**July Heat and Hidden Memories**
Even at eleven o'clock in the evening, the July heat was oppressive. Lu Yicheng wiped away a trace of sweat and said, "You can say you don’t owe me anything, but we still need to go to the hospital. You’ll probably need a brain CT scan."
Jiang Lan hadn’t made up her mind yet. She didn’t feel any headaches, and when she woke up, she was still in bed. "What if we wait until after the show finishes filming?"
Lu Yicheng ignored her suggestion. "I’ll make an appointment first. This isn’t something we can delay. Filming will take over a month, and then school starts right after."
Last night, he had done some research. Jiang Lan’s condition resembled amnesia, but not entirely. She couldn’t remember people or events, yet other details remained intact.
Jiang Lan nodded. Before making the call, she had turned off the cameras, so the room was safe. She asked again, "But what if I still can’t remember after going to the hospital?"
"I already told you—if you don’t remember, I’ll just chase after you all over again."
Jiang Lan felt a twinge of emotion. Lu Yicheng’s persistence was touching. At least her past efforts hadn’t been in vain. But wait—what did he mean by *chasing her again*?
It almost sounded like he had pursued her before.
Yesterday, he had said the same thing. "Hey, didn’t you say *I* was the one who chased *you*?"
Lu Yicheng’s expression stiffened. "Slip of the tongue. *You* chased *me* before, so this time, it’s my turn to chase *you*."
Jiang Lan wasn’t convinced. "How do I know if it’s really a slip of the tongue? You said the same thing yesterday."
Lu Yicheng sighed. "It really was. I’ve been so busy today—got to the office in the afternoon and stared at the computer until past ten."
Jiang Lan softened. "Poor piggy, working so hard."
Lu Yicheng chuckled. "Not hard at all."
What was a little exhaustion? The more he earned, the sooner he could marry Jiang Lan.
She leaned back on the bed, grinning. "Didn’t you say I used to call you *darling*, *hubby*, *baby*? Then why did you respond when I called you *piggy*?"
The camera shook slightly as Lu Yicheng turned away, his voice growing distant. "...I’m exhausted today. Just got back to the apartment. Elevator’s here. Let’s talk later—don’t stay up too late."
"Don’t you dare hang up!" Jiang Lan wasn’t about to let him off the hook. "Oh, so *I* chased *you*, wrote love letters? Then recite one for me right now!"
Lu Yicheng pinched the bridge of his nose. He hadn’t planned to keep this up for long, but he hadn’t expected Jiang Lan to catch on so quickly. With her, he was always at his most unguarded. "...It was years ago. I don’t remember anymore."
Jiang Lan snorted. "Nice try, liar."
There was no way she had been the desperate one. "How could you take advantage of me like this? Just because I don’t remember doesn’t mean you can make things up! Good thing I realized early, or else—"
If Lu Yicheng were here right now, she’d definitely give him a beating.
The elevator’s poor signal made the video lag. "You never stopped bullying me back then, either."
Jiang Lan didn’t quite catch it, but once he stepped out, she pressed for details.
"We really did meet at cram school. You said my name sounded familiar, and I thought you were just hitting on me." Lu Yicheng flicked on the apartment lights. "The rest can wait."
Jiang Lan: "I want to talk about it *now*."
Lu Yicheng took a deep breath, tugging at the hem of his T-shirt. "It’s eleven. I need to change and shower, and I’ve got work tomorrow. Let’s leave it at that, okay?"
Jiang Lan hung up.
Half an hour later, a message popped up from *Fairy’s Piggy*:
**[Goodnight.]**
---
**Monday Morning**
Yu Wanqiu headed to the villa’s delivery hub to pick up two packages.
The brown rectangular boxes marked her first-ever online purchase—two vases for the freesias.
Her original vase was too cramped for a full bouquet. She had considered asking Chen to bring one over—back when she had assistants handling everything—but Jiang Lan had suggested Taobao.
So Yu Wanqiu downloaded the app and carefully selected two vases. To her surprise, they were shockingly cheap—just over twenty yuan each, made of glass with a shimmer like Arctic ice.
Wary of false advertising, she ordered a second one from a different store.
Total cost: less than fifty yuan.
Bubble wrap protected the fragile items inside. When she finally unwrapped them, the vases looked exactly like the photos.
*This only cost fifty yuan?*
She had expected poor quality, given the price, but these were no worse than thousand-yuan pieces.
Jiang Lan grinned. "Online shopping is super affordable, Yu Laoshi. Taobao, Pinduoduo—you can get anything cheap and convenient."
"Pinduoduo even sells fresh-cut flowers shipped from Yunnan. Crazy cheap."
Yu Wanqiu scoffed. "How cheap can they be?"
Jiang Lan pulled up a listing. "39.9 for twenty stems. Buy-one-get-one-free in the livestream, plus two sunflowers and three eucalyptus branches."
*That* was cheap.
Yu Wanqiu frowned. "Then why didn’t you buy online the other day? Florists charge a fortune. Learn to budget—don’t splurge early in the month and end up eating instant noodles by the end."
Jiang Lan laughed. "It was last-minute, Yu Laoshi. And I’m not *that* broke. You make it sound like you’ve seen me begging on the streets by month’s end."
Yu Wanqiu rolled her eyes. "At least then I could help."
She downloaded Pinduoduo. "Huh. This ‘claim your 500-yuan reward’—can you really withdraw it?"
Jiang Lan hesitated. "You’d need to invite tons of people. Basically impossible."
Yu Wanqiu’s eyes gleamed. "Oh, really?"
By afternoon, she had successfully withdrawn *1,000 yuan*. "That was easy."
Jiang Lan gaped. "Yu Laoshi, who did you send it to?"
Yu Wanqiu shrugged. "Posted it on Moments."
For ordinary people, it might be a scam. But for Yu Wanqiu? Anything was possible.
*Such is the power of connections.*
Jiang Lan checked her phone. Yu Wanqiu had made two posts. "Yu Laoshi, you’re *amazing*."
Her chat with Lu Yicheng had stalled after their morning greetings. He claimed to be busy with work, but Jiang Lan suspected he was avoiding her.
Normally, she wouldn’t care—but the more he dodged, the more curious she grew. Now, she found herself looking forward to their nightly calls.
*How had he chased her back then?*
Zhang Tian, who had browsed their fan forums, recalled that Jiang Lan had gifted Lu Yicheng roses for his birthday last year.
*Were those from Pinduoduo?*
Probably. Buying them from a florist would’ve cost thousands—no way a student could afford that.
But so what? Jiang Lan had carried the packages, trimmed the stems, arranged the flowers herself. That effort made it even more meaningful.
As a half-hearted shipper, Zhang Tian had already convinced himself.
This segment was definitely going in the edit. Yu Wanqiu’s vase-shopping spree too.
His eyes burned from staring at footage all day. He was about to step out for a smoke when the assistant director rushed in.
"Lu Yicheng’s trending again."
Zhang Tian blinked. "He’s been trending nonstop. Why the long face? Did he do something to Jiang Lan?"
"Then what about the show? Do we still need it?"
The assistant director sighed. "It's not about that... this trending topic... just take a look for yourself."
[Lu Yicheng, We’re Sorry #39]
...
Zhang Tian grabbed a bottle of quick-acting heart relief pills and clicked into the topic.
It was a video reposted by netizens, with over 200,000 likes and 70,000 comments.
The video originated from Bilibili, edited by a well-known fan within the fandom.
Zhang Tian was familiar with Bilibili—it was a benchmark for measuring whether a person, drama, or movie had broken into mainstream popularity. Yu Wanqiu, for instance, had countless videos on the platform: fight scene compilations, crying scene compilations, and all kinds of "killing gazes."
Zhang Lin’s historical drama looks were also wildly popular.
This particular fan editor was a devoted supporter of Yu Wanqiu and Jiang Lan.
The video’s title was: *I Fell for My Son’s Girlfriend.*
The video lasted just over three minutes. It opened with Lu Yicheng and Jiang Lan meeting the parents, Yu Wanqiu sitting across from them with a calm expression—but stealing long glances at Jiang Lan when she wasn’t looking.
Then, the plot took a wild turn: Lu Yicheng spent his days fooling around, hooking up with one person after another, while Jiang Lan fell into despair, crying herself to sleep every night. Eventually, she broke up with him.
After the breakup, Yu Wanqiu asked, "I heard you blocked Lu Yicheng?"
Jiang Lan hesitated before nodding, her eyes drifting to the window—while on screen, Yu Wanqiu smirked.
Jiang Lan wallowed in misery for days, her sleep schedule ruined, her spirit broken. Then Yu Wanqiu called in a styling team, dressed Jiang Lan in beautiful clothes, gave her a glamorous makeover, took her out for dinner, and brought her to the movies.
The background music had a dark, eerie tone, and every smile from Yu Wanqiu carried hidden meaning.
There was even a fight scene between her and Lu Yicheng—smooth, fluid, and visually stunning.
The frames of Yu Wanqiu and Jiang Lan together were equally breathtaking, with Jiang Lan smiling brightly, seemingly having moved on from her heartbreak.
Zhang Tian recognized every single clip, but when pieced together like this, they felt completely foreign.
The "blocking him" line was from after their return from H City; the "ruined sleep schedule" was just Jiang Lan staying up late gaming; the "beautiful clothes" were for a premiere; and the "lavish dinner" was actually Jiang Lan throwing Yu Wanqiu a celebration party.
But that wasn’t even the wildest part.
The wildest part was that this was supposed to be a story about three people—yet Lu Yicheng only existed in name.
...Because Lu Yicheng was *played by Xie Zheng.*
Since Lu Yicheng barely appeared in the show (only showing up once in a livestream), fans simply cast a tall, handsome actor to play him—Xie Zheng, who had previously starred alongside Yu Wanqiu in *The Deep Sea*. In that film, he played a police officer and even had a fight scene with Yu Wanqiu.
After watching this video, who *wouldn’t* say sorry to Lu Yicheng?
The assistant director looked conflicted. "Is this really okay? How can people ship *any* pairing?"
Zhang Tian waved it off. "It’s fine. Fans just do this for fun. Everyone knows they’re in a real relationship, and Yu Wanqiu is married anyway. They just think their dynamic is entertaining—two stunning women, looking great together."
Zhang Tian rewatched the video twice. The editor’s skill was undeniable—the way Yu Wanqiu subtly laid a trap, the way Jiang Lan unknowingly walked right into it, the way they ate and gamed together... Zhang Tian finally understood what the trending hashtag *really* meant.
*Lu Yicheng, we’re sorry—we’re shipping your mom and your girlfriend.*
Zhang Tian coughed. "Why the long face? There are even fans shipping Lin Daiyu and Sun Wukong. Besides, keep the blessings in the family—we *are* a proper mother-in-law and daughter-in-law reality show."
Honestly, Zhang Tian was a little touched. Finally, someone was appreciating the charm of their show.
Last season, Du Wanzhou and Shen Xingyao had their own shippers too. Fans just enjoyed their dynamics.
And it was only at #39 on the trending list—not like it was *number one*.
Zhang Tian handed the phone back, then pulled out his own and opened Bilibili. The very first recommendation was that same video.
1.3 million views...
100,000 likes, 30,000 coins. The editor had over a million followers, so these numbers weren’t surprising.
The moment he clicked in, an explosion of colorful subtitles flooded the screen.
The top comments read:
**[Lu Yicheng, you can still leave now.]**
**[Lu Yicheng, RUN.]**
