Qi Yue

Qi Yue is Shen Tang’s close friend and one of the book’s most mobile figures: she can move from celebrity culture to family obligation, from glamorous social outings to professional production work, without losing her teasing intimacy with Shen Tang. Her decisive significance lies in the way her career trajectory reverses the usual entertainment-industry ascent. Qi Yue first appears to have failed and withdrawn from the industry, but later re-enters it in another capacity, turning apparent defeat into a change of position rather than an ending.

Identity and Background

Qi Yue is connected to the wealthy Qi family and is the sister of Qi Jue. Her family has enough authority to impose a clear career test: she agreed to see whether she could become successful in entertainment without relying on her relatives. When the trial did not produce the success expected of her, she was required to withdraw from the entertainment circle and return home to inherit the family business. This arrangement distinguishes her from Shen Tang, whose financial security depends on a marriage agreement promising five million per month and a two-hundred-million settlement after two years, as well as from Shen Tang’s scandal-ridden public career.

Qi Yue’s privileged position is not presented as simple freedom. It gives her a secure destination outside entertainment, but it also subjects her choices to family terms. Her departure is therefore both a personal disappointment and the fulfillment of an agreement made with her family. She leaves to prepare for the dissolution of her contract and the inheritance of the family business, while Shen Tang can only envy the possibility of returning to a powerful home that has not yet appeared to claim her.

Friendship with Shen Tang

Qi Yue’s relationship with Shen Tang is marked by familiarity, mockery, and practical companionship. When Shen Tang is resting after an injury, Qi Yue speaks up and asks whether Pei Kesong is from the Pei family, then acknowledges that she never expected him to become an agent. Her presence in the room is initially almost background-like, but the conversation reveals her attentiveness to the people and institutions shaping Shen Tang’s career.

Qi Yue later invites Shen Tang out with the promise of showing her the world. Shen Tang agrees eagerly without knowing the destination until she is already in the car. The outing becomes another example of their unequal but comfortable social ease: Qi Yue arrives dressed in a formal gown and high heels, while Shen Tang notices the gap between their appearances, yet Qi Yue simply decides that there is no time to change and they should go as they are. The friendship does not depend on ceremonial matching or careful presentation; Qi Yue’s decisiveness draws Shen Tang along.

Their exchanges also rely on exaggerated complaint and playful envy. When Qi Yue announces that she must return home to inherit the family business, Shen Tang jokes that she also wants to go home and inherit a family business, lamenting the absence of the mysterious rich parents who might come to take her away. The joke exposes a real contrast: Qi Yue’s family is present enough to set conditions and summon her back, whereas Shen Tang’s hoped-for family rescue remains unrealized.

Career Withdrawal and Return

Qi Yue’s first major career turn is her announced withdrawal from entertainment. She tells Shen Tang that she had agreed with her family to prove herself without their support, and that she clearly failed. The consequence is fixed in advance: she must leave the industry and go home. Qi Yue does not remain long after explaining this, because she has to prepare for ending her contract and taking up the family inheritance.

The withdrawal, however, is not permanent in the strongest sense. Later, when Shen Tang encounters her at an audition, Qi Yue explains that she did retire, but not completely; she has come in another capacity. This distinction changes the meaning of her earlier departure. Qi Yue is no longer pursuing the same kind of public career, yet she remains connected to production and entertainment through a different professional role. Her return demonstrates that leaving the spotlight need not mean abandoning the field altogether.

At the audition, Qi Yue appears with Qi Jue, and the resemblance between the siblings is immediately noticeable. Their presence places family power inside the professional space of the industry. Shen Tang is auditioning for the female general role, while Qi Yue and Qi Jue sit to the side, observing the proceedings rather than competing for the same role. Qi Yue’s transformation is thus visible in both position and posture: she has moved from performer or aspiring celebrity toward someone who can participate in the selection and organization of entertainment work.

Family and Social Connections

Qi Yue’s connection with Qi Jue is established through their sibling relationship and their joint appearance at the audition. Earlier, she personally introduces him to Shen Tang as her brother. His formal presentation contrasts with Qi Yue’s more playful manner, but their similar appearance confirms the family resemblance that Shen Tang notices when they sit together at the audition.

Qi Yue also introduces Shen Tang to her nephew, Tang Shuqing. The revelation surprises Shen Tang, who initially cannot reconcile the relationship with what she had assumed. Qi Yue takes Tang Shuqing’s arm and identifies him as her nephew, and Shen Tang then notices that the two resemble each other slightly. The scene expands Qi Yue’s family identity beyond the immediate sibling pair and shows how easily she occupies a socially confident role in family introductions.

Her family background also affects her romantic reputation. When a rumor circulates about her, Qi Yue is curious about who started it and jokes that such talk will make it difficult for her to find a boyfriend. Her reaction keeps the rumor in a comic register, but it also shows how public speculation reaches beyond work and into her imagined private life. Qi Yue treats the rumor as irritating nonsense rather than allowing it to define her.

Narrative Role and Characterization

Qi Yue functions as a foil to Shen Tang’s precarious public identity. Shen Tang is a low-status celebrity burdened by relentless online rumors, forced pairings with male celebrities, and the company’s effort to turn scandal into attention. Qi Yue, by contrast, can leave when the entertainment experiment fails because her family offers another route. Yet Qi Yue is not merely a static rich friend. Her failed trial, contract dissolution, inheritance obligation, and later professional return give her a compact arc of departure and reorientation.

She is also a character of controlled performance. In social settings she is glamorous and confident; in conversations with Shen Tang she is teasing and spontaneous; in professional settings she appears beside Qi Jue and participates from a new position. Her changing public role parallels the book’s wider concern with staged identities, celebrity attention, and the conversion of personal relations into social or economic capital. Qi Yue’s story suggests that the same entertainment world can be experienced as a precarious livelihood by one person and as a temporary experiment by another, depending on the family resources standing behind the performer.

By the later audition scenes, Qi Yue’s ending is not disappearance but redistribution of agency. She leaves the industry as a failed would-be success, prepares to inherit the family business, and then returns as a participant in a different capacity. That reversal preserves her bond with Shen Tang while making her a living reminder that withdrawal, reinvention, and continued influence can coexist.