WS - Chapter 18
Chapter 18
The spaceships that had departed from Changhui, Suiguang, and Beichen Planets the previous morning, after over a day of travel, landed one after another on Mingtan Prime on the evening of that day.
They barely made any stop, and as soon as the three ships had arrived, they were hurried aboard another intra-system spacecraft and, together with the six crew members who had been waiting for them at the Mingtan Planet hotel, officially set off for Wilderness Planet.
Apart from their team leader, who was waiting for them on Wilderness Planet, all six artists and six crew members participating in this recording were now present.
The crew members, unaware that they too had their own livestream windows, kept far away from the artists after boarding, taking up only a tiny spot in a corner. The bodyguards Zhao Da and Zhao Er, who had no assignments before entering Wilderness Planet, and the doctor Ni Jinghe, who was temporarily without a task, briefly showed their faces before going elsewhere. Only Director Zhang Jianshi and his subordinates Wang Daming and Feng Qianqian remained at their posts in the corner.
In the cabin lounge, the five artists besides Song Shiyue were clearly quite accustomed to the sight of a crowd huddled in a corner. Usually, whether filming a drama or doing a show, the surrounding crew was far more numerous than the three here now.
"We're all in the same boat now," Zhuang Jiachuan stood up from the sofa, smiling. "We've got over ten days of sharing weal and woe ahead of us. Let me introduce myself first. I'm Zhuang Jiachuan, thirty-six this year. Haha, I'm probably the oldest among us. But I work out often, and before joining this program, I even went through special training. I hope this old big brother won't be dead weight."
With that, Zhuang Jiachuan sat down smiling and looked at Yu Nianbing. What a pity. He had planned to mention in his introduction that he was a decent cook, but now he couldn't. After all, the big-plate chicken Yu Nianbing had made the day before was truly... tender and juicy, the potatoes so creamy and... ah, he mustn't think further. Zhuang Jiachuan silently swallowed his saliva.
"Yu Nianbing, average stamina." Called out by Zhuang Jiachuan's gaze, Yu Nianbing stood up and quickly sat back down, throwing Song Shiyue a look in the process.
Everyone present had a good sense of timing. After the glance was passed around several times, naturally no one jumped up to cut in.
Song Shiyue stood up smoothly. "Song Shiyue, pretty good stamina."
Then she sat down and looked toward the last remaining girl.
"Ning Chuyang, passable stamina."
"Mu Xingzhou, stamina really not good at all."
"Guan Yongyi, stamina okay."
As the last person to introduce himself stood up and sat down, Zhuang Jiachuan found it rather difficult to maintain the smile on his face and couldn't help glancing at Yu Nianbing again. So what had he been thinking... why had he wanted Yu Nianbing to keep the introduction going... turning it into this oddly formatted situation.
Yu Nianbing sensed Zhuang Jiachuan's gaze and didn't think there was anything wrong on her part.
"Haha, at least now we have some idea of everyone's stamina. For the next ten-plus days, we'll need to help each other and work hard together!" Zhuang Jiachuan did his best to liven up the atmosphere. Of course, on one hand, he wanted to establish his image as a considerate and motivating big brother. On the other hand, the production team had asked him to do so beforehand.
Without the variety show star Yao Mingzhu, the production team definitely needed to find someone among the six artists who could steer and energize the mood.
But Zhuang Jiachuan was already feeling a bit tired; he felt that both his own and the production team's positioning seemed to have gone slightly awry...
Director Zhang Jianshi, huddled in the corner and watching the floating large screen in front of him, was thinking exactly the same thing.
On Zhang Jianshi's wrist was the Camera Central Control System he had received two days earlier after handing in his StarNet client. Some of these invisible cameras controlled by StarNet could also be operated by him to shoot the angles and subjects he wanted. Of course, whether they ultimately appeared on the livestream page still depended on further processing by StarNet.
In other words, although Zhang Jianshi had some autonomy in filming, the majority of control rested with the StarNet Intelligent System. This was one reason why the production team of "The Wilderness Journey" had not sought out directors with stronger expertise and higher standing in the industry.
At this moment, Zhang Jianshi, still huddled in the corner, was looking at the images on the floating screen, frowning, clearly not too satisfied either.
The viewers on StarNet, however, had already been sent into gales of laughter by the rhythm Yu Nianbing had set, especially when they noticed how genuinely baffled and helpless Zhuang Jiachuan looked, and how Director Zhang was frowning with worry.
Originally, they would open the production team's livestream window mostly to see if the production team was up to some new trick, but now it seemed that watching the production team get flustered was also quite amusing.
Wilderness Planet had been converted from a subsidiary agricultural planet in the Mingtan System. It wasn't far from Mingtan Prime—just over two hours' journey. Thus, this spaceship had not been equipped with individual rooms for them.
No one seemed interested in leaving the lounge to explore.
After all, once they arrived on Wilderness Planet, there wouldn't be such soft sofas anymore.
Thanks to Zhuang Jiachuan's efforts, conversation eventually did pick up. To start with what was close at hand, they could always talk about their lives on the spaceship over the past two days.
Mu Xingzhou and Ning Chuyang had come on the same ship. Neither of them cooked, so they ordered meals on the ship every day and had plenty of free time. With their StarNet clients confiscated, and even bickering growing tiresome, they joined forces and pestered the production team into getting them some playing cards and an old-fashioned game console that looked like it had been dug out of a warehouse. With only two game cartridges, they still managed to have a lot of fun. This time when switching ships, they hadn't brought the game console, but they did bring the playing cards. After all, cards were a great icebreaker.
Zhuang Jiachuan felt deeply relieved as he watched Mu Xingzhou slap a few card boxes onto the coffee table.
Guan Yongyi was a man of few words. Though barely thirty, he already possessed the steadiness of someone in his mid-thirties. Life on the ship could be summed up in a word: workout, cook nutritious meals, workout, sleep.
Matters aboard the Beichen Planet ship were naturally recounted by Zhuang Jiachuan as its representative.
When it came to this, Zhuang Jiachuan had absolutely no fear of running out of things to say.
Whether it was Yu Nianbing's big-plate chicken or Song Shiyue's breakfast of stewed vegetables and fried buns, there was plenty to talk about. But Zhuang Jiachuan had his wits about him; his focus was on the cooking methods and the deliciousness, and he didn't describe the quantities much. After all, commenting on how much girls could eat was not something a gentlemanly, friendly person would do.
Perhaps Zhuang Jiachuan had some talent for describing food, but as he talked and talked, he saw Mu Xingzhou, who had been sprawled on the sofa, slowly sit up straight, and the gazes from Ning Chuyang and Guan Yongyi turn seriously attentive.
"By the way," Zhuang Jiachuan suddenly remembered something as he spoke and looked toward the trio of Director Zhang huddled in the corner. "Director, will we eat dinner on the ship today, or after we arrive on Wilderness Planet?"
Director Zhang shrank back a little, pointed outside the cabin, and replied in a low voice, "Wilderness Planet."
"Alright, alright." Zhuang Jiachuan looked at Song Shiyue.
"Hm?" Song Shiyue, sitting among a bunch of strangers, was a bit out of the loop.
Beside her, Yu Nianbing silently raised a hand and touched the cloth bundle next to Song Shiyue.
"Oh, right. We made some jerky in the afternoon. You can have some if you're hungry." Song Shiyue placed the cloth bundle on the coffee table and opened it, revealing the transparent food containers inside.
Since Zhuang Jiachuan had earlier praised their cooking so highly, the three remaining people were now genuinely somewhat interested in the jerky.
Mu Xingzhou, who always acted on impulse, was the first to reach out, pulling two pieces of jerky from the container and amicably handing one to Ning Chuyang.
Ning Chuyang seemed a little suspicious of his goodwill. She held it for a moment, and only after Mu Xingzhou had taken a bite did she put the jerky into her mouth.
"It's delicious! You guys really had a great time on the ship!" Mu Xingzhou found the jerky fragrant, slightly sweet, and perfectly moist—excellent texture. His eyes lit up, and he grinned at Ning Chuyang. "Well, isn't it amazing? Earlier I said we should go to the kitchen to make something ourselves, and you refused."
It was indeed very tasty. Ning Chuyang carefully swallowed the jerky in her mouth and rolled her eyes at Mu Xingzhou. "Who gave you the confidence to think we could make jerky like this?"
Guan Yongyi, seeing that they seemed about to argue, quickly grabbed a piece and stuffed it into his mouth, cutting in with a mumble, "Delicious, really delicious. Can we take this jerky to Wilderness Planet to eat? I figure it won't be easy to find food down there. Can we bring some dry rations?"
Five pairs of eyes all fixed on Guan Yongyi. Did this question even need to be asked? If they could bring their own food, would they need to go foraging? Would the production team of "The Wilderness Journey" be willing to cut out such a major attraction? Was this the straightforwardness of an athlete...
Seeing no one answer, Guan Yongyi craned his neck toward the three-person team of Director Zhang in the corner and loudly asked, "Director, can we bring some dry rations for the program?"
Director Zhang's head shook like a mechanical rattle-drum.
"Then... just a little, just a few days' worth, okay?" Guan Yongyi persisted, still not giving up.
The five others didn't stop him. After all... since someone had already asked, what if...
Director Zhang stopped shaking his head, cleared his throat, and answered clearly, "No!"
"Hahaha, after all, foraging is a highlight. Director Zhang, would you like some jerky?" Zhuang Jiachuan offered amiably.
Director Zhang continued shaking his head.
After a few rounds of conversation, Song Shiyue finally formed a more vivid impression of the people participating in this program.
There was little need to elaborate on Yu Nianbing. Whether in the earlier matters on Beichen Planet or during the two-day journey on the spaceship, Song Shiyue had received a great deal of care from her. The little thoughtfulness beneath that cold exterior actually had a somewhat unusual charm...
Among the rest, the one she had spent the most time with was Zhuang Jiachuan. He was... quite enthusiastic, talkative, and considerate. Yet Song Shiyue always felt he was a bit hollow. Of course, that wasn't to say Zhuang Jiachuan was a bad person, but compared to Yu Nianbing, who always managed to strike just the right chord, Zhuang Jiachuan seemed just a tad... superficial. Still, it was only for filming a show, not living their lives together. If he continued with such warmth and thoughtfulness, it would certainly be a good thing for the team.
Then there were the three she had only just met.
Guan Yongyi, the former athlete, looked very muscular and strong, though his exchange with the director team just now was a bit puzzling. Was that for the show's effect, or had he really not thought it through... But that didn't matter. What mattered was that in the wilderness, he should prove quite useful.
Then there was Mu Xingzhou, a casually impulsive and somewhat lazy young man, and Ning Chuyang, a pretty girl with a bit of a temper... If judging by appearances, the two of them might be the first to crack under hardship.
But it was a program, after all. If they couldn't take the hardship, the production team couldn't keep pushing them without end and would have to ease up a bit.
If it were the apocalypse...
Song Shiyue lowered her eyes slightly. Among all of them, probably only Guan Yongyi would have any chance of survival.
"Want some?"
Yu Nianbing's lowered voice, along with the jerky suddenly appearing in front of her face, broke into Song Shiyue's reminiscence.
The jerky was so close to her face that it seemed as if she shook her head, it would touch her.
"Thank you." Song Shiyue took the jerky and nibbled it slowly. Her thoughts about the apocalypse, interrupted like this, gradually faded and scattered.
Using the motion of eating jerky, Yu Nianbing glanced at Song Shiyue out of the corner of her eye a few times, only relaxing slightly when she saw that the inexplicable sadness had disappeared from her face.
Could it be that this girl hadn't fully recovered yet? How could she keep spacing out when the livestream had only been filming for two days? If this continued, over ten-plus days of filming, she might drift off even more.
Still need to keep an eye on her...
Yu Nianbing recalled how, before departure, Wang Mancang had earnestly sought her out with a request.
Right, she was definitely paying this much attention because of Wang Mancang's request. It absolutely wasn't because feeding her had gone so smoothly, or that the other person was interesting...
Yu Nianbing furrowed her brow slightly, pulled her thoughts back from Song Shiyue, and coolly swept her gaze over everyone present.
She naturally didn't need to observe or analyze these people the way Song Shiyue did. The production team would send her some information they thought she'd want to see.
For example, according to the production team's projected character archetypes, Zhuang Jiachuan would be a caring and considerate warm big brother, serving as the team's motivator. Guan Yongyi would be the strongest person in the team besides the yet-unseen leader, likely the main force for finding food and hunting. Mu Xingzhou and Ning Chuyang, being young, would be able to work and were cast as a bickering couple to liven up the atmosphere. And as for herself, the intellectual and composed big sister? Yu Nianbing had to admit a certain admiration for the production team's imaginations.
Of course, in Yu Nianbing's view, the production team's most amusing imaginative leap wasn't about her, but about Song Shiyue.
Song Shiyue, responsible for screaming, crying, and throwing in the towel...
Yu Nianbing really wanted to see how stunned the production team would look when they discovered that the real Song Shiyue was completely different from the one they had imagined and presupposed.
Probably...
Yu Nianbing glanced at Song Shiyue. The other girl was chewing the jerky earnestly, her cheeks slightly puffed, looking very serious.
Probably... it would be like in her own case over this period of time.
Since the six artists were now gathered together, many viewers, for convenience, had switched to the integrated window arranged by StarNet's intelligent system. However, most of the artists' loyal fans still kept their own artist's livestream window open.
As Yu Nianbing's fans watched, they began to sense something off.
Why did their Little Ice Cube keep glancing at Song Shiyue beside her?
In just the time they'd been chatting, she had already looked over several times!
If it were someone else, a glance might have gone unnoticed. But Song Shiyue hadn't spoken, and Yu Nianbing, who was supposed to be someone who paid little attention to others, not only looked at Song Shiyue but also took the initiative to hand her jerky. This made her fans a little uneasy.
Others might not remember clearly, but Yu Nianbing's fans all remembered well: Song Shiyue was that bad girl who had used a confession to ride the hot search half a year ago!
Even if she chopped chicken beautifully, looked quite satisfying while eating, and seemed to cook well, based on what she'd pulled half a year ago, she absolutely did not meet their standards for Yu Nianbing's other half!
When the "The Wilderness Journey" page had appeared nine days ago, they had felt the production team was going to push ships. At least the Mu Xingzhou and Ning Chuyang pair would certainly be promoted. As for Yu Nianbing and Song Shiyue... they had always thought it would be Song Shiyue clinging to Yu Nianbing, while Yu Nianbing would at most give her the cold shoulder...
The past two days of cooking livestreams on the Beichen Planet spaceship had been quite entertaining, so they hadn't been on alert about the seemingly harmonious relationship between the two. But now, they needed to be on high alert!
At first, only a small group of fans noticed Yu Nianbing looking at Song Shiyue a few times. It was when they started talking about it in the danmaku that it drew more people's attention.
Then came discussion, and the spreading of wild theories...
In the time it took Ouyang Hui to drink a bowl of soup, she returned to StarNet to find that on Yu Nianbing's page, quite a few people were already discussing in the danmaku whether the current same-sex marriage mechanisms were sufficiently comprehensive, and if Yu Nianbing were truly beginning to consider accepting Song Shiyue's confession from half a year ago, would her future rights and interests be effectively protected.
Fans were always like that—seeing 1, they'd already imagined 1000. Sometimes, just from seeing two artists move a little closer, they could extrapolate from romance all the way to marriage and children, or even a secret marriage with kids. Their imagination was far more powerful than the average production team's.
Ouyang Hui knew this logic, but she was still so infuriated that her stomach was starting to ache.
Watching Zhuang Jiachuan, who was not far from Yu Nianbing and seemed to have completely missed the interaction between Yu Nianbing and Song Shiyue, Ouyang Hui just wanted to curse again, "What an idiot!"
Regardless of whether the people inside and outside the ship were willing or not, time still marched cheerfully on, and the place they were meant to arrive at soon arrived.
Since everything about this program, aside from its name and the mandatory safety briefing, was kept confidential, Song Shiyue had always speculated that when they traveled from Mingtan Planet to Wilderness Planet, the ship might just dump them directly in an empty wilderness or uninhabited jungle.
Similar to some wilderness shows she used to watch on Earth, where they'd be dropped from the sky... with a parachute, or tossed into a lake.
To prevent being caught off guard by such a surprise, Song Shiyue had been constantly prepared since waking up this morning. Only now did Director Zhang in the corner signal that the ship was about to land.
"Don't be nervous, they won't throw us into the wilderness in the middle of the night. They'll give us some time to find food and water, and a safe place to light a fire," Zhuang Jiachuan stood up and reassured her.
Song Shiyue felt that Zhuang Jiachuan's words made sense, but she still couldn't help touching her belt again.
Director Zhang did not refute Zhuang Jiachuan's words.
Song Shiyue's heart settled a little more. It seemed tonight they wouldn't have to sleep out in the wilderness after all.
However, when Song Shiyue disembarked from the ship, she had thought they would have some safe shelter to spend the first night.
She just didn't expect...
it would be a place like this...
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