Chapter 6 (2/2): Love

But today, she noticed it had already been replaced with another ad.

Cen Yingshuang was puzzled and was about to ask Màn Jie beside her, when Màn Jie suddenly saw something and got so excited she practically exploded.

“Shuang! The brand just said the perfume you endorsed is already completely sold out!”

“Huh? Really?”

Cen Yingshuang was dumbfounded.

It had only been on sale for a day! How could it possibly sell out so fast?

“Of course it’s true!”

Màn Jie emphasized.

Naturally, Cen Yingshuang was overjoyed, hardly able to believe it.

“And your commercial has also been bought out.”

Màn Jie continued.

Cen Yingshuang was even more surprised, “By who?”

No wonder her ad had disappeared.

If it was bought out, wasn’t all her effort for nothing?

Her other fans wouldn’t get to see it anymore.

Thinking of this, Cen Yingshuang felt a bit regretful.

“No idea, the brand didn’t say.”

Màn Jie didn’t care much, just happy, “Ah, it must be some rich die-hard fan of yours.”

But the other party must be someone extraordinary to have the ability to directly buy out the ad of such a top luxury brand.

They were clearly obsessed with Cen Yingshuang.

“Shuang! Look at your selling power!”

Màn Jie hugged Cen Yingshuang tightly, full of pride. “I dare say, no one in the industry can top you!”

Màn Jie suddenly remembered something and quickly took out her phone, “Look, look, Weibo’s blowing up!”

Cen Yingshuang opened Weibo as well.

The top ten trending searches were all about her.

Everyone was talking about the Perfume Sold Out Event overnight.

And the brand hadn’t responded about whether they’d restock.

Some people who managed to buy the perfume yesterday said it really smelled amazing, with a super ethereal aquatic scent.

So countless others jumped in to lament that the perfume had become a rare, one-off item as soon as it launched.

Cen Yingshuang felt dizzy, as if she were floating in the clouds, dreaming—none of it felt real.

She knew she was fairly popular, but even so, something this unprecedented shouldn’t have happened to her.

She found it unbelievable, even downright unimaginable.

But no matter how hard it was to believe, it had happened for real.

She cast aside her worries and slowly calmed her soaring emotions.

With the Perfume Sold Out Event, Cen Yingshuang’s fame reached new heights—now everyone knew her name.

This time, Cen Yingshuang still took the VIP Channel.

Today, the terminal building owned by He Yuzhou was tightly closed, and unlike last time, there was no one blocking her.

So even more fans came to see her off at the airport.

Even the staff tasked with protecting her could barely hold back the passionate crowd.

She barely had time to accept gifts and letters before she was hurriedly escorted away by the staff.

Even after the plane took off, Cen Yingshuang hadn’t recovered from the earlier chaos.

It was already autumn, but she was sweating buckets.

By the time she landed in Rome, twelve hours had passed.

It was five in the afternoon, Rome local time.

As soon as she got off the plane, she headed to the hotel arranged by the brand.

Even though she’d slept the whole way on the plane, she dozed off again soon after getting in the car.

When she woke up, they’d arrived at their destination.

Groggy, she got out of the car.

But as soon as she saw the scene before her, she was instantly wide awake.

In front of her wasn’t the hotel building she’d imagined, but two grand and elegant Roman-style castles, their architecture dating back to the late Medieval Renaissance period.

They stood tall on the coast.

She could even hear the sound of waves crashing against the rocks.

It was dusk.

The sky was ablaze with clouds.

Even the mysterious, awe-inspiring castles looked a bit softer.

The beauty left her speechless for a moment.

But reason soon returned, and she realized this couldn’t be the hotel.

She asked Màn Jie beside her, “Did we come to the wrong place?”

“No, this is the address.”

Màn Jie replied.

Besides, the show would be held in downtown Rome, but here there was already the sea—clearly the outskirts.

At this moment, a woman in professional attire walked out with several servants.

Though clearly European, she greeted them in Chinese with a friendly smile: “Miss Cen, hello, I’m the person in charge here. I’ll take you to your room.”

So it really was arranged by the brand?

Did the brand go all out this time, booking such an ancient and luxurious castle?

Two servants went to the van and took out Cen Yingshuang’s luggage.

She followed the Butler into the castle.

Surprisingly, Màn Jie was taken by the servants to the other castle, and the two went their separate ways.

Cen Yingshuang didn’t ask further—since the brand arranged it this way, she had nothing to say.

Walking into the castle,

She was immediately enveloped by a rich sense of history, a blend of French Rococo and Gothic styles, the lavish maximalism shown to the extreme.

The only difference was the strong use of color—vermilion red walls and carpets.

On the third floor, instead of European oil paintings in the corridor,

There hung a painting in the national style.

A white dragon swam in the surging sea, stirring wind and clouds.

She stopped, taking another look.

The unique color and texture told Cen Yingshuang at a glance that it was a mineral pigment painting.

It looked like it was by the same artist as the one in the Fiji villa.

Cen Yingshuang asked the female manager with interest, “Excuse me, do you know who painted this?”

The female manager kept smiling, but avoided the question: “Miss Cen, your room is right here.”

The room was directly opposite the painting.

Cen Yingshuang replied, “Okay, thank you.”

She thought, maybe the manager didn’t know who the artist was either.

A servant carried her luggage into the room.

“Just leave it here, I’ll unpack myself.”

Cen Yingshuang said, “Thank you.”

“All right, Miss Cen.”

The female manager said, “If you need anything else, just call me.”

The manager quietly closed the door as she left.

Cen Yingshuang looked around the room.

She had only one feeling—the historical atmosphere was overwhelming, as if she’d traveled back to ancient Medieval Rome.

She was actually a little afraid of staying in such an old house.

She hurried to the window and pulled open all the curtains.

Instantly, the room flooded with orange-red light.

“Wow, so beautiful!”

The whole world seemed bathed in orange and red. She gazed at the fiery clouds in the sky, marveling, and quickly took out her phone to capture the moment.

Her fear finally dissipated.

Even though she was on the third floor, the ceilings were high and the view was wide. She saw a huge garden out front.

In the center of the garden was a fruit tree with a thick trunk—clearly very old—laden with red fruit.

But then Cen Yingshuang realized something was off. In this enormous castle, aside from her van, there weren’t any other cars at all.

And ever since she entered the castle, apart from the servants and the manager, she hadn’t seen a single other person.

The same was true for the area as far as the eye could see—desolate, with no sign of life.

Could it be that no one else had arrived yet? Did she come too early?

Cen Yingshuang didn’t dwell on it. She went to the bathroom, filled the tub, and found all sorts of essential oils on the shelf.

She didn’t know if the labels were in French or Italian, so she just opened and smelled each one, adding the scent she liked to the water.

The bathroom faced the endless sea, with no buildings to block the view, so the bathtub was placed by the half-open window for the sea view.

While the sunset still lingered, she hurried to enjoy a scenic soak.

As usual, she took out her bath-time companion—the handwritten fan letter she’d collected at the airport.

Not wanting to trouble the manager for fruit, she fished out a sugar-free lollipop from her luggage.

Sitting in the tub, half-leaning on the window, lollipop in mouth, she read the letter.

But she was absent-minded—the scenery outside was too beautiful, capturing all her attention.

Just as she was immersed in the view, a sudden evening breeze swept by, and the letter in her hand was caught off guard and carried away.

Cen Yingshuang snapped out of her daze and looked down to see the letter drifting toward the garden.

Without thinking, she jumped out of the tub, hurriedly dried herself, threw on some clothes, and rushed downstairs.

She arrived in the garden and began searching for her letter.

The greenery was dense and complicated, the branches thick, the foliage dazzling.

Add to that the fading light—it was hard to search.

Just as she was about to pull out her phone for a flashlight, a voice suddenly sounded not far behind her: “Looking for this?”

The voice came out of nowhere. Cen Yingshuang reflexively shuddered, nearly dropping her lollipop.

Luckily she held on, though she almost choked, coughed once, and just took it out of her mouth.

Before she could turn around, another sentence came: “Sorry, didn’t mean to startle you.”

Cen Yingshuang, who had just calmed herself, felt her emotions stir again when she heard the timbre of that voice.

It was a man’s voice.

A particularly pleasant voice.

Low and mellow, gentle and light, extremely distinctive.

The voice seemed to be getting closer.

Cen Yingshuang slowly turned around.

When she saw who it was, she froze on the spot, forgetting even to blink.

The man before her was very tall, wearing a light brown long coat, his shoulders broad and straight.

His hair was short, and he wore silver-framed glasses.

He walked toward her, every step as graceful as a model on the runway.

But what stunned her most was his face.

So handsome she didn’t even know how to put it into words.

Perhaps—perhaps like… the perfect sculpture from the Renaissance.

But as he drew nearer, Cen Yingshuang suddenly felt a strange sense of familiarity.

Until he stopped in front of her, holding the handwritten letter between his slender fingers, about to hand it to her.

A flash of realization struck Cen Yingshuang, and she finally matched his walk to a familiar figure.

“You’re…” She blurted out in surprise, “He Yuzhou?!”