Day Ten: No Thoughts

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After completing the first look, Si Nian hurried offstage to change into her second outfit.

Backstage, makeup artists, models, and every kind of staff member were tangled together in a chaotic whirl.

The four themed sections of tonight’s inaugural MiniGlitz fashion show lasted for more than an hour in total.

Because she was neither an influential celebrity nor a fashion icon, Si Nian had no chance to walk in the fourth theme, “Dreamy Night.” After completing her first two looks flawlessly, she finally appeared onstage with the thirty-odd models taking part in tonight’s show for the closing bows.

All the invited guests, fans, and audience members below were applauding.

Si Nian noticed that some of the entertainers ahead of her were waving to friends in the guest section during the finale. She swept her gaze around and spotted Jiang Yihan in the corner, a staff badge hanging from her neck as she waved frantically.

Si Nian smiled and secretly waved back.

In this digital age, market feedback was always astonishingly swift—especially for an event like tonight’s, which had drawn so many celebrities and naturally commanded considerable attention.

As soon as Si Nian stepped off the runway after the finale, she saw that the show director and staff were all wearing smiles they could barely contain.

The models were free to leave once they had finished walking. Jiang Yihan still had a wrap-up meeting to attend, and no one knew how late it would run, so Si Nian could only change clothes and take a taxi home first.

Sitting in the ride-hailing car, she scrolled through her phone and saw that the hot-search rankings had been almost entirely taken over by MiniGlitz’s inaugural show.

The main reason was that it had been so unexpected.

The public had assumed that this inaugural supplement show would be yet another exhibition unrelated to ordinary people—a parade of emaciated models wearing bizarre clothes. Even the most famous stars, once they stepped onto a runway, were expected to keep solemn, expressionless faces. Yet the young film and television actress who had opened the show with a smile had immediately delivered a surprise.

Then, as the models emerged one after another, viewers realized that every model in the show was a beautiful young woman who fit mainstream aesthetics and wore a vivid, attractive expression while walking.

Nor were the clothes they wore impractical designer pieces that no ordinary person could ever leave the house in. Every outfit was beautiful and suitable for everyday life. They made viewers’ desire to shop surge wildly; almost every look inspired people to imitate it. Before long, the public was wishing for more shows aimed at ordinary consumers, instead of designers using their self-proclaimed sense of sophistication to bully the public’s taste.

People were full of praise for the show. The top spots on the trending list were occupied by the actresses and girl-group idols who had walked as models that night. Some of those searches even seemed to have been purchased in advance.

Si Nian had originally hoped that the exposure from the MiniGlitz show would help her gain a little more attention.

Instead, when she opened her phone, the top searches were all praising the celebrities for being beautiful. Then came one fan war after another: one fandom said a certain actress had poor body proportions onstage, while another said someone else’s runway walk was terrible. The fans traded personal attacks and dug up each other’s scandals. They even fought bitterly over whose outfit had looked better and which celebrity had received the more prestigious treatment from the brand by opening or closing the show.

Si Nian pressed her lips together as she stared at the trending page, completely dominated by celebrities.

The spotlights on the physical runway had been equally bright for everyone, but the spotlight of the internet seemed to have spared not a shred of attention for ordinary models like them.

Even so, participating in the show was still an extremely valuable opportunity for the models.

The generous pay was secondary. More importantly, it added a significant entry to their resumes. If they competed for similar work in the future, their advantage would naturally increase considerably.

Si Nian gave a soft sigh at the trending page, where she could not even find a single photograph of herself from the show. Yet on the ride home and during the walk from the car, she still took a few dark, atmospheric live-style selfies.

Although the internet’s attention had largely bypassed ordinary models like them, everything depended on human effort. Even the slightest return was worth fighting for.

Si Nian edited the live photos into a short video and posted it to her account, “Whispering Thoughts.” She added the hashtags #MiniGlitzInauguralShow, #Glitz, and #DailyLifeOfModels, along with the caption: “Finished the show and heading home~”

…

By the time Si Nian learned she had made the trending list, she had already gone home, washed up, and fallen asleep.

Jiang Yihan had just finished her late-night meeting. She should have been filled with the resentment of an overworked employee, but when she called and woke Si Nian, her voice was bursting with excitement.

“Oh my God, Nian Nian, you’re trending!”

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“Hm?” Si Nian rubbed her eyes, unable to process it for a moment.

Then, hearing Jiang Yihan’s excited voice, she climbed out of bed in the middle of the night and opened Weibo. At two in the morning, she saw that the number-one entry on the entertainment rankings consisted of three words:

Whispering Thoughts.

Si Nian frowned slightly at her phone screen and swallowed.

Then she cautiously tapped the trending entry titled “Whispering Thoughts.” The first thing to catch her eye was a popular post from an entertainment account, accompanied by two animated images.

Both came from tonight’s MiniGlitz show.

The first showed a model walking toward the camera to the beat of the music during the show’s first theme, “Nineteen.” She wore a green shirtdress layered beneath a beige knitted vest. At her mark, she lowered her glasses and stuck out the tip of her tongue. The mischievous little expression perfectly captured the girl’s playful, spirited, and uninhibited character.

The second animated image came from the show’s third theme, “Working Day.” The model wore a dusty-pink slip dress paired with a pink cropped cardigan. With one hand resting on a chain-strap bag, she walked with effortless ease. At the end, she turned toward the camera from two different angles and smiled gently, as if she could instantly brighten the viewer’s entire day.

Si Nian saw that the post had already received more than one hundred thousand likes.

Apparently, the whole thing had started because the fans of several female entertainers who had walked in the show were fighting bitterly. Though they could easily have celebrated a win for everyone, they had instead argued over whose star had the best proportions, the strongest runway walk, and the most compelling stage presence. The more the gossip-loving public watched, the more irritated they became, until a rebellious impulse took hold.

Everyone had looked beautiful that night, but when people thought back on it, a few stood out especially vividly.

And so an entertainment account posted: “Stop fighting, everyone. My preliminary pick for tonight’s best is right here.”

The model had been an unfamiliar face no one recognized. Yet the moment she stepped onto the runway, everything about her—from her features and proportions to her styling and walk, right down to her uniquely expressive pose—had broken through the dazzling crowd and claimed the title of best in the show.

Excited viewers flooded the comments:

[Yes, yes, this one! When I watched the livestream, one pose went straight through my heart! Exactly my type!]

[She absolutely deserves tonight’s best. Both looks were made so beautiful by her! Her playful, mischievous style and her refined, gentle style were completely different, and she brought out both without repeating herself at all!]

[Now this is what a runway walk should look like. I don’t even want to mention the ones certain fans were hyping. They walked like they were strolling down the street. It was technically a fashion show—couldn’t they have found a teacher and practiced beforehand?]

[So beautiful, so beautiful, so beautiful! With all the incredibly resourceful people online, does no one know who she is? Please tell me her name!]

[I want to buy both outfits so badly, sob. The green eyeliner is gorgeous too.]

[What a perfect face, such a tiny head, and those unbelievable proportions. After looking at her, I saw myself in the mirror and laughed in anger.]

[Damn it, how have you people not dug up her identity yet? I want to know everything about this woman within three minutes!]

[Wah, someone else has taken a place on my heart. The tip of a durian-heart is always crowded with people.]

[Three minutes have passed. I’m very disappointed in this generation of internet sleuths. Smiling.jpg]

…

Though finding her within three minutes was difficult, the account called “Whispering Thoughts” was eventually unearthed by the internet’s remarkably capable detectives, who dug through everything with the determination of archaeologists. It successfully shot to the top of the trending list.

The girl from tonight’s show was a professional print model. Her profile contained more than a dozen posts about her daily work and life. Some time ago, she had even appeared in a sample shoot for a bridal photography studio that had recently become very popular. And just a few hours earlier, she had posted a short selfie video of herself heading home after finishing the MiniGlitz inaugural show.

Still somewhat dazed, Si Nian sat on her bed with her mouth slightly open. She looked at the short video she had posted earlier on her “Whispering Thoughts” account. Even at this hour, in the dead of night, it had already received tens of thousands of likes.

The comments read:

[So you were here! Miss, we finally found you!]

[Someone this beautiful has to go home alone after work? Crying.jpg. Would you let me take you home?]

[All right, I hereby announce that from this moment on, Whispering Thoughts is my wife.]

[How did you grow up looking like this? Will you teach me in my next life? Crying.jpg]

[Do you ever wake yourself up laughing when you look in the mirror at night? T T]

…

Si Nian instinctively glanced at her reflection in the vanity mirror.

She had not laughed herself awake. The person in the mirror wore loose, rumpled pajamas and had wildly disheveled hair. In the silence of the night, Si Nian pinched her thigh hard, afraid that all of this might be a dream.

…

At the same time, at Brightview Residence.

More than a month after their breakup, Lu Shuyan had still come here tonight.

He had seen Si Nian appear as a model at a fashion magazine’s inaugural show.

When that face appeared on the large screen, Lu Shuyan did not recognize her at first.

It was clearly the same face, yet the person on the screen was lively, mischievous, and vibrant, as though every inch of her radiated confidence and youthful energy. She wore the latest fashions and showed not the slightest trace of fear as she walked beneath the converging spotlights.

She seemed utterly different from the gentle, timid woman who had once stayed by his side—someone unwilling to work and sheltered from the world.

Lu Shuyan drew a deep, heavy breath.

Only after arriving at Brightview Residence did he discover that Si Nian appeared not to have taken any of her things with her. Her clothes, jewelry, and other belongings still lay quietly in the display cases of the dressing room.

After washing up, the man lay down on the bed again.

Lu Shuyan found that the moment he closed his eyes, the image of Si Nian on the runway returned before him. He turned over, but in the end he sat up, took out his phone, and began searching.

The marvel of big data was that as long as two people had once been connected, even if they no longer interacted, it could still accurately push news about one to the other.

Lu Shuyan scarcely had to search before he saw news about Si Nian.

An account called “Whispering Thoughts,” verified as belonging to a print model. Its online biography contained not only photographs from tonight’s show, but also—further back—many freshly taken wedding photographs.

The newlyweds in the pictures looked perfectly matched and sweet together, prompting numerous users to exclaim in the comments that they wanted the same kind of wedding photos.

Lu Shuyan’s gaze fixed intensely on one particular photograph, on the forehead Si Nian was being kissed.

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