The Hong Kong film industry was booming, but Wen Xi was at the very bottom of the ladder.
He was broke and struggling to make ends meet, spending his days shooting cheap, low-grade domestic horror movies.
Nobody believed that Wen Xi, all flash and no substance, who had to curry favor with rich second-generation heirs to get funding, secretly dreamed of becoming a great director.
He wanted to make top-tier films and prove that Chinese directors telling local stories could win the hearts of audiences around the world.
But reality was cruel. A lack of funding, rough scripts, and obscure cinematography meant Wen Xi was doomed to fail.
That is, until he met Zhu Yongan again.
Zhu Yongan was a rising young star, an average actor who had spent his way into becoming a wildly popular, scandal-ridden sensation.
He was also... Wen Xi's former lover, the real young master whose place Wen Xi had stolen.
Zhu Yongan had never deigned to mention Wen Xi. Even his hair seemed to radiate disgust.
After all, Wen Xi had taken his place in a life of luxury for eighteen years, leaving him to suffer in poverty. When he was fifteen, someone falsely accused him of stealing, and his right pinky was broken by force.
Yet it was as if Zhu Yongan had been bewitched. He turned down roles in famous directors' films, in casts that others would beg and plead to join, and threw himself into Wen Xi's production.
A director of trash films, a pretty-boy actor, the tangled lives of the real and fake young masters, and former lovers getting back together after a breakup: the sensational pairing became a traffic magnet for entertainment tabloids, a punchline for people chatting over their tea, and a joke the whole film industry was waiting to enjoy.
But who could have guessed that the two would bring Chinese-language cinema to the world stage and stun the entire entertainment industry?
Wen Xi and Zhu Yongan moved forward hand in hand, collecting the top awards one after another and breaking box-office records time and again, to rave reviews.
But after reaching the top of the film industry, Wen Xi became embroiled in a scandal involving leaked intimate photos, and his reputation was destroyed.
Everyone believed Zhu Yongan would leave Wen Xi without hesitation and beat him up for good measure.
He would be furious that Wen Xi had betrayed his love, resentful of his womanizing, and bitter that he had ruined his own future. The golden duo would part ways for good.
Sure enough, Zhu Yongan held a press conference. Just as everyone expected him to slap Wen Xi across the face, he showed off the plain ring on his ring finger in front of them all. "We're married."
The reporters rushed forward:
"What do you have to say about Wen Xi's leaked-photo scandal?"
"Did Wen Xi cheat on you?"
"Or was there infidelity in the marriage?"
Zhu Yongan dropped a bombshell. "He can't get it up for women."
The next day, every Hong Kong tabloid was running the headline:
Shocking! Internationally acclaimed director Wen Xi is impotent! He has resigned himself to being the kept man of Emperor of Cinema Zhu Yongan!
*
Wen Xi was the blazing sun, the brightest light in Zhu Yongan's bleak, barren life.
"I used to resent you for taking everything from me. I was supposed to be that blazing sun.
But after you disappeared, I finally understood: there is only one sun,
and it wasn't me."
Theme: You are my eternal blazing sun
