Chapter 52

Translator: Abo Dammen

After the whole apartment was tidied up, Chen Lu immediately used the tools in the room to swiftly create a ‘masterpiece’. He snapped several pictures of it and shared them with Fang Qizhi, accompanied by a deeply profound message. 

Chen Lu: [Image][Image][Image] Remember this style. This will be the content of your future work.

Fang Qizhi, who knows what he was busy with, didn’t reply immediately. Thinking about it, Chen Lu, embodying the spirit of ‘if we’re going down, we’re going down together’, also sent the photos to Qin Guchuan.

Chen Lu: [Image][Image][Image] You can come over to advance the plot now!!!

Qin Guchuan glanced at his phone upon hearing the notification. His somewhat weary spirit after a long day’s work was instantly refreshed. 

This was a physical kind of refreshment, entirely unrelated to any emotions.

…How did Chen Lu manage to create a work that looked even more frightening than the “Breaking Free” painting stored in the Qin residence’s warehouse?

Perhaps ‘frightening’ wasn’t the accurate word. It was more like… a sudden, violent assault on one’s aesthetic sensibilities.

Taking a deep breath, Qin Guchuan looked at the still towering pile of documents on his desk and replied to Chen Lu. 

Qin Guchuan: Okay, I’ll wrap things up and head over soon.

Qin Guchuan: Your painting has improved significantly.

Seeing Qin Guchuan’s evaluation, Chen Lu was stunned. He turned to look at his new creation, took exactly one glance, and immediately spun back without pause, deeply shocked that Qin Guchuan could actually discern any form of progress.

Chen Lu: Really??? 

Qin Guchuan: Mhm. It’s even more terrifying.

Qin Guchuan, displaying not a shred of instinct for self-preservation, sent a brutally honest response.

After some deep thought, Chen Lu also expressed his profound agreement with this assessment.

Chen Lu: True. I think when Fang Qizhi sees my painting, he definitely won’t be able to suppress the desire to tear it to shreds. 

Some bizarre, roundabout methods for completing plot tasks had inexplicably increased.

While exchanging messages with Chen Lu, the omnipotent assistant Zhou Ji had already sorted out the more important documents from the desk and moved them into the car Qin Guchuan was driving today.

Zhou Ji, observing his boss’s finally relaxed expression, asked quietly, “President Qin, perhaps it would be better if I drove you.”

From the top floor all the way down to the garage, his boss hadn’t taken his eyes off his phone. It did not inspire confidence in President Qin’s driving state. 

“I’ll drive myself. You can clock off,” Qin Guchuan rejected Zhou Ji’s well-intentioned offer without looking back. Standing by the car, he sent Chen Lu a few final messages.

Qin Guchuan: Is there anything you’d like to eat? I can bring it with me.

Chen Lu: No need, I’ve been fed! Look, the aunties next door brought this over for me! It’s a completely different flavor from the home chef’s, super delicious!! [Image][Image][Image]

Chen Lu: Do you want to come up and eat together? 

Seeing this question, Qin Guchuan’s expression turned wry.

Qin Guchuan: Can I come up?

Chen Lu: No (wicked grin.gif)

Because today’s plot could also be considered a classic segment. 

The evergreen trope in early-2000s dogblood novels that remains in use to this day—

‘The male lead, knowing the female lead wants nothing to do with him and has run away from home, is heartbroken. He parks his luxury car outside the female lead’s building, lights a cigarette, and silently smokes all night long, staying there wordlessly as if he had no mouth, before quietly leaving early the next morning.’

This is typically paired with the female lead, who hears the neighbors’ gossip, discovers the male lead’s presence, watches silently for a while before hardening her heart and going to sleep, only to toss and turn, unable to sleep.

Midway, the female lead gets up to look countless times, her heart aching for the male lead yet bitter for herself. Finally, she inexplicably falls asleep, only to jolt awake early in the morning, hurriedly open the curtains, see the empty entrance to the residential area, and feel a sense of loss, realizing the male lead had left at some unknown time.’ 

Moreover, this content often gets reused repeatedly in such stories.

Looking at Chen Lu’s wicked grin emoji, Qin Guchuan’s mind automatically conjured up Chen Lu’s sly expression.

Qin Guchuan couldn’t help but smile. He finally put away his phone and, under the bows of Zhou Ji and the other bodyguards, slowly drove out of the Qin Corporation building.

Even if the domineering CEO drives himself, the domineering CEO’s grandeur must not be lost. 

—It’s the world’s stubborn insistence.

Chen Lu’s home was quite far from the Qin residence, but the distance from the Qin Corporation wasn’t too bad. It didn’t take long before he arrived downstairs at Chen Lu’s place.

Just as he parked the car, Qin Guchuan took out his phone, preparing to send Chen Lu a message saying the plot could begin or something similar.

But clearly, this world was more impatient than he was. 

“My god! Why is this year’s limited edition XXX parked at our neighborhood entrance?!!!” A roar that shook the entire neighborhood erupted like thunder.

“This single car could probably buy several of our apartments?!!!” A second loud exclamation swiftly followed.

“Who is he here to see? That’s incredible!!!”

Chen Lu: “…” 

Qin Guchuan: “……..”

Neighbors’ gossip (Wrong).

Neighbors’ thunderous roars (Correct).

They were really afraid Chen Lu might accidentally miss it. 

Chen Lu looked down at the message Fang Qizhi had just sent him, raised his phone, recorded a short video capturing both Qin Guchuan’s luxury car downstairs and the neighbors’ ‘gossip’, and sent it to Fang Qizhi.

Fang Qizhi: Is this why you marked your stream as resting today???

Chen Lu: No, it’s because of this. [Video]

After watching the entire short video, which lasted barely ten seconds, Fang Qizhi, his IQ feeling assaulted: “…” 

He suddenly became completely unwilling to admit that this world was a book. Fang Qizhi felt his character, as an important villainous male supporting character in the book, was being insulted.

Fang Qizhi: This is what you call ‘advancing the plot’???

Five minutes later.

Fang Qizhi: ? Where’d you go? 

Fang Qizhi: Talk to me??

After sending the video, Chen Lu had tossed his phone aside and had already begun following the plot. Of course, he wouldn’t reply to messages.

Even though this part of the plot was his solo act, and he had absolutely no corresponding feelings internally, Chen Lu was still very professional in getting his expressions just right.

Chen Lu’s gaze focused intently on the luxury car at the neighborhood entrance, clearly making out the figure inside the car. 

The figure… who, seated in the driver’s seat, still hadn’t forgotten to work.

Chen Lu, whose physical eyesight had become exceptionally good due to the plot’s frequent demands for descriptions like ‘seeing XXX from afar’: “……”

Advancing the plot is truly the enemy of work.

Thinking about how his own actions had contributed to all the overtime Qin Guchuan had been working recently… Well… and he’d gotten a cut of the money too. 

The thought of the latter immediately made various ‘Your income has arrived’ notification sounds pop into Chen Lu’s head. He immediately managed to achieve the ‘deep, affectionate gaze’ described in the plot with great sincerity.

Following the plot, Chen Lu looked intently for a long time before ‘hardening his heart’ and closing the curtains. In his room, his thoughts in turmoil… he picked up his phone again.

During the time Chen Lu was performing his ‘deep, painful gazing’, the messages from Fang Qizhi on his phone had gone through many iterations.

After lighting up his phone screen, Chen Lu gazed deeply at the last message Fang Qizhi had sent, displayed on his lock screen. 

Fang Qizhi: Surely it’s okay if your future kid calls me Godfather, right?

Chen Lu was speechless, feeling that even his own rather fantastical train of thought couldn’t immediately follow what Fang Qizhi was thinking.

Scrolling up through Fang Qizhi’s earlier messages, Chen Lu clearly saw that Fang Qizhi, based on his online searches of various novel tropes, had already mentally composed a plot outline spanning hundreds of thousands of words for him, and had now determined that Chen Lu must already be pregnant and was currently in the ‘runaway with the baby’ stage.

Chen Lu immediately made the ‘subway old man looking at phone‘ expression. 

Chen Lu: Great imagination. In the future, focus on watching the livestreams properly. Spend less time mixed up in the world of 2D.

When it came to throwing verbal boomerangs, Chen Lu felt he had, through long practice, become proficient enough to graduate with mastery of the ‘Great Shift of the Qiankun‘.

While Qin Guchuan was working, Chen Lu chatted nonsense with Fang Qizhi for a while.

After roughly communicating the time and place Fang Qizhi needed to appear for the next plot point, Chen Lu checked the time and felt it was about right. He turned and sent a message to Qin Guchuan. 

Chen Lu: You can get out of the car and start smoking now!

Of course, Qin Guchuan in the plot wasn’t limited to just working (?) in the car.

A qualified male lead in a dogblood novel absolutely must have the classic CG scene of getting out of the car, lighting a cigarette, and looking up to gaze melancholically at Chen Lu’s window.

Thinking this, Chen Lu suddenly realized a problem. 

Chen Lu: Do you even know how to smoke?

After getting out of the car and seeing this follow-up message from Chen Lu, Qin Guchuan smiled.

Qin Guchuan: Don’t worry. I know how to light a cigarette.