Lin Chudong:...
How could she say that?!
Boss Lady, don't teach her the wrong things! And Jia Lu was so carefree, too. One dared to teach, and the other dared to say it.
"All right, go practice. What time does Super Challenge air?"
"Eight tonight!"
"Boss Lady, are the formalities taken care of?"
"I'm on my way back now!"
Lin Chudong nodded. Everything was going according to plan. Tonight was his first step toward returning to the Music Scene. Whether he succeeded was up to fate.
The band had nothing going for it: a lead singer with no connections, a half-decent drummer, a novice bassist, and a clueless Boss Lady. No matter how you looked at it, they had no future.
Sigh. There was nothing for it but to take things one step at a time.
That evening, everyone sat in front of the TV, waiting to watch the latest episode of Super Challenge.
Lin Chudong wasn't in a hurry. He wouldn't appear until the very end, and the Treasure Chest timer was about to run out, so he could open it first.
The countdown: 3, 2, 1!
Open!
[Red Treasure Chest x1] [Chess Mastery (Master Level)]
Lin Chudong could only smile wryly again.
Good grief, another completely unrelated skill. Chess Mastery? What use was that?
Was he supposed to enter a chess tournament?
That wasn't what Lin Chudong wanted!
Forget it. You could never have too many skills. The most important thing was that the Treasure Chest's quality had improved, going from purple to red.
And this time, Chess Mastery had been granted at Master Level right away. Unlike the cooking skill before, which had only been intermediate, the items in the Treasure Chest were clearly getting better and better.
Open Red Treasure Chest.
[167:59:59]
[Cost to accelerate]: 50000
Seeing two lines of text, Lin Chudong was a little surprised.
This Treasure Chest was a bit different!
The timer was long: opening a Red Treasure Chest took seven days, but he could accelerate it!
He didn't know whether accelerating meant opening it immediately or merely doubling the opening speed.
If it opened immediately, then it was pretty worthwhile. Fifty thousand yuan wasn't a lot, but it wasn't a small amount either.
In the past, Lin Chudong would definitely have spent the money to try it, but now he thought better of it. They needed the money to start a band, and he couldn't explain spending fifty thousand to Boss Lady.
More importantly, the skills he got were always things he couldn't use anytime soon. It simply wasn't worth it.
He'd wait and see what came out of the Red Treasure Chest, then decide whether to accelerate it next time.
Before they knew it, half of Super Challenge had aired, and they'd reached the final segment: the cooking showdown.
On TV, Lin Qiqi sprinted along so fast that the cameramen were all panting and wheezing. The Program Effect was excellent.
Lin Chudong thought for a moment, then used a Lucky Card.
At the same time, Liang Yin had finished setting up her computer.
"Da Fei, I published it successfully! Our band's first song!"
"Chengdu" was now online and had been released. There hadn't been any promotion yet, so its play count was still in the single digits.
Liang Yin kept refreshing the page in the backend and had posted advertisements on her Moments several times, but the play count still hadn't reached a hundred.
"Why is it so slow?!"
"What are you rushing for?" Lin Chudong said. "There's been no promotion, so you might as well consider the play count zero. Let's see how the show goes."
On TV, Lin Chudong made a dashing entrance on an electric scooter, immediately making everyone laugh.
"Holy crap, Brother Fei, you're so cool! You made an electric scooter look like a race car!"
"I can't do this anymore. I'm not watching with you guys—I'm going to watch the live broadcast on my computer. I have to see the Bullet Comments!" Liang Yin cared most about what people online thought, so she went straight into the livestream.
"Da Fei, someone recognized you!"
People in the Bullet Comments had already started recognizing Da Fei, and it set off a chain reaction. In an instant, they all realized who he was.
"Holy crap, Da Fei? The production team must have arranged this on purpose. What were the odds that the random passerby they ran into would be Da Fei?"
"Doesn't seem likely. Da Fei never takes part in variety shows. Maybe they really did just run into him."
"This is hilarious. It really is Super Challenge—kindhearted big brother, Brother Da Fei!"
"Lin Qiqi hadn't even debuted yet when Brother Da Fei was popular, right?"
"Da Fei joined a variety show after leaving his company? Don't you think something's off here?"
"You mean the company put Da Fei on ice and banned him from appearing on variety shows? This is a conspiracy!"
The Bullet Comments were full of all kinds of guesses and analysis, even more unreliable than Wang Zhi's theories.
When the show reached the part where they beat the Special Grade Chef in the competition, the Bullet Comments exploded again.
"My Brother Fei is amazing! Special Grade Brother Fei!"
"I know Fei! His band kicked him out, and he turned around and became a master chef."
"That judge killed me! 'You didn't preserve the original flavor of the ingredients, did you?'"
"Hahaha! What a massive psychological scar!"
The Program Effect really was excellent. They even gave a close-up of the Special Grade Chef tossing down his jacket and storming off at the end.
"Next, please welcome Lin Qiqi's group to perform their talent."
The scene of Lin Qiqi sitting beside Lin Chudong as he stood there was breathtaking. The Bullet Comments were filled with people calling her their wife.
When the camera turned to Lin Chudong, there were plenty of comments, too.
"With Brother Da Fei there, the talent performance is guaranteed to be good."
"I still think it's scripted. Otherwise, it's too much of a coincidence."
"My wife is so talented! She can play and sing, and she sings really well!"
"Mostly because Brother Fei taught her so well!"
As soon as Lin Chudong's voice rang out, thunderous applause filled the venue. The production team even added Special Effects to emphasize the audience's shock.
"Professional is professional! Brother Da Fei is incredible!"
"I love this song. I learned it after listening to it once."
"A university student quietly opens Quanmin K Ge."
"It's not on Quanmin K Ge yet, but it's on QQ Music!"
"A high school student picks up the guitar in his dorm..."
"This song is easy. I've already figured out the chords. Click my profile if you want to learn it!"
"..."
The Program Effect was surprisingly good. Super Challenge was the hottest variety show lately, and every episode generated a ton of buzz.
The production team had carefully edited the episode and given Lin Chudong plenty of screen time. His singing had gone over well, too—perhaps that was the Lucky Card at work.
"'Chengdu' has passed fifty thousand plays!" Liang Yin said.
In the blink of an eye, it had passed the fifty-thousand mark.
It had already entered the Top 100 of the Rising Chart!
The promotional effect was simply unbelievable.
Lin Chudong let out a long breath of relief. The Lucky Card hadn't gone to waste. At this rate, the song could make the Hot Song Chart within three days.
Just then, the door to the Piano Shop suddenly flew open with a bang, and a girl rushed inside in a panic.
"Sorry to bother you. Let me hide here for a bit!"
As she spoke, the girl crouched behind the sofa, right beside Lin Chudong.
Lin Chudong looked her up and down. "Miss, are you all right?"
The girl kept her eyes fixed outside, looking nervous. "I'm fine, I'm fine. Someone's following me. I just need to hide for a while."
Wang Zhi stood up and went to the doorway to take a look. A beautiful young woman out alone at night really wasn't very safe.
Outside, a middle-aged man sitting in a black car some distance away held his phone and spoke respectfully.
"Manager Jing, the young lady went into a Piano Shop."
"All right, Manager Jing. I'll head back to the company now."
With that, the car turned around and drove off into the distance.
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