The Villain Runs Wild

Ch 57 - Newest Top Celebrity x Washed Up Film Emperor: In My Heart


Before he knew it, Yan Qin had been pretending to be blind for two months.

He hadn’t opened his eyes starting from his initial discomfort up to now that he was used to it, and both his sense of hearing and smell were much sharper than before.

He clearly hadn’t been thinking about Lin Sui that often, so why were his senses still deceiving him?

Yan Qin knew he’d been working hard to gather himself, not only to overcome his bottleneck and stand up once again, but also to escape Lin Sui’s influence.

A star’s influence was pervasive, he heard him in TV commercials and saw him in advertisements, but Yan Qin shut himself away into his own world, enduring until he obtained a bit of peace.

He finished eating the bowl of wontons, then slowly walked along the road in the direction of his house.

The air in the shantytown smelled bad, with the occasional stench of sewage, but Yan Qin walked along the way without changing his face, distinguishing the current time based on the activity he sensed along the road.

It was probably nightfall when Yan Qin returned home, smelling the scent of burning medicinal incense.

“Blindeye, how about some incense? My son brought it back from the big city saying it was something to help with sleep, I’ll give you some.”

The neighbour was a fella with a thick countryside accent, and he spoke as he walked in holding a tray of incense.

They didn’t know Yan Qin’s name, he had never really talked to anyone since he suddenly showed up one day, so everyone just called him Blindeye since he was blind.

Yan Qin didn’t refuse his kindness and, as he was leaving, he put a bag of red dates he’d bought before into the man’s hands. The fella didn’t refuse him either, and returned to his own house.

After he returned home, he cautiously looked at the young man sitting inside his house, and spoke in broken Mandarin: “I gave it to him.”

When he’d returned home today he’d been startled by a young man as beautiful as a painting standing outside the door of his house, and he’d been more at a loss after the young man took out some money.

He found out that the blind man next door was a relative of this man, but he’d had a conflict at home and came here to live alone, so he’d come here to see how he was doing and take care of him.

The fella muttered that Blindeye didn’t know what was good for him and didn’t take advantage of his good fortune by insisting on coming to live in this lousy place, but money was money, plus this young man was strangely intimidating, a quick glance from his eyes would make his heart skip a beat, much more so than some officials he’d seen before.

“I’ll sit here for a while, then leave at night.”

Lin Sui stared at the wall a little lost in thought and spoke with an indifferent expression.

The fella took the money with no complaints and took out his best tea leaves to entertain his guest, seeping them in a pot and placing it in front of the young man, then went to crouch in a corner to do his own thing.

Night arrived before they knew it, and the faint smell of the medicinal incense came from next door. Lin Sui left the fella’s house and dexterously climbed over the wall.

The furnishings in this house were very simple, there were no other things aside from a table and bed in Yan Qin’s room.

He was laying on his side, sound asleep.

The incense was really used to help with sleep, Lin Sui had added soothing ingredients to it, and he had also added a bit of sleeping powder to the bowl of soup he’d handed Yan Qin today, so he wouldn’t wake up tonight.

His eyes were still covered with a black strip of cloth, Lin Sui didn’t remove it, he brushed his fingers lightly over his temples, wordlessly watching him.

He really looked like a miserable lost dog, Lin Sui sighed internally.

Despite losing his sight, and although Yan Qin’s external appearance seemed wretched, he actually kept himself clean and tidy, and his body gave off the simple smell of soap.

Lin Sui placed his hands over his waist and pressed his forehead against his back, then closed his eyes.

He left quietly before daybreak, as if he’d never been there.

Yan Qin always woke up very early after losing his sight.

The incense his neighbour had given him last night was apparently quite effective, he seemed to have slept very deeply, he’d even dreamt of a soft embrace.

He really wanted to tell himself that it wasn’t an illusion, but he knew Lin Sui wouldn’t show up here, much less hold him as he slept.

He didn’t know what Lin Sui was doing now, he was probably still a big star, living his life like before.

Lin Sui went to the airport in a private car, and flew two hours to return to the capital.

He sat on the sofa a little tiredly, and Fu Nai opened the door and looked at him with suspicion.

“Why are you always so secretive? Disappearing for a few days at the drop of a hat and being nowhere to be found.”

“What is it?”

Fu Nai: “I came to ask you about a donation, there was a drought someplace and the situation is relatively serious, and now everyone is donating. We’ve donated around 2 million.”

“Although we don’t know where Yan Qin is, his studio is still operating, and they’ve already declared they’re donating 3 million.”

Lin Sui spoke with an unchanging face: “Then make it 5 million.”

Fu Nai widened her eyes: “Is this turning into a competition?”

“It’s not because of that, and it’s not like I can’t afford it.”

“But won’t this make us stick out too much? It might make the others look stingy in comparison, and easily lead to people being denounced.”

“Don’t worry about what they think.”

Lin Sui didn’t care about the opinions on matters related to Yan Qin, how he used his money was his business.

“Okay, are you still not planning on taking on any scripts?”

Fu Nai was actually a little worried, it had been a full two months and Lin Sui hadn’t even picked a script he wanted.

“No.”

“Then let me take a variety show for you, okay? Either way it’s to maintain exposure.”

Looking at the recent decline in numbers, Fu Nai made a suggestion.

Lin Sui nodded without any objections: “Sure."

Fu Nai looked at her phone as she spoke: “If you don’t plan on accepting any roles for the time being, then I’ll get you a spot as a recurring guest in a variety show. I saw a relatively good one that involved interacting with children, but you don’t need to worry about messy things happening. I’ve seen all the children they chose, they’re all cute and with quite good tempers, and it could result in a lot more fans if the outcome is good.”

Lin Sui nodded without any opinions: “Hm.”

And so the matter was decided.

The news of Lin Sui donating 5 million got out, and everyone praised him.

Some people bitterly said that 5 million was nothing to a star, but getting rid of virtue signalling, how much money one took out was also a matter of feelings, and contemporary netizens were relatively clear-headed.

Lin Sui was not moved by the comments praising him, he wasn’t a “gentleman like the heavenly moon, brightly shining down onto humanity”, if one were to call him the moon, then he was only reflecting the light of the sun.

After accumulating wealth to a certain extent, as far as Lin Sui was concerned, those were just numbers. He’d also been doing charitable things in the last world, he just never announced it, he wasn’t a big philanthropist nor was he remorseful, he was just used to it, taking after a certain person’s habits.

Ah, that person had the style of a nobleman regardless of when he was.

Lin Sui was on a variety show called “Cute Treasures From Heaven” in which five guest stars would be matched with five children. The first round was a mutual selection in which they could directly team up with one if they happened to catch their eye, otherwise they would just draw lots to match with the adorable babies.

On the screen, Lin Sui saw five children sat obediently in the room, they were between three and five years old, three of them were boys and two were girls, and each of them had their own style.

One little boy was like a good-luck doll, holding food from beginning to end without spilling a single bite, one long-haired little girl was playing with a Barbie, the other little girl had exercise overalls and was playing with a little robot, and another delicately pretty little boy was sitting next to her in a familiar manner and playing with her.

The little boy left over had a healthy and vigorous appearance, he seemed to move a lot and wasn’t eating or playing with the other children, and he was fumbling and glancing all around.

He didn’t cry when he accidentally lost his footing and fell, he got back up and continued walking like nothing had happened, and one could tell he was sturdy and tough.

Lin Sui liked him at a glance, and saw the name written down on the card, he was called Hu Bao.

Lin Sui was an impatient person, and he didn’t really like or care much for human kids, he didn’t like creatures that were weak and had to be protected, so Hu Bao, who could be raised just by keeping an eye on him, really suited him.

The five guests gave out their respective picks very quickly, and Hu Bao was only chosen by one person.

Since he seemed very mischievous, the other guests were worried he would consume a lot of their energy and that, if they didn’t take care of him and an accident happened, it might lead to a child getting hurt, and that would be a big problem.

The kids had already made their choices, they picked who they liked based on a picture.

Lin Sui was the person with the most votes, kids also valued appearance and liked good-looking people.

Lin Sui and Hu Bao made a successful two-way selection, becoming the first successful best-matched pair.

In the first segment of the programme, they each took their cute treasures home first to get used to life for a while, then started the next part of their journey.

Lin Sui’s home had surveillance cameras installed, but he had no opinions regarding the newly-arrived little imp. He still did what he had to do every day, and just asked the housekeeper to cook an extra portion for the kid when mealtime came.

He also agreed to accompany Hu Bao wherever he wanted to go, but he’d have a seemingly cold and impatient look on his face.

Contrary to expectations, this reacted together wonderfully and made everyone feel like it was adorable.

Today, Hu Bao had a mission from the adults in the programme crew, to go wake his pretty uncle up.

Hu Bao walked upstairs on his short little legs and tripped over his own feet as he walked into the door, falling flat on his face. He didn’t cry, instead he rolled about on the ground and crawled to the bedside, where he suddenly found something, so he squeezed in and pulled out a box from under the bed.

A kid’s attention span was always short, and Hu Bao was very curious, so he forgot about his mission in an instant and opened the box, wanting to see whatever was inside.

But he had just looked at the box in his hands when it was taken away by someone.

Hu Bao pulled his head back and showed the displeased young man a flattering smile, innocently saying: “Uncle, I came to wake you up.”

Lin Sui spoke coldly: “I woke up by myself.”

Hu Bao let out an “Oh”, then suddenly realised something was wrong, so he trotted in front of the camera and said: “I failed the mission, I didn’t wake uncle up, uncle was awake.”

He looked very dejected, but everyone couldn’t help but give him a knowing smile.

Lin Sui’s originally bad mood mellowed out a little, and he stroked Hu Bao’s head.

Outside the camera, Hu Bao couldn’t help but ask: “Uncle, who’s that person inside the box?”

Lin Sui casually said: “Your aunt.”

Hu Bao wasn’t interested, so he ran off again to play with another toy.

On the second episode, the guests went to a water park to do a treasure hunt, and they used a relatively special live broadcast mode for the third, so everyone gathered together in a guest house to play.

Before the third episode started, “Damp” was nominated for Best Picture of the year, Lin Sui also made it to the finals for Best Male Lead, but unfortunately just missed the award.

There were also a lot of excellent films in the competition this year, and the actor who got the Best Male Lead award was the lead of another disaster movie that was also nominated.

When the news reached everyone, they all felt it was such a pity.

But even if he narrowly missed being Best Male Lead, being nominated was still a great credit, and almost no one mocked Lin Sui for being a flower vase now. However, the new way to mock him was by saying that Lin Sui couldn’t act well now that Yan Qin was gone, which was why he wasn’t making any movies.

But those kind of voices were very few, and not many people cared.

Lin Sui’s fans were very sorry that he missed the award, and CP fans were even more disappointed.

It seemed to be the Bad End of Bad Ends, everything was slipping through their fingers.

After the third episode was filmed, the other guests at the scene expressed their sympathies because of this, but Lin Sui didn’t think anything of it and continued as usual.

For the kid’s competition, the winning child could have a wish granted.

The final winner was that quiet long-haired little girl, Ke Li, but when it was time to bring up her wish, she walked towards Lin Sui.

She spoke in a sweet, childish voice: “Uncle, my mom really likes your movies, can you give me an autograph for her?”

Everyone burst out laughing, and the idol taking care of Ke Li was even more heartbroken.

Lin Sui nodded with a smile: “Of course.”

Outside the stage, Ke Li’s mother was very excited, she handed a photograph over to Ke Li, and she went to bring it over.

It was a two-person photo from “Damp”, and when the people saw it, their hearts gave a loud thump.

Who didn’t know about the matter of Lin Sui blacklisting Yan Qin so that he had to leave the industry? And in the end this unknown movie fan actually handed over this kind of photo.

Since it was a live broadcast programme, the barrage of comments was filled with full stops.

@Chachazi: I have no words right now.

@Ke Li Cub Is Super Cute: Umm, umm… the dead CP suddenly appears in front of my idol’s face, it’s back!

Lin Sui’s face didn’t change, and he signed his name on the back of the picture.

Just at that moment, a child’s voice suddenly interrupted with an earth-shattering comment.

“Hey, it’s auntie.”

Everyone turned to look at Hu Bao, dumbstruck, and a guest unconsciously asked: “What aunt?”

“It’s just auntie. That’s uncle,” Hu Bao pointed at Lin Sui, then pointed at Yan Qin in the picture: “That’s aunt.”

The aunt in the box.

Everyone present, including the guests, director, and even the crew: ??????

The army in the comments: ???????

@It’s Suisui Ya: Wait! What! Baby say it again!!!

@Yan Returns To Lin Is Real: What aunt? Aunt what?

@Qi: Right now I don’t even care why he called a man aunt, say it again, Hu Bao, I love to hear it!

This really was outside of Lin Sui’s expectations, he hadn’t expected that box under the bed wold be found by Hu Bao, and he hadn’t expected that Hu Bao would repeat his careless answer on this live broadcast.

“It’s from the movie, little kids don’t understand.”

Lin Sui downplayed his explanation, and handed back the signed picture to Ke Li.

Lin Sui seemed to be so calm and unruffled that the others couldn’t be flustered either, no matter what, the show still had to flow and the filming still had to continue.

But the CP fans were not convinced, it was as if they’d been given an artificial pacemaker and brought to life once again!

@It’s Suisui Ya: I said they were real! Where would a small child like Hu Bao get the idea from? It must be because the wife said something to him that he thought it was his aunt! Oh oh oh oh my idol approves!

@Yan Joins Lin: Oh oh oh my dead CP has risen! Hahahaha whatever this is, its sugar!

@Pressing The Heads Of YanLin: Hahahahahahaha, I’m laughing so much my whole family thinks I’ve gone insane.

Even passer-bys made guesses regarding the relationship between them, thinking that their previous romance was basically real, but they weren’t too interested, after all, the other celebrity had been laying low for a long time already.

At this moment, the other celebrity was carrying out preparations for filming.

After a few months of simulating blindness, Yan Qin had begun to slowly restore his vision under a doctor’s supervision, after all, he couldn’t really film blind, he had to look at the cameras and read the details.

The director and screenwriter of “To Know The Sun” were high school classmates, and they knew this story from the mouth of Dawa’s daughter, Xiao Yue.

The three of them were good friends. Xiao Yue had been so frightened by being abducted that she had a fever for several days and had no memory of the past once she woke up, but a person’s brain was a complicated thing, and after receiving a fright on a certain day, she suddenly remembered her childhood again.

When she remembered her blind father, Dawa, she hurriedly made her way back home.

But what she learnt was news of her father’s death, and just by hearing about the experience and finding some of the images of her father looking for her, Xiao Yue broke down into soundless sobs.

“Xiao Yue was a very optimistic person, but after regaining her memories of the past, she rarely ever smiled. She felt guilty and blamed herself all the time, she thought that if she hadn’t foolishly played outside that day, if she hadn’t been sick and lost her memory, if she could’ve found her father a little sooner, then maybe her father wouldn’t have died.”

“She suffered from severe depression because of this, she could only feel a bit at ease while constantly chasing after her father’s shadow, and only then she could feel that he was still with her. We walked with her a long time, slowly learning about this man we’d never met.”

“But as we found out about his miserable life, her illness became more serious and she could no longer bear the torment in her heart. That sense of loss was something our friendship couldn’t fill, so we waited for her swansong. We didn’t stop her, because she longed to return to her father’s arms, and we hope she finds happiness in heaven.”

“We’re determined to write and film this story, we’ve been editing and polishing it these past few years, and you’re the actor we set our mind on. We hope you’ll be able to film this, and that we won’t be ashamed to face him or feel like we failed Xiao Yue.”

“In fact, we didn’t choose the wrong person, we’re really thankful you’re taking this so seriously.”

The eyes of both the director and screenwriter, who were two big guys, were red. Yan Qin had a thousand things he wanted to say, but ultimately just patted them lightly on the shoulder.

Yan Qin understood what kind of disparity and suffering there was in falling from heaven down to into the abyss.

He used his own money to subsidise the cast and crew, but there were limits in order to make the two young men plan more and be more careful when making the movie.

He was so completely focused that he didn’t find out about what happened on the live broadcast that time until much later.

Yan Qin’s first reaction was thinking it was impossible. He felt like he was Dawa, and he was very afraid the thing in front of his eyes was another abyss.

But he overcame this fear in an instant, it was strange to say, but no matter how much Lin Sui hurt him, he still wanted to crawl towards him.

Yan Qin earnestly watched the entire video, and, for some unknown reason, an impossible guess emerged in his heart.

He paused filming for two days and returned to the shantytown where he’d lived for a few months, smacking open the door to his neighbour’s house.

“Aiya, are you Blindeye? Are your eyes better?”

The fella was a little shocked, feeling like the person in front of him and that blind man from before were completely different people.

“The day you gave me that incense, did you see a good-looking young man? Did he look like this?”

Yan Qin didn’t offer much explanation, taking out a picture of Lin Sui and showing it to him.

The fella hesitated for a moment and firmly shook his head.

Yan Qin caught his peculiar reaction and took out some money from his pocket, stuffing it into his hands.

The fella was in a bit of a tough spot, still hemming and hawing as he said: “Yeah, he gave me that incense, he sat with me here until night, then just left.”

Yan Qin didn’t stay longer and ran off to go see the lady boss of the wonton stand.

He got the answer he wanted, and after the uncontainable excitement and ecstasy, he was a little at a loss.

Why on earth would Lin Sui do this?

Why would he hurt him when he showed him love, but silently look after him and even embrace him without him knowing?

Yan Qin pondered for a long time, and remembered something Lin Sui once told him.

That day Lin Sui told him he was too deep into the role, he said something about Xing Yu and Ying Ting.

The general idea was that Xing Yu believed in Ying Ting’s love, so he let down his guard and was killed, ending up dead.

Lin Sui probably thought that love and these kinds of relationships were unreliable?

Or maybe, it wasn’t that Lin Sui didn’t like him, it was just that he set up layer upon layer of obstacles for love.

Lin Sui stood on the other side of the thistles and thorns, waiting for the person being tested to crawl in front of him covered in cuts and bruises, and, perhaps, only then would Lin Sui genuinely believe in his love.

“He clearly seems to be a fortunate person, so why does he guard his heart so strongly?”

Yan Qin muttered in confusion, but felt in indescribable, worsening pain in the bottom of his heart.

Still, Yan Qin felt that he himself should be a very resistant person, otherwise why would he still want to go bite that uncertain hook after having fallen twice in a row? As long as Lin Sui displayed a small bit of love, he’d be able to feed on it and move towards him.

The director and screenwriter of “To Know The Sun” discovered that, after returning from his two-day leave, Mr. Yan suddenly became particularly spirited, he seemed radiant, different from his previous silent appearance both inside and outside of the film.

Although he maintained a relatively good state while not filming, Yan Qin was still especially dedicated when he was immersed in the work, and sometimes it would be too heavy for him to be able to get out of character straight away.

Whenever that happened, Yan Qin would just go look at those pictures he couldn’t delete, and slowly come back to life.

Dawa had never seen the sun, but he had, and he was certainly going to have it.

“To Know The Sun” filmed for three months, and the entire cast and crew cried as they filmed everything. People would often be wiping their tears after a scene, especially the ones when Dawa’s wife died from complications from childbirth, when he held his wife’s memorial tablet and cried as he slapped himself, and when his child got lost, those scenes had everyone’s eyes swollen from crying.

When Yan Qin, who’d been gone for over half a year, returned, he came back with a new work, and it was passed on by powerful friends he had inside the circle one after the other. Yan Qin was not stingy with publicity either, and it won over the offline screening rate.

After the movie aired, it achieved a 9.9 score on a certain rating site, and even though it would maybe decrease with time and the number of people, this starting point was already extremely stunning.

@KaKa: Yan Qin really deserves those two Film Emperor titles, it’s shocking, when the movie starts you have absolutely no way to connect the Dawa in the movie to the real-life person, in that moment, you believe Dawa was exactly like that, no one could’ve done better.

@Camellia: I was sobbing at the cinema, luckily everyone was crying and I wasn’t the only miserable one. I can only say it was a good cry, like a kind of affectionate and tender despair, I don’t know how to put it into words. The narration of the story and the filming technique intentionally didn’t make everything with twists and magnificent momentum, you can feel that this is an ordinary person’s lamentable life, fate left shallow cuts on a person’s heart, but those wounds never healed.

@YunYun: I can feel Dawa was always working really hard, it feels like he was always like that, so that’s why people can feel sorrow and pain, but I also feel like Yan Qin is really a fantastic actor. He completely separated the role and the person, when I see Dawa’s face, I can’t separate him from his character, but when I see Yan Qin, I know that he is Yan Qin himself.

Meanwhile, a video of an interview with Yan Qin began madly circulating online.

“I’m very fortunate to have come across this story, and I’m extremely grateful to the director and the screenwriter, and, actually, there’s another person I have to thank.”

The reporter asked curiously: “Who?”

Yan Qin briefly touched his heart and smiled: “He’s here, I can’t say.”