CHAPTER 72: CHAPTER 71: STIRRING UP SCANDAL (PART 1)

On a cold winter morning, Huaiyi was enjoying the warmth of the bed, when a series of notification tones buzzed from beside the bed.

And it was the kind that just wouldn’t stop.

Huaiyi angrily threw off the blanket, turned over to grab the phone: "Shit!"

Who the hell is it!

WeChat messages were flooding in one after another. Huaiyi rubbed her sleepy eyes and opened WeChat.

The first thing that caught her eye was a message from Liu Yang, pushed to the top by the latest updates—

[Liu Yang: Damn Huaiyi! Is that assistant you???]

Huaiyi was bewildered and scrolled through a whole screen full of unread messages—

[Kang Xuan: Huaiyi, have you been dating Xiang Qichen for so long without telling me?]

[Ying Yue: Is that you, Huaiyi?]

[Zhou Youning: Sis? How come the assistant that’s trending on Weibo today looks so much like you?]

...

Huaiyi was completely dumbfounded by these questions.

The first reaction was to open Weibo and click on the trending topics.

The entry "Xiang Qichen suspected romance exposed" held firm at the top of the trending list, followed by a glaring red "explosion" icon.

Huaiyi’s breathing suddenly became tense. She clicked on the entry and the first thing she saw was a piece of text: [Near the water, the little assistant hooks up with the male prime? Appearing at the market around Mid-Autumn night, coincidence or arriving together? A secret meeting in the room late at night...]

Below were nine GIFs, apart from a few pictures of Xiang Qichen entering her room at the hotel, the rest were of the two being photographed entering a supermarket before and after the Mid-Autumn night.

In short, the whole page was filled with pictures of her being secretly photographed alongside Xiang Qichen — at the airport, on set, appearing below Xiang Qichen’s apartment, etc.

But fortunately, in most of the pictures, she’s wearing a mask and a hat, making her appearance unclear. Even those who had been in recent contact with her and knew her well were not too sure if it was her. No wonder there were such questions on WeChat.

As soon as the news broke, Xiang Qichen’s tens of millions of fans couldn’t stay calm, and the comment section was full of doubts—

["Impossible, absolutely impossible, it’s definitely a publicity stunt for the new movie (manual wave goodbye)"]

["If you think it’s fake, give a like."]

["Who is this person? Looks pretty average, is she worthy of our idol?"]

["To be honest, I’d believe he had a girlfriend, but an assistant as a girlfriend, no way."]

["Can’t stand this..."]

["Is this an act?"]

["What do I do now?"]

Of course, there were also insults—

["Little assistant? Fuck your mom!"]

["Wasn’t Xiang Qichen supposed to be about the looks? Just this? Looks pretty average."]

["Heh, publicity stunts are so fucking disgusting."]

["Greasy man with an ugly girl, quite fitting."]

["Xiang Qichen, how could you do this to your fans!"]

...

Huaiyi looked at the various comments online, feeling overwhelmed, although it was true she went to Xiang Qichen’s room in the middle of the night, roamed the supermarket separately on Mid-Autumn night, and frequently visited Xiang Qichen’s home, but!

That was all because the two of them had bizarrely switched souls...

She had just been on Weibo for a short while when Sister Yan’s call came through. Huaiyi, at a loss, simply pressed the screen to ignore it.

Once the call stopped automatically, without hesitation, Huaiyi immediately dialed Xiang Qichen.

The latter had just finished a call with Kang Xuan, responding to Kang Xuan’s inquiries with only two words: "Wait and see."

He hadn’t yet had time to check today’s news when Huaiyi’s call came through.

Xiang Qichen answered.

Huaiyi: "Qi Chen! What’s going on! Why were you photographed! Why did our relationship inexplicably get exposed???"

Xiang Qichen didn’t say anything, because in a way, having such news break out made him a bit happy.

"Sister Yan just called me, I didn’t dare to answer, I don’t know how to explain..." Huaiyi paused for a moment, then added anxiously, "She’s calling again now... What should I do TAT"

"Let’s..." after a long pause, he said, "talk in person."