Saturday afternoon, rehearsal ended.
Jiang Ci dragged his legs, walking out of the rehearsal hall utterly exhausted.
He was completely unaware of everything happening outside, only faintly sensing that during today's rehearsal, Director Liu Guodong and his classmates looked at him with more... complexity in their eyes than ever before.
Jiang Ci headed towards the cafeteria. Along the way, his rate of people turning to look at him was a staggering three hundred percent.
Students around him pointed and whispered, their gazes making his skin crawl.
He keenly sensed that the atmosphere was off.
Had sothing bad happened again?
He frowned, instinctively thinking that so bizarre new version of his "capital-backed actor" rumors had erged.
While waiting in line at the cafeteria, that eerie feeling of being watched grew stronger and stronger. Jiang Ci finally couldn't take it anymore and opened Weibo, which he hadn't checked all day.
A flood of @ntions, comnts, and private ssage notifications surged in.
Jiang Ci clicked on the trending topics list.
Then, he saw it.
Topping the list, followed by a massive "EXPLOSIVE" tag.
#JiangCiMom'sWeibo#
Jiang Ci's brain short-circuited for three seconds.
He clicked in, and then, he saw that all-too-familiar, utterly tacky "big sweet potato" photo.
Beneath the photo was an overwhelming sea of "HAHAHAHAHAHA."
He swiftly scrolled through the comnts and saw the one pinned at the top, from Su Qingying.
"Auntie, hello. [Rose]"
Boom!
Jiang Ci's face visibly changed from pale, to flushed red, to ashen gray.
The classmates queuing around him, seeing him take out his phone, stared with even more burning intensity.
"Look, he saw it!"
"His face has gone completely dark, hahahaha sorry I can't help it..."
"He's the embodint of social death, so tragic."
Amidst the chaos, Jiang Ci's train of thought once again veered in a direction ordinary people couldn't comprehend.
He just felt...
The photo his mom picked did indeed sowhat undermine his "tragic male god" persona.
But since when did his mom know how to use Weibo? Seems he needed to find ti to ask what was going on.
The person who could post this "little sweet potato" photo of him, along with those sincere words, was undoubtedly, without a doubt, his mom.
And so, under the watchful, amused gazes of his classmates, Jiang Ci, expressionless, used the official gold-V verified account his company gave him, went straight to his mom's Weibo post.
Left a comnt.
Then, put away his phone, and calmly said to the cafeteria lady serving food, "Auntie, one serving of braised pork, extra rice, please."
While he remained calm and unruffled, Weibo went absolutely crazy.
Because Jiang Ci's comnt was pinned to the top of the hot comnts by the system within minutes.
@JiangCiV: Thanks, Mom, for clearing things up and giving back my innocence. But next ti, rember to pick a handsor one from the album, thanks. [Bowing Emoji]
As soon as this comnt appeared, netizens who were already laughing themselves breathless were instantly injected with new vitality.
[OMG!!! The man himself has appeared!!!]
[Hahahahahahahaha help! I thought he'd be angry, but he's actually bargaining with his mom about the photo not being handso enough?!]
[What kind of bizarre thought process is this! The codic effect is off the charts!]
[Bro! Your idol image is still intact at a ti like this! I'm crying!]
[The whole internet is sympathizing with your social death, and you're worried about the photo? Jiang Ci, that's so you!]
The new hashtag #JiangCiBargainsOnline forcefully parachuted onto the trending list.
A tragic carnival whipped up by marketing accounts ultimately concluded as a hilarious, absurd cody for the entire nation.
The previous night, Xia ng experienced the collapse of her worldview built over twenty-plus years.
First, she was utterly stunned by Jiang Ci's "divinely inspired tear," learning what the pinnacle of emotion unreachable by technique truly was.
Imdiately after, she was left completely bewildered by his answer, "I was thinking about my mom."
She realized she could no longer use "technique" to asure this monster, Jiang Ci.
Sunday, 1:30 PM.
Rehearsal Hall No. 1.
For the first ti ever, Xia ng did not imdiately begin her warm-up routine.
Wearing her practice clothes but holding the script in her hand, she walked step by step towards Jiang Ci, who was stretching his legs in the corner.
This was the first ti she had actively sought him out outside of rehearsal.
Jiang Ci, grimacing in his struggle with his ligants, felt a shadow fall over him. He looked up and saw Xia ng's cool, detached face.
"Sothing up?" he asked lazily, thinking she was about to launch into another round of "academic criticism."
Xia ng's gaze settled on him, getting straight to the point. "I saw what happened online last night."
Her tone was still cool, but her eyes held less of the usual distance and scrutiny, replaced by a touch of genuine inquiry and confusion.
"Oh," Jiang Ci continued stretching, answering nonchalantly, "A large-scale public execution scene. I'm used to it."
But Xia ng shook her head.
She opened the script in her hand, pointing to a monologue circled in red pen.
"I'm not here to gossip."
"I want to ask you, about Ma Lu's action of giving up everything for Ming Ming, gouging out his own eyes to give them to her as a gift..." Xia ng lifted her head, her gaze burning as she looked at Jiang Ci. "Don't you think this fundantally lacks logical justification?"
Jiang Ci's stretching motion stopped.
He was taken aback, not expecting Xia ng to actively discuss the core logic of the script with him.
He slowly retracted his leg, sat up straight, and for the first ti, in the truest sense, gave his full attention to this opponent hailed as the "technical genius."
Seeing he didn't refute her, Xia ng continued her calm analysis. "Ma Lu's sacrifice lacks sufficient prior motivation and emotional buildup. From the perspective of behavioral psychology, a ntally sound adult would absolutely not pay such a reckless, even self-destructive price for a woman he's only t a few tis and who has no interest in him."
"His obsession is detached, forcibly set by the author for dramatic conflict."
Her words, each and every one, were built upon absolute rationality and logic.
This was a classic academic analysis thod: precise, yet cold.
After listening, Jiang Ci didn't directly refute her.
Regarding this question, the skill in his mind, the *Complete Guide to Scumbag Quotes and Techniques*, gave him an answer.
Instead, he asked her a question that seed completely unrelated.
"What do you think logic is?"
Xia ng answered almost reflexively. "It's cause and effect. It's patterns. It's objective existence, rational principles that can be analyzed and predicted."
Jiang Ci smiled.
That smile held no mockery or disdain, only a kind of understanding that saw through to the essence.
He looked into Xia ng's clear but emotionless eyes and said, word by word, clearly:
"You're wrong."
"For Ma Lu, when love reaches its extre..."
"Love itself is the only logic."
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