Du Ai Sha continues to try to ignore Yi Fei Yang, but he is a master at getting on her nerves and acting like the competition to her face, while secretly supporting her behind the scenes. Meanwhile, Ai Sha continues to keep everyone at an arm’s length while dealing with a crisis at work.
Recap
Yi Fei Yang reels Du Ai Sha into a hug after she tries to walk away. She promptly takes out her phone and snaps a photo, saying a hug between two consenting individuals conveys comfort, but if there isn’t consent, then it’s sexual harassment. She threatens to file a police report.
Fei Yang quickly pulls away and says there’s no need for her to file a report. This is just a misunderstanding. He only hugged her because he saw she was crying. He’s not the kind of person she thinks he is.
Ai Sha just looks at him, then changes the subject, saying that if he wants to go out for a meal, then it’s his treat. He smiles as he follows her out.
At dinner, Fei Yang laughs at how Ai Sha is tense even when she eats. She claims she’s not tense, she’s just wary of him. She pours him a glass of liquor and tells him that dinner is his treat, but the alcohol is her treat. After they drink, they’ll be even. But he just pushes his glass over to her, saying he doesn’t want to drink and he doesn’t want to settle up with her; he wants her to owe him something.
Ai Sha thinks that he doesn’t want to drink because he can’t drink, remembering how he also wouldn’t drink the wine at the winery. Did he give up the contract because he couldn’t drink? Fei Yang says it doesn’t make a different whether he couldn’t drink or just didn’t want to. But Ai Sha says that of course it makes a difference. If Lan knew he couldn’t drink, he would’ve found a different, more fair way to determine who should get the contract. (Ha, that’s ironic considering her earlier rant about how nothing is fair!)
Fei Yang says it doesn’t matter anymore: the contract is hers. But if she feels like she owes him, then she can repay him by being friends. He holds out his hand to shake, but she leaves him hanging, saying she doesn’t need friends. She stands up and adds that she doesn’t feel like she owes him anything, then leaves.
Fei Yang finds her standing outside the restaurant, waiting for her designated driver to arrive. He offers her a ride, but she rejects him. He says that they should get lunch together instead, but she also rejects that idea. Why should she get lunch with him? It’s not like they’re friends. He responds that he has something she’s lost, then drives off.
Fei Yang bops around… to opera music (which is adorably dorky) as he starts to drive home. But he gets a call from his brother inviting him out to drink, and he eagerly detours to a bar to meet up with him.
Fei Yang’s brother, Qi Zhen Kai (Gabriel Lan) is an imposing, serious-looking business man. The two break into smiles when they see each other, and hug, but when Zhen Kai comments that Fei Yang is in a surprisingly good mood for someone who lost out on the winery contract, it’s clear that Fei Yang isn’t completely at ease around his brother.
Zhen Kai seems to have a strong interest and firm hand in Fei Yang’s business. He is the one who slid Fei Yang in to meet with Lan before Ai Sha could, and is disappointed that Fei Yang gave up the opportunity. He has the same mindset as Ai Sha: you have to do whatever it takes to win in business; it doesn’t matter who came first and whether that’s fair. He lectures Fei Yang for giving up and letting someone else win. Fei Yang apologizes to him.
Zhen Kai also asks why Fei Yang moved offices: was the one Zhen Kai picked out for him not good enough? Fei Yang responds that he’s locked onto a target near the new Golden Man office. He moved there because it was an opportunity to get closer and he didn’t want to miss. He’s just waiting for the right opportunity to strike.
Zhen Kai just shakes his head with a sigh and a smile while Fei Yang twiddles his fingers with a self-satisfied scheming look in his eye.
Ai Sha returns home to find Ye Xuan waiting outside her door. Her mom called him to report that she had left without eating dinner, so he’s here to make sure she has something to eat. He also starts to organize her space and make her neat little bento boxes for lunch.
Ai Sha reads an article about being “left on read” while Ye Xuan meal preps her lunch for the next few days. He reminds her to not sleep on the sofa, drink too much beer, or skip meals. She finds him naggy, saying it’s clear why he doesn’t have a girlfriend.
She asks him his opinion on being “left on read.” She finds the article trashy, yet for some reason it gets hundreds of thousands of hits. She shakes her head and sighs that she really doesn’t understand women these days. Maybe Wen Jing Jing is right: does she not understand women because she doesn’t understand men?
Ye Xuan reassures her that she definitely understands both men and women. After all, Chic Fashion is the top women’s commerce site because of her.
But Ai Sha wonders why she’s never been able to maintain a romantic relationship for more than six months. And her exes won’t even give her their wedding invitations in person. She suddenly leans in toward Ye Xuan’s face, asking if she just doesn’t act like a woman. He freezes and stares at her, not saying anything.
Before he can speak, she pulls herself back and waves him off, saying that he obviously won’t have an opinion because he’s been her neighbor for twenty years.
Ai Sha has fallen asleep on the couch by the time Ye Xuan is done cooking and cleaning for her. He gently extricates her tablet from her arms and covers her with a blanket, giving her a longing look before turning off the lights and leaving.
While asleep, Ai Sha hears Fei Yang’s voice in her dreams, telling her she should get lunch with him. It repeats like a broken record, until she shoots awake in annoyance. And then she remembers what he said about having something that she lost.
The next morning, Zhen Zhen helps her sneak into Golden Man. Ai Sha pokes around Fei Yang’s office while Zhen Zhen stands watch, but she accidentally activates a robot on Fei Yang’s desk. The sound makes Zhen Zhen come running in as they struggle to figure out how to turn off the robot. They have just powered down the robot when they hear voices coming up the stairs. Ai Sha hides behind Fei Yang’s desk.
The voices belong to Jing Jing and Fei Yang. Fei Yang spots Ai Sha hiding and shields her from Jing Jing’s view while Jing Jing prattles on about collaborating with Golden Man. He makes excuses for why he’s not ready to collaborate yet. Zhen Zhen shows up and pretends to clean while trying to help Ai Sha sneak out, but Fei Yang steps on the hem of her dress so that she can’t move.
Jing Jing finally leaves and Fei Yang steps off of Ai Sha’s hem so she can stand up. He asks if he should take a page out of her book and report her to the police for trespassing in his office. She primly responds with a “Who said I was trespassing?” She grabs a tissue, drops it on the ground, then bends down to pick it up, saying that she was just there to help Zhen Zhen clean. Then she walks out. Fei Yang watches her go with an amused smile.
Vicky and Yuki spot Ai Sha as she puts on her shoes after leaving the Golden Man office. They exchange knowing looks, sharing the same assumption as to what she could have been up to in there without her shoes.
Xiao An watches a blooper reel of Ye Xuan from their video shoot the previous day, and giggles. She snaps to attention when Ai Sha walks in and asks for her daily report. Chic is still the top e-commerce site for women’s fashion, but Xiao An reluctantly shares the bad news: their advertising revenue and traffic have had negative growth since last quarter.
Ai Sha takes Xiao An’s tablet to look over the data while Xiao An elaborates: social media platforms have changed their algorithms so that their marketing reach has been limited. Their most successful marketing campaign has been their collaboration with Marguerite, an influencer.
Ai Sha thinks back to what she heard in Fei Yang’s office: if Golden Man and Chic collaborate like Jing Jing wants, it may temporarily boost traffic to both of their sites, but can they hang on to those users after the collaboration ends? That’s the real question.
Xiao An interrupts her silent thinking by reminding her that Marguerite’s contract expires soon. She’ll be in the office shortly to shoot a promotional video: should they show her some goodwill to help negotiate a contract renewal?
Ai Sha is confident that they’ll be able to keep Marguerite because Chic was the one who helped her become famous on social media, but Xiao An is a little more skeptical, since Marguerite’s been a bit full of herself lately. Ai Sha says that they’ll treat her like a princess if that’s what she wants. She’ll personally greet her when she arrives.
Ai Sha is waiting when the elevator doors open and Marguerite (Emmie Ries) strolls out. But Marguerite barely pays any attention to Ai Sha and instead beelines for Fei Yang, who has just rounded the corner with the rest of the Golden Man employees. She throws herself into Fei Yang’s arms, calling him Fei Yang-ge while Ai Sha watches with raised eyebrows.
Marguerite invites Fei Yang to watch her video shoot. The rest of Golden Man follow. The Chic women surreptitiously scope out the Golden Man men, pretending to film the video shoot on Yuki’s phone when in reality she has it zoomed in on the men of Golden Man. Vicky silently assesses them and rates them based on wealth and eligibility.
Ai Sha comments on how all the Golden Man men are the same in the way in which they invite themselves places. Fei Yang responds that he’s just here because Marguerite invited him. He’s sure Ai Sha can tolerate it for the sake of a smooth shoot. He smiles and waves as Marguerite blows him a kiss. Ai Sha rolls her eyes.
Fei Yang tells Ai Sha that he knows Marguerite from his years abroad. They lived in the same neighborhood and he would occasionally take her to school. He leans in and tries to goad her by saying that he heard her contract is expiring soon. If he says something, maybe she’ll jump ship and join Golden Man instead.
Ai Sha scoffs, saying that Golden Man doesn’t sell any women’s products. What would Marguerite do there? But Fei Yang responds that he could turn Marguerite into an internet goddess instead of just being an internet model.
Ai Sha glares at him, asking if he’s trying to poach her people. He smiles and casually says that he was just being hypothetical. Why is she so nervous? Ai Sha sits back in her seat and humphs.
The Chic women wait until Ai Sha has left the office with her lunch before immediately dropping all pretense of working and gather for their break.
Fei Yang stops Ai Sha on her way into the stairwell, saying that they should eat lunch together. He points up toward the rooftop and says he’ll wait for her. She responds with a scoff and pushes her way into the stairwell. Yuki and Vicky see the whole interaction.
Ai Sha struggles to decide whether she should actually eat lunch with Fei Yang or not, but the temptation of getting her shark necklace back is too great. Fei Yang is waiting when she steps out onto the roof deck, and pulls out her chair for her while she rolls her eyes.
He chatters about how he ordered and extra meal and coffee just for her and how having a good lunch is important while he takes boxes out of his bag. By the time he looks up, Ai Sha has already stuffed her face with her own bento box and holds out her hand, demanding her necklace.
He teases her about eating too quickly, saying she won’t make friends that way. She repeats that she doesn’t need friends. She just wants her necklace.
He holds it out teasingly, but when she moves to grab it, he quickly closes his hand and holds it out of reach, asking if they’re friends now. She continues to try and grab it, but he dances away toward the railing. While they struggle for it, he accidentally lets go. It flies out of his hand and plummets toward the ground below.
Ai Sha dashes downstairs, Fei Yang close behind, and scans the ground for her necklace. She spots it in the middle of the driveway in front of the building. She rushes to pick it up, not noticing a car coming toward her. Fei Yang holds her back to save her from being run over, but the car rolls right over the necklace, shattering the shark charm.
Ai Sha bends down to pick up the broken pieces, face frozen in shock, ignorant of cars coming up the driveway. Fei Yang holds his arms out and waves the cars around her so she doesn’t get run over. Once all the pieces are cupped in her hand, she silently heads back toward her office, ignoring Fei Yang who tries to apologize. She tells him that his apologies won’t fix anything.
She shuts herself inside her office, closing the door in Xiao An’s face and closing the blinds. Then she tries to hold her emotions together while she arranges the broken pieces in front of her.
Fei Yang tries out a few different apologies, using the statues and props around his office as stand-ins for Ai Sha. Steven, Xi Jun, and Ni Mo catch him talking to his punching bag, and he quickly tries to pretend he wasn’t just talking to an inanimate object by putting an arm around it and then punching it.
The three men confront Fei Yang about Ai Sha: what’s going on between them? When they first moved offices, Fei Yang claimed it was so that they could acquire Chic, yet now not only has he randomly dropped the winery contract, but he also has been acting strange because of Du Ai Sha. They guess that he is actually trying to pursue Ai Sha.
Fei Yang laughs awkwardly and unconvincingly says that he isn’t. He claims that he’s just been provoking Ai Sha for the sake of business.
Steven astutely says that there are other ways of joining with Chic if Fei Yang can’t manage this way. But Fei Yang suddenly gets serious and intently says that he has Chic in his pocket and Ai Sha too. Ai Sha is the most important person at Chic. Without her, Chic would be just another commerce platform. He will make sure that she joins them of her own volition.
That night, after everyone has gone home, Fei Yang slips into Chic and sees Ai Sha in her office, meticulously trying to glue the shark back together.
Ai Sha recalls the rest of her memory of her birthday. Her father told her to wait for him at the shark tank while he went to take care of his other child, saying he’d come back. She waited the rest of the day until closing, but never returned.
When she got back home, she found her things strewn about the hallway in her house. Her mother was busy pillaging her room, saying that if she wanted her father so badly, she could pack her things up and go look for him herself. Then she would see how little he actually cares for her.
Fei Yang watches as one of Ai Sha’s tears falls onto her glued together shark. She tries to dry it off, but the whole thing ends up coming apart. Feeling bad, he leaves and visits multiple stores, trying to find another shark necklace, but is unsuccessful.
The next morning, Ai Sha gets into the same elevator as Fei Yang. Everyone else in the elevator gets out the moment she steps in, leaving the two of them alone. Fei Yang spends the whole elevator ride trying to muster up the courage to speak to Ai Sha, but she acts like he isn’t there. By the time he starts to speak, the elevator doors open and Ai Sha walks out, pretending she didn’t hear him.
She continues to ignore him as he follows her, so he finally has to cut her off and block her way in order to apologize. He wants her to give him a chance to make it up to her. But she warns him to stay away from her, otherwise she’ll find his weak spot and make sure he hurts twice as bad. Steven and Xi Jun see them and whisper to each other.
Fei Yang tries to stop Ai Sha from walking away, but Xiao An finds Ai Sha in the hallway and whispers something to her. Ai Sha immediately sighs in frustration and beelines into the Chic office to find her mom handing out facial mask samples to everyone there.
Jing Jing is all too happy to be getting free things and to see Ai Sha put in an uncomfortable position. Ai Sha drags her mom out of the office toward the elevator. Ai Sha’s mom continues to try to plead Nan Cheng’s case to her, begging her to at least have dinner with Nan Cheng and his business partner the next day to hear their pitch on their product. She reluctantly agrees.
When Ai Sha gets back to the office, chaos awaits. The company network and computers have all been hacked; the website and app are down. Chic is under cyberattack.
Fei Yang continues to be distracted by Ai Sha at work, not paying attention while Xi Jun and Steven discuss business. Ni Mo shows up and reports that Chic is in crisis and has been attacked. Fei Yang immediately runs up to his office and gets to work hacking at his computer.
Ai Sha is in crisis management mode. She comes up with a plan to pitch the attack as routine maintenance in order to combat online rumors that they’ve been hacked. Even Wen Jing Jing listens to her instructions.
By night time, the issue still hasn’t been resolved and Ai Sha is forced to acknowledge that she will have to give a statement to the journalists who are gathered in the lobby. But before she leaves the office, the site and app are suddenly back online.
Fei Yang surveys his handiwork, pats himself on the back, and heads home.
Ai Sha looks over data from the day, finding the large cyberattack followed by abrupt recovery suspicious, and wonders who is targeting Chic. It’s 11:30 PM on a Friday, and her employees are still in the office trying to do damage control and assemble reports assessing the impact of the attack. She tells everyone that they can’t leave until the work is done. Yuki asks if she can do her work Sunday because she’s a bridesmaid at a wedding the next morning, but Ai Sha doesn’t let anyone off the hook.
At 3:30 AM, Ai Sha is still at the office, working. Yuki has dozed off at her desk. Ai Sha takes pity on her and lets her leave, then sits down to finish up her report.
Fei Yang is so exhausted that he falls asleep on his concrete floor just inside his front door. He sleeps there until noon.
Ai Sha finally finishes her work Saturday afternoon, having pulled an all-nighter. She goes to the rooftop to eat some instant ramen, but ends up dozing off, ramen still in hand. That’s how Fei Yang finds her.
Now that Ai Sha has survived a cyberattack, Fei Yang says she should probably understand the value of having a friend who understands software. He jokingly offers her his shoulder to lean on. She gives him a suspicious look, asking how he knows that Chic had been cyberattacked.
I work in tech, so I find it hilarious when hacking and defending against attacks are portrayed on screen. It’s not nearly so glamorous and I’m not sure how Fei Yang would be able to help Chic without first hacking into their company network… which maybe he did?
But technicalities aside, I am continuing to love this show! I love the banter between Ai Sha and Fei Yang. Fei Yang seems genuinely sweet on Ai Sha. Even though he comes across as a bit of a player, and his original reasons for interacting with Ai Sha are a bit opaque, it also seems like he genuinely cares.
I appreciate that he is someone who appreciates talent. Ai Sha views him as a rival who needs to be taken down, but he recognizes that he needs someone of her abilities and needs her on his team. I am curious about the order of operations here. Which came first: his desire to acquire Chic, or his attraction to Ai Sha?
The Drama Llama 