Dad, Please Let Me Support Just One!

Since there were no cameras around and no one had electronic devices on them, these idol trainees behaved far less perfectly than they did on screen.

They chased both profit and the spotlight.

Everyone wanted to stand on the stage, and each had their own choices and tracks.

One trainee took the initiative to strike up a conversation in fluent Japanese. She had a pretty face, humble yet deft phrasing, and an approachable smile on her lips that made it very easy to close the distance between them.

Then, with countdown-level precision, she left behind her name and a preliminary impression before stopping at just the right point and politely bidding farewell with a smile.

She neither caused Kiriwake Yayoi much trouble nor left much room for her to refuse conversation.

It could only be said that it was a highly emotionally intelligent approach.

The remaining contestants who came to greet her were much the same. They were not overly deliberate, yet all planted the seeds for taking the initiative to speak to her next time in front of the cameras.

Chu Wangshu silently played dead, secretly delighted by this and only wanting to make a fortune without drawing attention.

If Kiriwake Yayoi had other friends, she would not keep clinging to Qingqing, right?

Their private world for two was within reach!

Chu Yuanqing blinked and looked towards Kiriwake Yayoi, whose social battery was nearly depleted but who still maintained a perfect smile. Suddenly, she recalled a bullet comment that had floated past while she was scrolling through videos last time.

—Win over a Sakura Girl in three days, because I'm a Great Xia lesbian!

Book recommendation!

A yuri novel written by a good friend.

Synopsis: The Survival Game suddenly disappeared, and Fu Zhen returned to the real world.

After surviving for four years in the game, she was merely a frail, sickly beautiful girl with heart disease in reality. Just as she gave up and waited for death, darkness suddenly descended upon the real world.

[System upgrade complete. The public beta version of Survival Game has successfully connected. We look forward to every player's challenge!]

Only then did Fu Zhen abruptly realize that the game she had played before had been the closed beta version.

The bad news was that, in order to survive in the game, she had resorted to every possible means, including but not limited to:

Deceiving beautiful NPCs with feelings before digging out their hearts.

Gaining the trust of stage Bosses before backstabbing them and digging out their hearts.

And forcibly tearing out hearts after suppressing them with violence.

When the game suddenly ended, she had just dug out the heart of who knew which victim. Her victim's breathtakingly beautiful face was full of disbelief, while she, right before her eyes... ate her heart.

Who could blame her when her own heart did not work properly and she needed someone else's?

But these NPCs and Bosses would not die after having their hearts dug out, while she was now... merely a frail little wretch sitting in a wheelchair!

Sure enough, she should just go die.

Title: <After Backstabbing the Game Boss, They Came to Reality>

Volume One: 36. Standing on the World's Highest Stage.

Pfft.

The moment that sentence popped into her head—

Chu Yuanqing nearly laughed out loud. Of course, she did not think the trainee who had initiated the conversation was a lesbian. She simply found that Kiriwake Yayoi's awkward situation of being "besieged by beauties" unexpectedly fit that line rather well, making it hard not to laugh.

But when she considered Kiriwake Yayoi's suspected people-pleaser personality, she immediately felt a headache coming on.

Could this child really handle it?

Chu Yuanqing was a little worried. As an experienced corporate slave, even if she did not understand the scheming and fighting involved in idol competitions, she could easily see that these trainees swarming over were all here to leech off her and ride her popularity.

The only difference was whether their methods were clever or not.

Thinking that, Chu Yuanqing cast Kiriwake Yayoi a sympathetic glance.

At this stage, the sharing privileges of A-Class contestants had not been completely exposed. At most, they could guess that A-Class contestants could bring people into their own practice rooms, but they could not imagine that the usage privileges for certain valuable equipment could also be transferred.

The real test would be the tsunami that followed once the rules were fully revealed.

But... things could still be easier for now, right?

After thinking for a moment, the girl seized a gap when no one was trying to strike up a conversation. She grabbed Kiriwake Yayoi's sleeve with her slender hand, signaling for her and Chu Wangshu to follow, then lengthened her stride and quickened her pace.

What should one do if one did not want to socialize?

Very simple—just act like it was inconvenient to talk.

As for being resented by others, or being caught on camera and interpreted online as ruthlessly leeching off others...

For someone who only wanted to withdraw from the competition and did not have long to live, none of that mattered in the slightest.

Since it did not matter, why not spare this warmhearted Little Idol some trouble?

Thus,

With that mindset, while the other two hesitated as if they wanted to say something but could not, Chu Yuanqing maintained an aloof, uncommunicative attitude all the way. She coolly said "excuse me" several times and, with some inexplicably irresistible aura, forcibly dragged the two of them into the gathering point.

This gathering point was not in the original Competition Venue. At first glance upon entering, it looked like a university lecture hall.

Its overall palette was ivory white, while most of the decor was made from expensive raw wood. Combined with the virtual scenery of birdsong and blooming flowers outside the windows, as well as the soft lighting that was nearly impossible to distinguish from the real thing, it looked quite fresh and youthful.

Dream Weaver Rabbit sat at the podium like a teacher. Whenever it saw a trainee enter, it would use its pointer to tap the blackboard displaying the seating rules.

Chu Yuanqing glanced at it and was somewhat speechless.

Simply put, it was another rule that thoroughly enforced the class system.

There were currently 168 contestants in Sea Capital's Flash Dance: 14 A-Class contestants, 26 B-Class contestants, 39 C-Class contestants, 41 D-Class contestants, and 48 F-Class contestants.

Using virtual reality projections, this lecture hall divided the floor into different colored sections. It also used five differently designed types of chairs, arranged from high to low. The colored sections and chairs corresponded to one another, making it very easy to distinguish the disparity in rank.

Chu Wangshu blinked and muttered in disappointment:

"Ah, this time we can't choose freely? It's restricted by rank?"

"What a shame. I wanted to sit with Qingqing."

Chu Yuanqing comforted her on the surface, but inwardly she was secretly delighted and even breathed a sigh of relief.

There's Nothing to Be Done. In her current state, she had no authority whatsoever in front of Xiao Shu. Even when she acted extremely cold, she could not bring herself to be fierce with this child.

Mm, that had resulted in even her coldness being regarded as part of her personality.

How tragic. Her daughter was no longer afraid of her at all!

So not sitting together was best. Distance made the heart grow fonder; as long as they sustained the relationship of ordinary friends, it was enough. It absolutely could not develop into the perilous situation of becoming close enough to cling to each other.

Though for some reason, she rather enjoyed being clung to, and Xiao Shu did not have any bad intentions, the deeply ingrained male way of thinking still made her extremely resistant to physical contact with her daughter.

Besides... enjoying it was completely a sign that she was beginning to fall!

The more Chu Yuanqing thought about it, the more right it seemed. She eagerly said goodbye to the little girl and was about to sit in the most secluded corner among the C-Class seats, but before her hopeful little steps could take her away, her sleeve was abruptly tugged.

—It was Kiriwake Yayoi.

Who knew what this girl had imagined? Her eyes held restrained gratitude. She gave Chu Yuanqing no chance to speak. After grabbing her sleeve, she naturally wrapped both arms around her and actually gave her a fleeting, dragonfly-skimming hug in public.

Then,

The Little Idol made an adorable cheering gesture with her hand before walking toward the highest tier under Chu Wangshu's gritted-teeth stare from afar and sitting in the area assigned to A-Class contestants.

Chu Yuanqing was faintly annoyed and at a loss. Maintaining a straight face under the subtle gazes of everyone else, who looked at her like a femme fatale, she sat in the corner of the C-Class section, filled with the urge to viciously pinch the other girl's cheeks until they swelled.

Damn it, I did that to make things easier for you, not so you could take the initiative to leech off me!

Why are you so easily moved? Are you an idiot?!

Well, if she knew the bitter history of how Kiriwake Yayoi had once been badly betrayed by her teammates, she would probably understand why things had developed this way.

Chu Yuanqing was especially vexed. She was not afraid of being called a scheming green tea or anything like that, but she was worried about drawing the attention of netizens and increasing the difficulty of getting herself eliminated.

However, as one beautiful trainee after another entered the lecture hall using every trick at their disposal, filling more than half the seats, the anxiety in her heart eased by more than half.

Right. There were so many pretty girls on this show that they were almost impossible to count. Who would care about a contestant with little presence and terrible ability? She was being far too self-conscious.

Chu Yuanqing quickly regained her confidence and became optimistic again, waiting for the promotion and distribution results of the theme song battle with the mindset of watching drama unfold.

Soon, a gigantic screen was projected onto the blackboard. It played MVs customized for the theme songs. Every song was cut very quickly, switching to the next after playing only its most memorable segment.

The eight theme songs were previewed once within two minutes, after which the footage on the screen shifted to the voting page on Flash Dance's official website.

Dream Weaver Rabbit swept its gaze across the trainees in the room. Rather than mentioning the purpose of this gathering, the corners of its mouth curled upward as it smiled with mocking malice.

"Although only twenty-four hours have passed since the last evaluation, you should all have realized the importance of rankings."

"Among you are those who have fallen to F-Class, those who are only one step away from A-Class, and those lingering in D-Class and C-Class who have already accepted that they have no chance at a Debut Spot."

"Do you find it strange? The show has clearly only just begun, yet the goddess of victory seems to have lost interest in you."

"Isn't it unreasonable? Your future victory or defeat, and even your fate as an idol, are determined by your performance on a single stage."

"But idols are precisely those who must constantly overcome such unfairness—who take the stage as their lifeline and burn freely upon it before they can bloom into dazzling beings!"

"Flash Dance's selection mechanism is victory and defeat on the stage!"

"Losers will have years of effort denied, perhaps even be stripped of their right to shine. In the end, even their dreams and beliefs will be trampled underfoot."

"Yet the winners will bathe in flowers and praise, wade through the corpses of every loser, devour the dreams of every rival along the way, temper themselves into something brilliant, and stand upon the world's highest stage!"

Volume One: 37. Is Chu Yuanqing a Succubus?

Dream Weaver Rabbit's words came to an end.

The lecture hall fell silent, yet every word it spoke was like falling streams of fire from the heavens, crashing down upon a boundless wilderness and stirring up a magnificent, scorching sea of flames that ignited everyone's ambition and desire.

Flash Dance's elimination and selection mechanism determined that the average level of resolve among the contestants present was extremely high.

In an instant, every contestant's gaze seemed to burn with dim Fierce fire. Their personalities were completely different, yet they all revealed a similar spirit at that moment, making the atmosphere throughout the room incredibly tense.

The contestants in the upper ranks had especially intense presences.

Chen Yining's smile was dazzling, as though she possessed absolute confidence. Her rose-red contacts were Full of defiance.

She certainly did not think she was the strongest.

But if she wanted to fulfill the promise from her childhood, she had to be a little prouder, a little more confident, and work a little harder. Only by using those things to construct a false yet perfect self would she have a chance of catching up to that person who was, in the truest sense... a genius.

The girl's hair fell over her shoulders in vivid color, and her expression management was flawless. From the corner of her eye, she looked towards that childhood friend in the distance, who seemed to be drifting atop the clouds. The knuckles of the hand hidden beneath the desk tightened slightly, then abruptly relaxed as she withdrew her gaze.

I'll win.

As Long As I'm with Shu Zhu, I'll never lose.

Ji Shuzhu lowered her eyes at Dream Weaver Rabbit. She had already memorized the styles of the eight theme songs and analyzed the specific dance genres in their corresponding choreography from the fragmented clips.

Every movement performed by those dancers was replayed and reconstructed within her mind with the aid of the illness known as Hyperthymesia. Then, through the instincts of her calm and efficient thinking, they were freely broken down into one puzzle piece after another before ultimately being woven into complete dances.

After Ji Shuzhu finished all that, her expression remained completely unmoved. She only found it dull and tedious.

Sure enough, this is boring.

Those dancers were all inferior products, Far Inferior to Xiao Ning.

Only those with the potential to shine—those who could become the best idols—could possibly cut through every negative impurity in the infinitely piled palace of memories and inject Brand new happiness into it.

Ji Shuzhu yearned for happiness.

The depths of the girl's eyes were obscure and unreadable. She stretched out her pale, slender hand and silently covered the center of her Chest cavity, as if she wanted to heal that gap that grew more wrenching and more hollow by the moment, quietly lost in thought by herself.

Xie Qingxuan sat in the center, her expression calm. Her platinum hair clearly resembled that of a blessed angel, yet the glimmer in her eyes seemed to have been crushed apart. The emotions within were like undercurrents, burning jealousy, hatred, envy, fury, and confusion into profound blackness.

Yes, exactly.

Dream Weaver Rabbit was right.

This was why she had joined Flash Dance and stepped onto the stage.

To trample that person's dreams, seize that person's wishes, and strip away that person's existence—how many people's beliefs she had to crush, how many people's passion she had to desecrate, how many people's efforts she had to insult along the way did not matter.

Kiriwake Yayoi was also sitting nearby, but compared to the others, she looked like a normal good child. She was somewhat nervous, somewhat expectant, and her passion for the stage was apparent—a classic idol path.

Further down the next tier were the B-Class seats.