The curtain flickered again.
The scene remained at the sea, dawn rising softly over the horizon. But this time, the playback didn't end with Victor's roar on the shore.
It showed what happened after.
Victor didn't return home immediately. Instead, he mounted his battered bicycle and pedaled with trembling legs toward the hospital.
The audience stirred in surprise. Many had expected him to collapse in his slum bed or wander aimlessly. But no—he went straight to seek help.
---
Inside Iron City First People's Hospital, Victor moved with practiced ease. He knew where to go, as if he had been here before. He entered the medical wing, found a director, and filled out paperwork. The form was chilling: voluntary enrollment in the FEFWA brain cancer experimental drug trial.
He signed his name beneath a line that read: I accept all consequences, including potential disability or death.
The director overseeing the trial, a heavyset man named Yuan Quan, looked at him with sorrow.
"Victor, are you sure about this? This is only a first-stage drug. The side effects are violent. I advise you to wait, or you won't survive the strain."
Victor smiled faintly, his face pale but calm.
"What excitement could compare to this? Obese, unresponsive, weak, my head pounding with pain I can't explain—what's the difference? At least if I try, I might live. If I don't, I won't."
Yuan Quan listed side effect after side effect—fifteen in all. Obesity. Neurological damage. Hallucinations. Seizures. But Victor cut him off with a laugh.
"It's fine. Better fat than bones. Better pain than death. If this keeps me alive, I'll bear it."
Reluctantly, Yuan Quan stamped the form.
---
The audience leaned forward, breathless.
Victor endured the skin test. He swallowed the pills. He submitted to injections. And then, instead of resting, he rode his bike home, swaying dangerously on the pedals.
---
On stage, the male host spoke gravely.
"The production team investigated further. They found Iron City First People's Hospital, where this drug trial began. Director Yuan Quan has since retired."
The curtain shifted again, revealing a video of Yuan Quan himself. Older now, with a thick white coat stretched across his round frame, he looked almost unchanged from his younger days.
He was never a man who chased fame, and the star-struck glitter of the show meant little to him. But when he saw Sophia, he froze. For a moment, it was like seeing Victor again.
"You look so much like your father," he said quietly. "Back then, when he came to me, I thought—what a pity. Such a handsome man, and yet doomed. I even said it was a pity he'd leave no legacy. But I was wrong. He left you."
The audience hushed.
---
Yuan Quan took a breath and continued.
"There's one thing I will never forget. I asked Victor, 'Aren't you afraid of death?'"
He looked at the crowd, then imitated Victor's calm tone:
"He said: There's nothing to fear. I was born an orphan. When I die, I'll return to the earth beneath my feet. When autumn comes, I'll become a fallen leaf. It's no different from the first time I stepped into the ghetto.
But my death cannot be now."
---
The hall erupted with whispers.
Yuan Quan raised his hand, silencing them. His eyes softened.
"I asked him why. He only smiled, but I could feel it. He had someone in his heart—someone too important to leave behind. His will to live wasn't for himself. It was for her."
When he finished, the camera cut back to Principal Carter, leaning heavily on his cane. His eyes were moist, his lips pressed tightly shut. He remembered that man, greasy and awkward among the other parents, and he realized how wrong he had been.
---
In the audience, the discussion turned.
"Wait… didn't Sophia say he became fat after that?"
"It must have been the drug. Those side effects! No wonder he grew weak and unresponsive. His willpower is terrifying."
"Then maybe his temper and mental illness later weren't his fault either—it was the medicine, the pain!"
Contestant Samuel spoke up, frowning. "But if the side effects changed his personality, then that explains it. The anger, the delusions, the loss of control—it all came from enduring too much."
Heads nodded across the stage.
---
Sophia sat silently, her heart torn.
When she had been seven, she had only seen the surface. The fat man who shouted at her, who grew lazy, who seemed broken. She never knew it was because he had chosen to poison himself with experimental drugs—just to live long enough for her.
She remembered his words now: It's good to be fat. Better than being bones. As long as I live.
Her chest ached.
---
She spoke, voice trembling.
"When I was seven years old, I received a casting invitation for the Qin Empire. At first, I was only meant to play the daughter of King Zhuangxiang. But at the audition, the director changed his mind. He asked me to play the young Ying Zheng."
The audience stirred in recognition.
Host Nana's eyes lit up. "I remember! The release of The Qin Empire! You were breathtaking as the child Ying Zheng. That was the first time your acting aura exploded on screen. From then on, every depiction of Qin Shihuang's childhood used your image as a model."
The crowd buzzed with excitement.
---
Sophia nodded.
"That was my first real moment of glory. But at home… my father was unraveling. The drugs, the illness, the mental torment—it made him a different man. He lost himself. I couldn't understand. I only felt pain and fear."
Her voice cracked. "That was the first time I wanted to leave him."
The stadium quieted.
Everyone could picture it: a little girl practicing lines in a broken home, her father spiraling, his body betraying him, his mind slipping. And yet, somehow, she bloomed brilliantly on stage, stunning the world.
Host Nana broke the silence, clapping her hands. "Goddess!"
The word caught like wildfire. The audience surged into cheers.
"Goddess!"
"Goddess!"
The roar was deafening.
---
Ten million people were watching the live broadcast. Most now admitted what they had refused before:
Yes, Victor had once shone. His sacrifice was real. His pain was real. But beside Sophia, his light was dim, too fragile.
Compared to her, he was destined to be forgotten.
-------------------------
Visit our Patreon for more:
Get membership in patreon to read more chapters
Extra chapters available in patreon
patreon.com/Dragonscribe31
-----------------------------------------------------