The penthouse of the Junle Hotel.
The weather was not good today. It was just past three in the afternoon, but looking up at the sky through the glass ceiling, the layers of dark clouds seemed about to collapse and fall into the swimming pool.
Liu Chen gripped the handrail of the ladder to enter the water, looked up, and then her feet landed on the bottom of the pool, on the mosaic tiles.
Step by step, Liu Chen walked to the head of the pool, then turned around, her back to the edge of the pool, facing the twenty-meter-long pool. Her legs were slightly bent, her arms naturally extended forward, floating on the water, and she gently leaped.
Liu Chen’s entire body lay peacefully on the water, and then she began to move.
Ren Yu stood on the edge of the pool in the middle section, ensuring that if Liu Chen encountered danger, he could reach her as quickly as possible.
He watched Liu Chen in the pool, like a diligent little frog, drawing her legs in, kicking, and then gliding.
Ren Yu had originally intended to teach Liu Chen butterfly stroke because it looked very elegant and suited Chenchen’s usual style.
But Chenchen refused and firmly chose breaststroke.
Watching Liu Chen swim in the pool with all her heart, Ren Yu still felt a bit dazed. Chenchen was a little genius in sports. In just two weeks of teaching, she had learned breaststroke, freestyle, and backstroke.
At first, he would blush and his heart would race due to occasional physical contact. After two weeks of adjustment, he no longer blushed.
But she still loved breaststroke the most, just like now, swimming non-stop in the water, and only stopping when she couldn’t swim anymore.
Liu Chen felt unrestrained joy in the water. When people exercise, they secrete dopamine, and dopamine makes people feel happy.
After swimming back and forth for twenty laps, Liu Chen brought her legs together, knees tucked to her chest, then pushed her arms back, and slowly straightened her body.
Then her feet slowly landed on the blue and white mosaic tiles at the bottom of the pool, and her fair feet playfully gave a victory sign, clearly marking another successful swim.
After doing all this, Liu Chen turned around and looked at Ren Yu, who had been standing by the pool for nearly half an hour, concentrating on preventing any accidents.
Before she could say congratulations, the phone on the lounge chair by the side suddenly rang.
Liu Chen was startled, then supported herself with her hands on the edge of the pool, her knees slightly bent, and pushed upwards. As she burst out of the water, she felt her swimsuit, which had been warm at the bottom of the pool, suddenly become heavy. Fortunately, Liu Chen’s physical strength had increased significantly after two weeks of training.
After getting ashore, she walked barefoot to the lounge chair, bent down to pick up the phone on the chair, and saw it was Mi Zhuzhu calling. Liu Chen swiped to answer, turned on the speakerphone, placed the phone on the small coffee table beside her, and then picked up the bathrobe from the lounge chair and put it on.
“Hello? Hello?”
“Zhuzhu? I’m here.”
“Chenchen, our crew will be filming my scenes with Lai Jielun for the next half month. Do you want to come and see? You can even make a cameo, I tell you, it’ll be so much fun!”
Make a cameo in *Empresses in the Palace*?
She might be scrutinized by netizens who had nothing else to watch for the next decade, with every detail magnified.
To cameo or not to cameo?
That was the question.
But…
“Then I’ll check the plane tickets. I’ll come over tomorrow. You guys just act, don’t worry about me. I’ll message you when I arrive.”
Whether she made a cameo or not, Liu Chen was sure that she wanted to see what this classic masterpiece of future generations, her colleagues’ comfort food, the classic drama played in the canteen, was like during filming.
“Okay, then I won’t talk to you anymore, I need to change into my costume and be a maid!”
“Okay, bye-bye.”
Liu Chen said goodbye, and the call ended. Ren Yu walked to her side at some point, sat on the lounge chair, and reminded Liu Chen:
“Hengdian is a complicated place, it’s not safe for you to go there.”
His words were like a basin of cold water poured over Liu Chen’s head, drenching her previously enthusiastic plan to visit the set.
“How about this, we’ll take a helicopter. We’ll stay for two days and then fly back by helicopter. Besides, I have so many people protecting me. I can’t just stay home, at the factory, or here forever. I should give those behind-the-scenes people a chance, shouldn’t I? I can’t have them protecting me forever, can I?”
Liu Chen quickly adjusted her mindset.
Two days, plus a lucky charm, Liu Chen felt she wouldn’t be that unlucky.
Hengdian World Studios.
Mi Zhuzhu was standing behind Sun Lu, the female lead of *Empresses in the Palace*. They were currently filming a crucial scene of the drama, where Noble Lady Qi accuses Consort Xi.
“Your subject impeaches Consort Xi for having an illicit affair with Imperial Physician Wen!”
“Cut! Excellent! The emotions are very full. We’ll shoot a close-up shot, and that’s it for today!”
The director sat behind the ‘television,’ silent, just sitting there.
Although he felt the emotions in the scene were in place, for some reason, he always felt something was missing.
But he couldn’t pinpoint what was missing. Moreover, it was mid-August. Even with air conditioning in the studio, the studio was so large, and there were so many actors and staff, and they were worried about continuity issues, so the cold air from the air conditioner dissipated before it even reached them.
Because of the heat, the makeup for the actresses had to be touched up several times per scene, as sweat would smudge the makeup.
Mi Zhuzhu, however, was unaware of the director’s troubles. She had finished her scenes for the day. Because Lai Jie liked to study acting, he was on set observing even when he didn’t have his scenes.
Mi Zhuzhu was now lifting the hem of her maid’s skirt and tying it up with a rubber band.
She waved to Lai Jielun, who was standing outside the set:
“Let’s go. I called Chenchen today and invited her to come watch us film. I just checked my phone, and Chenchen said they are flying to Hangzhou today and will arrive in Hengdian tomorrow morning.”
Lai Jielun nodded, reluctantly pulling his gaze away from the set. Although the men had very few scenes in *Empresses in the Palace*, and most of the drama was about the women in the harem, Lai Jielun didn’t feel that the women’s scenes were any less engaging.
On the contrary, during his time on set, he discovered that when the ensemble cast of women acted together, even he, who was standing outside the camera, secretly watching behind the director, couldn’t help but hold his breath.
It was amazing!
Lai Jielun even felt goosebumps all over his body watching them. He wished his acting skills could reach that level.
Despite his admiration, Lai Jielun spent most of his time in the hotel room, pulling Mi Zhuzhu to practice scenes with him every day.
This caused Mi Zhuzhu, who originally only wanted to be an extra, to become a good actress playing a little maid because she practiced scenes with Lai Jielun every day. The assistant director specifically asked her to try out a few more roles, and finally, she was cast as a maid to the female lead, Sun Lu.
When this great opportunity fell into Mi Zhuzhu’s lap, she even suspected that the assistant director had pulled strings for her out of respect for Liu Chen.
However, after trying out twice, she found that the assistant director seemed to genuinely think she was good, and the originally cast actor couldn’t make it due to delays from his previous project, so she was chosen.
“Perfect, I have a scene with Sun Lu tomorrow afternoon where we first meet. Sister Chen can come and see if I’ve improved this summer!”
The two of them chatted, planning how to give the upcoming Liu Chen a fulfilling trip to Hengdian.
Liu Chen had just landed in Hangzhou and it would take four hours to drive to Hengdian from Hangzhou.
By the time they arrived in Hangzhou, it was already evening. The setting sun cast an orange-red sky, making the white clouds look as if they were burning from behind. A warm breeze blew, reminding Liu Chen of her first time in Hangzhou in her previous life.
She stayed in a budget hotel and was busy with work every day. Even though she was near West Lake, she never got to see it before leaving.
Later, she remembered feeling a bit regretful.
Thinking of this, Liu Chen turned her head to look beside her, and happened to meet Ren Yu’s gaze. Their eyes met.
“Pfft! What are you looking at! Let’s get a taxi to the hotel!”
Liu Chen said, stepping out of the airport first, a bright smile on her face, pulling her small suitcase towards the taxi stand.
Behind Liu Chen, Xia Tian and Dong Tian followed closely. If one were to look more carefully, two men in casual clothes, wearing baseball caps and old-fashioned Bluetooth earpieces, could be seen trailing about three to four meters behind.
The six of them split into two cars, one in front and one behind, heading to the Grand Hyatt Hotel by West Lake.
Inside the Grand Hyatt Hotel, two dark-skinned women were sitting in the lobby, seemingly waiting for someone. Next to them were a sun hat and two 28-inch suitcases.
The receptionists didn’t pay much attention to these two women waiting in the lobby. It was the peak summer tourist season, and people dressed and with luggage like them filled almost all the sofas in the lobby.
Moreover, with the peak season and full occupancy, they had been extremely tired lately. Fortunately, the hotel had hired a batch of summer interns, which managed to keep the hotel running.
At this moment, the taxi Liu Chen was in stopped at the hotel entrance. A doorman quickly came forward to help open the door. Ren Yu stepped out of the car, silently creating a distance between the doorman and the car door.
Then Liu Chen, wearing sneakers, got out of the car. She had long, shapely legs and was wearing sports shorts, a loose short-sleeved shirt on her upper body, and a blue baseball cap.
“Thank you.”
Liu Chen nodded to the doorman who had opened the door and then took the suitcase from Dong Tian. The four of them, two in front and two behind, walked towards the hotel reception in a seemingly loose formation, but with no blind spots in their vision.
As Liu Chen stepped through the revolving door of the hotel, she felt a flash of light pass before her eyes.
A normal person would instinctively avoid the source of the light, but Liu Chen looked up towards where the light might have come from.
The lounge sofas in the lobby were very noisy. A six or seven-year-old boy was running around with a toy gun, and a three or four-year-old girl, though she didn’t understand, was eagerly following behind, wanting to join in.
The adults were chatting and laughing, occasionally exclaiming,
“Oh my gosh?”
“Really?”
The woman who had been pretending to reapply sunscreen with a makeup mirror, upon seeing Liu Chen quickly look up in the mirror, decisively closed the makeup mirror and said to the other dark-skinned woman beside her:
“Lili, they haven’t come after waiting for so long. Why don’t we check in first and wait for them in the room?”
The woman called Lili nodded silently, agreeing to her companion’s suggestion.
Coincidentally, in the brief moment they were speaking, Liu Chen and Ren Yu had already reached the reception desk to check in.
Ren Yu casually took out his ID card from his wallet and handed it to Liu Chen. Liu Chen’s lips curled up slightly, showing her good mood at the moment.
The receptionist who was handling the registration placed the ID card on a white machine and then looked at the computer screen. Looking at the photos on their ID cards displayed on the screen, the receptionist couldn’t help but sigh inwardly.
“Oh, people who are good-looking are even good-looking in their ID photos!”
“Okay, your information has been registered successfully. As Miss Liu, you are a platinum member of our hotel, so we have upgraded your room to a Deluxe West Lake Suite free of charge. You can go to the elevators on your left to the 28th floor. As your room is on the executive floor, there is unlimited breakfast and afternoon tea on the 26th floor every morning and afternoon. We wish you a pleasant stay.”
“Thank you.”
Liu Chen took their ID cards and put them into her card holder, then tossed the card holder into the small backpack on her back.
It looked like she was just throwing the card holder into her backpack, but in reality, as soon as the card holder fell in, Liu Chen had already put it into her system backpack.
Lili, who was standing behind the reception desk, queuing behind the people in front, heard everything the receptionist said clearly. However, they showed no special reaction and simply waited quietly behind the people in front, as if they were just there to check in.
In fact, Xia Tian had already observed the tourists behind her through the mirrored surfaces of the pillars on either side of the hotel reception.
They seemed to enjoy outdoor activities, their skin tanned, and there were quite a few sunspots on their faces.
Their exposed arms also showed no signs of muscle, which put Xia Tian at ease.
In fact, since being assigned to be responsible for Miss Liu’s safety at the beginning of the year, both Los Angeles and Seoul were abroad, and Xia Tian hadn’t had a chance to make a move in China.
As for the time when the Ministry of State Security arrested suspects, she didn’t even have a chance to participate, which left her feeling restless.
Xia Tian and Dong Tian were not members, so they did not receive any free room upgrades. To avoid being dealt with separately, they chose twin rooms when they were out, and their room was on the 20th floor.
After Xia Tian and Dong Tian left, Lili’s companion didn’t even give them a glance and handed over the two ID cards.
“Your reserved room is a Deluxe West Lake Suite, located on the 30th floor. It is to your left. Please take the elevator to the 30th floor. Your executive lounge is on the 26th floor. We wish you a pleasant stay.”