Chapter 68: The Learning God

October 25, 2022kaychandra

Chapter 68: The Learning God

There were many programs on the National Station and many recording studios. It was normal for artists to sometimes have a coincidental encounter there. Like now, Gongxi Qiao just happened to meet some entertainers who had just come out of a show’s taping.

“These are all singers who are out of fashion, but still have a bit of access and are making a living from a few half-dead shows,” Chen Ke whispered in his ear. “Just say hello.”

Gongxi Qiao had some impressions of these people, who had become popular throughout the country with one song, but their follow-ups were weak. Relying on one finished song to perform everywhere, they maintained their status as singers in an uncomfortable manner.

But no matter what, these people at least had a hit song. It was much better than the singers who fell into obscurity before they made their debut.

These years, the record industry was in a slump, and the internet platforms had nurtured many internet singers and made the traditional record market even more sluggish. This also led to a strange phenomenon in the entertainment industry. That was, the status of pop singers was less than that of actors, but singers were exceptionally superior.

Taking the initiative to greet these singers, Gongxi Qiao saw the tangled emotions on these people’s faces of wanting to curry favor but wanting to maintain their poise. He sighed a little in his heart, but maintained the respect of a junior to his seniors on the surface until these people walked away, and then walked into the elevator.

As soon as Gongxi Qiao went upstairs, a staff member came to receive him. A group of people crowded around him to go to make-up, with a friendly and enthusiastic attitude, treating the newcomer a lot better than the standard. Even Chen Ke, the agent, received a polite and courteous reception.

Compared to local TV stations, the National Station placed more importance on the overall quality of the artists, rather than which artist was popular and which artist was enthusiastic, which would be too inconsistent with the National Station’s lofty and cold style. For example, if Gongxi Qiao was a popular entertainer, according to their previous standards, it would be impossible to put him on a high profile program like ‘Understanding Conversation’. However, he had another identity as a young calligrapher and painter. A young calligrapher and painter who made foreign media and painting and calligraphy lovers drop their jaws.

It wasn’t rare to see a popular entertainer, but it was rare to see a young man who won glory for their country. Moreover, in a few days, their documentary about the National Art Exchange would air. With Gongxi Qiao as one of the representatives, not only would the ratings be guaranteed, but they could also take the opportunity to promote traditional calligraphy and painting. It couldn’t be better.

The news of Gongxi Qiao’s upcoming appearance on ‘Understanding Conversation’ was already released by the National Station’s Channel 3, so many Qiao fans were already waiting obediently in front of their TV sets, even though there were still ten minutes before the show started.

At 8:40 P.M. Imperial Capital time, the familiar opening music of ‘Understanding Conversation’ started to play, and many families who were used to watching this channel sat down in front of their TV sets to enjoy the quiet after the day’s hustle and bustle.

After the opening music, there was an introduction of the guests. The editing style of the National Station was always steady and atmospheric. They didn’t use pompous words to describe the guests, but the words used were solemn enough to make every viewer feel their intention.

The final guest introduction ended with a photo of Gongxi Qiao painting while being surrounded by foreign media. Liang Jing’s elegant and handsome face appeared in front of everyone’s eyes and he opened the show in a familiar way.

Gongxi Qiao, sitting next to him, only had to smile elegantly and then wait for Liang Jing’s opening speech to finish before greeting the camera.

Liang Jing was a very good host, very good at grasping the rhythm. His words and manners were gentle, not making the guests feel offended. Gongxi Qiao intended to portray an elegant and courteous but definitely not dull young man in front of the audience, so he paid great attention to the cooperation between him and Liang Jing in terms of conversation.

“I’m very happy to chat with Xiao Qiao today,” Liang Jing said with a brighter smile on his face. “If I may be so bold as to ask a favor, I wonder if you can grant me a request.”

Gongxi Qiao smiled at that, “Brother Liang, please tell me.”

“Since this person has come, he should definitely leave some kind of gift to our program crew. I’m not greedy, just give us a piece of calligraphy.” Liang Jing teased, “You don’t know, since early this morning, the director has been reminding me not to forget to ask you for a piece of calligraphy. After the program started, he waved the cue card in his hand at me several times, and I couldn’t even pretend not to see it.”

In fact, with the status of the National Station, if they really wanted a piece of his calligraphy, Gongxi Qiao wouldn’t refuse if they mentioned it after the program. By bringing it up in the program and making such an exaggerated statement, Liang Jing was in fact intentionally promoting him.

“You flatter me, you flatter me, it’s an honor for Brother Liang and the director to look at my calligraphy. Since you don’t dislike it, I’ll offer it.” The other party had given him a ladder, so he not only had to climb up, but he had to do so humbly, so that everyone’s face would look good.

The staff of the program had already prepared everything. Gongxi Qiao went to the table, lifted the brush and dipped it into the ink. He found that it wasn’t any ink, but hand-ground ink, and the other tools were also antique and very sophisticated.

When inviting people to write calligraphy, the degree of preparation of the four treasures of the study[1] showed the attitude of respect or not. These things prepared by ‘Understanding Conversation’ gave him great respect.

You give me papaya and I will give precious jade in return.[2] Gongxi Qiao’s attitude also became a lot more deliberate when he put his brush to paper.

As he wrote, the camera was pushed closer, with a large close-up, presenting his writing posture and poise perfectly in front of the TV.

“The bright moon is accompanied by the bright stars, the Milky Way is filled with clouds like waves.”[3]

“Good!” When Gongxi Qiao’s last stroke was completed, Liang Jing, who was standing next to him, couldn’t help but shout “Good!” He was also interested in calligraphy and had received many pieces of calligraphy from others over the years after coming to their show to showcase calligraphy, but compared to Gongxi Qiao’s calligraphy, it was still a bit less elegant and graceful.

Sometimes calligraphy depended on the state of mind. In the past, people who came to their programs to do pieces of calligraphy were cautious for fear that their writing might not be good enough. But Gongxi Qiao wrote these two verses with great panache and elegance from the moment he put brush to paper.

Some people only wrote calligraphy for the sake of a hobby, while others wrote calligraphy just to show off. Gongxi Qiao’s posture was obviously the first one, because he wrote with the attitude that it was like eating and drinking, so simple that it wasn’t worth mentioning.

He wrote the words in a spontaneous manner, but they were so beautiful that he, a connoisseur, couldn’t help but itch to get the piece of writing in his hands immediately. Unfortunately, there was a director watching from below, so he couldn’t make a grab for it on camera.

After signing and stamping his own seal, Gongxi Qiao put aside his brush and said to Liang Jing, “Presenting my humble work.”

Experts watch the method while laymen just like to watch a show. The viewers in front of the TV didn’t know what was so good about Gongxi Qiao’s calligraphy, but that didn’t stop them from appreciating Gongxi Qiao.

Look at this young man, standing in such a beautiful posture, just like a small pine tree, so spiritual.

The way he held the brush and wrote was so elegant, pure and clean. At a glance, it was clear that he was a well tutored child.

Those characters were really beautiful. Although they didn’t know anything about calligraphy, they looked good ah!

Anyway, when this handful of characters was put out, Gongxi Qiao added a lot of grandmother fans and mother fans. As a result, many grandmothers and mothers, when educating their children, didn’t forget to mention such a sentence: Aren’t you guys chasing after stars? That young man Gongxi Qiao is more than capable. Not only does he look good, he is also a graduate of a famous university, and he writes well. Kid, if you don’t study like him, how could you have the cheek to chase stars?

So Gongxi Qiao took on several titles, such as “the other family’s child” poster boy, “the most reassuring idol for mothers”, and “if you want to chase stars, chase Qiao Shao”.

There were even parents who wrote to the National Station, saying that the station should invite more artists like this to participate in the program so that they wouldn’t have to worry about their children learning badly, and by the way, do you know this kid’s secret to the college entrance exam?

As a result, Gongxi Qiao inexplicably drew a lot of hatred from his peers.

He was perfect in front of the camera and lazy behind the camera. He didn’t care about those things. The day after the recording, he returned to the set to continue to be tormented by Director Jiao.

At this moment, he finished filming his own scene and sat in the corner chatting with Chen Yi, Dai Ni, Chen Wen and a few others.

“I heard that after your PSA aired, a lot of fans donated to a charity for the deaf and mute. The celebrity effect isn’t small ah,” Chen Yi unwrapped snacks for the others, eating while teasing, “How do you feel about being the most reassuring idol for mothers?”

Reaching out to snatch a handful of snacks from his hand, Gongxi Qiao raised an eyebrow, “Don’t you make fun of me. A few days ago a certain person was elected the title of the most perfect boyfriend.”

When Dai Ni and Chen Yi’s romance was first exposed, not many people were optimistic. But since fans often caught the two on intimate trips and even found Chen Yi lining up to buy Dai Ni’s favorite snacks in disguise, gradually everyone’s opinion changed.

What does age matter? If people are in love, what is the point of outsiders intervening?

“Yes, yes, the artist with one hundred percent boyfriend power,” Chen Wen smiled and looked at Dai Ni, “Sister Dai, don’t you think so?”

Dai Ni was made fun of by her but wasn’t angry. Instead, she reached out and pulled on her cheek, “Bold pupil, actually making fun of master. Be careful or master will expel you from the sect.”

The two of them played master and disciple in the movie, plus they were in the same agency, so their relationship outside of the movie was pretty good.

When Chen Yi saw this, he couldn’t interrupt. Instead, he said to Gongxi Qiao. “Seriously, that PSA of yours is really good and effective. With this PSA, your future path will be better.” It would be false to say that he didn’t envy Gongxi Qiao, but people each had their own destiny. It was useless to envy others. Instead, it was better to correct his own mindset and try his best to do better, “You have the opportunity to develop now, so don’t miss it. In this circle, there are many artists who want to rise to the top, but the opportunity is fleeting. Don’t waste the good resources that you have now.”

Gongxi Qiao nodded. He knew what Chen Yi meant. His work team was also interested in pushing him in a direction of development that was both highbrow and grounded, so the past two years had been a critical time for his development.

After taking out his phone and swiping through Weibo for a while, he found a high school senior fan who sent him a screenshot of a mathematics function problem in the comment section, hoping he would help with the answer. Countless fans followed suit and liked the comment, putting it in the second place of the hot comment section.

After reading the question, Gongxi Qiao asked Xiao Yao to find him a pen and paper and wrote down three steps to solve the problem, listing the formulae to be used as well. After finishing the answer, he took a photo and replied to the fan.

He knew vet week how to attract attention without being offensive. So this kind of behavior of helping fans to answer difficult questions was just one of the good ways to get fans.

Gongxi Qiao was right. After he replied to the fan, he soon caused a lot of screenshots to be re-posted. No way, there were too few academics like Gongxi Qiao among entertainers who were both trendy and didn’t attract haters. They were happy to join the fun.

“There are so many ways to answer this question. I’ve got a new perspective.”

“The learning tyrant is the learning tyrant. This kind of question makes me dizzy, but the learning tyrant can still find various ways to answer, is this the difference between a learning scum and a learning tyrant?”

“My Qiao isn’t a learning tyrant, but a learning god. This handwriting is so beautiful. I think just these few words, it’s so Sue, my face[4]. The fan who was lucky enough to have Qiao Shao answer the question, for the sake of Qiao Shao personally answering the question, should also get a good score out of the college entrance exam, otherwise how could you go out and say you are a Qiao fan. Forget it, let’s not talk about it, I’m going to go read a few math books and be shocked.”

Gongxi Qiao’s work team also took advantage of this incident to create a good image of Gongxi Qiao as the learning god. It just so happened that Gongxi Qiao had no film or TV work released recently, so it was good to rely on this to fire up publicity.

After reading the comments on Weibo, Chen Ke couldn’t help but smile. As an entertainer, Gongxi Qiao was definitely the most popular among all the entertainers he had worked with. Sometimes lofty and cool, sometimes down-to-earth. He didn’t make people feel that he was deliberately being funny, losing his godliness, or making people feel too distant or without a sense of authenticity.

Now he had positioned himself correctly and it was very beneficial for his future development. Sometimes an entertainer would lose a lot of good roles because the image he portrayed in reality was too overpowering, which would affect the director’s perception of his character. Pretending to be crazy and selling silliness to collect fans also couldn’t be a permanent approach. Without good works coming out, fans would gradually leave. Regardless of whether someone was pretending to be crazy and selling silliness, after everyone had a laugh, who would turn their head and pay attention to them?

The first step was Gongxi Qiao’s public service announcement and ‘Understanding Conversation’, which raised his godly reputation. Then, he helped his fans to solve their math problems, which brought him closer to his fans.

The moon was clear and the stars were sparse, the night scene was just right, and the ‘Cultivation’ crew was on site.

Gongxi Qiao stood on the stage, wearing a swishing white costume. In order to show the protagonist’s outstanding lofty aura, the sleeves and hem lines of his costume were blown by a big fan to flutter wildly, full of an immortal atmosphere.  But as soon as the scene was over, he hurriedly jumped off the stage, tugging at the wig on his forehead and said to Director Jiao. “Director, this wind is too strong, tears are almost blowing out of my eyes.”

“Do you want the staff to tug on your clothes with strings?” Director Jiao rolled his eyes, “Our crew can’t use such a primitive method. The audience isn’t stupid, they can see at a glance that the effect is caused by string tension, there is no beauty.”

“We have all this beauty but my eyelids are almost blown inside out,” Gongxi Qiao rubbed his eyes and said, “For the sake of my efforts, you can give me a half day off.”

“Don’t even think about it.” Director Jiao raised his eyebrows, “Don’t slack off in front of me, climb up on the stage and move on to the next shot.”

The other staff members laughed at the words, and Ji Yuming said, “Director, this is bullying children, ah.”

“I haven’t said anything yet, how did it become me bullying him.” Director Jiao quirked his beard. “You all, don’t look at the handsome young man. You don’t put this director in your eyes. 20 years ago, I was also a handsome young man.”

Gongxi Qiao was raising his arms for the staff to hook up his wires. Hearing Director Jiao’s words, he burst out laughing and said, “If we all admit that you are handsome, are you going to treat us to supper, ah?”

“Yes, yes, Director Jiao. You are definitely the most handsome director in the world, so you’re contracted for tonight’s supper,” Ma Qian, who was also having wires hooked on, touched her stomach, “I just happen to be hungry now.”

While pretending to be angry, Director Jiao pretended to have no choice but to agree, causing everyone to laugh again.

But no matter how much they laughed and joked, when the shooting started, everyone got serious. This was the reason why Director Jiao was so kind to the actors and actresses in the crew. Although these main actors and actresses were all big stars surrounded by fans, none of them played big names after entering the crew, and none of them wanted to add scenes based on their status and were all dedicated.

Even Gongxi Qiao, the young master who had a very good relationship with Xi Qing, never complained of suffering when filming. Even if he hung from the wires for most of the day, wearing out the skin on his body, he wouldn’t lose his temper, and listened carefully to his advice as a director.

If ordinary artists listened to him, Director Jiao might not have been so impressed, but the fact that Gongxi Qiao, with his status, would also be so dedicated and respectful to other staff members was enough to make Director Jiao think highly of him.

Perhaps this perception was unfair to other entertainers, but if a person’s status was high enough, then his attitude towards his work was more likely to give rise to a different perception.

There was a difference between doing what you had to do, and doing what you didn’t have to do, but still did.

When Xi Qing came to the ‘Cultivation’ crew, Gongxi Qiao was still hanging from the wires and playing around. Producer Zhou saw him and was busy welcoming him enthusiastically, “Boss, are you here to visit the set?”

Looking down at the time, it was almost eleven o’clock in the evening, was the boss here to visit the set or to join in the fun?

“How long will it take to finish filming?” Xi Qing saw the wires Gongxi Qiao was hanging from slowly descending. He didn’t wait for Producer Zhou’s answer, and walked directly towards Gongxi Qiao’s direction.

Producer Zhou looked at Xi Qing’s back and was speechless.

When he heard the word “President Xi” mentioned by the staff, Gongxi Qiao looked up and saw Xi Qing walking towards him. A smile appeared on his face, “You’re here?”

Xi Qing nodded in silence and waited for the staff to remove the wires from Gongxi Qiao’s waist before saying, “I saw that you were still not home this late, so I came to take a look.”

The surrounding staff:……

How did President Xi know Qiao Shao hadn’t gone home yet?

“We just finished filming and Director Jiao is going to treat us to a late dinner, do you want to come along?”

Xi Qing nodded silently.

Gongxi Qiao smiled and looked towards Director Jiao, “Director Jiao, would you mind if I bring him to dine with me?”

“Don’t mind, don’t mind.” Director Jiao secretly sighed that Gongxi Qiao really gave him face. Other directors tried their best but couldn’t meet Xi Qing, but because he had Gongxi Qiao as an actor in the crew, he had become a familiar face in front of Xi Qing.

Master Xi was willing to give him face to have supper, he couldn’t be happier. How could he mind?

Dai Ni looked at Xi Qing, who was accompanying Gongxi Qiao to remove his makeup, with complicated eyes. With Gongxi Qiao present, wasn’t Master Xi a little too approachable?

Xi Qing was sitting quietly next to Gongxi Qiao who was surrounded by make-up artists to remove his make-up, and his eyes were gentle to the extreme.

A lot of make-up artists present once again sighed that the feelings of Master Xi and Qiao Shao were really too good to be true.

T/N: 

1. The four treasures of the study: Brush, Ink stick, Paper, and Ink stone, the items needed for calligraphy. 

2. You give me papaya and I will give precious jade in return: a Chinese proverb about cherishing the kind intentions of others and reciprocating.

3. Bright moon (etc): 明月朗朗星为伴，银河迢迢云似涛。When I searched this poem online I found a lot of pages quoting it so it seems to be a well-known piece of traditional poetry. I didn’t find any mention of the original author/source of the poem though.

4. Sue, my face: 就能苏我一脸 here’s my best guess: the Sue means Mary Sue. The “my face” is slang that just intensifies the statement like, OMG or something.