Chapter 83: The Signing Event (2)
As the signing event went on, the amount of time fans spent with each member varied, and sometimes the seat in front of them would briefly be empty.
Those gaps—just a few seconds, sometimes over ten—were the perfect opportunity for fans in the audience to snap photos.
Lai Yudong had just finished signing for a fan who came specifically for Yin Zizhen. She was the efficient type—getting the autograph and then immediately rushing off to the next person. The next Starseeker was still sitting in front of Su Junzhe, with a little time left on the clock.
Just as he set down his pen, he faintly caught voices calling from below the stage.
“Yuzu! Look at the camera!”
“Lai Yudong!”
“Yuyu! Look this way, darling!”
Yuzu-fans’ voice was almost drowned out in the noise of the venue, one call after another teetering on the edge of breaking. They were urgently trying to grab their idol’s attention, unwilling to miss even a single second.
The boy with pale blond hair lifted his head at the sound. A silver chain draped across his high, straight nose, looping back around his ear and swaying in the air. Against his cool, finely sculpted features, the sparkling rhinestones showed no trace of cheap plastic—on him, it looked like a luxury piece carved out of diamonds.
Guided by the striking primrose color, he quickly located the source of the voice.
His gaze lingered; the corners of his lips curved faintly. The look that entered the fans’ lenses was like a deer strayed into a fairy-tale forest—eyes shimmering, graceful and composed.
The shutters below clicked furiously.
Unfortunately, the next Starseeker stood up and walked over, forcing him to pull back his gaze and turn his attention to the person before him.
Switching back and forth between “squeezing in fan service” and “one-on-one interaction” became a repeated rhythm.
The questions and requests from fans kept coming endlessly, and for Lai Yudong—someone with no prior signing-event experience—many of them were far beyond what he had anticipated.
It wasn’t like the show’s deadly “trap questions” designed to dig pits for them—he just hadn’t expected fans to ask these kinds of things.
Fortunately, he was able to answer them with ease.
Yuzu-fan: “Yuyu, what’s your major?”
Lai Yudong: “Broadcasting and Hosting.”
Fan: “Wow, I guessed right! Please, read this tongue twister for me!”
Lai Yudong: “? Sure.”
Yuzu-fan: “Why did you choose the name Miura Yuki?”
Lai Yudong: “I used to dabble a little in the ACG community…”
Yuzu-fan: “I know that part. What I mean is—what was the inspiration behind it? Does it carry any meaning?”
Lai Yudong: “I searched up Japanese male names. The character ‘佑 (Yu)’ means protection or blessing. Once I settled on the given name, I picked a surname that sounded nice together with it—wait, how do you know about this?”
Yuzu-fan: “Because I dug up your old ID posting history.”
Lai Yudong: “…”
Yuzu-fan: “Hubby, can you go without smiling the whole time?”
Lai Yudong: “Me?”
Yuzu-fan: “Mhm! I want to see you talk to me with a straight face. You look super cool that way! I really love it!”
Lai Yudong: “…I’ll try my best to hold it in.”
Yuzu-fan: “Lai Lai, please use your real name to come up with a support slogan!”
Lai Yudong: “Any specific requirements?”
Yuzu-fan: “Keep it short, easy to remember!”
Lai Yudong: “Through the harsh winter, wings emerge into a butterfly—how’s that?”
Yuzu-fan: “Mm… huh? S-sorry, you’re too good-looking, I zoned out by accident. Can you say it again?”
Yuzu-fan: “If Li Xu and Xu An fell into the water at the same time, who would you save?”
Lai Yudong: “I’d call Liang Zhisheng.”
It wasn’t the show’s kind of extreme, trap-like questions — he just hadn’t expected fans to ask these things.
Luckily, he handled them all smoothly.
Yuzu-fan: “At this moment, Liang Zhisheng’s phone is busy, but the two people in the water are about to drown! You must — and can only — save one. Who do you choose?”
Lai Yudong: “Li Xu. If dyed hair gets into the water it’ll fade and pollute the water.”
Yuzu-fan: “Baby, you’re the most environmentally conscious idol I’ve ever been with.”
In that cheerful atmosphere, the signing event had, without them noticing, already passed the halfway point.
Taking advantage of a brief moment when no one was in front of him, Lai Yudong picked up a bottle of mineral water from the corner, unscrewed the cap, and took a sip.
Not every fan came with a long list of questions — some ran out after two or three, others froze from nerves in front of the real person and forgot everything they’d prepared. They could only stare at him, making a few strained “uh…” sounds with nothing more to say.
That was when he had to step in.
To avoid dead air, his mouth hardly stopped moving; speaking for nearly half an hour left his throat dry. Although Lai Yudong’s fever had broken, he hadn’t fully recovered yet — keeping the mood from turning awkward drained both energy and brainpower, especially because the person in front of him was a stranger he didn’t know.
He couldn’t just blurt out random topics. The usual go-to questions — “What’s your zodiac sign?”, “Where are you from?”, “Have you eaten yet?” — spoken by an idol would only make things weirder.
If the fan tossed him a topic, he couldn’t ramble on just because they were a fan; staff had already reminded them that not every question could be answered.
Lai Yudong set the water bottle down, composed himself, and waited for the next person without a trace of fatigue showing in his eyes.
The next fan happened to be Yuzu-fan.
“Waaah, wife… I almost thought I wouldn’t get to see you…”
Lai Yudong was startled at first, thinking the girl was actually crying. But on closer look, her words and actions were just a little exaggerated.
As soon as this fan, Yuzu-fan, sat down, she wailed dramatically:
“How can Sky be so cruel! To see you just once, I had to go through trials like fetching scriptures from the West, all ninety-nine hardships and eighty-one tribulations — I almost perished halfway!”
Lai Yudong accepted the wizard hat and photobook she handed over.
The hat’s brim was oversized, sticking out far beyond his head, and the star on its pointed tip dangled backward with gravity. The exaggerated design made him look like a senior student walking straight out of Hogwarts.
As he adjusted the hat, he asked, “Was it through voting and drawing lots?”
“Not just that!” Yuzu-fan began listing the organizers’ crimes. “Wasn’t the Galaxy ranking supposed to decide the spots? This crappy list wasn’t even updated in real time, and it didn’t show how many support points each trainee had! It only refreshed once a day at midnight —the rest depends on blind voting!”
Lai Yudong quickly grasped how ridiculous the rules were. “Then you’d be voting without any sense of where you stood?”
“Exactly!” Yuzu-fan was grinding her teeth in frustration. “We had no idea how much we needed to surpass the person ahead, and we had to worry about being yanked down on the last day. So we were cursing the organizers while voting nonstop. The vote only ended last night — right when you were in the hospital. No one knew if you’d show up today, and the organizers acted like the dead, saying absolutely nothing.”
Lai Yudong opened the photobook. “Didn’t the official account release the final list of names?”
“They only posted seven shadowy silhouettes last night — I’d believe it if they told me it was the director — keeping everything under wraps until this morning when they finally released the signing-event lineup. Luckily I’m local, so I didn’t have to worry about travel. But the sisters from out of town agonized over it for a whole day.”
“You’ve all had it so rough.” Just hearing the description made Lai Yudong feel suffocated. He knew too well what it was like to be about to set off without ever getting firm confirmation. “The program team really is heartless.”
“Whoa!” Yuzu-fan covered her mouth in mock shock. She sneaked a glance at the staff behind them, then couldn’t hold back a grin — the kind you share when gossiping with close girlfriends. “Are you even allowed to say that?”
Lai Yudong gave a perfectly straight-faced, “official” answer: “The staff’s reminders didn’t include any rule against it. What the law doesn’t forbid, one may do.”
“That makes sense. Support!” Yuzu-fan clapped in agreement.
Then she went back to her complaints: “The lottery was just as ridiculous. Unlike the performance audience who could register for free, the rest of us were left to fate — and this thing required spending money.”
Lai Yudong grew curious. It was something he had wondered about before. “What exactly were you paying for? This photobook?”
“Nope, the PB is picked up on-site.” Yuzu-fan smiled faintly. “There wasn’t enough time to ship physical copies, so of course it was an e-magazine.”
Though Lai Yudong didn’t know much about idol merchandise, even his shallow understanding told him that virtual goods were the most… indescribable.
Like digital albums, or gacha pulls in mobile games.
Yuzu-fan went on: “The most disgusting part was how the organizers set the e-magazine as limited-time but not limited-quantity. Out of however many copies were sold, only fifty people got drawn. Without cash power, winning was basically like being chosen by fate.”
“Even the rich ladies who spent ten thousand yuan weren’t guaranteed a spot. And the worst part? Not a single cent goes back to you — pure tool behavior.” She sighed. “I originally planned to leave it to fate, not spend more. But that night I was tossing and turning in bed, couldn’t sleep… so I got up and bought five more.”
Lai Yudong paused his pen and looked up. “And one of the five won?”
“Exactly!” Yuzu-fan’s face lit up with excitement. “It must be because I reposted Golden Pomelo and was blessed by the Pomelo Sect!”
Golden Pomelo himself: “…”
He never thought he’d one day replace the koi fish as a bringer of luck.
“But…” Yuzu-fan pressed her lips together. “I’m not totally sure, but the competition for both the third public performance’s center spot and the signing event was fierce. So Miura’s ranking might be…”
She couldn’t bear to voice the deductions that many seasoned survival-show fans were making. But she also didn’t want the recent streak of good fortune to give her idol a false sense of security, only for him to be hurt by the results later.
With the final stroke, Lai Yudong finished writing the designated message and handed the photobook back to Yuzu-fan with both hands.
“Don’t overthink it.” He arched his brows slightly, as if he understood everything. “No matter what the outcome is, it’s the trophy of your hard work. And the fact that I can sit here today is also a gift you’ve fought to win for me.”
A trophy meant victory.
In his heart, he and his fans would always be the victors — victors who had earned love and respect.
“Mhm, we understand!”
Cradling her hard-won, exclusive photobook with reverence, Yuzu-fan made her final request: “Wife, can you do a cheek-heart pose and bless me to draw your photocard?”
It was Lai Yudong’s first time hearing the term photocard.
Based on context, he made a rough guess: “A photocard is an individual photo?”
“Right, you get to draw one before leaving. There are seven sets, forty-nine cards in total, and the hidden version is a group shot of all seven.” Yuzu-fan lowered her voice. “Honestly, I think whoever pulls that one is the real unlucky soul. If you draw someone else, at least you can trade. But who’d want to trade for a group photo? The group hasn’t even debuted yet—there are no group fans to take it.”
She sighed in distress. “Fifty cards in a mixed draw, how could I possibly get yours? I already used up all my life’s luck on those last five e-magazines.”
“A one-in-seven chance — much higher than the lottery. You just might get it.” Lai Yudong blinked. “What does a cheek-heart look like? Can you teach me?”
Yuzu-fan demonstrated in person: “Like this, like this! A super cute move!”
“Got it.”
So it turned out to be a pose requested by the “Horror Box” benefit selfie event.
Lai Yudong set down his signing pen, lifted both hands to either side of his face, curved his fingers into the upper half of a heart, pressed his knuckles lightly against his cheeks, and pointed his thumbs straight down to line up with his chin—half a heart on each side of his face.
With a dazzling smile, he said, “I’ll share my good luck with you—may you always get the things you wish for.”
The one minute ended.
Satisfied beyond measure, Yuzu-fan shouted, “Glory to the Pomelo Sect, my Lord bless me!” and headed straight outside. But after skipping happily just two steps, she was dumbfounded when Mo Li reminded her, “Um… I don’t think you’re supposed to skip anyone’s turn?”
“…I’m so sorry! I was dazzled by Yuzu—no, I mean, my head was completely filled with pulling photocard luck, my soul flew away! I didn’t mean to jump over you! I’m really, really sorry!!”
