Love Variety Show: The despised me exploded in popularity

Instinctively, she clicked on the trending search and browsed through posts about Xu Qingyan. She noticed that some of the smear posts had been cleaned up, probably in a hurry.

The comment section of the account "Xu's Spring and Autumn" was no longer viewable, completely flooded and all sorts of insults were thrown.

With a slap, she covered her face.

With the comment section like this, and not a word from Xu Qingyan, he must have been told by the show's team not to respond. Her heart sank with worry, fearing that it was a solid hammering.

Her cousin hadn't replied to her messages all night, which made Zhou Lili even more uneasy.

As she looked up and saw Pei Muchan's signed album on the wall, she couldn't help but think weakly. Even if he was hammered, she would still support Xu Qingyan—after all, he was really righteous.

Wuwuwu, say something, Brother Xu!

She hugged her duvet, repeatedly refreshing the screen, yet Xu Qingyan's Weibo remained silent. It's as if he was indifferent to everything, too lazy to respond.

Knock knock knock, her mom was knocking on the door outside.

"Get up! Time for breakfast."

"Not getting up, call the princess to get up."

"Calling you, you lazy bum, what princess are you? Eat it or leave it!"

Reluctantly, Zhou Lili moved her body and while putting on her shoes, she instinctively scrolled down the hot search list looking for fun, when suddenly, a trending topic #Paramela caught her eye.

She had no particular interest in luxury cars, except for the Paramela.

After quickly clicking into it, she found it was a house viewing blogger who posted a video, adding the tags #Xu Qingyan, #StreetSnap, #Paramela.

"Huh?" Her keen eyes spotted a peculiar hashtag, "That must be a mistake, how could my poor Brother Xu be there?"

Zhou Lili moved slowly out of her room, pushed the door open, and walked to the dining table, yet to click on the video which had already garnered over half a million views.

Her mother was nagging again.

"Your generation is really lucky, born in good times."

"Mom, you're starting again." Zhou Lili looked up, "Are you going to talk about how you had good grades but were too poor to stay in school, how you weren't as tall as the stove so you stood on a stool to cook, and how you carried a basket to cut pig grass before dawn?"

"That's the truth, ask your grandma if you don't believe me." Zhou's mom shot her daughter a look, "You all don't know how good you have it, can't even get up for breakfast."

"My grandma says being poor is true, the good grades are false." Zhou Lili didn't give her mom any face, "Grandma said you were a coward in school, you couldn't learn even if you ate your books!"

"Nonsense, your grandma must be getting senile too!"

"Mom, Grandma also said you insisted on marrying Dad just because he read a few more pages of a book than you did."

"I'll beat you, you heartless little wretch!"

Zhou Lili scored a point and gleefully opened the video. The video only captured a segment and the beginning was shaky, it was obviously raining, and from the looks of the buildings, it seemed to be on the edge of Pucheng District.

"Keep up!"

In front of the camera, a man in his late twenties wearing a fluorescent raincoat was jogging through the rain, constantly waving at the photographer, while the sound of car horns filled the rainy atmosphere.

Puddles on the ground reflected neon signs, colorful and dreamlike, accompanied by a piece of popular music.

Suddenly, the man in front seemed to see something. He abruptly stopped in front of a crossroad next to the brightly lit Wanda Plaza.

The camera caught up, and through the misty drizzle, a black Paramela stood across the road facing the man.
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The person in the driver's seat looked careless, one hand propped on the window and the other resting on the steering wheel. His profile was smooth, and as he turned his head, it was none other than... Xu Qingyan!!!

"Is that really Brother Xu?" Zhou Lili couldn't help but blurt out.

In the video, Xu Qingyan seemed to notice the man too, looked stunned for a moment as he turned his head. Then he smiled at him and even raised his hand to greet him.

At that instant, a beautiful face popped up from the passenger side, curiously peeking outside. The camera caught her perfectly—it was nobody else but Lin Wanzhou.

Right then, the video's soundtrack reached its climax. Xu Qingyan, clad in clothes worth just a few hundred, paired with that black million-dollar luxury car Paramela, and then the little diva in the passenger seat.

All the elements combined gave off an inexplicably luxurious vibe.

"Fuck!!" Zhou Lili barely managed to blurt out, her bite of fried dough stick still intact.

"Swear again, and I'll hang your face up and slap it!" Mother Zhou glared at her.

Gulping, Zhou Lili shrank her neck and hastily shut her mouth. She wasn't sure about other moms, but her own definitely meant business with threats like that.

Punishing with a stuffed teddy bear, whipping ferociously.

She silently liked the video and then checked the comments, finding all sorts—those who were shocked, those cursing, those skeptical, and the moral high horses taking things out of context.

However, the comment section wasn't just a mix of paid trolls anymore; the video had too much information and too many talking points. A flood of real users swarmed the comments, instantly scattering the rhythm-setting trolls.

"No way! Brother Xu is for real? He's the poorest on that show, how did he get this car?"

"Is this really his car? Must be a rental, right? This fucking pauper won't even spend six yuan on soy milk, now he's driving a Panamera, a car worth over a million? Fake as hell!"

"Fuck, that's brutal, Brother Xu actually fucking drives a Porsche? The world's gone topsy-turvy! Just yesterday I was seeing him getting bashed all over the internet, was even waiting to watch him sell stuff in a livestream!"

"Am I seeing things, or is that Lin Wanzhou in the passenger seat? Fuck, it really is. How can Brother Xu afford this car, it's more painful than killing me!"

"Damn it, just passing by this romance show and I get stabbed. Fuck, why is my Zhouzhou in the same car with this fucking guy!"

"I'm broken, Brother Xu really drove a Panamera? It's more painful than killing me, fuck, I want to die. I'm not envious of anyone else driving, but why the hell does Brother Xu get to drive a Panamera!"

"Are you guys seriously broken, or what? Tell me now! Brother, I'm on my way to an early class, seriously broken here. Last night was all laughs, and today I'm the clown. Didn't they say he was guzzling canteen soup?"

As the video views soared, Xu Qingyan hadn't done a thing, yet his reputation was already getting mixed reviews.

A luxury car, plus a Little Queen in the passenger seat.

All the insults and dirty water cast upon him were overturned overnight.

The internet is indeed a magical place, one day embroiled in true and false gossip. Furiously typing on the keyboard to curse out loud, and the next day possibly changing attitudes completely.

At half past nine, a black Audi A8 slowly approached the outskirts of the university town with the traffic.

After the rain stopped around eight in the morning, Qi Ting led a masked and cap-wearing Lin Wanzhou out quietly after breakfast.

Xu Qingyan, on the other hand, first took Pei Muchan home and waited in her living room as she took a shower and changed into light makeup, then picked her up again to rush to the studio.

The studio started work at ten, with the first-floor employees and her second-floor office being separate; it didn't interfere with each other. However, Pei Muchan usually preferred to reach the studio around nine.

Unaware of the situation, Xu Qingyan also headed to the studio around the same time.

In fact, the studio staff on the first floor had not seen the boss for over half a year. Even a year prior, the boss only ever stayed at the studio for a while before leaving.

When had they ever seen the boss care so much about the studio, coming in from nine to late?

"You're on the trending searches again," Pei Muchan said, not looking up from her phone in the passenger seat.

"What rumors about me this time?" He wasn't concerned, his mind on asking Director Chen about the situation later. If there were no objections from that side, he would take action.

"This time it's not rumors; you've been caught red-handed," her tone was light.

"Hm?"

"Someone caught you driving out with Lin Wanzhou and posted the video online."

Xu: "… Who's so idle?"

"Don't know," Pei Muchan replied indifferently, then opened her camera app for a selfie.

"What are you doing?" Xu Qingyan, catching a glimpse of her activating the selfie camera from the corner of his eye, couldn't help his eyelid twitching. "Stop messing around, sister; I'm driving, don't joke with the driver."

"Alright," Pei Muchan pursed her lips and put away her phone, remaining silent for the rest of the ride.

Xu Qingyan felt numb and didn't know how to console her. Dealing with this patron was trickier than managing a child, so he could only drive in silence all the way to the studio.