Strings of classical music were played by a live quartet. Feng Mian instinctively felt her body moving to the rhythm with barely a moment of adjustment. The original body was an unquestionable male lead who was unparalleled in every aspect, including dancing.
Hao Junlin wasn't doing too bad himself, growing up in a high-class family meant that he was trained in ballroom dances.
"Who's that Huang Chun?" Hao Junlin leaned in close to whisper.
"She's my- I mean the original body's mistress." Feng Mian kept her voice just as low to avoid others prying into their discussion.
Hao Junlin glowered. "Is she the original female lead?"
Feng Mian shook her hand. "Shouldn't be ah. Aren't female leads usually Mary Sues with high moral values that wouldn't hook on a married man?"
System 555: "Xiao Mian, the data upload was pending just now. I'm sending you the rest of the story now."
There was an electric shock sent down her brain's nervous system and several more images popped up. It was the scene after Li Xiaocheng divorced his wife and got together with Chun Hua.
After they got divorced, the original cannon fodder Wan Junli got into a car accident and died. The scum male lead then smoothly got together with his childhood sweetheart after this hindrance was gone. But his life after being married to Chun Hua was not a bed of roses as he imagined.
Chun Hua became too controlling and was extremely paranoid of any woman who even as much as made eye contact with Li Xiaocheng. Li Xiaocheng couldn't handle her constant jealousy and their honeymoon phase had gone sour pretty quickly.
To add on, his companies were facing a major financial crisis as one black material surfaced on the internet after another instigating that they had done back door deals to receive contracts. This is when the female lead, Yu Yan, came into the scene.
Yu Yan was a young, good-looking intern who accompanied her boss Li Xiaocheng during overtimes when the company was almost facing bankruptcy. The many nights of working together helped Li Xiaocheng develop fondness towards this new intern.
Long story short, in order to make the two leads come together, a rift must happen between the pair of husband and wife and someone must become the villain. Later in the story, it was revealed that the car incident involving his first wife was not an accident and had in fact been orchestrated by Chun Hua.
This became a convenient reason to put the cannon fodder behind bars and as they say, the third time is a charm. The male lead's third marriage was his lucky strike and the story ended with the villain's comeuppance and the leads' happily ever after. Wan Junli was not just a cannon fodder, she was the fodder of cannon fodders.
Feng Mian wants to hack this stupid storyline to pieces. What happily ever after ah? This Li Xiaocheng should be charged with second-hand murder. If he hadn't neglected his original wife, would his mistress have dared to plot murder?
Feng Mian: "System, where's Li Xiaocheng's soul currently?"
System 555: "All the bodies host has occupied is an empty vessel. It's likely that Li Xiaocheng has gone to reincarnate."
Feng Mian: "I hope he gets reincarnated as a pig."
System 555 sensed something on its radar and informed its host. "Detecting the original female lead's presence, she's in the vicinity host."
"My system said the female lead's somewhere here," she relayed 555's words to Hao Junlin.
Feng Mian was multi-tasking now between dancing, conversing with Hao Junlin, and trying to find the female lead. Her eyes bouncing rapidly, searching for a possible female lead from the crowd. In theory, picking out an unfamiliar face of a stranger from the crowd would be impossible, but Feng Mian has a feeling that with the female lead halo, this protagonist would be hard to miss.
True enough, there was a young female server who stood out from the crowd like a sore thumb despite being so ordinary. It was as if the extra characters were automatically blurred out when the female lead is on the scene. She was carrying around a tray of glasses filled with white wine.
Feng Mian moved them to dance away from the centre of the floor and towards the sidelines. "See her, in that black and white waitress uniform? I think that's her."
Hao Junlin's eyes analysed the person from head to toe. "How mediocre," he commented as if unsatisfied that the female lead didn't live up to his standards.
Hao Junli was not wrong, Yu Yan could be described as a cute beauty at most but it's hard to distinguish her from this room filled with gorgeous women decked in splendour. But this female lead has a special something no other ladies in this room has: a plot armour. Though she was ordinary, there was a glow radiating from her that makes your eyes lock onto her visage.
Hao Junlin looked down at his somewhat ample breast then looked at the female lead's. "Mine are bigger than hers," he said.
Feng Mian coughed. 'Is this something that you as a man should be comparing?'
Feng Mian and Hao Junlin continued dancing without missing a beat. "Weh, Hao Junlin don't you think everyone else is staring at us weirdly?"
"Must be because we're so good looking." Hao Junlin was not embarrassed to compliment himself. It doesn't matter if he was in a male or female body, what matters is he's the most good-looking.
System 555: 'It's not because you guys are good looking. It's because you two have been in the wrong position from the start.'
Feng Mian and Hao Junlin forgot that their genders had been reversed and Hao Junlin had been leading the dance with his arms resting on Feng Mian's waist while Feng Mian had hers on his shoulder's. They had been dancing like that for a whole twenty minutes, it's no wonder the crowd stopped to stare.
The crowd of presidents and directors whispered amongst themselves, 'Is this how the young folks do it nowadays?'
With Hao Junlin's heels, he managed to reach the height of Feng Mian's ears, so there was no trouble moving them both around. Feng Mian was expertly twirled into a circle and twisted back into Hao Junlin's arms with smooth motions.
Feng Mian discretely felt that something was out of place but put the thought behind her and decided to just enjoy the dance.
Both of them parted before the next song began to play. Feng Mian wanted to catch a drink and Hao Junlin followed behind her. They hadn't made it to the drink table before someone knocked onto Feng Mian and spilt drinks over her pristine grey suit.
"I'm so sorry!" the waitress who bumped into her shouted.
Feng Mian turned around.
'Isn't this female lead-sama? What a coincidence! Is this the legendary magnetic pull between the male and female lead?'
She shrugged it off, the place where the suit was soaked felt slightly sticky but it wasn't worth fussing about. "It's fine, don't worry about it."
Yu Yan however had switched on her Mary Sue's 'Cannot turn a blind eye when someone's in trouble' mode and frantically pulled out a tissue to wipe the wet traces down.
Her hands were held back before she could touch the materials of Feng Mian's suit. "There's no need miss. He'll just change into another suit." Her pair of hands was held back by Hao Junlin's grip.
"Ah, okay." She was flustered by the firm tone of the beautiful female companion and was quick to retract her stretched hand.
Hao Junlin turned to a nearby male server. "Lead us to a vacant room," he said succinctly.
Since it was Li Xiaocheng's own company that was hosting the party, there was plenty of spare suits stored in Li Xiacheng's office on the upper floor. An errand boy was sent to fetch one of them and Hao Junlin quickly changed Feng Mian into the other ensemble.
"There's an auction after this that you'll have to officiate. Let's get downstairs quick." Hao Junlin smoothened the creases out carefully by tapping them straight.
"What's in your pocket?" Hao Junlin felt a bulge around the suit's pocket area.
"Huh?" Feng Mian shoved her hands in to see what it was. She squeezed the tube-shaped object which splurted out a gum-like essence to her fingers.
She yelped. "Ewww, it's sticky!"
"What is it?" Hao Junlin took her hands out of the pockets and held it to see what it was.
Feeling the stickiness, Hao Junli tried retracting his hands, only to drag Feng Mian's hands with him. It can't be unstuck.
"It seems to be... glue?"
Hao Junli looked at their hands in perplex. "Why do you have glue in your pocket?"
"Oh, I wanted to try a pair of heels from your closet before we came here, but the heels broke off before I could walk ten steps in it. I stuck it back by using glue."
"..."
***
The Li and Wan couple held hands as they walked downstairs to their VIP table. They took a seat on the table that was occupied by middle-aged executives and the board of directors from the LXT company. Both of them with high visual impacts were like flowers in the pool filled with weeds. Blame in on the male-lead halo, everyone else had to work all their lives to achieve their current status but the male-lead is an overpowered existence that defies the law of hard work.
The two's hands were still stuck so Feng Mian had to hold Hao Junlin's hands in his to make it seem more natural.
The people on the table were surprised to see this harmonious scene of husband and wife glued by the hips. There was an ongoing gossip in the company that even managed to reach the ears of the higher-ups. It was said that their CEO was not fond of this newlywed of his and preferred to sleep in his own office rather than spend the night home.
Indeed, rumours are just rumours. If others could see how their CEO was unwilling to let go of his wife's hands for even just a second, such ridiculous unfounded rumours wouldn't be spread around. Look at how lovey-dovey they are, tsk, rumours really can't be trusted.
Feng Mian: 'My hands hurt.'
Some of the executive's wives even pinched the thighs of their husbands under the table. 'Look, this is how other husbands treat their wives. Look at you stuffing yourself with food while your wife sits next to you with her plate empty.'
Now fully understanding that the CEO's wife holds some weight, the look given to Hao Junlin became seventy per cent more cordial. Several compliments were thrown out by the executive's wives in a continuous flow to gain over some favour. Hao Junlin offered a sociable smile throughout the conversation.
"No wonder the president hid Mrs Wan so well, turns out that she's such a face turner."
"Mrs Wan, why don't we discuss your skincare routine some other day? My face tends to get dry over the summer, but yours doesn't seem to be affected one bit. What do you use ba? Do tell?"
Feng Mian piped in. "He uses seaweed extract made from the southern sea and a collagen face mask once every three days."
She had also oftentimes borrowed a few packets of masks from him every time she ran out.
***
The president of LXT was soon called up to give the officiating speech. Feng Mian had no choice but to drag Hao Junlin to the stage with her as she gave a short speech prepared for her beforehand.
'Ho ho, look at this blatant display of PDA. This CEO of theirs is really a henpecked husband.'
The crowd clapped in unison as the ribbon was cut. But on another table, Chun Hua hands clenched into a fist.