Quentin’s appearance, as composed and unfazed as a fortune teller, was quite amusing when juxtaposed with the chaotic barrage of comments.
But the person in the footage couldn’t predict the audience’s reactions. At least Quentin really didn’t think there was anything wrong with his actions, and the teammates standing behind the curtain had long since gotten used to it.
Earlier, they weren’t embarrassed just because of the hand or face touching. It’s normal to have some physical contact while recording a show and playing games, especially with friends they were close with.
It was just that when Quentin leaned in close to observe earlier, being stared at by those green eyes made them involuntarily start avoiding his gaze.
Of course, not everyone was so thin-skinned. People like Yan Qiao and Cui Yan looked back openly, not feeling uncomfortable at all, and chatted casually to break the tension.
By the time the official game session started, with an opaque curtain separating them so no one could see anyone else, and being touched by Quentin’s bone-measuring technique, any feelings of discomfort vanished, replaced by the desire to win that was gradually ignited by the countdown.
Quentin remembered clearly in his heart that only two out of the six teammates had fingers slightly longer than his. So as soon as the game started and he touched the first hand, he had a basis for his guess.
Palm to palm, five fingers straightened…Yes, about a quarter of a finger longer than his. It was either Cui Yan or Qi Yang.
Finger length might be somewhat related to height. Cui Yan and Qi Yang happened to be the two tallest in their team, ranking first and second. The remaining few were about the same height as him, while Xue Mingzhu was a bit shorter than the rest.
Quentin thought for a moment, then asked: “Senior Sister Lou Yu, is this Cui Yan?”
Lou Yu saw that he had been touching for less than ten seconds, but he asked so quickly, yet he happened to hit the nail on the head!
She looked at the wheat-skinned hand reaching out from the curtain, then looked up at Cui Yan behind the curtain who was smiling with a mouthful of white teeth. After hesitating for two seconds, she decisively said: “Yes!”
She only had one chance to lie. Using it at the very beginning was too rash. She needed to observe some more.
After hearing the answer, Quentin nodded, then put down the hand and walked to the second curtain.
Senior Sister Lou Yu hadn’t lied. Quentin had already guessed that it was Cui Yan’s hand before he even asked.
Cui Yan was the easiest to identify among the six teammates because he had a high body temperature and warm hands. You could tell just by touching.
Comparing finger lengths and such were just fake moves to throw people off. He wanted to try and lure out Lou Yu’s chance to lie. If she foolishly lied, then he could just do whatever he wanted with the subsequent questions.
Maybe it was Quentin’s good luck. The fingers on the second hand were still a bit longer than his, clearly indicating the person behind the curtain was Qi Yang.
Quentin used the same trick again, pretending to be unsure as he held Qi Yang’s hand, comparing repeatedly for over ten seconds before asking: “Is this Cui Yan?”
Lou Yu was stunned for a moment, thought it over, and cautiously said: “No.”
The third hand was quite lively. Before Quentin even walked over, it had already reached out from the curtain, the long fingers waving back and forth nimbly like waves, even waving in the direction of Quentin and Lou Yu in greeting.
But unfortunately, the flirtation was wasted on the blind. Quentin, who was wearing the blindfold, was truly blind. And Lou Yu, who was trying hard to observe Quentin’s movements and agonizing over whether to lie for the next question, didn’t even glance over.
The quality of the blindfold was too good. Quentin couldn’t see anything at all. As a result, he couldn’t stop in time and bumped into this hand.
The hand wasn’t shy at all. It took the opportunity to hook onto Quentin’s waist, with nearly half an arm reaching out from behind the curtain. It was hard to imagine what posture the person behind the curtain was in.
Quentin stood there and thought about it. Among the remaining teammates, the only ones who would mess around like this were either Xue Mingzhu or Yan Qiao. Wen Xinyan and Fang Xu were at least his roommates. He knew their upright personalities very well. They wouldn’t be so playful.
While he was thinking, his hand subconsciously rested on the arm blocking his front. Lou Yu, watching this scene from behind, widened her eyes: “Hey, Quentin, you can’t just touch randomly. You can only touch the hand, not other places.”
[Quentin: …Who’s touching randomly?]
[Quentin: Whose hand is this on my body, why won’t it stop moving?]
[You’ve been exposed, Brother Qiao! Who else would mess around like that!]
[Hahahaha Yan Qiao’s posture, bending down and squatting there, what are you reaching for, brother!]
The host noticed the overly active hand and quickly came over to stop it: “Pay attention, you can’t break the rules. This person, please take your hand back.”
Lou Yu joked: “Something’s wrong, Quentin. This wasn’t planned by your team, was it? That won’t do. I haven’t lied yet. I’ve answered your questions properly.”
Her intention was to throw out some smoke bombs, but she didn’t expect the blindfolded, blonde-haired young man to turn his head back towards her and nod seriously in response: “I know. Senior Sister didn’t lie. Don’t worry, we didn’t plan anything. This is all Yan Qiao taking the initiative.”
Then, Quentin’s hand holding Yan Qiao’s was shaken up and down a couple of times, as if the person behind the curtain was agreeing with their conversation.
Lou Yu was stunned.
Wait a minute. How did he know it was Yan Qiao? Was that blindfold on tight enough or not? Did they really not plan this beforehand? How on earth did he guess!
She turned her head and looked at her own team’s “blind man” who was still hesitating in front of the first curtain. At this moment, only a minute had passed, and Quentin’s side had already gotten through three people, and at least two of them had their identities guessed correctly.
During those few seconds of Lou Yu’s silence, Quentin raised an eyebrow slightly and thought to himself, ‘Looks like it really is Yan Qiao.’
He was just casually testing the waters. He didn’t expect Lou Yu to be so easy to trick. He had actually been leaning more towards Xue Mingzhu in his heart.
But Quentin didn’t reveal his thoughts. Instead, he pretended to be confused and tilted his head, asking: “Did I guess wrong? This isn’t Yan Qiao?”
Lou Yu blinked. An idea struck her. “Does this count as a question?”
Quentin thought for a moment. “Mm… then let me ask again. Is this Xue Mingzhu?”
Before coming to record the show, Lou Yu had heard that Quentin, Yan Qiao, and Xue Mingzhu had a very good relationship. They spent every day together in the practice room, eating together, and going back to the dormitory together.
Hearing Quentin’s question now, she immediately realized that his guess was completely based on this hand’s overly lively movements. Perhaps in Quentin’s view, only Yan Qiao and Xue Mingzhu would actively get this close.
Lou Yu thought for a moment and decided to use up her lie here.
Quentin was too good at guessing, and too fast. She was worried that if she waited, she wouldn’t get a chance to use it!
So she decisively said: “Yes!”
Quentin smiled: “I trust Senior Sister.”
The production team really knew how to stir up trouble. If they just edited this section alone, the audience wouldn’t see any problem with it. At most, they would sigh about how Quentin’s casual smile was so swoon-worthy.
But the later editors happened to insert a clip of Quentin’s post-interview here.
In the shot, the young man sitting on the small sofa was wearing a red and white tracksuit. His hair was soft and fluffy, clearly freshly washed and not styled.
His bare, clean face was turned towards the camera. No one knew how long the post-interview recording took, but his beautiful brows and eyes couldn’t hide their tiredness.
A staff member’s voice rang out: “Quentin, do you still remember during the game session of today’s public performance, when Teacher Lou Yu lied to you, saying Yan Qiao was Xue Mingzhu? Did you realize at the time that you were holding Yan Qiao’s hand?”
The blonde young man’s brows moved slightly, as if the question had woken him up a bit. He didn’t hide anything and calmly nodded: “Mm, I remember. I had already figured it out by then.”
“So you asked that question knowing Yan Qiao’s identity on purpose? Was that a game strategy you had planned in advance?”
Quentin: “It’s not really a strategy. I just wanted to trick Senior Sister into using up her lie earlier.”
The staff member laughed: “Trick? Did I hear that right? You just used the word ‘trick’. Shouldn’t it be that the Senior Sister is trying to trick you in this segment?”
“Senior Sister is very expressive. One can tell what she’s thinking without even looking at her face, just by listening to her tone of voice.”
Quentin explained: “I’m the opposite. I’m not easy to trick.”
[Really? I don’t believe it.]
[Lou Yu… As expected of our group’s silly girl. Do you know that an eighteen-year-old high school graduate just said you were easy to trick!]
[Saying with a completely serious face that you’re not easy to trick… It really makes people itch to try and stuff you into a sack (rubbing hands together like flies)]
[There’s a pink sack right here. Little QT, will you come home with Big Sister (sparkly eyes)]
The half-minute post-interview quickly passed, and the subsequent games became much simpler.
Senior Sister Lou Yu couldn’t lie anymore, so for the next two questions, regardless of what Quentin asked, he would get a one hundred percent correct answer. And he only had three teammates whose identities were uncertain. Even an idiot could guess correctly!
But Bi Xiao on the other side looked miserable even with the blindfold on. His worried expression was impossible to hide. He dawdled until the five-minute countdown ended, without ever figuring out one, two, three, or four.
It was all because Zhang Fu spoke so gently and softly, making it impossible to tell if she was lying or not.
And Bi Xiao, on one hand, didn’t have enough brain cells to spare, often blurting out questions without thinking them through carefully. On the other hand… when faced with a beautiful big sister, his IQ automatically halved. He was so confused and led around by the nose by Zhang Fu, it would be strange if he didn’t lose.
By the time the entire game ended, Quentin’s team had won so easily, and Cheng Shaozhi’s team had lost so anticlimactically.
Neither Lou Yu nor Bi Xiao really understood how they lost. But considering it was just a game, the two simple-minded people forgot about it in a flash, without any sense of having been completely played by someone.
Netizens on the forums happily teased them, and fans of both Aurora and “NS” officially established friendly relations.
Both sides had smart people and fools. Each side tricked the other once, so they canceled each other out, ultimately resulting in no real loss, only a strengthening of their bond!
So after the eighth episode aired, Aurora’s official group account and the forum accounts of each member saw a wave of explosive fan growth.
Compared to the past, the data for newly posted threads doubled directly. Invitations for commercial activities also came pouring in. The originally dying limited-time group seemed to have suddenly experienced a second spring.
Of course, the discussion surrounding the game session still couldn’t compare to the stage.
The quality of the third public performance stage had taken a huge step forward compared to the first two. The trainees’ skills had improved, the stages were more visually appealing, and the audience was naturally happy to accept it.
The popularity of the stage videos continued to climb. After some time, the gap of data between Quentin’s team’s stage and those ranked a few places behind was not as overwhelming as before.
This was unreasonable! After all, this time Quentin’s team had gathered almost all the highly popular trainees, recognized by the audience as the candidate debut group!
Given that the individual popularity of the members far exceeded that of other trainees, shouldn’t their stage have opened up an even larger gap?
Fans discussed heatedly on the forums and finally concluded…the reason this stage wasn’t overwhelmingly better than other groups was definitely because Quentin wasn’t the center enough.
Although Quentin had the highest percentage of time in the center position during the singing and dancing segments, anyone with discerning eyes could see that the dramatic focus of this stage was not on him.
Quentin’s fans, however, didn’t care much about whether he was the center or not. Everyone who had watched the eighth episode update knew that their Quentin was not interested in love scenes. He was completely oblivious in the love department.
It wasn’t that he couldn’t act opposite Zhang Fu like Qi Yang did, but the fans were detail-oriented and could see that their little trainee wasn’t interested in this kind of thing. Otherwise, the part allocations wouldn’t have been arranged this way.
Anyway, none of this affected Quentin’s soaring popularity. The little butterflies were very busy every day…busy appreciating the latest works of their idol’s talented fans, busy blowing rainbow farts in the threads of many related topics, busy slapping black fans in the face with their idol’s achievements…
In short, if others didn’t actively provoke them, they couldn’t be bothered to fuss over trivial little things.
Little Butterflies: There’s nothing we can do, our idol is too competitive. We need to be broad-minded too. Just focusing on our own is fine~
…
>Topic: [Has anyone noticed? The canvas shoes QT wore during the public performance are sold out. The store can’t restock fast enough. Even pre-orders are stopped now (eating melon)]
1L: [Is this the pair OP is talking about? (Photo of wearing canvas shoes.jpg)]
2L: [?!]
3L: [Holy shit, 1L is way too fast!! Did you order right after the eighth episode was updated?]
4L: [Reply to 3L: No, I went to the third public performance live. I recognized the brand of shoes Quentin was wearing. I ordered five pairs right after the performance ended, one of each color (happy)]
5L: [Awesome!]
6L: [I remember these canvas shoes are an original brand of a small studio, right? The kind of Taobao store with barely over 100k followers. So niche it gets mistaken for an unknown generic brand… How did 4L recognize them (dumbfounded)]
7L: [This shows that not only did the sister on the 4th floor get a ticket for the third public performance front row, but her financial power is also very strong. These shoes cost seven or eight hundred each too. Ordering five pairs in one go, I’m envious.]
8L (OP): [Don’t you guys know? These canvas shoes can be resold for over a thousand now. The colorway of Quentin’s style can probably sell for even more. There was a transaction early this morning for two thousand yuan. There are really a lot of rich women in your QT’s fan circle]
9L: [The ones who spend money to buy from others are probably fans, but the ones sold out on the official website are mostly bought by casual viewers.
The video of Quentin skateboarding has gone viral even abroad. Not to mention how popular the shoes he wears are, sales of longboards on various platforms have doubled now… What terrifying sales power! If I were a merchant, I’d probably worship a poster of Quentin (praying)]
10L: [The official account of that canvas shoe brand studio has posted nearly ten threads thanking Quentin. The pinned post is a screenshot of Quentin skateboarding. The brand side is throwing out money and sending red envelopes in the posts. In a certain sense, it’s also considered a cyber-offering haha!]
11L: [Wok!!]
12L: [It is said the brand side has severely insufficient stock, causing scalpers to miss the business opportunity of reselling these shoes. Buying in for 700+ and reselling them could fetch 2000+, a doubled profit. I’m already envious just looking at it]
13L: [This money is not earned honestly. It’s all paid for by fans. No need for this, right?]
14L: [Upstairs, rational fans are all patiently waiting for the official website to release stock. Rich women with mines at home won’t care about this expense anyway. Different people have different fates. Respect others’ fates]
15L: [To be honest, it feels like Quentin’s first breakthrough to the mainstream just happened yesterday. I know he has a lot of potential, but I didn’t expect him to get this famous this fast. If he debuts through “NS”, he will absolutely be the one carrying the group afterwards!]
16L: [Welcome to #Quentin Dragging An Aircraft Carrier# special edition~]
17L: [Thinking about it this way, I am still quite worried about their group’s development. If the gap between the popularity of the top member of the group and the group itself is too large, it is very detrimental to the growth of the boy group. Those who know, know]
18L: [The emperor isn’t worried, but the eunuchs are. I think Quentin is doing just fine. First of all, this is a limited-time group. Second, Quentin is only 18. This kid’s future is so bright it makes me anxious just looking at him (facepalm, wry smile)
And since he’s capable of creating so many viral stages on “NS”, why worry in advance about whether he can lead the group to go further in the future?]
19L: [Thank you to the above poster. To have a big boss like Quentin participating in a survival show, “NS” and Galaxy Entertainment should be secretly celebrating.]
