Chapter 124 - 121: Only the ’Dere’ Is Left

Chapter 124: Chapter 121: Only the ’Dere’ Is Left

’So... her career path is the same as the artist I’m training? I guess this is some kind of weird fate.’

"Alright, then. The evening of the fifth. I’ll come find you then."

"The fifth? I can’t guarantee I’ll have time on the evening of the fifth."

"You’ll have time. We are definitely going to meet. So that’s settled. I have to run, something’s come up. I’m really looking forward to our meeting."

"?"

Lying on the bed, Lin Zhengran felt his heart sink in resignation.

Lin Zhengran picked up the photo of Jiang Qian his grandfather had given him earlier that day. He glanced from the picture to the chat history on his phone.

No matter how he looked at it, the whole situation was just bizarre.

"This is Jiang Qian? But I get the feeling..." Lin Zhengran grimaced, looking at the photo again. At this point, even he was getting confused about who his betrothed actually was.

’But it doesn’t matter. I don’t care who she is. I’m just meeting her to collect the reward for this serendipitous event, anyway.’

The next morning, Lin Zhengran got up and went to Jiang Xueli’s house as usual.

The studio had sent out a new notice today about the competition on the fifth and sixth.

Lin Zhengran sat on Jiang Xueli’s bed, phone in hand. Jiang Xueli, sitting with her legs tucked out to her sides, leaned over curiously to look at the screen as well.

Lin Zhengran said, "There’s a new notice about the competition, and it’s a little long."

Jiang Xueli read the text aloud:

"New Notice: The competition scheduled for October 5th and 6th has been partially revised. The competition will no longer use an elimination format based on one cover song per person. Instead, it will adopt a voting model utilizing a ’Little New Star Chart’ and professional judges.

Each contestant is required to compose two original songs. The top ten singers will receive prize money and an additional mysterious grand prize."

Jiang Xueli paused, astonished. "Two original songs?! And this New Star Chart... is it the New Star Chart I’m thinking of? But they added the word ’Little’... a Little New Star Chart."

Lin Zhengran asked, "The New Star Chart? You mean the one for the ’Music Candidates’ show?"

Jiang Xueli nodded.

"There can’t be any other New Star Chart, right? I’m talking about the one for ’Music Candidates,’ that huge show in Shanghai. If you make it into the top one hundred on the New Star Chart, you get to be on the show. And basically every singer who gets on that show becomes famous! The only difference is how big they get!"

Lin Zhengran had looked up this "Music Candidates" show before. It was a massive program, similar to something like The Voice from his past life.

It was definitely a top-tier stage for musicians.

Jiang Xueli added, "But this one has the word ’Little’ attached. Does that mean it’s different?"

"Let’s keep reading first," Lin Zhengran said.

Still in shock, Jiang Xueli nodded and continued reading. "For this competition’s judges, we have specially invited the famous music stars Sty and Lun Jie to participate— Ah?! They’re both super famous!"

Lin Zhengran knew that in this world, those two were music stars of the highest caliber.

The kind with a net worth in the hundreds of millions.

’I never expected a small-town competition to have this kind of budget.’

’Normally, you’d only see celebrity judges of this caliber at the most high-profile competitions. And yet, here they are.’

Excited, Jiang Xueli continued reading:

"For the two original songs, one must have a ’Void Spirit’ feel, while the other can be in any style the contestant chooses. The judges will select songs for elimination. All contestants who are not eliminated will be featured on the Little New Star Chart.

The final champion will be decided by online user votes. The prize money has also been increased, from a range of one thousand to ten thousand yuan to ten thousand to seventy thousand yuan in cash rewards. These are all the changes to the competition. We ask all contestants to prepare accordingly."

After excitedly reading through all the changes, Jiang Xueli simply couldn’t contain herself anymore.

"Didn’t they say this was just supposed to be a small competition?! Why is it so huge now? They’ve got this Little New Star Chart, and they even invited celebrities! Before the changes, the top prize was only ten thousand yuan, and now it’s jumped all the way to seventy thousand!"

Lin Zhengran glanced at the competition details again.

He spotted Jiang Jingshi’s name listed among the investors.

He let out a quiet sigh.

’Looks like this competition is Jiang Jingshi’s way of paving the path for the music team she’s managing.’

’But... even though Jiang Jingshi is rich, she couldn’t have bankrolled something this massive all on her own. I can only assume her investment was a catalyst—a coincidence that pushed things forward and attracted other influential people to invest and join in on the excitement.’

Lin Zhengran opened the studio’s group chat.

Sure enough, the chat was already blowing up.

The singers from the studio were all talking about it:

"Holy shit, did you guys see the new notice? Sty and Lun Jie are coming to our town’s competition! They’re both my idols!"

"I saw it! I can’t believe the competition is this huge. Didn’t the studio say it was just going to be a minor event?"

"I heard they got a lot of investment over the past six months, so they scaled it up. And a lot of teams from out of the province are coming, too."

"Then how are we supposed to win anything? There are so many amazing singers."

"The main thing is that New Star Chart. Isn’t that the chart for ’Music Candidates’ that only happens once a year? How can we get on a list like that?"

"Didn’t you read it closely? It’s the ’Little New Star Chart,’ made just for this competition. But I heard a rumor that the so-called mysterious grand prize for the top ten is a direct ticket to ’Music Candidates’! If you get on that show, even if you’re eliminated in the first round, you’ve still been on television!"

Even in the age of the internet, it seemed people still had an inexplicable obsession with being on TV.