“Gu Yi, you’re here early,” Qi Miao greeted.

“Morning, Sister Qi.”

She handed him a cup of coffee.

Qi Miao had always prided herself on being early—years on film sets had made it a habit. But lately, to her surprise, Gu Yi had been arriving even earlier than her.

Every morning, without fail, she’d find him sitting on a bench, reading the script.

From where she stood, the sun catching his face, his skin seemed to glow faintly. Thick lashes cast gentle shadows over his cheeks, and the way his gaze locked onto the page—it was as if he had melted into the stillness of the morning itself. Qi Miao almost didn’t want to break the silence.

“Studying the script?”

Gu Yi nodded.

They chatted for a moment until the other cast and crew members began to arrive. “Morning, Xiao Gu,” people greeted warmly.

Since the start of filming A Letter on My Desk, aside from the first day’s awkward fumbling with camera positions, Gu Yi had improved at a visible pace with each passing day.

He still had the marks of a newcomer—especially in the romantic scenes with Qi Miao, where he sometimes missed the emotional beats and needed her more seasoned guidance to carry him through.

But in every other aspect… his progress was astonishing.

Even Wu Qingchun had stopped making snide remarks.

There’s nothing more frustrating for a scene partner than working with someone who doesn’t memorize their lines, doesn’t understand their role, and only cares about striking cool poses in front of the camera.

Gu Yi wasn’t fast to enter character—but once he did, he didn’t just act the part. He became it, bringing out the full emotional texture.

“Such a hard worker,” the assistant director said with a grin.

“No doubt about it,” Wu Qingchun agreed. “Young people like him are rare these days.”

Because Gu Yi was doing so well, the filming schedule moved swiftly, and even Director Sun Youming’s mood had been consistently good.

The crew feared nothing more than a director’s bad temper. And though Sun Youming was known as one of the more even-tempered directors in the industry, when he did get mad, everyone braced themselves for long nights of overtime.

So far, there hadn’t been a single day of overtime on this set—not even for night scenes. They always wrapped on schedule.

Initially, the crew had been skeptical about the newbie. Now, they were all fully convinced.

“Xiao Gu, come over here a moment.”

Sun Youming waved him over. Gu Yi got up and walked over.

The director picked up Gu Yi’s character notes. When he first joined the crew, it was a slim two-page write-up. But after just a week, the document had grown considerably thicker, with the script itself densely annotated.

Gu Yi’s portrayal of Shen Yao had gradually transformed from something two-dimensional into something textured and real.

There was a scene involving Shen Yao leading a group of chemists in an experiment. Although Gu Yi was the least experienced actor in the cast, he was—ironically—the most similar to the character in temperament.

Sun Youming flipped through the notes, page after page, impressed by the depth. But then he reached the final pages—and shoved them back at Gu Yi with a huff.

“Take these away!”

So that’s why the binder was so thick. The last part turned out to be a full-blown “Analysis of XXX” paper.

Sun Youming broke into a cold sweat at the mere sight of the word analysis. He stared at the page, only recognizing those two characters—everything else might as well have been arcane runes. It was like every symbol on that page was mocking him, drilling home the realization that, maybe, he really was a bit of a dunce when it came to science.

…

These past few days, they’d been filming the scenes of Shen Yao throwing himself into his research, day and night, without pause.

While Gu Yi’s academic background in his past life had some overlap with Shen Yao’s field, it wasn’t a perfect match. The original novel focused more on the outcomes, but the screenplay expanded on the experimental process. Still, Shen Yao wasn’t meant to be just one person—he was the sum of many.

That’s why, even in the script, the experiments could feel slightly abstract or ungrounded.

Gu Yi’s additions to the character backstory specifically targeted this—he wanted Shen Yao to feel like a real person. Only then could the role truly come alive.

“Ready for filming!”

This was a solo scene for Gu Yi. According to Sun Youming, this wasn’t some filler moment—it was a significant portion of the film, designed to showcase Shen Yao’s relentless drive and perseverance.

Before the cameras rolled, Sun Youming pulled him aside.

“No point in me overexplaining,” he said. “Honestly, I think you already understand this character better than I do.”

“Don’t hold back. Just go for it.”

Gu Yi nodded calmly.

The camera locked in on him.

The first shot—Sun Youming instinctively clenched his fist.

This… was it.

Exactly the shot he had envisioned. Perfectly realized.

Gu Yi had fully captured Shen Yao’s essence.

The focused intensity. The sheer force of will when Shen Yao threw himself into his experiments. It all came through, crystal clear.

Gu Yi handled the experimental procedures like second nature—so when he performed, it all looked real. No pretense. No effort.

“No… this isn’t right.”
“The procedure’s correct, the reagents are right… then what’s causing the problem?”

At his most focused, Shen Yao’s gaze became something to fear.

He poured himself into the work with such single-minded intensity that everything else ceased to exist. It was no longer Gu Yi playing Shen Yao—it was Shen Yao, alive in the flesh. His frustration over failed trials, his desperate search for a solution… it all felt frighteningly real.

Around him, actors and crew subconsciously held their breath, afraid to make a sound that might shatter the spell.

Everyone could see it—Gu Yi was fully immersed in the role.

His frame was already slender, with a delicate, camera-friendly face. Before shooting this scene, the makeup artist had deliberately added a touch of pallor to make him appear more haggard.

But haggardness—true haggardness—wasn’t just about appearance. It was about the look in one’s eyes.

At that moment, anyone looking at Gu Yi might notice the tired lines on his face, but what truly caught the eye was something deeper—his gaze.

His eyes were streaked with bloodshot veins, deep shadows pooled beneath them. And yet, they burned with a piercing, almost unsettling brightness.

He kept trying. Over and over. Even if he failed ten thousand times, he would fight just as hard for the ten-thousand-and-first.

The original novel A Letter on My Desk described Shen Yao’s string of failures in vivid, painful detail. Every time Qi Miao read those chapters, she felt her chest tighten. Watching Gu Yi now, she experienced the same anxiety all over again.

That anxiety felt contagious—it spilled outward, gripping everyone present, stirring a collective hope from the depths of their hearts: Please, let Shen Yao succeed.

Qi Miao’s emotions were tangled—a cocktail of joy and quiet disquiet.

Part of her watched as a book fan. But part of her watched as an actor.

As a former child star and winner of the Cloud Star Award for Best Newcomer, she’d received praise for her performances for years. She’d met actors with talent—but theirs was usually the result of steady accumulation, honed over one work after another. It was talent plus experience.

But A Letter on My Desk was showing her something else.

Genius.

Gu Yi seemed born with the ability to grasp the emotional heartbeat of a character.

And if she hadn’t witnessed his awkward first attempts with her own eyes, Qi Miao wouldn’t have believed it.

When casting was finalized, she’d done her homework on the leads. There were no acting clips of Gu Yi to be found—but she did come across several of his stage performances.

These past few days, she’d been rewatching Battle of the Stars. Now she understood why Gu Yi had ended up the centre position. She’d seen all his stages. He wasn’t the most naturally gifted—but his ability to understand the stage was unmatched.

Now, his scene was drawing to a close.

After dozens of failed attempts, Shen Yao finally discovered the source of the problem.

He knew, deep down, that this next experiment would succeed.

Yet on the surface, he remained composed. The excitement buzzing around him felt disconnected from his quiet stillness—except for his eyes, which betrayed the storm of emotion beneath.

And once again, Qi Miao was moved.

“Cut!”

Sun Youming’s voice snapped Gu Yi out of it. He blinked, dazed, as though surfacing from another world. It took a few seconds before he fully came back to himself.

He’d thought about this scene for a long time—how to balance his own interpretation with the core traits of Shen Yao.

Shen Yao was quiet, reserved. Even in moments of crisis, even in the face of failure, he didn’t lash out or unravel.

But his passion for chemistry ran deep. Bone-deep.

“Very good,” Sun Youming said, clapping a hand on Gu Yi’s shoulder. “Really good.”

Coming from Sun Youming, “very good” was as high as praise got.

Throughout the shoot, Gu Yi had had his share of NGs, of course. But even when he did, it was rarely because he didn’t understand—it was because his understanding took a different path than the director’s vision.

Sun Youming didn’t deny Gu Yi had talent. But to become Shen Yao, Gu Yi had also worked harder than anyone could imagine.

On set, it looked like he nailed the scene in one breath. But when reviewing the footage, Sun Youming could only marvel.

At the start, Gu Yi couldn’t even find the right camera angle. Now, he naturally gravitated to the perfect marks, folding seamlessly into the lens’s frame.

“I really did go to the right door that day,” Sun Youming muttered.

Outsiders assumed Gu Yi had pulled strings to land the part. No one knew the truth—that it was Sun Youming who had gone to him.

With every day of filming, Sun Youming became more certain: Gu Yi wasn’t just a good fit for Shen Yao.

He was the only fit.

He could see it clearly—Gu Yi’s performance lifted everyone. Qi Miao, as a fellow young actor, refused to be outdone. The veteran cast members, too, dropped their airs and delivered with renewed focus.

They couldn’t be shown up by the younger generation, after all.

…

Meanwhile, a thread quietly appeared on the “Gossip Island” forum.

[Mark my words: Next year’s breakthrough acting genius—the one destined to shine like the Purple Star—will emerge.]

The forum was full of people hyping up their faves as the legendary “Purple Star,” the one actor destined to astonish the world. Every fan wanted their idol to be the one.

[“Sounds unlikely.]

[“+1. Xin Ruchen already comes close. But even he doesn’t quite fit the title.”]

[“Honestly, half the guys on the big screen these days are so ugly they offend my eyes just by existing.”]

After a few replies, users noticed—the original poster wasn’t some random fangirl. It was a well-known, long-time account. The kind that had posted several eerily accurate predictions before.

Back when Xin Ruchen was still a no-name, they’d predicted he’d blow up. Some users even suspected the poster was an insider from the industry.

[“A serious actor, huh? Who? Song Ruwei? Wei Jin?”]

[“Impossible to guess.”]

[“A true ‘Purple Star’ should stun everyone from the moment they appear. My wild guess: Gu Yi.”]

[“HAHAHA now that would be unexpected.”]

[“If Gu Yi really turns out to be the Purple Star, what are all those career actors going to think?”]

[“Let’s be real—he’s in A Letter on My Desk and people already think it’s doomed. Even with Sun Youming directing, nobody thinks he can be saved.”]