Thanks to the buzz from last night, Lin Shuwen’s Weibo followers had officially broken past the 10 million mark. And on top of that, her percentage of active fans was relatively high compared to other celebrities. So the moment the post went live, it racked up tons of likes and comments in no time.
“Big hug for the assistant—hard work pays off!”
“Kinda disappointed there wasn’t a new song at today’s show.”
“For real. I actually went specifically, but it was all old tracks.”
“Long-time fans know Wenwen’s pretty tight-lipped—not one to spill easily. Yesterday was probably just the right mood hitting her.”
“Wenwen looks so cool when she’s seriously focused on a game! By the way, what game is that? I wanna play too.”
“It looks sort of like Sudoku but not quite. Seems pretty interesting. Anyone know the name?”
At that point, Chen Sichu switched to her personal alt account and left a comment underneath: “The game’s called 2048—just came out today. No idea where Wenwen got her hands on it early. Wait, is this an ad?”
Then she switched back to Lin Shuwen’s main account and replied to her own comment: “Not an ad! This game was developed by a friend of Wenwen’s. She’s basically a beta tester.”
Since Lin Shuwen’s official account personally replied, that comment quickly got pushed to the top.
At the same time, some netizens started voicing their displeasure:
“Some people just love stirring up drama for no reason.”
“Exactly. If Wenwen stops posting these daily life updates, are you gonna post them for us?”
“Can’t celebrities post normal everyday stuff on their Weibo anymore?”
“Jumping to malicious conclusions about others is just gross.”
Chen Sichu waited until the netizens had vented for a while before logging back into the main account to apologize.
Naturally, that comment chain remained pinned near the top of the post.
Now, any fan who clicked into the post would see the ad loud and clear.
“Wen Jie, all set.” Chen Sichu handed the phone to Luo Ming for him to check.
Luo Ming scrolled through it and was genuinely impressed by Chen Sichu’s execution. She was way too smooth at steering the conversation.
“Chuchu, you did great. I’ll give you an extra 500 yuan bonus this month—” Ring-a-ling! Before he could finish, Sister Shan’s call came through.
“That fast!”
“That’s just Sister Shan’s normal speed,” Chen Junmiao said, glancing at her watch.
Luo Ming scratched his head and picked up. The next second, Sister Shan’s signature booming voice came blasting through the receiver: “Lin Shuwen, what the hell are you doing?! How dare you advertise a game on your own?!”
“Sister Shan, calm down and let me explain.”
“Explanations are just excuses, and excuses are the truth!”
“Uh, well, I’m not denying it either. I did advertise the game.”
“So you admit it! Lin Shuwen, you’ve got some nerve—going over my head to take an ad gig?”
“No, no, you’ve got it wrong, Sister Shan. The company that developed this game is actually one I invested in. I’m the majority shareholder.”
Sister Shan’s tone softened a little but was still dead serious: “You invested in it? What’s this all about? Spill it.”
“About half a month ago, an old high school classmate of mine posted on Qzone that he’d started a game company and urgently needed funding. I don’t have many friends, but he’s one of them, so I asked about his company, tried out his game, and decided to invest.”
“Is this the game you’re advertising?” Sister Shan pressed.
“No, this one’s just a test run—something to build some buzz. The real game won’t come out until after New Year’s, before the Lunar New Year.”
“I don’t know, this all sounds pretty sketchy to me. Do you even know anything about games? You’re just throwing money around?”
“Um, Sister Shan… Wen Jie actually does know her stuff. She even knows C++,” Chen Sichu chimed in weakly.
“C++? What’s that?” Sister Shan clearly hadn’t heard the term before and sounded utterly confused.
“A programming language.”
“You know programming too?”
“I took an elective in college called ‘Program Design Concepts and Methods.’ I found it interesting, so I signed up. That’s where I picked up most of my programming knowledge.”
Sister Shan fell silent. She knew Lin Shuwen was a strong student, but she never expected programming to be in her wheelhouse.
Still, she remained cautious—mostly because she didn’t understand the field and wasn’t sure if “Lin Shuwen” was feeding her a line.
So Sister Shan said to Luo Ming, “Get your butt home right now. I’m bringing someone over. I want to see for myself if you really know this stuff.”
Luo Ming grunted in acknowledgment, his expression oozing confidence.
At this point, it wasn’t just him—even Lin Shuwen could easily pass whatever test Sister Shan threw at them. He wasn’t worried in the slightest.
An hour and a half later, Luo Ming and the others got home. Sister Shan was already there waiting at Lin Shuwen’s place, accompanied by a “top-tier talent.”
Worth mentioning: Li Yunshang had tagged along too. Mostly because Chen Sichu also wanted to see just how much Wen Jie actually knew about C++—she was worried Wen Jie might be getting scammed. So instead of offering to take Li Yunshang back to her hotel, she just let her come along.
“Wenwen, let me introduce you. This is Wang Hongyu, head of our tech department. Xiao Wang, this is my artist, Lin Shuwen.”
Luo Ming glanced at Wang Hongyu’s hairline and immediately recognized a kindred spirit.
He knew programmers’ personalities inside out, so he took the initiative to greet him: “Good evening, Director Wang.”
“Good evening, Miss Lin.”
“Alright, now that you’ve met, let’s get started with the test!” Sister Shan urged.
Wang Hongyu nodded and began with the most basic logic-based questions.
Luo Ming answered them all without breaking a sweat.
As the questions went on, Wang Hongyu’s expression grew more and more peculiar. He couldn’t shake the feeling that this pop diva had stronger technical chops than some of the fresh hires at the company.
Intrigued, Wang Hongyu pulled out his laptop.
What started as a Q&A session quickly turned into hands-on coding. Watching Luo Ming’s fingers fly across the keyboard, writing programs with practiced ease, Wang Hongyu immediately sensed he was in the presence of a fellow coder.
Meanwhile, the women in the room were completely lost.
“Chuchu, are they talking about that… C++ thing?” Sister Shan asked.
Chen Sichu froze for a second, then quickly shook her head: “Sister Shan, I have no idea!”
“But didn’t you say Wenwen knows C++?”
“That’s not what I said. Last week, when Wen Jie went to inspect the company she invested in over in Bingzhou, one of the partners mentioned it.”
“She went to Bingzhou last week? I thought she went back to her hometown?” Sister Shan frowned.
“Wen Jie is from Shanxi!”
“She’s not from Bei—oh, right, I almost forgot.” Sister Shan caught herself mid-sentence, remembering that Lin Shuwen had only moved to the capital with her parents—she wasn’t a native Beijinger.
“Sister Shan, Wenwen really does seem to know programming,” Li Yunshang whispered.
“Huh? Miss Li, how can you tell?”
“I sometimes use web crawlers to collect data, so I know a bit about Python. I can roughly follow what they’re saying.”
“Python? Is that another programming language, like C++?”
“Yeah. But compared to Python, C++ is way harder—roughly the difference between middle-school math and advanced calculus.”
Just as Sister Shan was about to follow up, they heard Wang Hongyu exclaim excitedly: “Miss Lin! You’re incredible! You should quit being a celebrity—it’s a total waste of your talent! Come join the tech department—I’ll hand over my director position to you!”
Sister Shan raised an eyebrow. Poaching her artist right in front of her? Was she supposed to just sit there and pretend she didn’t exist?
