Does she want to?
To marry him, have children with him, and from then on build a home with him.
When Ray meandered over from afar again, he felt that the two of them, crouching together amid such a beautiful English-style flower garden, looked less like a dignified proposal and more like two little children.
Shang Shao was down on one knee. As she remained suspended in indecision, his palm had already grown damp with sweat. He didn’t think Ying Yin would reject him – not because he was confident in himself, but because he trusted in the love they shared. Yet with her taking so long to say I do, his heart still felt like a bubble rising higher and higher, carried up into an unfathomably high sky.
“What’s wrong?” Shang Shao let out a soft laugh, suppressing the strain in his breathing. “Do you really need to think about it for this long?”
“What? It’s only been two seconds.” Ying Yin was dissatisfied with his concept of time.
She still had both hands clasped around the backs of her knees, her palm-sized face turned sideways and resting against them. Her gaze shifted between Shang Shao and the ring.
“Why did you take me to meet Great-Aunt last time?” she asked in an innocent, guileless tone.
Shang Shao’s heart sank slightly, but he gently brushed the question aside. “She’s a very important elder. I wanted her to meet you.”
“Such an important elder, yet Shang Lu doesn’t even know her.”
This time, the surprise on Shang Shao’s face was unmistakable, his brows drawing together. “You asked him?”
The hand holding the jewelry box lowered. He turned his wrist downward, enclosing the velvet box in his palm, though he didn’t close it.
“Mm.” Ying Yin nodded. “One day I went to see him and Mr. Ke, and we talked for a while. When you told him at the set that you were ‘ready,’ what did you mean by that?”
The movement of his Adam’s apple was barely perceptible. Afraid that Ying Yin would see through him, Shang Shao swallowed only halfway. His expression remained calm and composed. “I was ready for you to spend your whole life making movies.”
That wasn’t exactly a lie, merely a version of the truth polished to conceal what lay beneath it.
“Ready for the possibility that I might leave at any time, right?” Ying Yin saw straight through him without missing a beat.
Shang Shao’s fingers suddenly tightened around the velvet box.
He said nothing, because in a moment like this, no matter how beautiful the lie, it would still be a desecration.
“Great-Aunt’s husband committed suicide. There are no calendars in her house. She doesn’t turn on the lights at night. She’s lost all interest in the changing seasons, in dawn and dusk. She lived like that for more than a decade.” Ying Yin spoke as though she were talking to herself.
Shang Shao finally swallowed hard, his voice tight. “Ying Yin…”
But he seemed unable to say anything more.
“Is it Great-Aunt who has no regrets, or you? Even if you end up in the same situation as her. The jacarandas bloom for only twenty days. The remaining three hundred and forty-five days are utterly unremarkable.”
Shang Shao said stiffly, “Can we not talk about this today? If you’re not ready yet…”
He made as though to stand and leave, unusually hurried in his movements, but the hand resting on his knee was caught by Ying Yin.
“Tell me. Tell me yourself. Tell me about the regrets, about being ready.” Ying Yin curled the corners of her lips into a smile. “You can talk to Great-Aunt about it. You can talk to Shang Lu about it. So why won’t you talk to me?”
Shang Shao let her hook her fingers around his. With his other hand, he wiped a hand across his face. After a long silence, he pressed his lips together and smiled.
“I want you to marry me. Whether our life together is long or short, I accept it all. I love you knowing that you could leave me at any moment, and I have no regrets. I will stay by your side forever. As for the world you would leave behind after you’re gone, I’ve already imagined it fully. I’ve even seen the harshest reality of it firsthand. Because I love you, I’m not afraid. I will stay with you forever.”
He looked into Ying Yin’s eyes. At some point, the smile had disappeared from his face, leaving behind something like a calm, unwavering resolution.
“Whether in life or in death, Shang Shao will always belong to Ying Yin alone. Even if one day you leave me, even if you are no longer here, you will still have all of me – my whole self, and no one else’s. I will stay with you until I draw my final breath.”
Ying Yin’s body trembled, a shudder that seemed to travel from her soul all the way through every limb. “Even if Heaven told me right now which film you would die in, it still wouldn’t diminish my resolve to kneel here on one knee and ask you to marry me. No one can stop me from marrying you.”
But no matter how calmly he spoke, he could not dispel the panic deep inside him.
He was terrified that Ying Yin would try to spare him.
Shang Shao’s fingertips pressed tightly against the rare, exquisite pink diamond, his fingertips turning pale.
The gemstone was beautiful, but hard and unyielding. In truth, it hurt terribly.
He simply hadn’t noticed.
“Nothing can stop you from marrying me, unless…” Ying Yin straightened her face, resting her chin on her folded arms.
Shang Shao had never considered that there could be an “unless” in all of this. His heart instinctively ached as her pause stretched on.
“Unless what?” he asked, his voice strained.
Ying Yin’s gaze met his steadily. “Unless I don’t love you.”
Shang Shao’s heart suddenly stilled.
There was no expression on his face. It was the armor he had forged through years of occupying a position of power, an instinctive composure that betrayed nothing. Even after hearing those words, he remained silent for a long while. Yet tenderness slowly surfaced in his eyes like points of light, and then, little by little, the corners of his lips lifted.
He knew that she loved him just as surely as he knew that he loved her.
“Marry me,” he said again, his voice impossible to distinguish as either tender or certain.
“I will.”
At those words, Ying Yin suddenly threw herself into his arms.
“I will marry you. It’s not that you will always belong to me; it’s that I will always belong to you. It’s not ‘regardless of life or death.’ It’s that I want to love you and stay by your side, through the limited lives we have until we grow old and die naturally, and throughout the endless expanse of time. I will never, ever leave you alone. ‘Love’ isn’t enough to describe it. ‘Love’ isn’t enough to describe what I feel for you.”
Shang Shao had been kneeling on one knee for so long that his muscles had stopped obeying him. As he pulled Ying Yin into his arms, he awkwardly toppled backward onto the ground, crushing a swath of flowers beneath him.
He held her incredibly tightly, ignoring the stabbing pain in his knee and the numb ache spreading through his muscles. His gaze went from vacant to lucid, and as he laughed through his racing heartbeat, he repeatedly kissed Ying Yin’s cheeks.
“Baby, baby…”
Shang Shao murmured the words, his sentences broken and breathless, every one of them filled with laughter. He buried his eyes against her shoulder, his clasped hands nearly squeezing Ying Yin to pieces.
Moisture welled uncontrollably in his eyes, but somehow he managed to hold it back. He squeezed his eyes shut, his chest rising and falling in slow, heavy breaths as hot air escaped his lips.
He was no longer afraid.
He no longer had to force himself to remain calm, perpetually tensing against the possibility that everything might come crashing down at any moment.
From now on, he didn’t have to be afraid. He didn’t have to keep himself guarded.
“I love you, Shang Shao.” Ying Yin knelt in his arms, one slender palm caressing his broad shoulder. She tipped her chin up, her face taking on a delicate point. “I want you to put the ring on me.”
Shang Shao took a deep breath and eased her out of his embrace, then took the ring from the jewelry box.
Ying Yin held out her right hand. Unsure, she then held out her left.
Shang Shao gave a soft laugh. “Left hand.”
Ying Yin obediently withdrew her right hand, curling it into a fist against her heart, and held her left hand out to him.
When the ring reached her fingertip, it paused for the briefest moment, as though waiting for the solemn chime of fate’s bell.
Then, in the next second, he slowly pushed it into place.
It was on.
Shang Shao took her fingertips in his and gazed at the ring with her for a long while. Her fingers were fair and delicate, lending the openwork vines and flowers on the band an almost sacred, ethereal beauty.
He then gently lifted her wrist, pressed his lips to her knuckles, and placed a reverent kiss upon them.
After that kiss, Shang Shao did not raise his face. Instead, he rested his eyes against the back of her hand.
For some reason, at this moment of overwhelming happiness, of finally having his deepest wish fulfilled, two streams of hot tears slipped from his tightly closed eyes.
It was hard to imagine a man like him crying. Ray had never seen tears in his eyes. Even when Ray was dying, all it had ever seen in his eyes was a steady, compassionate sorrow.
Still, everything was going to be all right.
Perhaps, from now on, he would no longer come to Ray alone in the dead of night, sitting quietly with his thoughts and reflecting on himself.
The whale shark leisurely swam away, leaving the two of them all the time and space they needed.
Inside the underwater-viewing suite, the phone kept vibrating and ringing itself off.
The caller ID read: Zhuang Tiwen.
Zhuang Tiwen was on pins and needles. She had suddenly developed the bad habit of biting her nails and had nearly chewed her thumbnail down to nothing. No one was answering. She had called Ying Yin several times but couldn’t get through, then tried Shang Shao, only to get no answer there either.
After the call automatically disconnected again, she pulled up Uncle Kang’s number.
On the trending searches, #YingYinJinYuanmin had shot up toward the top.
The results of last night’s superimposed-image comparison were out.
There were simply too many red-carpet photos and promotional materials of Ying Yin, and she often wore evening gowns that hugged her figure, making it incredibly easy to create image overlays comparing the two.
An entertainment marketing account was the first to post:
[The atmospheric couple who racked up over a million likes on Douyin turns out to be #YingYinJinYuanmin# /shocked//shocked/. The CP fans have already made comparison images, and there are all kinds of clues. These two had absolutely no connection before – was it love at first sight at the Galaxy Awards?]
The post was accompanied by nine images: three animated comparison overlays matching Ying Yin’s red-carpet photos with screenshots from videos; a comment posted by an account called [Iron Hand Grasping Dreams] that read, “Congratulations, you two. I can’t believe I actually shipped a real couple”; three images related to the helicopter New Year’s Eve incident previously posted by someone who worked on the Xueqing production; a pinned reply from the video creator confirming that the man was Jin Yuanmin; and a photo of the two exchanging glances at the Galaxy Awards ceremony.
The comments section quickly racked up tens of thousands of replies:
[This is wild.]
[You little rascal, you’ve got something going on.]
[The CP fans really came through (and caused a huge disaster).]
[Holy shit? So you’re saying the guy stayed with her on the set for two months?]
[Judging by the production crew’s reaction, it seems like they’re all pretty supportive /eating popcorn/]
[Her fans haven’t started flooding the comments to control the narrative yet?]
[After being quiet for half a year, and with no promotion from Chenye anymore, there must be quite a few fans who quietly unfollowed her, right?]
The fans’ efforts to control the narrative in the comments followed almost immediately.
[@YingYinStudio, hurry up and sue them!]
[Thank you for your interest in Ying Yin. Justified Prevails is currently showing in cinemas. Everyone is welcome to support the film at the box office.]
[Those screenshots don’t prove anything. How can you actually believe this?]
[You say that’s Ying Yin, so it’s Ying Yin? You can’t even see her face! For everyone’s information, knowingly spreading and reposting rumors more than 500 times is illegal.]
But when a top-tier film actress was rumored to be in a relationship, rival fandoms and people looking for entertainment weren’t about to pass up the opportunity to mock her. They immediately swarmed the fans’ comments, grabbing the top-liked spots:
[Keep insisting it’s not her~]
[How come you fans suddenly can’t recognize your idol from behind?]
[Keep going. I love watching you panic while stubbornly denying everything.]
[Congrats on getting yourselves a brother-in-law?]
[Wasn’t Sister Yin supposed to marry into a wealthy family? After all that hype, this is what you came up with? This?]
[So what if he’s a CEO? Aren’t they just fancy wage slaves? Yinyin is the one throwing herself at him – don’t love him too much~]
[Fans, hurry up and spend money to support your celebrity’s ordinary-person husband-to-be!]
[Yinyin’s already been used up. Finding a guy like this to take over is pretty good for her.]
[Hurry up and retire from acting. Eight babies in one go is asking too much, so let’s just wish Yinyin two kids in three years.]
Every time the major entertainment gossip groups refreshed, there were new posts, filling the screen from top to bottom:
[Isn’t Jin Yuanmin already married? Who remembers? Who saved the screenshots?]
[Weren’t those set screenshots dug up by our group? Remember when that Iris girl made a name for herself overnight? Now some marketing account gets to cash in on it.]
[Curious how the fans are feeling right now. Is this a fandom meltdown, or are they blessing the relationship?]
[Honestly, they’re a perfect match.]
[This is the nice thing about movie stars – their relationships getting exposed won’t affect the box office or CP fandoms. If this were a TV actress, she’d probably already be finished.]
In the group chat [Raise the Banner for Jin-Yin], there were more than 9,999 unread messages.
[Who sent it to the marketing account?]
[Looks like someone’s been lying in wait for a long time.]
[Why would they do this? Why didn’t they post the chat screenshots from yesterday proving that Jin Yuanmin was single?]
[They did it deliberately for attention.]
[You piece of shit, come out and face us!]
[The entire public narrative has completely changed!!!]
The narrative really had changed.
At first, the casual fans who had previously shipped the two of them came back to life on the spot. Ying Yin’s fans who supported her career also began sending their congratulations, telling other fans to take it in stride and saying things like, “The guy seems pretty good.”
The turning point came when screenshots from the original posts claiming that Jin Yuanmin was married were dug up again. They became seemingly ironclad – and utterly absurd – “evidence” of wrongdoing.
[Back when everyone was told not to ship them, people swore up and down that Jin Yuanmin was married and had two kids.]
[LOL. Back then they said shipping a morally questionable CP was unfair to his wife, and now Yinyin has gone and barged right in between them. Classic Yinyin, huh?]
[Yinyin really loves him. Willing to be the other woman for love.]
Meanwhile, members of the CP group voluntarily started flooding the internet with posts:
[The elder Jin Yuanmin is married, the younger Jin Yuanmin is single!!!! The one dating Ying Yin is the unmarried one!]
[The original whistleblower mixed up the two people! Nobody is the other woman! Nobody cheated!]
Of course, they also attached that screenshot of the original press release, along with photos of the real Jin Yuanmin and his wife.
But wasn’t that explanation simply too absurd?
[Fans, stop going overboard defending her. They’re all executives at Qinde Land, all at the CEO level, and they’re all named Jin Yuanmin. Not even a single character is different. Tell me, what are the odds something like this could happen?]
[Do you really think netizens are that stupid? Who are you trying to fool?]
[The fans have completely lost their minds.]
[What vicious fans. Just to cover up for a homewrecker, they’re plastering an ordinary person’s photos all over the internet. @Ning City Cyber Police, does this count as doxxing and an infringement of portrait rights?]
[@Qinde Land, come out and say something. How many Jin Yuanmins do you people have over there?]
Soon, #QindeLand and #JinYuanmin both climbed onto the trending searches as well.
Zhang Chengwan was scrolling through the gossip on the trending page when she froze in stunned disbelief.
Of course she recognized Ying Yin from behind.
But… wasn’t that Shang Shao?
She hadn’t attended the previous Galaxy Awards in person, so it had never occurred to her that someone like Shang Shao would walk a red carpet. Even more baffling was why he would use the name Jin Yuanmin.
Yet as the video of the two of them appearing together while presenting an award climbed the rankings, Zhang Chengwan clearly caught a faint trace of a smile in Shang Shao’s eyes.
She was reminded of that time she had been invited to his home for afternoon tea. He had been so quiet and listless, and the only thing that could draw his gaze back from the sea was the name “Ying Yin.”
Zhang Chengwan suddenly understood –
He hadn’t been her fan.
Back then, all he had wanted was to hear her talk a little more about Ying Yin.
“She’s not the other woman.”
The words were already typed out on Weibo. Just as she was about to hit send, she hesitated for a second, and her fiancé, Zeng Meng, stopped her.
“What are you spacing out for?” Zeng Meng asked.
“He’s not married.”
“And how do you know that?” Zeng Meng raised his eyelids slightly. “How do you know whether he has a fiancée or girlfriend behind the scenes? What good is it going to do you to stick up for Ying Yin now? She’s just some woman he’s fooling around with. You help her, and Chairman Shao might not even appreciate it.”
Everything he said was perfectly reasonable, striking directly at the interests at stake.
“Besides,” Zeng Meng gave a cold laugh, “a woman like Ying Yin becoming someone’s mistress isn’t exactly surprising, is it? And this is Shang Shao we’re talking about. If she succeeds, he’ll make sure she’s set for generations.”
Zhang Chengwan’s palms were clammy with sweat.
Very soon, the entire internet had its answer –
An account that had been registered for years but had never posted a single update suddenly gained tens of thousands of followers:
[I am Jin Yuanmin’s wife. Ms. Ying Yin, if you like my husband so much, you could have told me. Why make things so undignified? I will give you both my blessing.]
It was one of those accounts that existed solely to post on the public feed. The post appeared on the real-time trending page and rapidly racked up one hundred thousand, two hundred thousand, then three hundred thousand likes.
The entire Qinde group was caught completely off guard. It was the weekend, and messages snowed down across all the private group chats:
[Holy shit, holy shit? So the “little girl” Chairman Shao officially announced last time was Ying Yin?]
[Fuck, so he went to the red carpet last time because of her?]
[Holy shit? This is such a mess. I need a minute to process this.]
[Chairman Shao really took his romantic gesture way too far this time.]
[Now he’s in a position where he can’t explain himself no matter what he says.]
[Unless he comes forward and proves who he is.]
[Would he? The chairman would probably just have the post deleted, right?]
[Shangyu: I’m just a hardworking money-making machine. I did not sign up for this level of attention…]
[You have a serious misunderstanding about our parent company…]
[At this moment, all I want to say is: Poor Mr. Jin…]
[Mr. Jin’s wife… why on earth did she have to come forward… This is ridiculous…]
Jin Yuanmin couldn’t believe his eyes. He called his wife. “Are you crazy?! Can’t you tell that’s not me?”
His wife was a gentle woman with considerable wisdom, but even she was furious at this moment. “You’re the crazy one. Do you think that’s my account?”
“Fuck?” Jin Yuanmin planted his hands on his hips and started cursing. “Then who the hell is it? What kind of fucking idiot is this? What the hell are they trying to do?”
This had become a major public-relations crisis. Before long, it caught the attention not only of Qinde, but also of the headquarters of Shangyu Group. Since the matter involved Shang Shao, the controversy was swiftly brought directly to the desk of Shang Qingye, Chairman of the Board.
Shang Shao’s face was plastered all over the internet. Interestingly, before any official statement was made, almost no one actually came forward to expose his true identity. Even those who did merely hinted at it evasively:
[This is Jin Yuanmin? LOL…]
[You really don’t recognize who the actual big shot is?]
But these ambiguous hints were all dismissed as Ying Yin’s fans trying to whitewash the situation.
Shang Qingye swiped through several screens’ worth of screenshots on his tablet. When he finally set it down, his face was expressionless, a dark heaviness settled in his eyes. After a long moment, he gave a cold laugh and told his secretary to contact Shang Shao. “Tell him that the mess he made himself is his own responsibility to clean up.”
Amid the incessant barrage of flashing incoming calls, it was finally a call from Ying Fan that Ying Yin answered.
“Ying Yin!” Ying Fan’s voice was completely distorted. Her face was deathly pale, her eyes unfocused. She choked back a sob, then burst into tears.
“You’re trying to get yourself killed.”
