t help but tease her a little.

Ni Bingyan was completely unbothered. "It’s like you said. We’re adults. There’s nothing shameful about having been in a relationship."

She admitted that she had panicked for a moment when she first heard the question, but she had also long been prepared for this to happen. In the blink of an eye, she had steeled herself mentally and decided to let nature take its course.

"SLURP—SLURP—"

After finishing the milk in a few gulps, Ni Bingyan casually tossed the carton into the trash can before continuing:

"Not every flower bears fruit. How could I be lucky enough that one relationship would last a lifetime? Breaking up is a perfectly normal thing!"

After their brief exchange, the matter was considered closed.

After finishing her bun, Ni Bingyan curled up in her seat, growing drowsy. Just then, she heard Sister Wei say to her:

"I’ve secured endorsement deals for a laundry detergent and a dishwasher salt. Two years, thirty million total before taxes. How about we use this to wash away our bad luck?"

Endorsements like these were low-risk, so Ni Bingyan nodded in agreement. The two of them began to idly discuss the details of the commercial shoot.

Ni Bingyan was utterly exhausted and fell asleep mid-sentence. She slept all the way home, then quickly washed up and went upstairs to bed.

Wei Shuojie was exhausted too, so she and Duanmu Li made do and stayed the night at Ni Bingyan’s place. The next morning, after discussing the follow-up work with Ni Bingyan, they drove off.

Coming out of the study, Ni Bingyan saw that Duanmu Li also had dark circles under her eyes. She knew that both she and Wei Shuojie hadn’t slept well last night. Seeing that she had half a day before leaving for the promotional tour in the next city, Ni Bingyan immediately contacted a moving company. She had the fitness equipment moved into the garage and the original furniture for that room brought in from the storage room.

Since she hadn’t installed any equipment that would damage the walls when setting up the gym, moving everything was very convenient.

The moving company had never received such a simple order: moving things from one room to another.

But considering how heavy the solid wood furniture was and how slender the owner was, it was understandable.

As they were finishing up, people from a housekeeping company arrived. The movers couldn’t help but sigh. It was great to be rich; whether it was a job you couldn’t do or a job you didn’t want to do, you could just hire someone.

’When I get a break, I’ll hire some workers to partition off a gym here.’

Ni Bingyan stood in the garage, making silent plans.

This house had a large yard but a small main building. The garage in the backyard had been renovated by the previous owner and could fit several cars. Originally, she had only planned on living alone and arranged things for her own comfort, so she hadn’t kept many bedrooms. Thankfully, it wasn’t too late to mend the fence.

Seeing how busy Ni Bingyan was, and that she was using her rare half-day off to go through all this trouble just so they could live more comfortably in the future, Duanmu Li was deeply moved but didn’t say anything.

Her relationship with Ni Bingyan only grew closer after that.

While Ni Bingyan was busy rearranging her home, she paid no attention to the drama online. She had no idea that the starlet from the premiere had actually been flamed so badly for her gloating that she ended up on the trending topics list.

In the end, before Wei Shuojie’s team could even make a move, the starlet’s agency, furious, had the trending topic removed. Ultimately, it didn’t stir up much of a fuss.

As for Ni Bingyan’s situation, Wei Shuojie paid to have the trending topic removed and arranged for her PR team to guide public opinion—

[The Qing Dynasty fell like, ages ago. Are adults not allowed to break up after dating?]

[Talk, talk, talk, what is there to talk about? It’s one thing to share good news with fans, but to dig up a breakup from ages ago to talk about it? Is there something wrong with her, or is there something wrong with you people?]

[I mean, that Second Young Master Jiang is handsome and rich, not like he’s someone to be ashamed of. So many people would be jealous to death to have dated him. Is there really a need to mock her for it?]

[Honestly, I only care about my Bingbing’s new movie. Relationships are a private matter, and I trust she can handle it herself.]

...

As long as the guidance was effective and no new gossip emerged, interest in the matter would slowly fade.

Unfortunately, plans can never keep up with changes. That very evening, a new exposé appeared online—

[Tsk... a secret relationship? What a way to flatter herself. If you don’t know, don’t talk nonsense. Anyone who asks around in the circle knows that the Second Young Master never once took her out with him. She was just a canary in a cage...]

This single stone stirred a thousand waves. The anti-fans who had yet to disperse immediately regrouped—

[Hhh, I knew it! Why would a big boss fall for some minor celebrity!]

[Have any of you ever dated someone without ever meeting their friends?]

[No wonder! She only graduated a few years ago! And she’s already a Best Actress! So many veteran actors who have struggled for decades have never won that award!]

...