MORIC - Chapter 27
Chapter 27: Who Wants to Play Lovers with a Love Rival?
Chi Yueshan hadn't processed it yet. She subconsciously said, "What does this have to do with me?"
But many people's gazes fell on her, a mixture of jealousy, envy, and ridicule.
Only Xi Zhoumeng's gaze was easily distinguishable from the others. She lowered her eyes nonchalantly. "It's the script I want to perform. Are you dissatisfied?"
Chi Yueshan's mind was filled with the line 【You are my yellow rose】.
What the hell kind of script is this, and what the hell do you mean by 'are you dissatisfied'?!
Your next line isn't going to be something like [Are you satisfied with what you see now], is it!!
Besides, how could someone like Xi Zhoumeng possibly play a supporting role?
If there had to be a protagonist in this world, Senior Wen Xinghuo might be one, and Xi Zhoumeng would definitely be the other female lead.
How can a small fry like me from the Lower World ever shine?
It's so hard.
Chi Yueshan turned her face away. "I wouldn't dare."
Her reply was baffling. Xi Zhoumeng chuckled. "Then it's decided."
Her tone sounded quite pleased. She glanced at her light-screen. "I'll assign the roles in five minutes."
The students who got the script for The Yellow Rose were grinning from ear to ear.
No matter how you looked at it, they were set. On the other hand, the groups other than Duan Daizhen's were all visibly unhappy.
The teacher came up to smooth things over. "These two students are professionals, so their scores won't be counted in the final grade."
After speaking, she looked at Xi Zhoumeng. "I will award points based on your performance. After all, the standard is different. I look forward to your final performance in the auditorium."
The sleeves of Xi Zhoumeng's school robe were different from everyone else's, resembling court attire from many years ago.
Chi Yueshan was still holding the soft velvet gloves, staring blankly at the pearls adorning them.
Xuan Ping turned around with a smile. "Yueshan, you're set this time."
Some were happy, some were sad. Even with the teacher's words, the other groups knew they were done for.
But Xi Zhoumeng and Duan Daizhen were originally students in this elective, so they couldn't be considered outside help. Even though they rarely attended class, it meant they were eligible for the final performance.
The Yellow Rose group had a total of five people. One Omega had switched to Duan Daizhen's Bad Angel group, and another had gone to supplement a different group.
Including Xi Zhoumeng, there were a total of three Omegas and two Betas.
Three female Omegas and two Betas, one male and one female.
Xi Zhoumeng had never acted in this play. In contrast, she had performed in Duan Daizhen's script on the closing night at the Imperial Theater when she was fifteen.
It was her final submission for her theater career in this world.
But the creative background was too distant, a combination of ancient mythology and romantic love—a theme Xi Zhoumeng disliked the most.
She didn't like playing the protagonist; she preferred some of the more despicable supporting roles.
The Yellow Rose was a story from an era before secondary genders had appeared.
The male protagonist, Fu Nian, was born into a large family and had a gentle fiancée.
But the vast family fortune was not his. He had two younger sisters.
The second sister, Fu Xin, was a science and engineering girl with no desire to fight for the family fortune, engrossed in her academic research.
The third sister appeared extremely frail, had a very rocky love life, and was always looking for someone to be with her.
Fu Nian thought his position was secure, but he never expected that he wasn't his father's biological son.
He was the illegitimate child of his mother and her ex-boyfriend.
Under the condition of bloodline inheritance, he had no advantage.
Just then, his father married a beautiful new stepmother. If he didn't cover up this secret and the stepmother gave birth to a younger brother, he would be completely finished.
Even if the stepmother gave birth to a daughter, the inheritance wouldn't fall to him.
The second sister, Fu Xin, would be next in line.
Fu Nian's fiancée, Tang Rongrong, had attached herself to him for his astonishing family fortune. To prevent this prize from falling into someone else's hands, she plotted a grand murder with Fu Nian.
Starting with the frail third sister, they would make her die in a "love-related" car accident.
Next was the beautiful stepmother, who would die in a shooting staged to look like the father killed her for having an affair.
Finally, it would end with the second sister, Fu Xin, who rarely came home, making her die in a lab explosion.
Fu Nian planned meticulously, but he never expected the frail and innocent third sister to turn the tables and kill the boyfriend who claimed to love only her, winning their father's pity and gaining half of the company's shares.
Nor did he expect that the beautiful stepmother was actually the second sister's girlfriend, and that they had long ago devised a flawless plan.
Fu Nian's scheme became just one link in their chain of plans.
In the end, Fu Nian died at the annual company party, "accidentally" falling from the twenty-second floor, dying right before his father's eyes as he was giving a speech.
The fiancée hooked a new rich young master but died in a cruise ship accident.
The third sister contracted a hereditary disease. Still beautiful and fragile, she generously gave her fortune to her second sister.
She asked her to help kill one person for her: her beloved first love, the man who had also abandoned her.
This was a thrilling and magnificent story of a murderous family, with its earliest version being an online story from a thousand years ago.
The story ends with the refined Fu Xin and the beautiful stepmother, Qiu Mei, drinking coffee on a terrace.
They had planted a garden full of roses, and not far from the terrace was the family cemetery.
There was no such thing as an eternal family. Fu Xin took over this identity and, with the person she loved most, seized an unexpected windfall.
On the rainy terrace, they clinked their glasses in front of a yellow rose in a glass vase.
When Chi Yueshan was looking at the optional scripts, she had immediately ruled this one out.
She didn't really like these kinds of crazy, bloody stories. Her life was already gloomy enough; she preferred something more like a fairy tale.
But the choice of script was not up to her.
Xuan Ping left during the second half of the class. Chi Yueshan steeled herself and sat in the back row of the classroom, watching Xi Zhoumeng assign roles.
"Are there any roles you particularly want to play?"
Xi Zhoumeng leaned back against a desk, her open school robe revealing the long dress underneath. Her waist was so slender it seemed a single hand could encircle it, not to mention the embroidery on the dress.
It looked very expensive no matter how you looked at it.
"Senior, there are only two male roles in total: the male lead, Fu Nian, and Fu Nian's father. We'll let you assign them."
The speaker was a male Beta with curly hair. He had an ordinary appearance and looked like a good student.
He probably didn't have much of a presence usually. Even though it wasn't the first day of the elective, Chi Yueshan had the illusion that she was seeing him for the first time.
"Alright."
Xi Zhoumeng's eyes curved into a smile. "What about the remaining female roles? You can pick any of them except for the stepmother."
The remaining two Omegas didn't look very aggressive.
Naturally, they couldn't play the lazy yet sharp stepmother from the script.
Chi Yueshan sat at the very end. To her left was a female Beta named Jiang Xian. Chi Yueshan had exchanged a few words with her during the first class.
She seemed quite friendly and easy to get along with.
"I want to play the fiancée..."
She was a lively person, but for some reason, she seemed a bit shy at this moment.
Chi Yueshan subconsciously glanced at the male Beta, Shi Shuyang. He was sitting to the side and gave a gentle smile.
Ah, so it's a campus romance!
Chi Yueshan understood, and so did everyone else.
Xi Zhoumeng nodded. "What about you, Junior Sheng?"
Sitting at the far end was Sheng Yangkui, who hadn't spoken a word. The royal family's basic courses were all held on their own grounds.
But electives were mobile. From the first class until now, Sheng Yangkui had always sat with her triplet sisters. Now that she was separated from them, she seemed particularly ill at ease.
She let out a small "ah" and raised her eyes slightly, like a frightened kitten.
Chi Yueshan thought of the sight of Wen Xinghuo and her leaving together yesterday, and that sour feeling crept up again silently.
The three princesses of the Sheng family were all Omegas. From her appearance, one could tell Sheng Yangkui was the youngest.
Her two older sisters, the second named Sheng Qiuyu and the eldest Sheng Xinggui. They looked almost identical. When Xi Zhoumeng flipped to the student registration form, she almost went blind.
Isn't this just a matching game?
However, not only did Sheng Yangkui look easily frightened, but she was also much smaller and thinner in comparison, just like the innermost doll in a set of nesting dolls.
"I... I'm fine with anything."
Her voice was also very soft. Xi Zhoumeng leaned in, her own voice becoming even gentler. "Is there one you want?"
The perfume she wore seemed to change often, but the top note was always a faint scent of tea.
Chi Yueshan never expected to see such a gentle expression on Xi Zhoumeng's face.
She thought: A tea person's pheromones aren't bad at all. It's clearly a scam.
Besides, this person only ever tells me to get lost.
None of the people present had likely ever seen her use such vulgar words or make such a ferocious face.
So what if she's the Omega of everyone's dreams? She's still two-faced.
But on what grounds? Why am I the one getting the 'different' treatment? Is it just because this Sheng Yangkui is a princess?
Right, a princess.
And I'm just an unruly commoner.
Chi Yueshan was feeling sour about this and that, but over there, Sheng Yangkui had become restless because of Xi Zhoumeng's proximity, looking as if she was about to cry.
This was the first time Xi Zhoumeng had been this close to Sheng Yangkui. She asked the system.
【Do you think it's her?】
【System: I already said I don't know.】
【Xi Zhoumeng: Didn't you say you know what you're supposed to know?】
【System: I was just talking nonsense! If I knew everything, would I be here chatting with you every day? You think I don't want to get down to business?!】
The system's voice was always filled with a sleazy, mechanical tone, as if it had been slathered with too much lubricant.
Xi Zhoumeng maliciously thought that this thing was probably at the bottom of the barrel even among other systems.
Even the AI robot at home was more intelligent.
【System: Hey, hey, hey! Show this system some respect!】
"I... I don't know."
Sheng Yangkui had heard about Xi Zhoumeng long ago, when she was still very young.
The Xi Family was the nobility of the nobility. In a sense, the children of the Xi Family were even more precious than the royals.
Because their spiritual power was extremely formidable, it couldn't be shaken even by a Zerg's mental invasion.
An ancestor of the Xi Family had even been captured during a battle with the Zerg, yet managed to destroy the Zerg base and return alone.
A hero of heroes.
The royal family, on the other hand, was just an empty shell. Only the noble Queen could represent the glory of the Empire.
This glory was merely something bestowed by others.
What was so good about becoming Queen? The palace was so large, so cold, and you could only be alone for a lifetime.
You even lost yourself.
Only a numb shell remained, to be controlled.
They were not allowed to have preferences.
Sheng Yangkui didn't allow herself to have any either. After all, she had never possessed anything, yet she still had to experience loss.
Xi Zhoumeng raised her eyes, not looking at the trembling little girl.
There wasn't much of an age difference between them, yet it felt like many years separated them.
Xi Zhoumeng was like a complete adult—mature, beautiful, and noble.
She gave a helpless smile. "Then I'll assign you a role, okay?"
Everyone knew which role Sheng Yangkui was suited for.
The sickly youngest sister.
But no one dared to say it, afraid of being accused of making an insinuation.
Xi Zhoumeng tapped the screen of her light-brain. "Then I'll do the role assignments."
She didn't seem to be paying any attention to Chi Yueshan at all.
Chi Yueshan got angry. "What about me?!"
Everyone else instantly looked over. Even Jiang Xian turned her head, her eyes seeming to say, Isn't that obvious?
Xi Zhoumeng chuckled and nodded. "What role does Student Chi want to play?"
Chi Yueshan: "The sister!"
Everyone present was dumbfounded, thinking, Is this first-year blind?
Xi Zhoumeng asked, "Why?"
As if she thought Xi Zhoumeng was an idiot, Chi Yueshan said, "It has the fewest lines. My acting is terrible, otherwise I'll just drag everyone down."
Jiang Xian suddenly thought this first-year wasn't so bad after all.
Xi Zhoumeng let out a surprised "eh," her shock a little too deliberate.
If anyone else had done it, it would have seemed affected, but her face was just too deceptive. "If your acting is terrible, isn't that all the more reason to practice?"
Jiang Xian nodded vigorously again.
Chi Yueshan thought: Girl, you can't be serious! You just thought I was right a moment ago!
This bunch of fair-weather friends!!!
Chi Yueshan: "I'm not trying to become an actress. It's just one class."
She said it as if it were a matter of course. Even with the glasses, Xi Zhoumeng could imagine her blinking eyes at that moment.
She's definitely cursing me in her head again, isn't she?
Xi Zhoumeng smiled, tucking a stray strand of long hair behind her ear. "I'm a perfectionist. Since we have to complete this performance together, we must give it our all."
She teased Chi Yueshan with a self-righteous air, "You're not afraid of playing my lover, are you?"
Everyone else gasped, remembering their status as love rivals.
Xi Zhoumeng: "Don't worry, a stage play isn't like a movie. There aren't any exaggerated passionate scenes."
P-passionate scenes.
Chi Yueshan couldn't help but think about what she had done to this person.
I didn't do it on purpose, but I feel so guilty.
She immediately didn't dare to look at Xi Zhoumeng, turning her face away and stammering, "Wh-who's afraid?!"
Xi Zhoumeng hummed in agreement. "Then prove it to me."
She added, dropping a bombshell, "I'll ask Xinghuo to make a guest appearance."
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