Boss, He Is Chasing Stars Again Chapter 12

Chapter 12: Chapter 12: The Topic of “Shi Xingze, the Royal”…

The topic “Shi Xingze, the Royal” was hanging in the middle section of Weibo Entertainment’s trending searches, and the heat was slowly climbing even after Jian Xingzhi first clicked into it.

Jian Xingzhi frowned as he clicked in. The comments were already filled with fans from various camps accusing Shi Xingze of being a “Royal” who used capital to steal a spot. While tearing down Shi Xingze, some people were also spreading rumors that he was involved with a high-ranking executive at his company.

Shi Xingze’s current entertainment agency is called Qihuan Entertainment, which is not considered a major company in the industry.

Jian Xingzhi had met Qihuan Entertainment’s boss at a banquet once. Although the man was rather unattractive and a known womanizer, Jian Xingzhi had never heard that he was interested in male celebrities; the few minor stars he kept were all female.

There were many people in the entertainment industry who kept minor celebrities. Although Jian Xingzhi disapproved of such behavior, he wasn’t inclined to interfere when it was a mutual arrangement.

But Shi Xingze was different. Jian Xingzhi had personally spent money on milk to vote for him. Attacking Shi Xingze as a “Royal” and spreading malicious rumors about him based on that was something Jian Xingzhi could not tolerate.

Jian Xingzhi frowned and called Assistant Yu, asking her to find a way to suppress the trending topic. If this continued, Shi Xingze’s reputation would suffer.

After hanging up with Assistant Yu, Jian Xingzhi registered a burner account and went to the trending topic to refute those spreading malicious rumors about Shi Xingze. He used logic and avoided foul language. When the opposing side finally lost control and resorted to insults, Jian Xingzhi immediately reported them.

Weibo takes online civility very seriously, and its word detection is intelligent. Once reported and muted, the user has to contact customer service and take a full set of spiritual civilization tests, needing a score of 90 to be unbanned. Even then, there is a 24-hour cooling-off period for comments and messages.

Jian Xingzhi learned this trick from Jian Lezhi. He had never used it before; today was his first time.

However, amidst the barrage of insults, Jian Xingzhi keenly spotted a comment, seemingly from one of Shi Xingze’s university classmates, which read: “Does no one know? Shi Xingze is gay, and he even chased a guy from the next class, throwing himself at him.”

What did this person mean by that?

Jian Xingzhi wasn’t sure if “gay” meant what he thought it did, so he scrolled down further and found that the person had replied again: “It means exactly what you think. LOL, he has zero career ambition, his head is full of dating, and he still wants to debut. He’s only fooling little girls like you.”

Jian Xingzhi was unsure about the authenticity of this comment, so he didn’t speak rashly right away. He wondered if Shi Xingze’s management company had noticed this comment. In Jian Xingzhi’s experience, if this comment wasn’t handled, it might affect Shi Xingze’s future development.

But there was one point Jian Xingzhi agreed with: Shi Xingze was just starting his career and was indeed not suitable for dating.

Although he felt that based on Shi Xingze’s diligence shown in the behind-the-scenes footage, Shi Xingze didn’t seem like the type to neglect his career for love, his fervor for voting—driven by the desire to prove he wasn’t an entertainment industry Medusa—calmed down slightly.

Watching the discussion about Shi Xingze climb while the voting numbers barely moved, Jian Xingzhi only cast a small number of votes.

He happened to be going on a business trip next week and wouldn’t return until the day before the second public performance of Starlight Training Camp. Jian Xingzhi decided to put his fan activities on hold for now and use this opportunity to see how Shi Xingze’s agency handled the situation.

Although he could use his connections to get the answers he wanted, Jian Xingzhi just wanted to be a normal fan. Besides being a fan, he also had to focus on his own career.

What if Shi Xingze was fine when he returned? Then he would take the voting screenshots and brag to Jian Lezhi, seeing if she dared to laugh at him again.

Zhao Jia was watching the latest episode of Starlight Training Camp, still happy about Yue Lin’s performance, when she discovered that Shi Xingze, who was in the same group as him, had been hit with a negative trending search. She immediately felt strong dissatisfaction toward Shi Xingze.

Based on the footage released by the production team and some interactions between Shi Xingze and Yue Lin, their relationship seemed decent. However, fans like Zhao Jia worried that Shi Xingze’s issues would negatively affect Yue Lin’s reputation.

They also saw the comment—which was gaining heat—claiming Shi Xingze was gay. Zhao Jia saw it late at night, and now the heat was slowly rising. Many people had taken screenshots, but the account owner who posted the comment seemed unaware of its rising popularity and hadn’t reacted at all.

Zhao Jia angrily commented below: “Stay away from Lin Bao, don’t get involved!”

Yue Lin was finally gaining some traction, and Zhao Jia didn’t want to see his reputation suffer and resources dry up because of Shi Xingze. Moreover, if Shi Xingze was really gay, who knew what he might try to do to Yue Lin? Zhao Jia felt furious just thinking about it!

The video of the first public performance had just been released, and there were no group recording tasks today. Shi Xingze had the rare chance to sleep in, but Brother Long’s phone call came in impatiently.

Shi Xingze was still groggy, his voice confused, “Brother Long, what’s wrong?”

Brother Long heard that Shi Xingze was still sleeping and guessed he hadn’t seen the online rumors yet. He immediately grew anxious: “Don’t sleep anymore. Get up and listen to me while you wash up. I’ll talk, you listen, hurry up.”

Hearing the seriousness in Brother Long’s tone, Shi Xingze rubbed his eyes, sat up in bed, and walked to the bathroom to wash up. While brushing his teeth, he mumbled indistinctly, “What happened?”

Brother Long sighed and said, “Someone bought a negative trending search about you on Weibo. The heat isn’t low, but that’s not the worst part.”

“There’s something worse?” Shi Xingze brushed his teeth gloomily. Besides Zhao Xian and those few people, he hadn’t offended anyone else. Besides, when their group got the highest on-site votes, those few contestants had privately apologized to him and Yue Lin.

As Shi Xingze thought this, he heard Brother Long say, “Someone claiming to be your university classmate exposed that you chased the class heartthrob from the next class but failed, and that you’re thinking about dating even before debuting.”

“Pfft!!!”

Shi Xingze couldn’t help but almost choke on his toothpaste foam. He immediately turned on the faucet, rinsed the foam off his face, and said in disbelief, “Who spread these rumors?!”

Besides this, there were also rumors that Shi Xingze was being kept by the company boss, but Brother Long didn’t tell Shi Xingze about that; he was already handling it himself.

Brother Long told Shi Xingze to leave the dorm and find a quiet place to talk. He asked earnestly, “Xingze, everything else is manageable, but the matter exposed by your supposed university classmate needs immediate attention. I am your manager. I need you to tell me everything exactly as it happened so I can handle the follow-up.”

Brother Long paused after speaking: “Tell me the good and the bad, don’t hide anything.”

Shi Xingze looked at his phone gloomily and told Brother Long, “Actually, I wasn’t very close with my university classmates. Besides classes, I spent all my time trying to get extra roles or taking acting lessons. I don’t know who leaked this.”

However, at this point, Shi Xingze remembered a small detail. He perked up and told Brother Long, “Speaking of the next class, I do remember a guy who was quite handsome. I borrowed his notes during an elective course, and there was a letter tucked inside. I thought it was sent to him by someone else, so I didn’t open it. I felt a bit awkward when I returned it to him. Is that what this is about?”

Brother Long pondered for a moment and asked him, “Was anyone around when you returned the notes?”

“Quite a few people, I think,” Shi Xingze recalled. “I went to return it to him during the break. I just put it in his hand and left. There were many students around. Could that letter have accidentally fallen out?”

If that was the case, he would never be able to clear his name.

Brother Long, however, felt the matter wasn’t so simple. If there was a letter tucked in the notebook, couldn’t the other person have noticed? Brother Long suspected that the letter in the notebook was actually from that person to Shi Xingze, but Shi Xingze hadn’t thought much of it and returned it unopened. Otherwise, why wouldn’t the other person explain?

Shi Xingze also fell silent after hearing Brother Long’s words. After some hesitation, he quietly told Brother Long, “Although I don’t know who posted it, not all of that content is false.”

Brother Long had a bad feeling hearing Shi Xingze’s evasive tone: “Such as?”

Shi Xingze said with insufficient confidence, “Such as, I do like guys. But I promise I absolutely haven’t dated behind your back. I’m not love-brained; I still want to develop my career!”

Brother Long: “…”

Brother Long took a deep breath, gripped his phone, and asked Shi Xingze, “Are you alone?”

Shi Xingze looked around. He had hidden in the basement to make the call, so there shouldn’t be anyone, right? Shi Xingze quietly told Brother Long, “No one else is here, Brother Long, don’t worry.”

Don’t worry about what? He was already worried sick!

Brother Long sternly instructed Shi Xingze, “Keep this hidden. Don’t tell anyone, not even friends. If you date in the future, you must tell me immediately. You must never hide emotional matters from me.”

“Mhm!” Shi Xingze nodded obediently. Fortunately, he genuinely wanted to focus on his career, so Brother Long was slightly relieved. He then brought up another matter: “Right, how did the product placement ad shoot go the other day? Chengtai was very generous this time. If our company had better resources, I would have tried to find a way to get you into the debut lineup.”

The limited-time group had a full year’s mobile phone endorsement contract! Endorsements of that caliber usually went to established celebrities or leads of massively popular film and television dramas. For Starlight Training Camp to get it, they must have been extremely lucky.

Shi Xingze’s ad shoot went smoothly, and he mentioned the investor who came to inspect the set: “The investor came to inspect during the first public performance. Director Qi even reserved a row of empty seats for him. That investor looked quite handsome.”

“A handsome investor?” Brother Long was confused. Unlike Shi Xingze, who didn’t follow the news, the big shots in the industry were generally around forty, and the younger ones were also in their thirties. Someone handsome who was also an investor… could it be…?

Shi Xingze nodded without any psychological burden: “Yes, he was quite handsome. I heard he only invested recently. Maybe he’s a high-level executive or something.” And he looked a little familiar.

Brother Long told Shi Xingze not to hang up and sent him a photo, asking, “See if it’s him?”

Shi Xingze opened the photo, puzzled, and confirmed, “It’s him, no mistake. Wait a minute, Chengtai Group General Manager… Jian Xingzhi?”

Brother Long sighed and told him, “Pay attention. That handsome guy you mentioned is the Sugar Daddy who invited you to shoot the product placement ad.”

Shi Xingze looked at the photo in a daze. So he and the Sugar Daddy were actually this close?

Author’s Note:

———————-

Author: And you even winked at him!