Early the next morning, Ji Zhaoxi got up and headed to the lab.
For once, she wasn’t arriving at the very last minute.
She had spent the entire previous night scrolling through her hate comments and refuting them one by one, each rebuttal well-reasoned and airtight.
But for some reason, her eldest sister had somehow known at four in the morning that she was still awake and had messaged her to go to bed early.
Perhaps she and her fans really were connected by some kind of unspoken understanding.
When Ji Zhaoxi opened the lab door and saw someone already inside, she froze for a moment. She had thought she would be the first one there.
The person holding a test tube saw her, paused, then lowered his head as if he hadn’t noticed her.
The smile vanished from Ji Zhaoxi’s face at once. She wasn’t the type to keep smiling warmly at someone who gave her the cold shoulder!
Before long, the other senior students arrived as well. They were all surprised to see Ji Zhaoxi.
“Wow, Junior Sister actually made it here early today,” one of the senior girls teased.
“She must have gotten scolded by the professor. Yesterday, he said he was going to cure her bad habit of always showing up at the last minute.”
The lab quickly grew lively. Ji Zhaoxi kept well away from a certain someone and chatted with the senior students beside her.
The professor arrived soon after and lavished praise on Ji Zhaoxi for coming early.
Since the start of the semester, this was the first time she had managed to arrive ahead of schedule.
Ji Zhaoxi continued examining the slides under the microscope. Maybe she had been concentrating for too long—her hand kept trembling, and she couldn’t get the target in her field of vision to line up properly.
She frowned tightly and repeatedly adjusted the knobs.
Just as she was about to call for one of the senior girls to help, she saw that they were still busy discussing something. She had no choice but to keep adjusting it herself.
Ji Zhaoxi was getting increasingly annoyed. There was also someone constantly walking back and forth in front of her, and she couldn’t help glaring at him.
Lu Huainan: …
What now?
Hadn’t she said she was as serene as a chrysanthemum, with a broad and generous heart?
This person really was far too easy to anger. He had merely walked past her, and she was already glaring at him.
Lu Huainan stood silently to one side. Watching Ji Zhaoxi fumble around, he reached over and gave the edge of the stage a gentle nudge.
The blurry image instantly came into focus.
The two of them fell silent.
Ji Zhaoxi looked at Lu Huainan suspiciously. What was he trying to do? Was he planning to put on some kind of performance in front of the professor?
The moment Lu Huainan saw her expression, he knew she was imagining something ridiculous again. He simply walked around her.
For the rest of the experiment, the two of them stayed far apart. They didn’t even brush against each other’s sleeves.
Everyone else watched the scene with some confusion. They had never seen the two of them actually fall out, yet somehow, they always seemed to find each other irritating.
As soon as break time arrived, Ji Zhaoxi immediately sat down and opened Weibo to stalk her own fan circles.
She was determined to see who had been badmouthing her this time.
Sure enough, the moment she opened Weibo, she saw a hate post bearing her full name.
L: Heh, Ji Zhaoxi’s “serene as a chrysanthemum” act is completely fake! In reality, she’s more petty than an ant and holds grudges like nobody’s business!
L: Whenever she’s in a bad mood, she takes it out on other people. Her temper is seriously awful!
The comments below had already erupted into an argument.
Are you Ji Zhaoxi’s delusional boyfriend or something? Why do you bash her every day? Do you think she even pays attention to you?
Did she actually get angry at you? What are you imagining now? Stop acting like you know her!
Ji Zhaoxi curled up in a corner, watching her fans’ comments with great satisfaction.
Exactly. What was this L trying to do, acting so familiar with her? She didn’t even know him.
The others in the lab had long since grown accustomed to Ji Zhaoxi’s furtive phone-scrolling.
After all, she loved secretly browsing her own hate comments.
When she had first started streaming, she had even asked the senior students in the lab to help her report the hate comments.
But there had been far too many of them. By the time they finished, their fingers were trembling, and they still hadn’t managed to report them all.
Ji Zhaoxi continued scrolling through L’s Weibo. This L definitely went to the same university as her.
Suddenly, she felt one of her eyelashes poke her eye. Unable to help herself, she rubbed it. After rubbing her eye for quite a while, it finally began to feel better.
Lu Huainan, who was conducting an experiment not far away, glanced at her without thinking. The moment he saw how red her eyes were, his brows drew together.
The corner of her eye was terribly red. She even dabbed at her tears with a tissue, all while continuing to swipe across her phone screen.
Lu Huainan was silent for a moment.
She couldn’t be secretly crying, could she?
But judging from what he knew of her, wasn’t she usually the one who made other people cry?
As Ji Zhaoxi continued scrolling, she suddenly noticed that the two posts L had just made had disappeared. She was thrilled.
Her fans must have reported them.
She was in such a good mood that even her attitude toward Lu Huainan improved slightly.
At noon, everyone in the lab sat on the folding beds and chatted. Ji Zhaoxi found a corner and began taking selfies in earnest.
Lighting, angles, and equipment—all of them were indispensable. Ji Zhaoxi took the matter extremely seriously. She had several devices for taking selfies, and she kept changing angles until she was sweating all over.
She spent the entire two-hour lunch break taking selfies.
In the end, she finally selected a few pictures suitable for posting.
Doing experiments is so exhausting. Took a few quick selfies. ［Attached: nine-photo grid］
One second after she posted it, a hate comment appeared.
L: If those were really quick selfies, I’ll eat shit…
Ji Zhaoxi gave a cold laugh when she saw it and deleted his comment.
If he loved eating shit so much, he could go ahead and eat more.
After a full day of experiments, everyone in the lab except the professor was covered in dust and grime.
After finishing the day’s work, Ji Zhaoxi dragged herself back to her dorm.
She still had to stream that evening.
Even after streaming for so long, she still wasn’t used to it. The company wanted her to act aloof and unruffled while on camera, because that was supposedly how a rich, beautiful heiress behaved.
But Ji Zhaoxi’s emotions fluctuated wildly. She got angry whenever she saw a hate comment and happy whenever someone praised her. Remaining perfectly composed was no easy task for her.
The moment her livestream began, the number of viewers started climbing rapidly.
Ji Zhaoxi skillfully turned on the beauty filter and began greeting everyone. “Good evening, everyone.”
Big sister looks gorgeous today!
Your skin is so fair! Were you born this pale?
Baby, are you tired today?
Why does the top of your head look kind of pointy…
While calmly answering the questions on the chat screen, Ji Zhaoxi secretly adjusted the beauty filter.
How had she set it up before? She felt like she looked a little different from usual today.
The fans in the livestream watched as the cabinet behind Ji Zhaoxi twisted and warped, the top of her head alternately rising and sinking, while the lipstick effect occasionally jumped onto her nose.
Ji Zhaoxi kept a cool, aloof expression as she answered the questions. Then she coughed lightly.
“I’ve been doing experiments all day, so I’m a little tired, but I’m fine.”
“As for the braised beef noodles? Ah, that was fake. If he keeps spreading rumors, I’ll go straight to a lawyer.”
In an unnoticed corner, the major fan group was quietly discussing the situation.
She’s going to keep adjusting that beauty filter forever, isn’t she? I’m exhausted from praising her.
Xixi probably forgot her previous beauty-filter settings. Can everyone please be a little less harsh on her? ［Heartbroken］
I’m guessing she’s even forgotten that she once built her entire image around never using a beauty filter…
