Chapter 102: Support Displays
“Wow—”
Xu Mingmei’s mouth fell open.
Outside Hongyuan Stadium was a huge open plaza, and it was already filled up with the different fanbases’ support displays.
At a glance, it was a riot of colors.
Xu Mingmei immediately spotted her group’s flag. The flag’s surface was in silvery blue—
The background was a perfectly deep shade of blue, overlaid with a flowing galaxy-like moonlight, sprinkled with silver-foil stars.
When the wind blew, the flag shimmered in the sunlight like ripples of light on a lake’s surface.
“Our fan site is just too amazing…”
And the flag was only one part of it. Together with the exquisitely decorated flower wall and the breathtaking standees, you could see exactly where the money had gone.
Peng Tao glanced at a few neighboring groups’ printed flags. “Other fans are saying Tide is deliberately trying to step on them. Do we even need to do it on purpose?”
For marketing accounts, fan wars meant traffic, which meant profit. So as soon as the different support setups appeared, they immediately lit the fuse.
They rushed to post: [The support walls for Starlight’s finale night are here, which one is your favorite?]
The bystanders caught the scent of drama and rushed over eagerly. After looking through more than a dozen pictures, they were left speechless.
Respect to the marketing accounts—but were these support walls even in the same league? And they were still trying to compare them?
Yue Zhaolin’s flower wall had a deep blue base, covered with glittering material of varying shades, as if scattered with stardust.
In the middle of the wall, light strips were connected into the shape of a half-moon. With the refracted sparkle of rhinestones, it looked like hazy moonlight.
Thread-like “shooting stars” cascaded from the top of the wall, fixed into curved arcs.
Hidden among the neatly arranged clusters of flowers were tiny lights that flashed rhythmically, piecing together the shape of tides that surrounded the “moon.”
The effort—or lack thereof—was obvious at a glance.
The other trainees’ displays were practically serving as Yue Zhaolin’s comparison group. Among the top ranks, Cen Chi’s in particular looked the most pitiful in contrast.
His flower wall was made of five folded pure yellow panels, decorated with flowers and balloons, but for some reason, it all looked sparse.
The support color was too garish, and the life-size standee placed in front stuck out awkwardly.
It gave off a strong sense of perfunctoriness.
[Putting Yue Zhaolin’s support wall here is basically a dimensionality-reduction strike] — 57k likes
[Yue Zhaolin’s is the best-looking] — 53k likes
[Was Yue Zhaolin’s support wall placed last on purpose, to lower expectations first and then stun everyone? Nice move, I admit I’m impressed] — 51k likes
[This is all money…] — 49k likes
[Some groups should really be investigated, their support walls all look copy-pasted. Better make sure the money collected from solo fans didn’t just turn into down payments for seaside apartments] — 47k likes
[Cen Chi’s looks so cheap…] — 37k likes
[Can I say this? Fu Xunying’s fan site has terrible taste. This green doesn’t look like fireflies, it looks like dung beetles. Gross.] — 33k likes
[Deng Yangbing’s fan site—are they unwilling to spend? The setup looks so petty] — 27k likes
[Yue Zhaolin’s flower wall is so heartfelt, it feels like a love letter from fans to him] — 25k likes
Flower walls were a common form of fan support. The bystanders had played judge countless times before, but this time the winner was beyond dispute.
The top comments were almost unanimously in favor of “Yue Zhaolin’s group” while mocking other walls.
Other fans were unhappy but had no way to refute it. All they could do was throw shade, saying the marketing accounts were bought off by Xingqiong and were hyping things on purpose.
Xu Mingmei clicked her tongue. “If other fans aren’t hyping, is it because they don’t want to?”
This was debut-night support, and just like the top comments said, it was a love letter to the idol—how could anyone half-ass it?
Other groups failing to hype things up—was that somehow Tide’s fault for being too good? Did that make sense?
Peng Tao glanced at Cen Chi’s support wall. Yeah, it really wasn’t good-looking.
Over on Cen Chi’s Super Topic, fans were already raging. The finale-night support wall was supposed to be a chance to win face for their idol, so how could the fan site drag them down instead?
Casual fans had bought merch, and pooled money into the fan site—where had all that money gone?
Online outrage soon spilled over into offline reality.
Some felt dirty laundry shouldn’t be aired in public, but those who had spent money felt duped, and went straight to the flower wall to confront the fan site admins.
The arguing didn’t resolve anything.
Later, it was discovered that the admins weren’t even real die-hard Cen Chi fans. They had opened the fan site just to grab money, then turned around and spent it buying albums for another Korean idol… but that was another story.
As for now, at this late stage, re-doing the flower wall was impossible. The fan site had no money left, and casual fans couldn’t do anything about it.
Both of them could hear the noise coming from that side, leaving their feelings mixed.
Debut-night support wasn’t just a competition between eighteen fan sites—it was also an expression of devotion to the idol. If the fan site flopped, of course the fans would be devastated.
Xu Mingmei said, “Sigh, forget it. It’s not our problem. Let’s go check in at the wall.”
But just as she turned around, she bumped into someone. Xu Mingmei hadn’t even gotten a good look yet, and instinctively blurted out, “Sorry, are you okay?”
The other person replied, “Daijo—ah, it’s fine.”
Huh?
Xu Mingmei noticed how the unfinished word sounded a lot like the Japanese “daijobu.” Just then, another girl walked over and asked what had happened.
Later, she learned that the two were Japanese exchange students. Only one of them had a ticket, but they had come to the city together.
And with just a little asking—they were fans of the same idol!
Meeting fellow fans from another country, the group of them happily chatted away.
The two girls said they had seen Yue Zhaolin’s banners in the mall, and even on the big screens in the subway and the airport.
At their hotel, the scrolling marquee at the entrance read, [Welcome Tide fans of Yue Zhaolin], and just earlier they’d even spotted Yue Zhaolin’s support bus.
For them, it was an incredibly joyful experience.
The four of them were in the middle of talking when suddenly a commotion rose up.
“What’s that…”
…
It was an airship.
Tide always had a mysterious sense of ceremony with numbers—before, it was 1,115 drones, and now, 15 airships.
These support airships were essentially giant balloons. They couldn’t carry people and didn’t fly very high, but the advantage was their sheer size.
So when a whole fleet of airships came floating in, the visual impact was overwhelming.
On the airships was Yue Zhaolin’s portrait, along with a simple line of text: [Yue Zhaolin, happy debut].
Just one sentence. It looked ordinary, yet carried deep affection.
…
The marketing accounts smelled the heat and immediately reposted the fan pictures, writing: [Yue Zhaolin’s airship support—what level is this?]
[What the…]
[Exactly how much money have his fans raised?]
[So are they not planning to live normal lives anymore?]
[Hongyuan Plaza has flower walls, flags, and buses. Outside there are subway, airport, buses, mall screens. Is money really being burned like this…]
[It’s not even dark yet. Wanna bet the International Center building will light up later?]
[Entertainers bring ruin to the nation.]
[Wait, Yue Zhaolin has already debuted?]
Confused netizens were baffled. “Wasn’t debut night supposed to be tonight?”
[Just look at the vote gap—you can already tell Yue Zhaolin’s center debut is set in stone.]
[They’ve given the lower ranks a week or two already, right? Still can’t even catch his shadow. A center gap this wide—it’s like the Great Rift Valley of East Africa.]
[If this group debuts, will it even have group spirit? It’s basically one person carrying the whole team, hilarious.]
[Forget after debut—even now, just seeing this airship support, the other trainees must be feeling unbalanced, right?]
Unbalanced—what could they do about it?
If the gap were smaller, they could still struggle a bit, turn jealousy into motivation. But when it reached the point where they had to look up from far below, then the only option was to lie flat.
That was what Chu Li thought.
Of course, seeing the airships floating above the stadium, he still instinctively felt sour, then nudged Yue Zhaolin to hurry and look.
On camera, this counted as a kind of reaction too.
Yue Zhaolin was wearing his in-ear monitor. Hearing that, he looked up, and a smile spread across his face—the reflection in his eyes rippled like a silent wave.
On the surface he appeared calm and natural, but in reality, he was nervous. Yet at the moment he saw the support, his heart miraculously settled.
Behind him, he had people who had his back.
·
At six o’clock, ticket checks began.
Outside, fans from each group started entering in an orderly fashion. This finale night in the stadium was no different in scale from a full concert.
After entering, there was still about half an hour to wait.
For most of the audience, that wait was both filled with anticipation and hard to endure.
Xu Mingmei and Peng Tao’s seats weren’t in the same section, so they split up—one heading to the east stands, the other to the southeast.
Once seated, Xu Mingmei suddenly felt nervous and sent Peng Tao a message.
“Bzzz—”
Abruptly, the central screen of the venue lit up.
The seats weren’t even full yet. Was it starting already?!
The big screen began playing a video—it was the first public stage, “Necktie.”
Everyone let out a sigh of relief—it was just a false alarm. They were probably playing this to make sure the half-hour before the real start wouldn’t feel too dull.
The cruelty of an offline survival show was thus put on display ahead of time—
Different groups, different performers, different reactions.
The volume of the screams became the most direct—and most brutal—comparison. The trainees waiting backstage could hear it all loud and clear.
Especially when the comparisons came back-to-back, the gap was just too stark. Of course some people would feel hurt and humiliated, but the audience had no obligation to care.
After all, most people had only come to see the ones they liked.
Next came “Dead Leaf Butterfly,” “Toward the Sunset,” “Actually,” “89%,” and “Cold Lover,” one after another.
The moment “Cold Lover” reached Yue Zhaolin’s part, the nearly full audience erupted into a tidal wave of screams.
All the trainees preparing backstage instinctively looked up.
It was a sound that felt almost tangible, crashing through the space and into their eardrums.
The reaction was completely different from any of the earlier screams. Even the most mentally steady trainees couldn’t help but feel shaken.
The gap was just too big.
Staff: “Check the equipment again, it’s time to get ready to go on stage.”
The prompting voice broke most people’s thoughts. With no time to dwell on it, they immediately lowered their heads to check their outfits and microphones.
Onstage, the warm-up stages had ended, and the venue fell into darkness.
The livestream also began simultaneously.
[Is it starting?]
[It’s about to begin?!]
Audience members craned their necks, trying to make out something in the pitch-black hall. But just a second later, the screen lit up.
Against a starry night sky backdrop, lines of text slowly appeared:
[Trainees are like stars.]
[Every star must pass through darkness before it can light up the night sky.]
[Every trainee must surpass themselves through sweat and practice before they can shine with their own brilliance on stage.]
[Tonight, we invite all Star Producers to witness how these stars break through the darkness and illuminate the night sky of dreams.]
[Who is the star you pick?]
As soon as the question appeared, the venue fell into a brief silence. Then, as the audience snapped back, they immediately shouted out the names of the trainees they had picked.
“Yue Zhaolin—!”
“Yue Zhaolin!”
Everyone around was shouting, and Xu Mingmei shouted too, so loudly she nearly made herself cough.
But whether it was because the space was too large, or because she was dizzy from yelling, she still felt like her own voice was drowned out.
The subtitles on the screen faded, replaced by a countdown.
Three, two, one—
On the screen bloomed a red rose fallen to the ground, its thorned stem entwined with a piece of fuzzy red yarn.
The camera followed the yarn upward to a hand draped on the edge of a bathtub. The red thread circled around the pale, slender pinky finger—the contrast of red against white suggestive and intimate.
On the back of his hand lay a single petal, suddenly blown up by the wind.
The lens chased that petal until it landed on his eyelashes. He seemed to be asleep, a not-yet-bloomed flower resting between his lips.
His lashes quivered, as though about to open, and at the same time, beneath him, countless petals and water surged upward, submerging him.
“Ahhh, let me finish watching!”
The sudden switch of shots made the audience cry out.
But just then, the hazy image turned into a fogged-up pane of glass. A hand reached out and wiped—
Wiped out a palm-wide clear space, enough to see the person behind the glass.
The “Sleeping Prince” awoke. A beautiful, striking young man with black hair, a red petal resting in his strands, eyes tilted upward at the corners, lips curved in a smile.
He looked into the camera, and in the section of the screen cleared of fog appeared a single name:
[Yue Zhaolin]
