Chapter 18: Treating a Dead Horse as If It Were Alive

"Heh! Did you think you’d really be singing live?"

Before anyone else could speak, a man sitting behind Huang Daming broke the silence. Garen recognized him as Huang Daming’s assistant from when they entered earlier.

As for Huang Daming himself, he sat there with an air of indifference, wearing sunglasses indoors. His eyes were hidden, but the way his lips curled suggested either a sneer or a twitch.

The assistant, emboldened by his boss’s presence, looked Garen up and down with a sideways glance. "You’re just a rookie who hasn’t even debuted. What if you mess up singing live at an event like this?"

Garen frowned, replying bluntly, "I am a professional singer. I have my principles!"

"What a joke..."

The assistant scoffed. "Which conservatory did you graduate from? Central Music? Huayin? Shanghai Conservatory? And you call yourself a professional singer? Please..."

Garen only smiled calmly, unhurried and composed. "It's true, I never attended a conservatory. I was just a bar singer once. But that doesn’t mean I’m inferior to them. Music is a harsh and arduous journey; the road ahead is long and winding, and I will search high and low to pursue it!"

"Uh—"

Everyone was momentarily stunned. That last sentence—how could it carry such weight and resonance?

"The road ahead is long and winding, and I will search high and low to pursue it!
The road ahead is long and winding, and I will search high and low to pursue it!
The road ahead..."

A few of the screenwriters kept repeating the phrase, their eyes growing brighter each time.

The director, too, savored the words, looking at Garen with curiosity. Such a line hardly seemed like something he could come up with.

And indeed, it wasn’t originally Garen’s line; he had found it on that computer from another world. The phrase had struck him deeply when he first read it, and after reading it several times, he had memorized it.

In this world, Qu Yuan was known, but only as the figure commemorated during the Dragon Boat Festival. For some reason, his works had vanished from cultural memory.

The assistant, for his part, had never been so talked back to before. As Huang Daming’s assistant, countless artists were polite and deferential toward him. Now, he’d been put in his place by a newcomer who hadn’t even debuted yet, and his expression darkened.

Huang Daming, meanwhile, simply turned his head away, clearly unwilling to look at Garen at all.

"Ahem..."

Gao Zishan coughed softly to smooth things over. "Alun, there’s no need to take it so seriously. All premieres do it like this. The sound quality isn’t great, and even if a superstar sang live, there’d be flaws!"

The prep team across the room was visibly displeased by her remark. Poor sound quality? This was Yida’s in-house variety show studio—a venue that had cost over a hundred million to outfit, from lighting to sound to stage and interior design. If this was considered poor, then perhaps only the national broadcaster’s studio would meet her standards.

Wu Chaoyang came over and gave Garen a gentle pull. "Alun, Xiaoshan is right. It’s all to ensure the event goes smoothly and without mishap. Don’t take it to heart."

Garen snorted, unconcerned. "Fine! It’s not like I’m important anyway!"

With that, he went back to his seat and sat down, tuning out whatever the host said next.

At 9:10, the premiere officially began. Garen had originally thought of going out to watch, but his interest was completely spoiled now. Since it was just lip-syncing, he’d go up, strike a pose with the microphone, and get it over with—then head home as soon as possible.

So he simply lay down on the conference table and went back to sleep. Right before dozing off, he told Wu Chaoyang, "Wu, I’m going to nap a bit longer. Wake me when it’s time to go."

"Yeah, sure, get some rest," Wu replied, though he felt uneasy about the whole thing. He hadn’t known in advance about the lip-syncing. If he had, he’d have thought twice about bringing Garen. After all, this was Garen’s first public appearance as a singer. To begin his career with a fake performance could have serious consequences for his future prospects.

Garen slept deeply. In his dream, he was on stage receiving an award at some grand ceremony. Suddenly, a commotion jolted him awake, shattering his award-winning fantasy. Annoyed, he opened his eyes and looked around, only to find that Wu Chaoyang was nowhere in sight.

Outside, all the staff seemed to be rushing toward the front hall. Garen’s heart skipped a beat—had something gone wrong at the premiere?

He stood up, walked to the door, and stopped a staff member. "What happened?"

The staffer glanced at the badge hanging around Garen’s neck, saw the words "Premiere Singer," and replied politely, "There’s supposed to be an interactive video call between the lead cast and some netizens, but now there’s someone threatening suicide!"

"What? Suicide?"

Garen was startled, instantly wide awake. He hurried to the entrance of the studio, but the security guard stopped him.

He flashed his badge, and the guard let him through.

Inside, he saw on the large screen the image of a girl with the blue sky behind her. The wind tossed her hair, but she looked calm, showing no fear or panic.

On stage, the production team was huddled together. In the center, Huang Daming held the microphone, his voice tense. "Little sister, let’s talk this through, don’t do anything rash. Think of your family, your classmates, your friends. They love you, they care for you. Please, don’t do anything foolish."

"Thank you, Master Huang! To see you at the end, I have no regrets!" the girl replied, smiling. "In my next life, I hope I can still be your fan, act with you, join your shows..."

Garen felt a chill—this was a life-or-death situation.

He looked around. Reporters were snapping photos, and a female journalist beside him was scribbling out a news article.

Garen asked her, "Excuse me, what’s going on?"

She nodded at the screen. "See that girl? She says she’s a fan of Master Huang and wants to act like her idol, but her family refuses to let her study acting. Now she’s desperate and planning to jump."

"Shouldn’t you call the police?" Garen said anxiously. "That’s someone’s life at stake!"

"They’ve called, but it’ll take time for the police to get here. They don’t even have her address. The police asked us to keep her talking—every minute counts," the reporter replied regretfully. "These stars always look so eloquent on stage, but now they’re at a loss, just repeating ‘don’t jump, don’t jump,’ and nothing else."

There was a note of deep contempt in her voice.

Garen didn’t have time for further thought. He rushed onto the stage, determined to try and help.

Turning things over in his mind, a song from that other world came to him—a stirring, motivational piece he had listened to several times recently and nearly memorized, though he’d never performed it in public.

He had nothing to lose. Desperate measures for desperate times.

He would try—whatever happened next.