The Film Emperor Is Sick, I have No Cure - Chapter 2

Chapter 2

Hearing the familiar footsteps outside the door, Lu Wenfei braced her hands on the bed frame, swiftly moved herself from the bed into her wheelchair, and spun the wheels on either side, moving from the bedroom into the living room.

“Brother!”

Seeing the man standing by the entryway, joy lit up in Lu Wenfei’s eyes. “Brother, I thought you were on duty again and wouldn’t be coming back…”

“Why are you up so early today?”

Lu Danggui changed into his slippers, set down the plastic bag in his hand, and pushed his sister to the dining table. “Eat breakfast first before it gets cold.”

Looking at the plastic bag on the table, Lu Wenfei scratched her nose a little shyly.

Inside were her favorite custard buns and soy milk, still steaming hot. That breakfast shop was always packed with people, her brother must have gone early in the morning to line up.

Lu Wenfei took the custard bun her brother offered, wrapped in a napkin, and took a big gulp of hot soy milk. Just as she was about to dig in, she suddenly felt that her brother seemed a little different from usual.

He wasn’t smiling as he normally did, waiting for her to eat heartily. Instead, his hands rested flat on the table, and the look in his eyes toward her seemed like he had something to say but was hesitating.

“Mmm, Brother, what’s wrong?”

With most of the bun stuffed in her mouth, Lu Wenfei puffed out her cheeks as she asked.

Lu Danggui lowered his gaze, staring at the back of his hand in thought for a long moment, before finally asking hesitantly, “Wenfei, let me ask you, lately, that Xing Cheng… has there been any news about him?”

At the sudden mention of Cheng Cheng, Lu Wenfei’s heartbeat skipped a beat. She put down the bun in her hand and spoke haltingly, “Brother, didn’t he already quit the industry? I haven’t followed his news for a long time…”

Lu Danggui knew his sister was lying.

Last month, when they had hired an auntie to clean the house, she had found several of Xing Cheng’s photobooks and magazine covers wedged between the bed frame and the bottom of the cabinet. Wenfei had trouble walking, so he didn’t even know how she’d managed to hide those merch items without him noticing.

Afraid she might notice, he’d told the auntie to put them back exactly where they were.

Later, when Wenfei’s old phone got water-damaged while she was taking a bath, he took her iCloud account to the store to restore the data, only to find that his sister had secretly registered several alternate Weibo accounts, all following Xing Cheng, related content.

Having depended on each other for so many years, how could he, as her brother, not know those little thoughts she kept to herself?

When Lu Wenfei saw her brother remain silent for so long, she grew more and more flustered, and hurriedly added, “Brother, I really haven’t been chasing stars anymore. If you don’t believe me, go ask Ah Yue!”

She knew her brother absolutely hated Xing Cheng, he was one of Xing Cheng’s biggest anti-fans. In their household, the words “Xing Cheng” were practically banned; no one was allowed to mention them on any ordinary day.

“Brother didn’t mean anything by it, it just suddenly came to mind.”

Seeing Wenfei getting anxious, Lu Danggui didn’t want to upset his sister, so he patted the top of her head and gently changed the subject. “Didn’t Yueyue invite you to see a movie today? I was on duty too late last night, so I’ll go back to my room and catch some sleep. You finish breakfast first, when you’re done, I’ll take you.”

Back in his bedroom, Lu Danggui was so tired his eyelids were fighting to close, but after lying in bed for a long while, he still couldn’t fall asleep.

In fact, on his way home, he had already searched online for Xing Cheng’s recent news, including checking those anti-fan accounts he’d followed before.

There really was nothing, completely blank.

Two months ago, not long after ascending to the throne of Best Actor, Xing Cheng had suddenly announced his retirement from the industry, shocking the entire entertainment world. Paparazzi from all sides desperately tried to dig up the reason for his withdrawal, staking out his residence and his agency’s office for a long time, but all returned empty-handed.

Xing Cheng’s last appearance in the public eye was at a press conference the day after he announced his retirement. Standing at the entrance of his agency, he bowed deeply to the hundreds of media outlets who had rushed there upon hearing the news.

After bowing, Xing Cheng raised his head, smiled, and waved at the cameras, bidding farewell to the fans and audience outside the frame.

From that moment on, he vanished from the world.

Yesterday at dawn, the news of the car accident was hastily taken down from the platform shortly after being posted. Even when opening news apps and searching each relevant keyword, it was impossible to find a single report from the time of the incident.

And then, thinking back to the helicopters that appeared in the night sky, and the temporary closure of the river-crossing bridge in Xicheng District…

In Lu Danggui’s mind, that teardrop-shaped mole, soaked in blood, gradually surfaced.

Xing Cheng had a small mole just like that beneath the corner of his left eye, it was his signature feature.

Turning over in bed, Lu Danggui thought groggily: …It couldn’t really be him, right?

Just an annoying entertainment star, could he really have that kind of ability?

—

One month later.

Affiliated Hospital of S University.

“Mr. Xing, psychological treatment requires confidentiality. May I ask your bodyguards to step outside for now?” the vice president politely asked the man in the wheelchair.

The man looked to be only in his twenties. His features were exquisitely beautiful, carrying an almost oppressive allure, but his complexion was nearly sickly pale. Even sitting in a wheelchair, with bandages wrapped around his arm and forehead, his air of nobility was undiminished.

“Xing Shi, does your Master allow you to leave?” Xing Cheng turned his head and asked the man in black behind him.

“The chairman instructed us to obey the Young Master’s orders in all things,” Xing Shi bent down to reply.

“Good. Then take your people and get lost,” Xing Cheng said.

With one light remark, he sent all the accompanying bodyguards out.

“…Yes.”

After leaving the dean’s office, Xing Shi didn’t dare wander far. He and his men stationed themselves silently at the elevator entrance.

More than a dozen pairs of eyes stared intently at the office door at the end of the corridor, afraid that the young master would stir up more trouble.

A month ago, it was precisely because they had failed in their duty and lost track of the young master that he ended up in a car accident.

On that rainy day, visibility had been extremely low. The bodyguards had searched frantically all over the city without finding him. In the end, Chairman Xing had to send out helicopters, and only then did they find traces of the Young Master at the entrance to the highway bridge leading out of the city.

It wasn’t the first time the Young Master had had an episode, but it was the first time he’d gone so mad that even his bodyguards didn’t recognize him.

If not for the pre-set roadblock slowing him down, the Young Master might have driven straight into the river.

Once all the bodyguards had left the office, Xing Cheng straightened up leisurely from his wheelchair and looked at the middle-aged man before him.
“Shall we begin?”

Receiving Xing Cheng was the vice president of the Affiliated Hospital of S University, a vice academician with considerable prestige in China’s psychiatric field. He was an old and close friend of Chairman Xing and had long heard of the Eldest Young Master’s situation.

Chairman Xing had given special instructions, this boy was very dangerous, so his old friend should be mentally prepared in advance.

Seeing the younger man before him looking completely uninterested, Dean Qiu skipped unnecessary pleasantries and spoke directly,

“Mr. Xing, according to our medical team’s analysis and observation reports, we believe you have developed empathy toward Xu Jian.”

“You want to become Xu Jian, yet you cannot, perhaps even wish to replace him. This may be the source of your inner anxiety and fear.”

Hearing Dean Qiu’s opening statement, Xing Cheng’s gaze cooled slightly, though the smile on his face remained.

They weren’t wrong, this old fellow did have some skill.

“…The doctors before,” after a long silence, Xing Cheng spoke faintly, “they all said Xu Jian is my split personality.”

“No,” Dean Qiu denied bluntly, “he’s just a character in a film—fictional. How could he possibly be your split personality?”

Dean Qiu didn’t understand the entertainment industry and paid little attention to domestic film and television. Only after accepting Chairman Xing’s request did he buy the Blu-ray disc and watch Xing Cheng’s starring film Evil Dog several times.

Evil Dog had been last year’s dark horse in Chinese cinema. With explosive word-of-mouth and the lead actor’s superb performance, it swept multiple international film festival awards, and idol star Xing Cheng, who played the protagonist, won the Golden Peak Award for Best Actor.

The film’s protagonist, Xu Jian, was an ordinary man locked in a psychiatric hospital. The eight years he spent there brought him precious friendship and romantic love.

Later, Xu Jian’s lover died under suspicious circumstances in the ward, and everyone suspected Xu Jian was the killer. After all, the more normal someone appears, the deeper the evil they may be hiding inside.

Having lost his beloved and become the target of public scorn as a murderer, Xu Jian was ultimately driven completely mad.

At the end of the film, while being hunted down by the antagonist, the protagonist Xu Jian suffers a psychotic episode, drives a pickup truck out of the psychiatric hospital, steps on the gas, and soars off a bridge over the river.

The director gave Xu Jian a special close-up. Outside the car window, wind and rain raged, thunder and lightning flashing. Covered in blood, Xu Jian turned his head and stared fixedly into the camera—

As if looking past the screen, straight at the audience beyond.

The camera kept zooming in on his face until it stopped on Xu Jian’s left eye. The mole at the corner of his eye looked like a teardrop stained with blood.

When Dean Qiu saw Xing Cheng for the first time, he finally understood why the actor’s fans praised his acting to the heavens.

A madman playing a madman, how could it not look real?

After some discreet observation of Xing Cheng, he had to admit, the title of Best Actor was indeed well-deserved.

The Eldest Young Master of the Xing family was someone who knew exactly how to act in front of others.

When Xing Cheng smiled, the corners of his eyes would lift slightly, and his gaze would glimmer with light, making him seem full of vitality.

Especially the teardrop mole at the corner of his eye, it would seem to move subtly with every shift in his facial expression. As if with just a casual stroke, God had sketched a vivid, flesh-and-blood soul into the human world.

But his smiles never reached his eyes, an advanced level of the smile-that-is-not-a-smile.

Dean Qiu turned the iPad on the table toward Xing Cheng, motioning for him to watch the surveillance footage on the screen:

“Mr. Xing, during the accident a month ago, at what point did you realize you weren’t Xu Jian?”

The final scene of Evil Dog had been filmed on the overpass in Xicheng District of S City. What played on the iPad was footage from the dashcam of a Bugatti, recorded at the exact same location.

After comparing the two, Dean Qiu discovered that Xing Cheng’s route, speeding all the way toward the outskirts, was almost identical to the path Xu Jian took in the movie when driving to his death.

In the film, Xu Jian drove straight into the river. But at the last moment before plunging into the water, Xing Cheng had yanked the steering wheel hard and slammed directly into the side wall of the overpass.

“I don’t remember.” Xing Cheng’s expression looked a bit bored.
“When I woke up, does that really matter?”

“It matters a lot,” Dean Qiu said. “That was your brain’s self-defense mechanism, it saved your life at the critical moment.”

Xing Cheng said nothing.

That rainy night, at the moment he crashed the Bugatti into the overpass wall, he had suddenly felt an unprecedented clarity.

This was the human world where he lived, not some hell.

He was Xing Cheng, not Xu Jian.

Everything belonged to Xu Jian, not to Xing Cheng.

Xu Jian had already died in that final chase at the end of the movie, but Xing Cheng was still alive, enduring day after day, with no end in sight.

“Mr. Xing, you never actually had any intention of taking your own life, nor do you have dissociative identity disorder. You saw yourself as Xu Jian because Xu Jian had something you don’t.”

“Xu Jian is a deeply emotional, tragic character. He dares to love and hate, his moods swing dramatically, and he can fully empathize with the outside world, because of that, he experiences endless beauty and endless pain.”

“You wanted, through him, to find an emotional connection to the world, to fill in the blank spaces in your own emotions. Am I right?”

Dean Qiu knew well how to control the pacing in conversations with patients, and he stopped there.

The rest of the time was left for Xing Cheng himself. Only once he figured it out could treatment move forward.

The office fell into brief silence.

Soon, Xing Cheng rested his uninjured right arm on the wheelchair and spoke frankly, “That’s right.”

Although Dean Qiu had basically pinpointed his situation, Xing Cheng felt no surprise.

That was exactly why the Xing family had forced him to come to the hospital for treatment.

What the doctor said, he didn’t care.

The entertainment industry was full of gossip, and all kinds of scandals and negative news about him flooded the internet. Whether it was the slander and abuse from haters, or the frenzied adoration from fans, he didn’t care about those either.

Or to put it another way, it wasn’t that he didn’t care, he simply couldn’t distinguish, experience, or respond to other people’s emotions.

He was a severe case of alexithymia.