Chapter 8

Cheng Lang held his guitar, looking utterly defiant. "As long as the money's right, you could make me sing a two-person folk duet!"

The customers below burst into laughter.

The customer who had spoken earlier did not know whether to laugh or cry. He directly tossed up a wad of cash, though he did not ask Cheng Lang to sing a folk duet. Instead, he requested a classic old song from thirty or forty years ago.

Two hours later, Cheng Lang stepped down in triumph.

As soon as he got offstage, Cheng Lang checked his phone. There were slightly more comments beneath his two social media accounts. Everyone seemed to have started treating Cheng Lang's alt account as an emotional confessional. Some talked about their secret crushes, while others asked who the handsome young man in the photo was.

"Cheng Lang, you sang really well!" The floor manager patted Cheng Lang on the shoulder and said with a smile, "I never knew you had that talent. If I'd known you were such a good singer, you should've applied to be a resident singer from the start. Why come here to work as a waiter?"

"What's wrong with being a waiter? There's no such thing as high or low in honest work, only different divisions of labor." Cheng Lang replied carelessly, "Got any water? My throat's practically on fire!"

The bar's customers had no sense of decency. They clearly knew singing ruined his throat, yet they kept ordering him drinks. Not one of them had sent him water.

The floor manager smiled. "There's no resident singer quite as willing as you to drink whatever people offer."

Cheng Lang did not care. "One drink costs ten thousand yuan."

That had been the rule they set yesterday. Those people spending money were not afraid of being suckers, so why should he, the one making money, be afraid of having too much cash?

The floor manager was completely speechless. "I can't be bothered with you. Go find some water in the back yourself."

Cheng Lang raised an eyebrow. Before looking for water, he went to the restroom first. There were too many people on the first floor, and he could not get in line. So Cheng Lang simply went up to the VIP area on the second floor.

When he came out, he ran into Meng Tianye again in the lounge area. The guy was clutching a bottle of XO and chugging it fiercely!

Cheng Lang frowned and walked over. "Drinking that hard? Do you even want your voice anymore?"

"None of your business!" Meng Tianye shot Cheng Lang a vicious glare. "Feeling pretty pleased with yourself today? All those people are cheering for you. You're really in the spotlight now!"

Meng Tianye could hear the cheers and screams from downstairs even on the second floor. Before yesterday, those cheers and screams had belonged to him. Thinking of that, Meng Tianye could not help feeling bitter. Bitter and angry.

"You're White Jade Capital's new top act, after all. It's only natural you'd get this kind of treatment." Cheng Lang saw complimentary lemonade on the coffee table in the lounge, so he sat down and poured himself a glass.

"Are you deliberately trying to provoke me?" Meng Tianye glared at Cheng Lang. "Did you come over here just to flaunt yourself in front of me?"

"You gave me the chance first." Watching Meng Tianye gulp down drink after drink, Cheng Lang walked over and snatched the bottle from his hand. "Stop drinking. If you really ruin your voice, you won't even know what tune to cry in."

Cheng Lang remembered that in the original novel, after Meng Tianye was abandoned by Lu Chengxuan, he gave up on himself and began drinking heavily. In the end, he ruined his fine voice and was thrown out of White Jade Capital. His ending was miserable and destitute.

"Quit sticking your nose in!" Meng Tianye looked at Cheng Lang impatiently. "Don't you drink every glass the customers order for you too? I've never seen anyone as willing as you to accept anything. It's beneath you!"

"How am I the same as you?" Cheng Lang said with a laugh. "I don't have any musical dreams. I don't want to become a singer or a star, and I'm not counting on singing to make a living."

Cheng Lang remembered that Meng Tianye's dream seemed to be debuting as a singer.

Meng Tianye fell silent. After lying on the sofa for a while, he suddenly said in a muffled voice, "Qin Dynasty Records only signs White Jade Capital's top act as a contracted artist every year." Cheng Lang had taken his position as top act. He had no hope left.

Meng Tianye did not realize that, influenced by Cheng Lang, he too had begun calling people "top acts."

"Why are young people so stubborn?" Cheng Lang shook his head. He had thought it was something serious. "If this path doesn't work, take another one. There are so many talent shows these days. You're good-looking, and you sing well. Go join one. Even if you don't win, you can still make a splash, right?"

By then, he would have fans and buzz. Why worry about no agency coming to sign him?

"A talent show?" Meng Tianye frowned. He did not particularly like that way of debuting. "Don't you know that talent show singers are at the very bottom of the industry's pecking order?"

Meng Tianye still wanted to debut as a proper artist.

"Young people these days, honestly!" Cheng Lang was almost annoyed into laughter. "You haven't even filled your stomach, and you're already worrying about whether an imperial feast suits your taste!"

Cheng Lang shook his head, too lazy to bother with these ambitious dreamers.

"No matter how you want to debut, if you still want to sing, remember to take good care of your voice. It's the only capital you have to achieve your dream." Even the ancients knew that to do a job well, one must first sharpen one's tools. If he could not even take care of the thing that fed him, yet still dreamed of making a fortune, he might as well keep dreaming!

Meng Tianye watched Cheng Lang's back and suddenly asked, "Why are you so good to me?"

Shouldn't Cheng Lang have come over to mock and ridicule him?

"Me? Good to you?" Cheng Lang was dumbfounded when he heard that. When had he ever been good to Meng Tianye? He had no idea himself.

Meng Tianye looked at the bottle in Cheng Lang's hand, silently indicating that this was how Cheng Lang had been good to him.

Cheng Lang shook his head, not knowing whether to laugh or cry, and could not help complaining, "This counts as being good to you? How starved for affection are you?"

After saying that, he ignored Meng Tianye's embarrassed fury and waved his hand. "A few nice words from someone can charm you so much that you lose all sense of direction. I'm telling you, you need to change that personality of yours." Otherwise, when he got taken advantage of in the future, he would not even know who had sold him out.

Chapter 8

"You really know how to treat people tenderly." As Cheng Lang went downstairs, he suddenly heard someone speak.

Cheng Lang looked closely and saw Lu Chengxuan standing in the stairwell between the first and second floors, leaning against the wall. The cigarette between his lips glowed and dimmed.

Noticing Cheng Lang's gaze, Lu Chengxuan gave a scornful laugh. "First Shen Huaiyu, and now Meng Tianye. You seem very interested in my people."