Chapter 59 059 Ending

Chapter 59 059 Ending

"Am I the only one who noticed that Lu Xu has another drama with viewership ratings over 10,000?"

"!!!"

"Suddenly, I realized that since its release, 'The Path of Bones' has consistently maintained viewership ratings above 10,000, but everyone seems to take this result for granted. Is it because 'The Empress' is too prominent?"

"It's more like... we've just gotten used to it."

"So... 'The Empress' failed to target 'The Path of Bones'?"

Although the news that 'The Empress' deliberately rescheduled to compete with 'The Path of Bones' was just a rumor, on the day both dramas were released, half of the entertainment industry shared Qiao Mengyao's Weibo post, including several celebrities who either had conflicts with Lu Xu or had overlapping career paths with him.

Choosing that moment to repost was quite subtle.

Since celebrity Weibo accounts are also professional platforms, why did those young actors feel compelled to side with 'The Empress'?

But rumors are just rumors, and no one has any evidence.

However, as 'The Path of Bones' continues to air, its viewership ratings are still climbing. No matter what malice those people hold towards Lu Xu, their wishes are destined to go unfulfilled.

"Pass on Lu Xu's career luck!"

"By the way, since Lu Xu transitioned to being an actor, hasn't he starred in any drama with viewership ratings below 10,000?"

"Well... that's true."

...

'The Path of Bones' has exceeded 13,000 in viewership ratings, making it one of Grape TV's best-performing dramas in the past two years. Unlike 'Watchmen' and 'Rising Sun,' which started with a bang but fizzled out, 'The Path of Bones' has maintained a stable popularity throughout its run. Although its topic engagement isn't as high as 'The Empress,' its audience scores have never dropped.

It clearly belongs to the category of dramas that are both critically acclaimed and highly popular.

While Grape TV is pleased, they also feel a tinge of regret.

'The Path of Bones' clearly hasn't been promoted enough, yet it still managed to maintain its popularity based on quality alone. If they had gone all out with promotion, wouldn't the viewership ratings have skyrocketed?

Of course, the backlash from over-promotion is evident in 'Watchmen,' and Grape TV, having learned from past mistakes, doesn't dare to promote too aggressively.

But sitting back and doing nothing isn't the platform's usual approach.

Now there's a perfect marketing opportunity—

The entire entertainment industry must know that 'The Path of Bones' is the number one in viewership rankings!

If anyone still doesn't know this fact, then Grape TV hasn't done its promotional efforts well.

At this point, 'The Empress' is barely able to suppress 'The Path of Bones.'

In many cases, if a drama flops, the production team's usual excuse is "the drama was overshadowed," "the platform didn't give us a chance," or "our competitors bought too many negative trending topics, and there's nothing we can do." However, a truly popular drama cannot be suppressed.

Although 'The Path of Bones' doesn't trend on Weibo as frequently as 'The Empress,' the viewership rankings are right there for everyone to see. At least it's clear that during this period, the audience prefers 'The Path of Bones.'

Moreover, the audience of 'The Empress' has accumulated a lot of dissatisfaction.

Previously, when 'The Empress' was number one in popularity, the drama's issues were overshadowed by its popularity. But now, with 'The Path of Bones' surpassing it, fans of various actors are pointing fingers at each other, and the audience's dissatisfaction has finally erupted.

Not everyone watching the drama is a fan of the actors.

To be precise, fans only make up a small portion of the audience who watch the show.

However, because of fans' comments, these genuine viewers can't express their thoughts—they just want to watch a typical female-led drama.

The female lead doesn't need to be adored by everyone, nor does she need to love everyone. It's enough for her to have her own remarkable life.

The expectations are that simple.

Yet, even these simple expectations can no longer be met.

"Xi Rongyi isn't quite what I had in mind."

"I wanted to see the female lead govern the world, achieving a state of peace and prosperity, becoming a wise monarch. But if the men around her are like this, I feel like her country might fall apart."

"Collapse +1, the throne isn't something you can just naively grab."

"And... does Qiao Mengyao even realize exactly what kind of drama she's taken on?"

No matter how much fans argue, what really decides success or failure is the content itself.

The show's fans are genuinely disappointed.

From the moment Qiao Mengyao decided to take on *The Empress*, it became one of the most anticipated female-led dramas in the past two years. With its source material, viewers expected to see a wise and intelligent Xi Rongyi, challenging imperial power as a woman.

Sadly, this version of Xi Rongyi never showed up.

The greater the expectations were, the greater the disappointment.

As male characters were introduced one by one, fans hoped the plot would get better. After all, it's a historical romance—it's unrealistic to skip the romance. A good romantic storyline could further enrich Xi Rongyi's character. With both plot and romance, *The Empress* would feel well-rounded.

Sadly, Xi Rongyi's character didn't just fail to grow—she was also overshadowed by the male characters.

Drama fans have their patience limits. While some actors blatantly add scenes to their roles, ensuring the audience notices, added scenes shouldn't disrupt the story's original pacing. They should add interesting bits, not long, boring, and sleep-inducing scenes.

How could viewers possibly enjoy that?

...

*The Empress*'s popularity has been steadily dropping. While fan wars have made the drama more 'famous' than it actually is, they've also tanked its reputation.

Even viewers interested in the show's content couldn't help but back away from such chaos.

The viewing experience is important too.

In contrast, the popularity of *The Path of Bones* continues to rise.

Many viewers who followed *The Empress* have started switching to *The Path of Bones*.

To some extent, the dominance *The Empress* production team hoped for is now happening with *The Path of Bones*.

With the drama's popularity soaring and the lead actor, Lu Xu, being a Starlight Award nominee, Lu Xu received an invitation to a currently trending variety show a week before *The Path of Bones* finale.

"Just go and play some games, follow the host's flow," Xu Wen said. "Appearing on this show is proof of your popularity."

The male leads from *The Empress* who "blew up" haven't even been on it yet.

Lu Xu frowned, "I don't have any gags."

Xu Wen: "………………"

"Just don't repost 'X Le Wu'."

Lu Xu: "...That's a pretty low bar."

Xu Wen remained silent in response.

The agent never imagined that one day he would hear the word "no gags" from Lu Xu's mouth.

Seriously, this guy's got so many jokes that his account got banned!

"Just show your full face to the camera and smile—that's all you need," the agent suggested. "Don't let that face go to waste."

"After this show, you can start looking at new scripts," Xu Wen said. "You wouldn't believe how many scripts are coming in lately."

Lu Xu's development has far exceeded Xu Wen's expectations for him, and also exceeded the expectations of Feiyang Entertainment.

He's rock-solid.

So far, there are almost no negative reviews online about Lu Xu's portrayal of Yu Yi in 'The Path of Bones'.

The scripts Lu Xu is getting now are more varied, with both period and modern dramas. Lu Xu told Xu Wen he wants his next role to be less intense—maybe a romance, maybe not, but something closer to a normal life.

Thinking about the roles he's played, Yu Wei actually had the best ending.

Xu Wen used to think it was hard to find roles for Lu Xu because he's such a top-tier actor—directors always want him for the tough parts.

I mean, if Lu Xu takes the easy roles, who's gonna handle the hard ones?

After 'The Path of Bones' took off, Lu Xu started getting more leading roles. Usually, the lead is the most relatable character in a drama. After some thought, Xu Wen managed to find a few good fits for Lu Xu.

...

'Very Night' is a flagship variety show under Huayu Entertainment, featuring celebrities and running for nearly 20 years.

It airs every Friday at 8:30 PM, with each episode featuring a group of celebrities. The show usually invites celebrities who've been in the spotlight lately, so lesser-known stars rarely make the cut. If there's no hit drama around, the show prefers to invite bigger names.

Before Lu Xu's appearance, 'Very Night' started building hype.

The show's blog teased silhouettes of the next guests—one looked like Lu Xu, but fans didn't want to get their hopes up.

After Verse disbanded, Lu Xu hasn't done any variety shows.

Fans guessing about Lu Xu even doubted themselves: "If you showed a silhouette of a dog on a bike, maybe I'd recognize it."

"If it's not Lu Xu this time, get him on next time!"

"Lu Xiao Gou definitely can make it!"

"I'd love to see a show with all of Verse, where the little dog takes them on 1v3."

"Isn't that basically every day with them?"

After guessing for a long time, fans still couldn't figure out the identity of the next guest from the silhouette, and finally, the 'Very Night' show team revealed it themselves.

It was indeed Lu Xu—the killer version.

The show team actually directly released a still from 'The Path of Bones'!

"Next Friday is the finale of 'The Path of Bones', Lu Xiao Gou, you are really bold!"

"It's funny, everyone knows that on the day 'Very Night' airs, the popularity of TV dramas tends to drop a bit. It's just typical of Lu Xu, always sticking to this kind of approach."

It's not that Lu Xu needed to rush to appear on the show that day, but the finale date of 'The Path of Bones' had been set long ago. Since 'Very Night' was scheduled to air that day anyway, it was better to appear on the show and promote 'The Path of Bones' at the same time.

He saved Grape Pictures a bit of money again. Next time he meets the platform executives, he ought to ask for a raise.

Once Lu Xu confirmed his appearance on 'Very Night,' fans couldn't decide between watching the variety show or the finale of 'The Path of Bones.'

"Why not do both?"

"Tablet + TV, I'm ready."

Some grumbled that Lu Xu appearing on 'Very Night' that day was probably aiming for a double hit.

"Hopefully, the ratings of 'Very Night' don't drop and the popularity of 'The Path of Bones' isn't affected."

In the end, though—

On Friday night, both 'Very Night' and 'The Path of Bones' became the biggest winners in the entire entertainment industry.

The ratings of 'Very Night' set a new record since last year, and the finale episode of 'The Path of Bones' reached a popularity score of over 14,000.

This was a goal that 'The Empress' had long aimed for but never achieved.

In the finale episode, Yu Yi's fate was decided.

The cold executioner finally shed tears from a girl's embrace.

This warmth was the life Yu Yi should have had, but he never experienced it.

The audience couldn't hold back their tears too.

To promote 'The Path of Bones,' 'Very Night' asked Lu Xu to reenact this scene on the show.

The young man, who was smiling brightly just moments ago, suddenly looked different, his eyes slightly red, unable to bear the soft, warm embrace.

It wasn't the coldness of revenge, but the true self after letting go of cruelty.

Yu Yi was still quite young.

He could have had a warm, happy life.

Although he completed his revenge, he ended up an empty shell.

This embrace brought him back.

His smile was shy, like he wasn't used to hugs, yet it was innocent and pure.

It seemed as if everything that happened in the entire story of 'The Path of Bones' paled in comparison, and only this moment of embrace was worth it.

Whether at the dimly lit prison gate or the brightly lit variety show stage, when the audience saw Lu Xu's expression, they felt as if they were seeing Yu Yi himself.

Just a performance on the variety show drove many viewers to check out 'The Path of Bones.'