Stealing the Moon - Chapter 1

Chapter 1

Another Friday. After finally finishing my overtime, I stretched and glanced at the time in the lower-right corner of my computer screen. There were still two days until Wen Yuan’s concert.

Two more days, and I would finally get to see him.

The corners of my mouth lifted in a good mood as I hummed a song and shut down my computer.

When I walked into the elevator, I happened to run into two female coworkers who were also getting off work. Out of habit, I took two steps back and stood in the corner, listening as they talked about genius idol Wen Yuan’s new song and the concert the day after tomorrow.

Then the topic suddenly shifted.

“Oh, right. Did you see what happened yesterday with the stalker fans rear-ending his car?”

“I did, I did. Stalker fans these days are seriously too much! I wonder how my Wen Yuan is doing.”

“I heard that at the time, aside from the driver, there were only Wen Yuan and his assistant in the car. Those stalker fans were chasing them way too closely and almost caused a pileup. His studio still hasn’t released any statement to clarify things. It won’t affect the concert the day after tomorrow, will it?”

“Those damn stalker fans. If anything happens to my Wen Yuan, I won’t let them off!”

Standing in the corner, I heard their conversation and hurriedly opened Weibo. Only then did I realize that over the past two days, while I had been pulling all-nighters for the sake of the concert, several trending topics related to Wen Yuan had climbed high on the hot search list:

#WenYuanStalkerFans#

#WenYuanCarAccidentRearEndCollision#

#WillWenYuansConcertProceedSmoothly#

I tapped in and saw that quite a few media accounts had posted surveillance footage from the scene.

In the video, it was clear that the stalker fans’ car had been tailing Wen Yuan’s van the entire time. Even though the van kept speeding up, it still couldn’t shake them off. In the end, the two vehicles collided at a traffic light.

Frowning, I opened Wen Yuan’s personal Weibo and his studio’s Weibo, only to find that the latest post was still from two days ago.

In other words, since the incident happened, neither the studio nor Wen Yuan himself had responded. They hadn’t even reported that he was safe.

Based on my years of understanding Wen Yuan and his team, this was not how they did things.

My frown deepened. A sudden unease rose in my chest. I opened the fan group and found that the fans inside were all asking how Wen Yuan was, but the big fans who had always been active before weren’t replying at all.

“Ding-” The elevator reached the first floor.

As I walked out, I opened the chat with a fellow fangirl I had known for years, about to ask if she had heard any inside news, when the two girls ahead of me suddenly stared at their phones and cried out in shock.

I instinctively looked up and heard unfamiliar words spill from their mouths: Wen Yuan, suicide, concert canceled…

What were they talking about?

Blankly, I lowered my head and tapped into the Weibo hot search on my phone, only to find that the app had suddenly frozen.

After refreshing countless times, I finally managed to get in. The top trending topic was highlighted in red and bold, followed by the character for “explosive.”

#WenYuanSuicide#

Almost without thinking, I tapped into the trend. Then I saw that a marketing account with over a million followers had posted a video more than ten minutes ago.

In the footage, an ambulance was parked outside a certain villa. Security guards and staff surrounded the area. I even spotted Wen Yuan’s manager among them. She was leaning against an assistant, crying so hard she looked like she was about to faint.

Then the camera shook, and everyone saw the hand hanging down from the stretcher inside the ambulance. Its bones were long and elegant, its fingertips far too pale.

It was a hand I knew all too well.

It had once gently patted my head when I was at my saddest.

It had also, beneath the gaze of countless fans, tenderly plucked the strings of a guitar…

“Genius idol Wen Yuan was found to have died by suicide at home in the early hours of this morning. He was 23 years old.”

I stared at the glaring words “23 years old” in the caption. In that instant, all the strength seemed to drain out of my body. My legs went weak, and I collapsed right where I stood.

The people coming and going around me immediately gathered to ask if I was feeling unwell.

Amid all those kind, concerned voices, I lowered my head and covered my face. At first, I only sobbed quietly. In the end, I broke down and cried.

It wasn’t supposed to be like this. It shouldn’t have been like this…

I was going to see you. I was about to see you…

There were clearly only two days left… and then I could have gone to your concert…

You were such a wonderful person…