Chapter 183: Chapter 81: Leading Lady of the 1960s Cultural Troupe

She secretly ground her teeth. The act had to continue.

Blinking, she turned her head, her eyes already glistening with moisture. The stage lights reflected in them like a river of stars. "Brother Hao, feelings between a man and a woman aren’t something anyone can control. It’s a blessing to experience a passionate, whirlwind romance even once in your life."

"He sacrificed his life for the factory. I don’t blame him, but... my heart has no room for anyone else now."

"So, Brother Hao, you can still make use of this persona of mine—the widow faithful to her deceased husband. Feel free to use it!"

Huo Tianhao stared at her for a long moment. "Your face is too small."

Xia Zhaoyun was stunned again. ’This guy’s conversational leaps are huge.’ Still, she dabbed at her tears with the corner of her shirt and said with a faint smile, "My face has always been small. A classic oval shape, you could say."

Huo Tianhao added, "I just meant you’re incredibly thick-skinned."

Xia Zhaoyun took a deep breath, huffed, and turned back to the performance, hugging the child in her arms.

The man beside her, however, was still struggling to digest the news he’d just pieced together. ’I’m being mourned as a dead husband. I’ve acquired a wife and kids all at once. And apparently, the whole world knows except for me! I’m the only one who’s been kept in the dark!’

’And to think, I had volunteered for a delivery run because I thought she had a partner. Then I eagerly rushed back right on time, just to be her escort and make sure she got through the semi-finals safely. It was completely irrational, but I had to admit I’d done it because I couldn’t fight my own heart.’

’This damn liar. Other than being pretty, she’s full of it. What part of her is worth me getting so hung up on?’

’His romantic life might be a blank slate, but he wasn’t an idiot. After analyzing his own strange behavior, he understood that he was probably starting to have real feelings for her. He just didn’t know when it had started.’

’Heh. They had only met three times. When had I become so shallow?’

’It really was true that the stuff between men and women couldn’t be explained with logic.’

However, he maintained a serious expression as he leaned close to her ear again, pulling her attention back. "Little Xia, how did you and your... your partner meet? What did you like about him? Just how deep was your love that you’re willing to mourn him like this?"

"Just tell me a little about it. Share your wisdom, won’t you? That way, when I meet the right person, I’ll have a better sense of whether I should continue seeing her or not."

Xia Zhaoyun gave him a strange look. ’This man is usually so cold and aloof, and his moods are all over the place. Why is he suddenly so curious about my romantic history?’

But looking at the man’s strong, chiseled features and his refined yet frosty aura, she remembered the feelings that had stirred in her when they last parted ways. Uncharacteristically, she found herself wanting to lecture him a bit.

’Maybe it’s because he’s a truck driver, just like Comrade Huo Tianhao. Their job is fraught with danger. He must be aware of that, and that’s why he doesn’t want to drag anyone down with him.’

’But that’s all the more reason he should have someone to live for. Someone to keep him on his toes, to remind him not to throw his life away so easily.’

With a hidden layer of encouragement in her voice, Xia Zhaoyun began, "My partner... he was a wonderful person. He once sat with me all night in the autumn rain, secretly brought me breakfast every morning, prepared brown sugar water for me for a week out of every month, and rushed halfway across the city just to buy me my favorite red-hearted roasted sweet potato..."

Huo Tianhao thought, ’Heh. Could this liar be any more ridiculous? Am I really the kind of sap who would do all that?’

"But I was young back then and only ever thought of him as a brother. Besides, my family had already arranged a marriage for me. So when he knelt down to confess his feelings, I rejected him without a second thought..."

Huo Tianhao thought, ’Kneeling to confess? That’s news to me. This girl is getting way too carried away with her own story, isn’t she?’

"Not long after that, he went on a run. Everyone else came back safely, but him... he was torn apart by wolves, and all they found was a single bloody shirt..." As she said this, Xia Zhaoyun’s gaze turned distant, as if she herself had gotten lost in the tale. "If only I’d been stronger then, if I’d refused my family’s arrangement and agreed to marry him... do you think Brother Hao might have fought harder to survive for my sake? Maybe he would have held on, even if he had to crawl all the way back?"

"There’s no one else in this world who treated me as well as Brother Hao did..."

"This is a debt I owe him. And the moment I heard what happened... I felt like my sky had fallen."

"’Until mountains crumble and the earth gives way, I could never bear to be without you!’ Brother Hao, love is a beautiful thing. If you never experience it, life will feel incomplete!" She then turned to the man beside her. "And you—you also need someone to keep in your heart, someone to remind you to stay safe and come back in one piece!"

Huo Tianhao felt like he was being roasted over an open flame. She was driving him so crazy he felt like he was developing a split personality.

’She sounded so convincing, I was starting to wonder if I actually had a twin brother I never knew about!’

’My feelings about this mother and her two children who had suddenly popped into my life were... complicated. I need time to process it all. It’s shocking, frightening... and yet, is that a hint of joy I feel?’

Suddenly, Liu Mingkun came tearing through the venue as if his own butt was on fire, scanning the crowd. He ran over, panting, and asked Xia Zhaoyun anxiously, "Little Xia, do you have a backup tape? A staff member was careless with his cigarette and lit the whole box of cassettes on fire! All the tapes for the afternoon session are destroyed!"

Xia Zhaoyun raised an eyebrow. Pursing her lips, she pulled another tape from her bag and, fumbling in the dim light, signed her name on it with a pen.

Liu Mingkun took the tape, glanced at the "family of four," and mentally lit a candle for his boss. Then he rushed back to the backstage area.

Xia Zhaoyun narrowed her eyes, her gaze fixed on the stage. ’Is this just a coincidence, or is someone already getting impatient and making a move?’

Standard Mandarin was, in fact, derived from the dialect of the Capital City, so broadcasters from there had a natural advantage over contestants from other places.

Besides, every contestant who had made it this far was an employee of a major organization, a veteran of countless contests. Who knows how many times they had honed their skills against their peers or how much professional training they had undergone.

Huo Tianhao leaned in close again, whispering in her ear, "Little Xia, want to bet that this tape won’t work either?"

"Even if you had another backup, I guarantee the playback equipment would suddenly have a problem the moment you got on stage."

Xia Zhaoyun looked slightly surprised. "They say things might happen once or twice, but not three times. Would they really be that blatant?"

"Wouldn’t that be broadcasting to everyone that the Golden Microphone competition is riddled with dirty tricks? People would start to question the award’s prestige."

Huo Tianhao scoffed, amused by her naivete. "How many ordinary people do you think are in this audience? These people don’t play by the rules to begin with. They believe might makes right. It doesn’t matter if the schemes are overt or covert; the final result is always determined by a brutal fight."

"The Golden Microphone is a huge affair. Almost every announcer with a bit of fame participates, and it carries a lot of authority. All of that is used to inflate its prestige."

"Kun even heard that you, Xia Zhaoyun, received unanimous praise from the judges in the preliminaries. You’re considered the dark horse most likely to pull ahead of the competition this year. So, it’d be a crime if they *weren’t* targeting you."

Xia Zhaoyun’s lips tightened. "Yu Huanxin? Xu Weilin?"

If you find any errors ( broken links, non-standard content, etc.. ), Please let us know < report chapter > so we can fix it as soon as possible.