The person who proposed the new way to play the game was Cui Yan. He usually paid quite close attention to online hot topics and could be considered as an “8G internet surfer”.
**8G internet surfer means someone who is extremely up-to-date with the latest online trends, memes, news, etc.
The others also had vaguely heard of this so-called “Ideal Type Challenge” little game.
As semi-entertainment industry professionals, their schedules as trainees were not as busy as those of stars. Young people nowadays like to browse forums and scroll through short videos in their free time. Most trending topics could not escape the push notifications of big data.
Only Quentin and Xue Mingzhu had never heard of this thing.
Xue Mingzhu had been a high school senior not long ago. As soon as the college entrance exam ended, he started preparing for the variety show. He simply had no time to go online. His understanding of entertainment trending topics remained stuck at two years ago.
But he loved to play. The moment Cui Yan finished explaining, he was the first person to respond, raising his hand more enthusiastically than anyone else’s.
In contrast, Quentin was largely indifferent.
At that time, his mind was full of those baffling “memory fragments.” The unfamiliar scenes made him certain that these experiences had nothing to do with his previous life.
The “Quentin” in those fragments appeared to be only fourteen or fifteen years old, probably around the age of junior or senior high school.
In his previous life, he was still living under the control of his biological father at that age, feeling both annoyed and disgusted every day by that man’s reconstituted family. The personality he displayed outwardly was also quite cold and rebellious, very much not to be trifled with.
However, the blonde boy in the “memory fragments” looked pale and weak. Judging solely by his looks, one would not find him difficult to get along with. He had a gentle temperament, carrying a calm and tolerant feeling, more like the current Quentin.
Because the system had said before that as long as Quentin spoke of his “past,” they would not be exposed as false.
So when these scenes surfaced one by one, Quentin’s first reaction was that the system was fabricating a past based on his inventions.
But those scenes were too real. The more Quentin recalled them, the stronger that vague sense of familiarity in his heart grew.
If it were just this, it could still be explained by the system’s higher-dimensional abilities. After all, the system bringing him into a book was even more unscientific than him suddenly gaining an extra chunk of memory.
The problem was, in those scenes, a person whom Quentin had never described appeared repeatedly.
It was a young man in his twenties, with black hair and black eyes, and very handsome. Whether it was his clothing and style, his temperament, or perhaps his aura, he was very impressive.
He did not resemble the ordinary people commonly seen in real life, nor was he a glamorous big star on screen. He seemed more like the kind of person who had held a high position for a long time.
As to whether it was the business world or the political sphere, one could not tell.
However, this was not why Quentin noticed him.
Although this young man appeared repeatedly on several occasions, in the fragments he was part of, he often merely served as a low-key bystander.
And the “Quentin” in the fragments never had any interaction with him. They appeared to be strangers.
Perhaps the “Quentin” of this world and he were indeed strangers. But Quentin, who possessed the memories of his previous life, could discern certain childhood features on this adult male’s face.
Before the age of ten, Quentin had experienced a childhood in a small town in southern China. It was not exactly carefree, but it was cherished.
Back then, he was the odd one in the small town, the “foreign kid” brought back to the countryside by his single mother. Everyone thought he was very strange. No one wanted to play with him, and he never actively approached the other kids in town either.
One summer, a group of people suddenly moved into the sealed compound next door to his house.
The young Quentin did not know their identity and had no interest in making contact.
The only thing he felt regret about was the several tall fruit trees in the neighbor’s yard. They had been his playmates for the longest stretch of time during that period.
He often climbed over the wall to play in the trees. The fruits he picked were extremely sour and astringent, hard for ordinary people to stomach, yet he could hold one and leisurely nibble at it for ages.
Now that the owners of the yard had returned, he naturally could not keep climbing over the wall.
At least, not openly in broad daylight.
So on a starry night, Quentin, who was tossing and turning unable to sleep, snuck out of his bedroom and nimbly climbed over the wall.
Then he casually straddled a high branch, gnawing on fruit while counting stars. The more he counted, the sleepier he became, nearly dozing off leaning against the tree trunk.
Until a child’s voice came from under the tree.
The reason Quentin remembered this incident so vividly was that the child did not speak human language… He was going “zuo zuo zuo”.
Yes, exactly the kind of “zuo zuo” sound used to tease a dog.
Although they later became very good friends, Quentin would never forget the misunderstanding that occurred when they first met.
Because it was dark, the child under the tree craned his neck to look up hard but could only make out a tuft of fluffy light golden hair amidst the dense leaves.
He mistakenly thought it was a small yellow dog trapped in the tree… What happened next needs no further elaboration.
Mm, setting the black history aside, if Quentin was not mistaken, the young man in his twenties who suddenly appeared in the “memory fragments” in his mind was Jin Sui all grown up.
If it weren’t for that faint trace of familiarity between the brows, Quentin would never have imagined that the kid who was two years younger than him in his previous life would grow up to be so… serious and stern?
He was clearly so cute when he was little.
It was difficult to describe Quentin’s mood at that moment. Perhaps it was because he kept silently comparing the young version of Jin Sui with the adult version in his heart, while going through the motions in the “Ideal Type Challenge” game later, he unconsciously bent his fingers based on the image of Jin Sui from his memories.
Xue Mingzhu said “cute and adorable girl,” Quentin bent one finger.
Yan Qiao said “mature and elegant woman,” Quentin hesitantly bent one finger.
Fang Xu said “childhood sweetheart,” Quentin bent one finger.
Cui Yan said “blonde hair,” Quentin was unmoved.
Qi Yang said “short hair”, Quentin bent one finger.
Wen Xinyi said “girl next door,” Quentin bent one finger.
“…Damn, you’re out!”
Xue Mingzhu stared at Quentin’s raised fist, the corner of his mouth twitched, and he said, “I couldn’t tell. You’re quite the womanizer.”
He had been eliminated before it was even his turn to say a keyword. Who would have thought it would be Quentin?!
Everyone silently turned their gazes toward him, all wearing complex and speechless expressions.
“What’s wrong?”
Quentin’s expression was calm. Perhaps because he appeared too frank, no one felt comfortable teasing him. Had it been someone else, they would definitely have been chased with a few teasing remarks.
And precisely because he bent his fingers so decisively, it instead made his ideal type seem very vague. He had named everything, yet it seemed like he had named nothing at all.
Was he fickle or was his thinking just too open-minded? One had to know, several keywords they mentioned were opposites. Did he really like everything?
“Ahem, nothing.” Wen Xinyi choked slightly and turned to look at Xue Mingzhu. “Xiao Xue, you continue.”
After that, as the game went on, everyone bent and straightened their fingers, and still no second person was eliminated. The longer they played, the more worked up they got, and the more small secrets were revealed.
In the end, it was Quentin, the first to be eliminated, who did not have any explosive secrets dug up. The xp of the others were all pretty much laid bare.
Everyone realized belatedly: What a loss. Quentin had listened to so much gossip, yet kept his own secrets tightly under wraps. Could this have been his plan all along?
Quentin, who had been forced to listen to gossip all night: Indeed… a person cannot be judged by appearance alone [drinking tea.jpg]
“Ahem, last night, mm, how to put it, we did chat quite a bit.”
Wen Xinyi took the initiative to pick up Zhang Fu’s words and answered with a smile: “The topic of love did come up. Although I don’t know if these conversations will help our stage performance, it should be better than yesterday, right?”
Zhang Fu noticed the evasive glances of a few individuals. She blinked thoughtfully, her expression one of understanding as she said, “Seems like you all had a very exciting night. Mm, I believe in you. Today’s rehearsal will definitely be better than yesterday’s. Let’s go!”
That’s true… but what is that meaningful look of yours? What do you think you understood!
The group hesitated, wanting to speak, but cooperatively changed the subject, too embarrassed to probe further into this matter.
*
The trainees’ rehearsals progressed calmly, day after day passing by.
On the day after the seventh episode of “Next Stage” aired on Sunday, the curtain quietly rose on the third public performance.
Just like the previous public performance, the number of tickets for the third public performance was increased by 500 on top of the last count. However, the venue was not changed. The recording site for the second public performance was sufficient to accommodate 1500 audience members.
The lottery process for ticket distribution had concluded a week earlier. The audience members who won tickets had already booked their flights and hotels, arriving one after another from all over the country.
Even after eliminating so many people, the support spectacle outside the public performance venue this time was not the slightest bit weaker than during the second public performance; it was even more grand.
Even the inflatable advertising balloons typically used only for large-scale events had been crowdfunded and set up by fans. And they were extravagantly done, with each balloon printed with one character, strung together to read…”(Heart) Quentin (Heart)”.
“Oh ho.”
Xue Mingzhu spotted this scene with his sharp eyes and clicked his tongue in wonder: “Hey, Quentin, see that? Your fans are still as powerful as ever.”
Quentin had already learned about the financial power of several wealthy fans from the system the night before. But seeing it now with his own eyes, he still could not help but stare and take in the sight for quite a while, and he did not forget to have the system take a photo.
Fang Xu beside him reminded in time, “Let’s get off soon. Go inside early to rehearse, see if we have time to run through it a couple more times. If we finish early, we can still come out and look around.”
The effect of Quentin’s team’s final rehearsal last night was actually already quite good. But these guys were all perfectionist scroll kings. The result of seven scroll kings gathering together was…
On the day of the official public performance, everyone woke up early and proactively requested the production team to send them to the venue early to rehearse.
Originally, they planned to catch the production team’s bus. Unexpectedly, Director Wang was exceptionally cooperative. He specially freed up a commercial vehicle and had a staff member from the team drive it, following behind several other cars and giving them a ride on the way.
Quentin and the others arrived too early. There were not many fans gathered outside the public performance venue yet. Only large support items like flower walls, balloons, and food trucks had been placed early in an orderly fashion at various spots.
Fans could recognize that the newly arrived cars belonged to the production team, but no one imagined there were trainees inside them.
As everyone knew, before an “NS” public performance, trainees uniformly arrived at the site in the black-and-gold logo shuttle bus. The people in these vehicles must be production team staff coming early to prepare for the public performance.
So initially, no one paid attention to the people getting off the vehicles, much less scrutinized the champagne-colored commercial vehicle trailing at the end of the convoy.
However, Quentin and the others had no intention of sneaking into the venue behind the fans’ backs. They were all directly wearing their training uniforms.
There was over a hundred meters distance from the commercial vehicle to the venue entrance. As they walked over, the familiar clothing color scheme flashed through the peripheral vision of nearby fans.
Fans: …?
Strange. It seemed like something red and white just went by. Something oddly familiar.
“!!!”
The girl who was busy organizing banner props in her box straightened up, tilted her head back, and took a big gulp of ice water. Just as she breathed a sigh of relief, she inadvertently glanced across the street and her eyes instantly widened. Before the water was even fully swallowed, she choked violently several times.
“Ahem ahem ahem! Wait… I, I think I saw… Quentin?”
She pointed across the street in shock while coughing, saying in a daze: “Am I dizzy from the heat? Or suffering from heatstroke? How am I hallucinating?”
Another girl on the other side, who had spotted the figures earlier, had a stunned expression. After coming back to her senses, she erupted in ecstasy: “No, it’s not a hallucination. I saw Xiao Xue. That red hairband is definitely him ahhhhhhh!!!”
“What? Who? Where did you see them?”
“Fuck! Is it that group behind the cars?! Look at what they’re wearing! It’s definitely them!”
“Qi Yang! I saw Qi Yang!! I’m going over! Nobody stop me!”
“Fuck, this old lady’s makeup is all ruined from the sun. Why did they show up so suddenly? I don’t even have time to touch up my makeup!”
“So many from Class A. Is this the grouping for the third public performance? Impossible. How could they let so many Class A members be in one group…”
“Quentin is here? Where’s Quentin? Why don’t I see him.”
“Yeah, I didn’t see him either. Which one is Quentin? Tch, why are there so many cars parked? I can’t see clearly…”
“Eh? Why does it look like there’s yellow hair in there? Can you even dye your hair for the public performance?”
“Blonde probably… That color is really nice though. So light. It’d need at least five or six rounds of bleaching.”
“Who else is there? Is my bias there? If not, I won’t go join the crowd.”
“Xue Mingzhu, Yan Qiao. That tall one must be Cui Yan. The pale thin one in front should be Fang Xu…”
“Are Class A trainees this intense? They came early to rehearse? Wait, if they’re all here, how could Quentin not be there!”
Fans across the street craned their necks excitedly to get a better look. The quickest to react were already dashing toward the crosswalk, looking left and right as they hurried across the road.
Meanwhile, on this side of the road, the fans sharing the same path as Quentin and the others were even more bewildered.
The surprise came too suddenly. They simply could not react in time!
