Chapter 98: I Like Him

Mo Qi picked up her chopsticks and absently prodded the rice on her tray. Seeing the two across from her eating with their heads down in silence, she said with a sigh, "Did you two have a fight?"

"How could that be!" Lin Zheng blurted out at once, her impulsive nature making her lift her head in denial.

When her eyes met Mo Qi's, Lin Zheng grew awkward and quickly looked away. She lowered her head, picked up a bite of plain rice, and muttered an explanation that only grew weaker by the second: "I... I just drank too much last night, and I didn't sleep well. I'm a little out of it."

Her voice trailed off into near silence. Even she could hear how unconvincing it sounded.

Xie An, who had remained silent all this time, suddenly looked up. "Mo Qi, Lin Zheng and I are together."

Mo Qi raised her brows slightly. Xie An seemed to have made up his mind all at once. He reached out and took Lin Zheng's hand, clasping it tightly in his palm. "I know the competition in the last two rounds will be even fiercer, and I shouldn't be distracted, but... I hope you'll bless us."

Lin Zheng stared at him in disbelief, eyes wide.

"Xie An, have you lost your mind?!"

"I've thought this through very carefully. I'm not crazy." There was nothing but seriousness in Xie An's eyes, leaving Lin Zheng with no words to refute him.

"So the two of you were acting so strangely because of this?" Mo Qi said. "Of course I'll bless you both. I already showed the contract from Tianyu to Lord Shen last night, and he said there was no problem. Lin Zheng can sign with Tianyu Entertainment without worry. With Xie An's talent, both Tianyu and Royal will probably try to recruit him. Since you already have a path forward, the rankings in the last two rounds aren't that important. Of course, having a little icing on the cake would be even better."

A flash of disappointment swept quickly through Xie An's eyes. Though he knew Mo Qi only regarded him as a friend, hearing her bless them so calmly and sincerely still made his heart sink with pain.

Lin Zheng turned her wrist twice, pulling her hand free from Xie An's grip, and lowered her head in silence to continue eating.

Xie An said, "I still have rehearsal this afternoon, so I'll go first. You two keep eating."

With that, he stood up, took his tray to return it, and left the cafeteria.

Only after Xie An was gone did Mo Qi say, "Tell me. After I lost consciousness from the drug last night, what happened between you two?"

Lin Zheng suddenly remembered how she had pushed Xie An into the private room, and became even more embarrassed, too ashamed to look Mo Qi in the eye.

"Don't tell me you were drugged too after I left the room?" Mo Qi asked sternly, pressing her hand against Lin Zheng's wrist.

"I wasn't." Lin Zheng finally gritted out the words and looked up. "Mo Qi, have you made it clear that you don't like Xie An, and that you'll never give him a chance? Is that right?"

"Didn't we already discuss this?" Mo Qi looked at her strangely. "I don't suit Xie An."

Lin Zheng kept her eyes on Mo Qi's face. After a long silence, she finally made up her mind. "I like Xie An."

Mo Qi was somewhat startled. Lin Zheng was straightforward and casual, never one to fuss over details. Seeing how she usually treated Xie An like one of the guys, Mo Qi truly had not thought much of it.

Lin Zheng felt a little humiliated under Mo Qi's gaze and awkwardly turned away.

Then Mo Qi suddenly smiled. "If you like him, go after him. I'm not Xie An's parent, so why ask for my opinion? Silly girl."

Faced with Mo Qi's sincere blessing, Lin Zheng felt a sharp pain in her chest.

She had been drawn to Xie An's talent and character, and she genuinely regarded Mo Qi as a close friend. After learning that Xie An liked Mo Qi, she thought that if the two of them could be together, she would simply bury her own feelings forever and bless them from the shadows.

But Mo Qi did not like Xie An. Watching Xie An suffer and lose heart because of Mo Qi left Lin Zheng equally heartbroken.

They had drunk far too much last night. Xie An could not hold his liquor to begin with, and after barely two bottles of beer he was drunk. As for her...

With only a seventy percent haze of drunkenness, she could no longer suppress the love she had kept hidden in her heart, so she threw caution to the wind, took Xie An to a hotel room, and then... then seduced him.

Lin Zheng herself did not even understand why she had become this way. Now, she could no longer face the friendship among the three of them with any ease.

"I... I also have rehearsal this afternoon, so I'll... I'll go first!" She suddenly sprang to her feet in a panic, left her seat, and hurried out of the cafeteria.

Mo Qi glanced at the tray opposite her, where only two bites of rice had been touched, and could not help but smile bitterly.

If Lin Zheng had confessed last night, the atmosphere between the two of them would never have been this awkward.

As for what else had happened, Mo Qi had some idea in her heart.

Check the third item on the trending search list.

It was a message from Sister Ming.

Mo Qi frowned. The last thing she wanted right now was to deal with public relations and online opinion.

She took out her phone, went online, and found the trending search list.

The topic in third place read: Reality show champion from Dream Takes Flight linked to a late-night hotel room scandal!

The headline was highly sensational, perfectly feeding the public's appetite for gossip and its urge to pry into celebrities' private lives.

Mo Qi clicked on it. Beneath the huge title were four clear photos of the two of them: two taken as they entered the hotel, two as they left.

They were Lin Zheng and Xie An.

Sure enough, the good never came true, while the bad always did.

Mo Qi scrolled downward. The entire article was written in a highly inflammatory tone, implicitly suggesting that Lin Zheng and Xie An lived recklessly and had behaved shamelessly under the influence of alcohol.

She also browsed the comments.

An upside-down broom is better than air conditioning: The entertainment world really is a mess. Those downstairs, line up properly.

A good name was ruined by a pig: Our lives are too boring. We should get more news like this to liven things up. Like if you agree.

I am very cool: What has happened to celebrities these days? As public figures, shouldn't they know how to behave a little more properly?

...

Mo Qi kept scrolling through three pages of comments, and there were very few netizens willing to stand up and say they believed Lin Zheng and Xie An.

She exited the page and immediately called Lin Zheng, getting straight to the point: "Check the third item on the trending search list."

After hanging up, Mo Qi put the two trays in the dish basin, left the cafeteria quickly, and headed toward the girls' dormitory.

Sure enough, Lin Zheng had not gone to rehearsal. She was staying in the dorm.

The dormitory door was not closed. Mo Qi knocked politely twice, then pushed it open and went in.

Lin Zheng was sitting on the bed with her knees drawn up, staring blankly ahead. Her phone lay beside her with the screen still lit.

At the sound, Lin Zheng looked up dazedly at Mo Qi.

Since the start of the competition, and indeed for the first time since she had entered this world of hers, she had been thrust into the eye of a public storm. And to be dragged there by a scandal like this...

It made her feel as if she had been stripped naked and thrown into a crowd, unbearably humiliated and distressed.

Mo Qi walked over, sat down beside her, and patted her shoulder in silent comfort.

Lin Zheng looked at her, and tears suddenly welled in her eyes. They spilled down in large drops. "Mo Qi, what am I supposed to do?"

Mo Qi wrapped her arms around her and patted her back gently. "This isn't something without a solution. Don't be too worried."

"I..."

Before Lin Zheng could finish, the dormitory door was shoved open hard.

Xie An stood at the entrance, drenched in sweat.