Chapter 1

Chapter 1

When I found out Big-Eyed Guy was about to implement a public real-name policy, I was lying there scrolling through videos on my phone, laughing my head off without the slightest bit of a female celebrity’s composure.

My agent came over and told me about it, but I didn’t take it seriously.

“So what if it’s real-name? My real name doesn’t sound bad.”

At that moment, I still hadn’t realized the gravity of the situation. In the entertainment industry, plenty of people used stage names, and I was no exception.

It wasn’t until I scrolled past two more videos that the realization hit me belatedly, and I shot upright.

My agent jumped. “What’s wrong with you?”

I switched at lightning speed to a certain secret alt account of mine and saw that its follower count had already reached 900,000.

?

Wasn’t it still 800,000 the last time I checked?

How long had it even been?

The readers under this alt account wailed every day, waiting to be fed. For no other reason than the fact that, aside from acting, I also occasionally stayed up in the middle of the night clacking away at my keyboard.

And what I wrote wasn’t anything proper.

I was a fanfic writer for the pairing of popular young actress Chu Ruotang and famous young director Zhou Qiji.

The ridiculous part was that I was Chu Ruotang.

Yes. I shipped myself with another man, and over the course of three years, I had written nearly a million words to imagine this nonexistent romance into being.

The results were obvious. The CP supertopic for Zhou Qiji and me was insanely popular.

And this alt account of mine was also on the verge of becoming a million-follower big V within those three years.

Everything had been going great-until the platform’s new rules appeared.

Sometimes, being online by yourself really was helpless.

Some people were only suited to twisting, screaming, and crawling around in dark corners. Why did they have to be forced into experiencing social death?

I had already seen quite a few people bringing up the real-name policy in the comments.

Netizens:

[I can’t even imagine how awkward Teacher Strawberry is going to be when the time comes.]

[Teacher Strawberry, is your name common? If it’s not, I suggest you hurry up and change it to something common. I think Zhang Wei is pretty good.]

[Hahahahaha I’m dying. Once this real-name policy comes out, how many of my internet pets are going to socially die? Another thirst-trap blogger I follow already has a million followers hahahaha.]

[Person above, I know exactly who you’re talking about hahahahaha.]

[Strawberry, you little brat. That’s what you get for writing random stuff about my fave online. Just you wait, I’m buying you followers right now. I want to see who you really are!]

[Teacher Strawberry, hang in there! You’re my spiritual nourishment. I originally thought Chu Ruotang and Zhou Qiji had zero CP chemistry, but after reading your fics, I actually started finding scenes of them together pleasing to the eye. You absolutely cannot fall!]

[Hahahahahahaha came here after hearing the rumors to watch Teacher Strawberry.]

[Zhou Qiji and Chu Ruotang have only worked together once. You CP-brained people need to stop going overboard. The two of them aren’t close at all. Don’t read a few lousy fics and take everything seriously.]

[…]

No wonder my follower count was rising so fast.

Someone had bought me followers.

This was… hard to comment on.

Just as there were plenty of people waiting for me to feed them on this alt account, there were also plenty of haters.

After all, even though Zhou Qiji was only a director, he just so happened to have a face so stunning it could shock the heavens. Ever since he showed his face on set before, things had spiraled completely out of control.

A director whose looks could rival a male celebrity’s, combined with the blessing of talent-Zhou Qiji had attracted no small number of fans.

Of course, there were plenty of solo stans and girlfriend fans too.

I’d been kicking around the domestic entertainment industry for years. As I gradually rose to fame, I’d built up a sizable fanbase of my own. Last year, I won a Best Actress award, and from that point on, my career hit its peak.

I had no shortage of solo stans myself.

So my fanfic-writing alt account, unsurprisingly, ended up getting boycotted by both sides’ solo stans.

And everyone knew what people who wrote fanfic were like. How much pure, wholesome content could they possibly write?

The second I thought about the things I’d written, I wanted to dig a crack in the floor and crawl into it.

It was obvious I’d offended a lot of people over the past three years. My alt account’s follower count was rising at an abnormal speed, and with real-name verification set to go into effect in a few days, I was about to die of social embarrassment online and in real life at the same time.

I could not allow that to happen.

After staring at my phone screen for ages, I finally made an important decision.

My manager had been calling my name for a while. “Ruotang, what on earth is wrong with you?”

I froze, instinctively set my phone down, and even turned off the screen while I was at it.

“Nothing, Sister An’an. I’m listening.”

“Listening to what?” My manager was clearly dissatisfied with my salted-fish attitude. “I said I got you a variety show. You’re going to make an appearance soon and solidify this hard-earned popularity of yours. Did you hear any of that?”

I nodded. “Got it, got it. Just send me the details later.”

Sister An’an still looked deeply distrustful of me.

But after reminding me of a few more things, she picked up her bag and left.

Once Sister An’an was gone, I stared at my phone and scrolled through the comments for a while longer. When I refreshed again, I saw that, at some point, my follower count had already reached 910,000.

?

No, seriously, who had that much free time?

I hesitated no longer and deleted the account at lightning speed before fleeing the scene.

In any case, everything I’d written had been cross-posted to another platform, and all the stuff Big-Eyed Guy wouldn’t allow was over there too.

That platform probably wouldn’t introduce real-name verification in this lifetime. Otherwise, I didn’t even dare imagine how many big-name creators would run for their lives overnight.

It took fourteen days to delete an account on Big-Eyed Guy. After submitting the deletion request, I logged out of that account.

Night fell quickly. I ate something simple for dinner, then showered, did my skincare, and finally lay on my stomach in bed watching a drama.

I had my earphones in and was completely immersed in the show, so I didn’t hear the front door open.

It wasn’t until my bedroom door opened that I belatedly turned around to look. A handsome face appeared before me. The man who walked in was dressed all in black, but it did nothing to hide his broad shoulders, narrow waist, and perky backside.

I was stunned for a moment before I remembered that after my shower, I’d put on a pink spaghetti-strap nightdress. A rather sexy one.

Normally, I only wore it when I was home alone.

Silently, I reached out and tugged the blanket over myself.

“What are you covering up for?” Zhou Qiji walked over, carrying the air of someone who had just come from a long journey. The corner of his mouth tugged up. “We’re an old married couple. What haven’t I seen?”

“…”

Yes.

Zhou Qiji and I had been married for three years.

He was my husband, and I shipped myself with my own husband-and even produced my own fan content for it.

After all, it was a business marriage. Though we’d been husband and wife for three years, once we got out of bed and walked out the door, we weren’t exactly familiar with each other.

A hidden marriage had been the option we’d tacitly agreed on from the start.

This was our third year of marriage-and my eighth year of secretly loving him.