Rebirth 02, the Celestial Being Told Me to Stop Pretending

Thank you to the generous donors Mengxi Zhou and Wufeng Yikefei for their donations, and thank you to the white cat in the flour for your donations.

In the past, Huayi Brothers tailored the female lead role in "The Forbidden Kingdom" specifically to win over Liu Yifei, but this statement is somewhat inaccurate.

Long before Huayi Brothers presented this "greeting gift," Liu Yifei had already secured the lead role through her own hard work.

Moreover, after the investors joined Huayi Brothers midway through the project, they strongly demanded that Liu Yifei be replaced and replaced with one of their own actors.

In the end, it was the director and screenwriter who insisted, and Huayi Brothers had always wanted to sign Liu Yifei, so they did her a favor.

Over time, it became known as bespoke tailoring.

However, Chen Jinfei, a short-sighted individual, turned around and signed Liu Yifei to the American WME, completely offending Huayi Brothers, which led to the subsequent "ban".

But in this life, that time has come earlier.

It's hard to say whether it's because of the sinking of the land.

It wasn't until long after hanging up the phone that Liu Yifei realized her hands were still trembling slightly.

But she did it.

She rejected Chen Jinfei, rejected Huayi, and refused to be assigned to any position.

But she wasn't as happy as she had imagined.

Top-tier resources, first-class treatment.

She refused all of these things.

What about the future? What will she rely on in the future?

She picked up her phone, intending to call Lu Chen, but then gave up.

She put down her phone, lay back on the bed, and stared at the ceiling.

She suddenly remembered Lu Chen's figure standing at the end of the corridor of the Mandarin Oriental Hotel in Hong Kong in March.

His shoulders were taut, like a fully drawn bow.

She watched from behind, and for some reason, her nose started to sting.

She didn't understand then, but she does now.

He was gambling too.

She gambled that she could save her brother, that she could persuade Sister Mei, and that she could survive in this industry.

He won his bet.

She will too.

At 10 p.m., Liu Xiaoli called.

"Sissi".

"mom."

"Mr. Chen just called me."

Liu Yifei unconsciously gripped her phone tighter.

"He said you rejected Huayi?"

"Um."

Why?

"I don't want to be kidnapped, I want freedom."

Liu Xiaoli's voice was much gentler than Chen Jinfei's.

"Sissi, Mom doesn't care about any of that. Mom just wants to ask you, have you thought it through?"

"I've made up my mind."

"What do you want to do?"

"I want to do my own thing, just like Lu Chen."

"Good, good child," Liu Xiaoli said, "You've grown up."

She hung up the phone.

Liu Yifei pressed her phone against her chest and closed her eyes.

She leaned against the headboard like that, the warmth of her phone seeping through her pajamas to her chest.

This was the first time her mother hadn't tried to persuade her to change her mind.

The words "You've grown up" echoed in my ears, as soft as a sigh.

She suddenly felt a lump in her throat. Even with her maturity beyond her years, she was still just a 16-year-old girl.

She pulled the blanket over her head and shrank into the darkness.

Lu Chen only found out about Liu Yifei's rejection of Chen Jinfei the next day.

"Brother Lu, I heard Liu Yifei rejected Huayi?" Wang Yan asked, holding a teacup with a gossipy look on his face.

How did you know?

"Everyone's saying it. Liu Yifei rejected the Huayi Brothers contract that Chen Jinfei arranged."

Lu Chen didn't speak.

"Impressive!" Wang Yan exclaimed.

"At sixteen, I dared to refuse Huayi. When I was sixteen, I didn't even dare to refuse my homeroom teacher."

"She's probably thought it through."

"Have you thought it through?" Wang Yan glanced at him. "Did you teach her?"

"I didn't," Lu Chen said. "She made the decision herself."

Wang Yan nodded and said nothing more.

In the afternoon, Lu Chen received a phone call.

"Lu Chen, hello. I'm Xixi's mother."

Liu Xiaoli.

Lu Chen had seen her on set. She was a woman dressed simply but with an elegant demeanor. She was a solo dancer at the Wuhan Song and Dance Theater, a national first-class actress, and a winner of the Huabiao Award.

She watched her daughter make one mistake after another, her eyes filled with heartache, but she could only silently hand her water.

"Hello, Aunt Liu."

"You've heard about what happened to Xixi, haven't you?" Liu Xiaoli said.

"Um."

"I know you talked to her," Liu Xiaoli said without reproach.

She told me, "I want to be like Lu Chen and do my own thing."

Lu Chen didn't speak.

"I'm not here to blame you," Liu Xiaoli said. "I'm here to say something to you."

"Please speak."

She told me she believed you.

There was a moment of silence on the other end of the phone.

"When she invested that 500,000, she also said she trusted you."

"Aunt Liu..."

"Let me finish." Liu Xiaoli's voice remained gentle, but with a hint of seriousness.

"I've seen too many people who want to get close to Yifei. Some are after her as a person, some are after her fame, and some are after the resources behind her. But I can see that you're not one of them."

Lu Chen held his phone, not interrupting.

"When you're teaching her acting on set, you're not just teaching her techniques, you're teaching her to understand the character. When you let her invest 500,000, you're not exploiting her, you're giving her a choice. When you tell her 'You walk your own path,' you're not interfering, you're letting go."

Liu Xiaoli paused for a moment.

Lu Chen could hear very soft breathing on the other end of the phone.

"But I still want to remind you."

"Please speak."

"She trusts you, but don't let her lose, okay?"

Don't let her lose.

These words were like nails driven into Lu Chen's heart.

"I won't," he said.

His voice was steady, but his grip on the phone tightened.

"Okay," Liu Xiaoli said.

"That's good. You young people have a long road ahead of you."

Lu Chen placed his phone on the table and watched the screen slowly dim.

This is a mother's most restrained entrustment.

In the evening, Lu Chen called Liu Yifei.

"What's wrong? What's wrong? Did you miss me?"

"Your mother called me."

There was a moment of silence on the other end, and when they spoke again, the previous excitement was gone.

"What...what did she say?"

"Let me stay away from you," Lu Chen couldn't help but tease her.

"Oh no, how could she do this? I clearly said it has nothing to do with you. No, I'm going to find her right now. I'm hanging up now."

"Hey, hey, don't rush me, let me finish."

"How can I not be worried? I don't even know what gives her the right to call you and say these things."

"Okay, okay. I was just kidding."

"Really?"

"Of course it's true. She didn't scold me, nor did she tell me to stay away from you."

"So what did she say to you?"

"It's nothing much, just that I should focus on acting, make money, and marry a good wife in the future."

"Impossible, you're lying again. Lu Chen, you dog!" "What exactly did my mom say? Tell me now!"

"Tell me not to let you down."

Liu Yifei on the other end of the phone blushed instantly, and her voice became somewhat unnatural.

"What betrayal? Don't talk nonsense, we...we didn't do anything."

"It's just that I can't let you down. What are you thinking?"

"Get lost, you're just kidding me."

But it was clear that she was in a much better mood.

"If you need anything, remember to call your brother Lu. There's nothing we can't handle."

"Hmph, stop bragging, I'm hanging up."

"Don't hang up, I want to say one more thing."

"Go ahead and say it, I'm listening."

"Liu Yifei, listen carefully. No one's life trajectory can be replicated. We just need to walk our own path through life's storms, even if we stumble and fall, even if the road ahead is full of thorns. We must bravely move forward despite the stumbles. Please always believe that we will eventually see lush green mountains."

"Hermann's Siddhartha, right?"

"Wow, you even know that?"

"I read a lot of books," she said, pausing for a moment before adding, "I've got it, thank you."

Lu Chen sat in his office and took out a piece of candy from his pocket—the one she had put in his pocket last time.

Ever since the promotional tour for "Stone", this girl would occasionally slip one into his pocket.

Very sweet.

He suddenly remembered that night in Hong Kong.

She stood under the streetlight, looked up at him, and said, "You're afraid you won't have enough time, that's why you're in such a hurry."

A sixteen-year-old girl, with her own eyes, saw through the deepest fear hidden in the heart of a reborn person.

She said she believed him.

Isn't he the same?

Lu Chen flattened the candy wrapper and tucked it into his notebook.

Then I turned on my computer and started brainstorming ideas for the next movie.