After Xia Zhiyi stepped off the stage, she noticed the director's expression... was somewhat strange.
I seem happy, but I also seem conflicted.
He asked curiously, "Director, what's wrong? Why do you look like that?" His performance just now shouldn't have been problematic, right? At least he himself felt it was fine.
It was just a matter of showing off a few skills; it wasn't a show that required repeated rehearsals. In Xia Zhiyi's eyes, it was practically the same as getting up early to practice swordsmanship.
The director's feelings were truly complicated.
The stage effects were amazing!
Even after the assistant director boldly suggested lowering the background noise, and eventually there was no background noise at all, yet it didn't affect the performance on stage at all, the director felt like he was looking at a mountain when he saw Xia Zhiyi.
He heard it all backstage: the whooshing sound of Xia Zhiyi's movements and the buzzing of the sword. Even the director, a middle-aged man, felt his heart pounding and wished he could go up and join Xia Zhiyi.
Oh, but he doesn't know Xia Zhiyi uses sword techniques, while he uses fancy moves.
The director composed himself and said, "It's nothing. President Fu is here today too. Do you want to see him? I can have someone take you there."
Upon hearing this, Xia Zhiyi smiled and said, "No need, I just saw it."
The director gasped, "Is martial arts really that powerful?"
With such bright stage lights, it's practically impossible to see who's in the audience or what their expressions are when you're performing.
Xia Zhiyi: "Hmm, maybe we're telepathically connected?"
Director: "... Alright, I know you and President Fu have a good relationship. Since you also need to change clothes, I just had someone take President Fu to the dressing room to wait for you. You don't need to go looking for him."
Upon hearing this, Xia Zhiyi was pleasantly surprised. Seeing that the director had nothing else to say, she immediately smiled and headed towards the dressing room.
Just then, the contestants went on stage, and the music soon started. Accompanied by a melody full of Xia Country charm, Xia Zhiyi walked through the corridor with a smile and pushed open the door to the dressing room.
The man, dressed in a black suit and seemingly having just come from the conference room, was sitting on a chair in the dressing room. Hearing the noise, he looked up.
Their eyes met, Fu Chi stood up, walked towards Xia Zhiyi, pulled him into his arms, and hugged him tightly.
Xia Zhiyi was smiling and about to speak to Fu Chi when she sensed something unusual in his movements and strength. She asked, puzzled, " Fu Chi? What's wrong? Did something happen?"
Why did you hug him so tightly right away?
Fu Chi did not respond to him immediately, but instead held Xia Zhiyi tightly for a while longer, until Xia Zhiyi couldn't help but say that he was in a little pain, at which point he loosened his grip slightly.
Xia Zhiyi asked, "What's wrong? Did you run into trouble?"
Given Fu Chi's abilities and current status, what could possibly be so troublesome for him?
Fu Chi shook his head, his voice slightly hoarse as he spoke, "You came back to change your clothes? Change first, we can talk after this is over."
Xia Zhiyi: "Are you alright?"
Fu Chi seemed to have composed himself by now, and gave a faint smile, "It's nothing."
Upon hearing this, Xia Zhiyi carefully observed Fu Chi's expression and saw that he had returned to normal. So she put the matter aside for the time being and waited until after work today to have a good heart-to-heart talk with Fu Chi.
Because of Xia Zhiyi's explosive opening performance in the final, related keywords immediately topped the trending searches, quickly attracting a large number of viewers to the live broadcast room. The director was so happy looking at the backend data that he could hardly see his eyes.
After Xia Zhiyi, the previously eliminated contestants were invited back by the production team to dance the theme song together again, which was also a nostalgia-based move by the production team.
Looking at the synchronized movements of the contestants on stage, the director sighed softly to the assistant director beside him, "It's a good thing we prepared this program beforehand. Otherwise, if we had directly followed Teacher Xia's performance into the public performance, the audience probably wouldn't have had time to catch up, and it wouldn't have been fair to the contestants."
The assistant director said awkwardly, "Well, I said before that if we really had Teacher Xia on stage to open the show, it would be a real feast, and the rest of the performances would be just appetizers for most people."
The assistant director had tried to persuade the director before, but the director... wouldn't listen.
The director muttered, "This is my last episode, and I might not have the chance to work with Teacher Xia again... Besides, although the results are a bit too good, isn't it more beneficial than harmful? Look at this backstage data, Lao Liu and the others will definitely think this is the front-end data!"
As we all know, front-end data is often inflated to make it look better; it's just a matter of how much inflation.
For example, some live streams display popularity scores on the front end, which look like the current number of viewers, but are actually the number of people who have entered the room, and they may even count them twice.
For someone like Director Chen, who works behind the scenes, the public image is just for show; when it comes to actually making a resume, you have to look at the backstage.
Of course, we still need to talk about the front-end data when facing the audience, even if everyone knows the inside story, but that's how it looks.
The assistant director glanced at the real-time data, which was still climbing steadily at the moment he was looking at it, and clicked his tongue in amazement. "Then, have them cut more shots of Teacher Xia later."
There's no way around it; after recording so many episodes, even though Xia Zhiyi doesn't show off his skills all the time and mostly acts just like Ordinary Person, he's still captivating.
Director: "Okay."
Xia Zhiyi, unaware of the two directors' ulterior motives, changed into an outfit Xu Chen had prepared for her. Looking at herself in the mirror, she asked Fu Chi, who had been intently watching her, "How do I look?"
Fu Chi: "It looks good."
Xia Zhiyi turned to him and smiled, "That's not what I'm asking. I mean, are there any details that weren't handled well?"
Fu Chi stood up and stood in front of him, reaching out to carefully straighten his collar. As they did so, their eyes met, and Xia Zhiyi smiled and leaned in to gently kiss his lips.
It was just a spur-of-the-moment thing, a quick touch would be enough, but just as Xia Zhiyi was about to pull away, she felt a slight weight on the back of her head, and she met Fu Chi's deep, dark eyes.
Xia Zhiyi: Hmm... it's just a kiss, it shouldn't cause any problems, right?
*
The show progressed quickly, and soon it was Yang Linlin's team's turn to perform. During the stage preparation period, Fu Yunyi glanced at the empty seat next to him and wondered, "Wasn't Xia Zhiyi just going to change clothes? Why has she been gone for so long?"
He had just seen the camera tilt towards him several times, but Xia Zhiyi wasn't there. Fu Yunyi was sitting next to him, and the camera switched to him several times. Every time the camera switched to him, he would subconsciously sit up straight, feeling a little tired.
Xie Linyue, standing to the side, also found Fu Yunyi's words somewhat strange. She smiled and said, "Perhaps something's wrong. Anyway, he doesn't need to play now, so it's fine. Or, should we ask someone?"
Fu Yunyi thought for a moment, then got up to go and see for himself.
Xia Zhiyi returned at that moment.
Fu Yunyi looked up, saw his face clearly, and asked suspiciously, "Did you go and redo your makeup?"
Why are your lips so red?