Chapter 53 - Breaking!
Older Brother: Shaoqing, the party is over, why aren’t you back yet?
Mo Shaoqing took the chance to cool his face down, and quickly replied.
Mo Shaoqing: Sorry big bro, help me explain to everyone! Boss Ling and I will go back together, you can head back first!
The morally upright Mo Shaohong could not allow this: That’s not right, how could you bother other people like this!
Mo Shaoqing could only silently apologize to his older brother in his heart.
Mo Shaoqing: Uh.. that is Mr. Ling still has some important matters to discuss with me, you’re already on the way home anyways, plus you’re opening the restaurant tomorrow!
Persuaded by his brother, he could only reply: Alright, don’t stay out too late!
Ling Senhao watched as Mo Shaoqing’s ten fingers typed away on his phone, chatting enthusiastically, his heart felt upset “That… have you thought about it?”
Huh? What? Can I have like 5 minutes? You don’t have to be so shameless.
Maybe it was because Mo Shaoqing’s eyes looked a bit surprised at his question, but Ling Senhao felt like he was going to get shot down.
The pair had already left the filming studio park over 10 minutes ago, and then went on a long walk. It would be too late to head back to Y City, so they decided to grab a hotel room in S City for the night.
Ling Senhao brought Mo Shaoqing a hotel penthouse suite where he had an extended stay booking in.
Mo Shaoqing: “Why did you book such an expensive room?”
Ling Senhao innocently looked at Mo Shaoqing: “I’m not used to living in those standard rooms!”
Mo Shaoqing: … no faults here, just speechless.
The Presidential suite was huge. Standing in front of the floor to ceiling window of the living room, you could look over the whole night view of S City. Attached to the living room was a kitchen with a dining room, there was also a washroom, and a semi-enclosed study... There was even a pool on the other side.
Wait, hold up, there was only one bedroom!!!
Although Ling Senhao appeared very strait-laced/strict, in private he was actually quite laid back. Loosening up his tie, he tossed his jacket on the sofa: “You can sleep here tonight!”
No way, that fast? Mo Shaoqing’s cheeks flushed red, he had clearly not even gave an answer yet.
Mo Shaoqing didn’t move.
Ling Senhao eyed him, “Feeling hot?”
“NO. Not at all.” Mo Shaoqing’s face got redder.
Ling Senhao suddenly had a thought: “Did you think there was only one bedroom?”
Mo Shaoqing didn’t respond, his facial features held a “Was I mistaken” type of look.
Ling Senhao cried a bit as he laughed, “ don’t worry, I won’t do anything to you!”
“Of course, if you did…”
“Ah -- where’s the bedroom? I want to reset now, today was tiring!” Mo Shaoqing took the lead and to find a room to interrupt Ling Senhao from speaking any more. He just had a feeling that the next few words would be something he didn’t want to hear.
Ling Senhao only pretended not to see through his (MSQ) thoughts and then pushed open a hidden door beside the cabinet and gestured to Mo Shaoqing to come in.
So it turns out the door was there, I was going to say, such a big presidential suite, how could there only be one bedroom!
Mo Shaoqing was embarrassed at the thoughts in his head and quickly rushed into the room and closed the door.
Maybe because he seemed flustered in the rush, but he could hear a small laugh from the other side which made him certain he didn’t want to go back out there again.
Lying on the bed, Mo Shaoqing started to reflect on the events that had passed. At first, he admired and respected Mr. Ling, but lately they would even nag at each other. Perhaps it was because they had gotten to know each other? It seemed that Mr. Ling had started to distance himself less… and it wasn’t like his consideration and care wasn’t nice…
Standing in the living room, Ling Senhao was not as happy as Mo Shaoqing imagined. He really did want to take things slow, but Mo Shaoqing didn’t seem to be attracted to him as much as he thought he did. So he decided to help him get through obstacles and find better resources. However, his overnight success with ELL magazine made him feel like he shot himself in the foot.
Ma Xiusi’s words were still ringing in his ears: This newbie has the potential to be a star.
At that time, he was at odds with himself. To let so many people see how this person shined, flawless and beautiful, made him regret it -- He shouldn’t have pushed him into the spotlight. The never wrong and infallible Ling Senhao could not deny that he had made the wrong move this time.
Ling Senhao bitterly laughed, there will be more situations like this in the future…
That’s why, blinded by love, he would lose focus. He was too eager! Rushing into things could lead to bad decisions, whether it be in the market or in romance…
That night Tang Qin made a post on Weibo and tagged @Mo Shaoqing:
ActressTangQin: [Picture] [Picture] [Picture] Thank you for hosting @Mon_Shaoqing! We ate it all up!
Mu Yibin who was also in the same series reposted it. Originally what was a normal post on Weibo became viral.
Mo Shaoqing originally had a few days of rest after wrapping up his filming. However, since he stayed out in a hotel that night, he had to wake up early the next day and catch a ride with Mr. Ling back home.
In bed Mo Shaoqing scrolled through Weibo and Moments*.
He was then stunned at the number of comments in Weibo --
“Shocked, Little brother you actually know how to cook.”
“Looks delicious.”
“My male gold’s first post this year (excluding the advert) went viral, but it was because of you, speak -- what is your relationship!”
“OMG, my idol is a foodie!”
“Are you close with male god Mu (Mu Yibin) Having a meal together?”
“So is [Legend of Emperor Ling] finished filming?”
….
Mo Shaoqing sharp eyes focused on a few fords, “Male god Mu”, “Repost”, “Legend of Emperor Ling”?
Did Mu Yibin post something on Weibo about the TV series he didn’t know about?
He immediately went searching online, but the results only returned “Mu Yibin eating hotpot” “Mu Yibin starring in [Legend of Emperor Ling]” etc…
Mo Shaoqing went back to his profile on Weibo, Well, my follower count has increased another tens of thousands! Even the number of likes on his last post exceeded 50 000!
The first time his post got reposted so many times made Mo Shaoqing very nervous. It was even more nerve wracking than performing on stage or selling flowers to strangers… So, he decided to do nothing about it and got out of bed!
Mo Shaoqing washed up, put on yesterday’s clothes again and went out. He noticed that there was no one in the living room. Only a set of clothes was laid out on the sofa.
The sizes fit me and are from decent brands, are these for me?
Mo Shaoqing changed into the clothes, walked around a bit and went to the kitchen and was almost startled by the scene in front of him --
In the kitchen wearing a blue apron was Mr. Ling with a frown as he fried some eggs. The eggs on on the plate beside him were either burnt or undercooked with broken yolk everywhere….
“Mr. Ling… what are you…” doing? Massacring all the eggs?
Ling Senhao’s expression changed immediately, he turned around: “You’re up, do you want to eat breakfast?”
He then looked Mo Shaoqing up and down, “Looks good on you.”
“Thank you Mr. Ling, that… uhm.. Why don’t you let me do it?” watching the man in the blue apron with rolled sleeves scraping at the pan, Mo Shaoqing thought he wouldn’t be able to even eat that breakfast.
“Great idea!” Ling Senhao had wanted to put in some effort to improve his image had no choice but to give up. Giving a sigh of relief, he handed over the spatula.
Mo Shaoqing had heard the sigh and had to hold back his laughter, “I’ll just make something casual, I hope you don’t mind!”
Ling Senhao felt a bit down, Mo Shaoqing wasn’t afraid of him anymore, but even laughed at him, he had to think of something new…
Mo Shaoqing felt himself pulled into a warm embrace, his body unconsciously stiffened up, “Watch out for any splash back.” said Ling Senhao said as he helped Mo Shaoqing tie on an apron.
Mo Shaoqing then felt a warm breath at the back of his head, “Anything is fine, whatever you make, I’ll eat it!”
“I’ll wait for you --”
After Ling Senhao left the kitchen, Mo Shaoqing shovelled the failed attempt of a fried egg out of the pan and prepared breakfast.
He opened the fridge, only to find it stocked full with a myriad of ingredients.
He wanted to make something quick, so he ended up passing on many of the ingredients.
Grabbing an avocado, he sliced it and mixed it with some fruit. Adding a dollop of yogurt as dressing for the fruit salad. He also steamed potatoes and fried some eggs. To the eggs, he planned on adding some vinegar and sugar to make sweet and sour eggs.
When the potatoes were cooked, he took some ham, sausage and shrimp and mixed it together. Seasoning with salt, he added some high gluten flour and kneaded it into a dough. Shaping the dough, he proceeded to pan fry it until both sides were golden brown. He warmed up some milk and set the dishes on the table.
Ling Senhao was confident in Mo Shaoqing’s cooking skills. He sat at the table quietly and read the morning paper while waiting for breakfast.
As he expected, it didn’t take long for delicious smells to come out of the kitchen.
As a foreigner who liked Chinese cuisine, Ling Senhao quite liked the sweet and sour eggs and subsequently ate 3 of them to give face to Mo Shaoqing.
The pan fried potato cake also blew his mind, in terms of the method of cooking he’d seen in his many years.
Mo Shaoqing was also hungry, he didn’t eat much the night before and was focused on cooking instead. Ignoring etiquette, he ate two pan fried potato cakes before serving.
Neither person spoke and quietly enjoyed a breakfast between themselves.
It wasn’t until they had finished eating and got in the car that Mo Shaoqing started to feel a bit embarrassed.
To hide his emotions, he took out his phone and swiped through Weibo as a distraction.
After simmering for a whole night and morning, the incident had already hit the top spots in the trending and hot search in Weibo: [Legend of Emperor Ling] Filming wraps up ahead of schedule, or anything regarding [Legend of Emperor Ling] filled up the word search bar.
[Legend of Emperor Ling] gossip ended up suppressing many other dramas airing at the same time, the reception was intense.
Xu Che, who had been paying attention to the series didn’t let go of this opportunity, he had waited a while for this moment.
It’s finally come. Heh, you dare take my role, just you wait!
He then posted a few photos on Weibo and subsequently wrote: Looking forward to our collaboration.
Although Xu Che was an unknown 18 year old model, he had nice facial features that attracted many fans. Soon the comments were rollings in:
“Wow, are you acting now?”
“Is it a new series?”
“Amazing, it looks like a new drama series.”
“The backdrop looks so familiar! Is it [Legend of Emperor Ling]?
A calculating smile rose on Xu Che’s face as he read through the comments, the fans were coming in droves.
*Moments is the newsfeed in WeChat of posts made in your friend circle.
This chapter made me hungry. If anyone attempts to make these recipes @ me in discord @Akuma3
PS. I've also read a bit further and decided to replace "Emperor Ling's Decree" to "Legend of Emperor Ling" as it makes more sense. The Chinese characters were "凌帝传", where the first two characters were easily translated to "Emperor Ling" but the last character has multiple meanings like "to transmit, circulate, biography, historical narrative" depending on context. So I felt like Decree/edict would be appropriate at first but as a TV series title I thought "Legend" would be more appropriate. It has been corrected in other chapters.