CHAPTER 311: FIRE AND ASH FAMILIA (7)

While the audience was applauding the great performance, which was quite different from the previous slog of ballads that had progressively gotten slower and sadder, the chats of people watching it live were blowing up.

└ Woah, they killed it!!

└ The Korean cameramen are unmatched. This performance looked amazing from home!

└ Jamie, who did your parents sacrifice for you to sing so well!! This would be perfect if that person weren’t on the team.

└ Woobin! Noona is proud! If only you weren’t grouped with that one.

└ When did Levi learn to sing like that?? Huh? I thought he was a rapper.

└└ You know his mom has been on Broadway. Of course, he knows how to sing!

└ My golden puppy! You did so well. Look at him smiling so happily.

└ Ahh, Justin. Even with your leg in a cast, you’ve worked so hard. Good job! I’m proud of you!

└ Even though it’s the same song I’ve always listened to, the vibe this time is so different.

└ I hate to admit it, but I might like this style better than the original

└└ Same. I always thought the bright sparkly outfits didn’t fit at all! The lyrics are bout sticking with someone through hard times. Why did they look like they were going to a disco party?

└└└ Don’t you ever disrespect the Golden Generation like that again. Nothing. NOTHING could beat their original performance. JM is a god among men. Everything he touches goes gold. Nothing can compare to him.

└└└└ Oh, brother, who activated Midas? They’re about to go crazy

As the chat continued scrolling, the panting, sweaty boys turned to face the judges, who were clapping with what looked like genuine smiles.

Shin Ji-yong spoke first, looking over each of them with interest before his gaze stopped at Ari.

"I know I shouldn’t speak first, but I just wanted to say that I enjoyed your performance. Before we get into it, do you all have a team name to go with this different concept?"

As his teammates’ eyes turned to look at him, Ari brought the microphone to his lips.

- booooo

- boooooo

Just as he was about to speak, he heard boos coming from a couple of places, before dying off as he glanced at those areas.

What he really wanted to do was to start booing them back, but remembering that he had to act like a proper team leader after almost messing up the beginning of the performance, he simply laughed and shook his head before speaking.

"Our team name is the Fire and Ash Familia."

"Ohh. Interesting. Is there a meaning behind it?" Shin Ji-yong asked as he leaned forward.

As Ari brought the microphone up to his mouth, a few boos started.

He put it down, and they stopped.

He put it up, and they booed again.

As he put the microphone up and down quickly, the boos started and stopped before somebody screamed.

- shut up, you rude punks!

Alright, enough playing around.

There’s no need to get rowdy.

Justin glanced over at Ari, who simply shook his head before gesturing for him to talk.

If the people wanted to boo, let them boo.

He would just stay quiet.

He was quite tired anyway, and sooner or later, it would all be corrected.

"Before you answer, I would like to make it clear that this is not a venue for tolerating rudeness toward any contestant who will be performing on this stage. If you can’t uphold the basics of courtesy and decorum, then this might not be the place for you." Shin Ji-yong calmly spoke to the audience before turning back to Justin, "Go ahead."

└ Woah! Big Boss Shin is putting people in their places!

└ Good! Even if you don’t like somebody, booing them is too much. That’s so embarrassing.

└ Keep that behavior online and outside the venue! I just hope no Melodies were participating in that nonsense.

└ Am I the only one feeling kind of bad for Ariel? Getting booed live is harsh.

└└ Yes.

└└ yes lol

└└ Don’t say that name. If you do, a tennis ball comes flying at your face, and Chloé Laurent casts a spell to make your clothing strangle you.

Having received permission, Justin cleared his throat.

"Uhm, ahem, well, when we were trying to figure out how to incorporate me into the performance because of my injury, and I was feeling like a burden to the team, Team Leader Ari commented that humans are like pieces of wood lit on fire. You’re valuable when you’re young, burning brightly, and the more pieces that work together, the bigger the blaze, and the brighter they shine. But eventually that wood turns into ash as time passes, and your body breaks down due to injuries and age. But becoming ash is not the end. It doesn’t mean that you’re useless or that you should quit, and there might still be an ember inside the ash that can still burn brightly; it might just have a different use than before, so both the process of becoming a roaring flame and eventually turning into ash should be enjoyed. So...uhm...yeah. We’re the team of fire and ash that wants to shine brightly with everyone."

Justin trailed off as he saw Shin Ji-yong watching him intently.

"That is actually quite poetic. It makes me want to crack your head open to see how you came up with it. How did you come up with that, Team Leader Ariel?" Shin Ji-yong turned to look at Ari with an interesting smile.

"I can’t take credit for that. I saw a movie trailer with a similar title when I was walking around, and had a weird dream about phoenixes and being reborn in ash and fire while singing the song by Golden Generation, so I just told him what I saw in my dream. He’s the one putting poetic meaning to it."

"Is that so? I want to have dreams like that. What were you doing to have that dream?"

"Practice so hard that you end up passed out on the practice room floor."

"That’s standard. Anything else?" Shin Ji-yong asked calmly.

The foreigners might not be used to it, but practicing this much was standard for trainees in Korean entertainment companies who were fighting to debut.

It would be even worse when they debuted due to the horribly packed schedules.

"Nope. Just practice as a group until you want to die, and if anyone has the energy to complain, add another hour of practice and do it all again. Then, when you go to sleep, you’ll have the best dreams because you’re so tired. Or you won’t dream at all, so it’s a win-win." Ari smiled gently, and his teammates, except for Jamie and Levi, began to hug themselves while shivering as they remembered the dreaded words ’again’ while green eyes stared like lasers.

’Do it again.’

’Just one more time.’

’Again.’

It was nightmare fuel.

Seeing the expressions, people in the chat began laughing.

└ They’re afraid lol

└ Why are they shaking?

└└ Wouldn’t you be shaking when someone who slices people’s faces with tennis balls smiles at you while telling you to practice until you want to die?

└└└ He said if you complain, another hour of practice is added. Yeesh.

└ What kind of practice are they doing?

└└ Death practice with tennis balls sent to **** you if you don’t listen. Keep up.

"Interesting. Well, I’ll let the others give their review first. Aimee?"

Shin Ji-yong placed his microphone down while glancing at the older Korean woman who began speaking slowly in English.

"I think vocally, you all did well. You kept the original key, and there were little to no mistakes. Especially the two of you. You did well, but most especially you. I believe they said your name is James?" Aimee glanced at the long-haired blonde boy, who had recovered his breath the quickest out of all the boys on stage and whose smile had stiffened earlier.

"Yes! But you can call me Jamie!"

"Jamie then. I think you did a fantastic job today. You have great breath control and vocal techniques, and I could feel your emotions pouring out of each word you sang. It was quite a lovely performance." Aimee looked at Jamie with pleased eyes.

As a more traditional singer with classical training, she was accustomed to the lighter, clearer, and airy sound found in Korean pop singers, so hearing someone with depth to their voice, even when hitting those high notes, was quite pleasing.

Especially as he still managed to stand out from the red-haired kid on his team, who had a more distinct tone that caught the ear more.

She could tell that this was a kid who really liked singing, had put in a lot of work, and it made her really want to nurture him.

"Thank you!" Jamie smiled brightly, his entire face sparkling at the praise.

"I guess I’ll go next." Kim Young-woo picked up his microphone as he considered what to say. "I liked the story you were trying to tell with the canes, the team name, the outfits, and the choreography changes to help accommodate Justin’s injury without leaving him out. While some parts of the choreography were a tad sloppy and looked like they came from amateurs, the complete performance came together quite well. I’ll be highjacking some ideas that I saw today when I have to come up with choreography for groups that have an injured member. Good job to each of you for making those changes and executing them on stage. I know it couldn’t have been easy."

They each nodded before glancing over at the leader of Golden Generation, who was the one they really needed to impress.

JM had a neutral expression on his face, which reminded Ari of the words they exchanged the last time, where the senior idol had made it clear that he would not approve of any changes to their song.

Why Ari had honored that vocally, on the other hand, visually....

Well, let’s say 65% was kept.

Technically, that was a passing grade, but as someone who had never gotten a grade that low in his life, Ari wanted to hear good words from the idol.

Especially because everyone had worked really hard to try to incorporate the changes he pushed for.

It would suck if they got a public lashing here.

After several seconds, JM began speaking slowly.

"I remember that we had a meeting with you all to help smooth some performance details out, and Team Leader Ariel pushed back because Mingyu and I recommended that Justin sit off to the side during the performance because of his injury. Because that’s what’s always been done, because it’s less burden on other people who already have so much on their plates, and it won’t disappoint the fans. Today, you made my advice null and void, and if I were Justin, I would be happy to be on a team where the leader fought for me to be included in the performance and didn’t treat me like a burden. I’m glad that you pushed back and that your team stood behind you in making that decision. All of you represented our song well, and to get this all done in a week is amazing. It looked great on stage, and like Kim Young-woo nim said, I might steal this outfit idea and maybe some choreography for whenever we do an encore stage in the future. It looked quite cool."

"Thank you."

"Thank you."

"Thank you."

Since everyone had already spoken, they turned to leave, but a voice stopped Ari.

"Ah, before you go. A quick message for you, Team Leader Ariel."

"Yes. Go ahead." Ari stopped to look at Shin Ji-yong.

"That fur coat of yours. I quite like it. It looks very cool."

"Thank you," Ari replied politely while staring at Shin Ji-yong, wondering if he could go now.

"I really, really like it and would love to get something like it as a gift. It looks so cool."

└ Oh no, his I want it disease is acting up again

└ Melodies who are on the ground, please stop Big Boss Shin from embarrassing the BTZ name.

└ Manager. Please come and get Team Leader Shin; he’s acting crazy again!

Somewhat used to the fact that nonsense might come out of Shin Ji-yong’s mouth, especially after their first interaction, where he confidently told Ari he wanted to pluck out his eyes so he could see a reaction, Ari restrained a sigh and held out the fur coat with a polite smile.

"The coat belongs to someone else, so it’s not mine to gift. But if you really want it, I’ll just tell the person who lent it to me that you wanted it. I’m sure I’ll be forgiven."

Whether Chloé ripped Shin Ji-yong a new one after finding out that he took her coat had nothing to do with Ari.

The man had grown so he could deal with that crazy, drunk lady.

And although Ari meant well, the chat didn’t feel that way.

└ What is he pretending for? Hiding the name like he’s a big shot. We saw the photo opp you had with Chloé freaking Laurent and her post about you. Why are you pretending she’s some random woman?

└ I hate people who flex unnecessarily.

└ He’s always trying to be cool and mysterious.

└ He’s trying to pretend he’s lowkey and poor again to get sympathy votes. News flash! Everyone knows you went to a private school in France and grew up with Chloé Laurent! That won’t work anymore!

"Ah, I’m kidding, I’m kidding. And of course, I know you got it from Madame Chloé Laurent. You know I like to joke around, right? From your fun eyes and expression to that fun dance challenge together, we now have lots of inside jokes between us, right?"

"Sure?"

Our sense of humour is different, but whatever floats your boat. Just let me go.

"Ohhh, you guys did a dance challenge together? You really like the contestants, huh?" JM commented, a bit interested in how friendly Shin Ji-yong was being.

Usually, he was a bit antagonistic towards talented juniors, but he seemed to like this contestant quite a lot.

"Ah, oops." Shin Ji-yong covered his mouth in shock, "Is that a spoiler? I guess they haven’t published any of them yet? If so, sorry PD-nim. It was an accident."

Even though Shin Ji-yong looked quite sincere, for some reason Ari thought that he was just pretending to be shocked.

He didn’t know what was going on between him and the PD, or if he was just bored, but Ari really wanted to leave the stage.

Unfortunately, there was a giant camera in his face, so, since he had to play along, he smiled politely before looking away.

Please release us from the stage.

I absolutely hate dealing with this maniac.

"Ahhh. There are the eyes I was looking for. I was wondering when they would pop out. Well, I’ll let you go. If you see Madame Chloé, please put in a good word for me. Okay? "

"Of course."

Never in a million years!

Ari vowed silently.

Bowing his head toward the judges once more, he tossed the fur coat over one shoulder, grabbed his cane, and walked off the stage with his teammates back to his seat.

And with a relaxed body, mind, and spirit, Ari sat down and watched the rest of the performances.

Nebu1a’s performance was boring, and Ari agreed with Jamie’s feedback.

William’s was okay.

He did well, but Choi In-su and Taeyong sounded terrible, and their stats were lower than usual, making it clear where William got his boost from.

And finally, Benjamin’s team, the final performance of the night.

All Ari had to say was-

Wow.

Seeing Benjamin’s team’s performance, he could only laugh as the audience screamed the fan chants while waving trumpet-shaped lightsticks, which were representative of BTZ that they had pulled out from who knows where.

In fact, more than half of the audience had those trumpet-shaped lightsticks, which were crazy impressive and a bit humbling.

Before this, if you asked Ari if he thought his team could get first place, he would have replied Maybe.

But now, after seeing Benjamin kill it on stage?

Mmm.

It would be a bit hard to get first place within the Pop Star Academy groups and overall, as well.

It was a bit unfortunate; he really wanted to get first place with this performance.

While Ari thought his team did as well as they could, the combination of Benjamin and Carlos on a vocal and rap-heavy hip-hop song was already a cheat code since that was right in both their wheelhouses.

Add in the fact that it was a BTZ song, and that cheat code turned the chances of victory from 50% to 99.99%.

As Areum took the stage once more to begin announcing the winning team, Ari wondered if NOVA had successfully held up its part of the bargain.

It couldn’t be that he was cheated, right?

NOVA had once said it admired the tactics of the PDs to force them to work and never pay up.

A large blue screen immediately filled Ari’s vision with the edges tinted red.

[I sense that you’re doubting me.]

[Don’t ever do that again.]

I didn’t even say anything!

Are you sure that you can’t read my mind?

[Just sit back.]

[Relax.]

[And watch the chaos.]

I can’t watch the chaos when you’re taking up my vision.

Shoo!

"The team coming in third place, according to the audience and judge vote, is-"

Areum pointed to the large screen behind her, but instead of a fun graphic displaying the winning team name and members, it was a blank blue screen that seemed to glitch red, sending audio feedback ringing through the speakers at an headache-inducing volume.

As everybody clutched their ears in pain, Ari could barely hear Areum apologizing profusely.

"I’m sorry, it seems we’re having some technical problems."

As the audience began muttering, wondering what was going on, the noise suddenly stopped, and the image on the projector transformed into a tennis court that had a blonde boy in a red tracksuit on one side and a boy with a red and black two-block haircut wearing a yellow tracksuit.

As if it were a movie, the clip played with multiple angles and replays, showing William smashing the ball at Suzuki Rei’s face.

There was a harsh whistle blown before the camera panned to William’s smirking face, and then his mocking voice could be heard.

{Ah, I’m sorry. I tried to control my strength, really. I’ll try to do better, but he should just get out of the way next time. He has eyes, doesn’t he?}

Then the clip showed William smashing the ball at Suzuki Rei again before repeating on a loop.

{Ah, I’m sorry. I tried to control my strength, really. I’ll try to do better, but he should just get out of the way next time. He has eyes, doesn’t he?}

{Ah, I’m sorry. I tried to control my strength, really. I’ll try to do better, but he should just get out of the way next time. He has eyes, doesn’t he?}

{Ah, I’m sorry. I tried to control my strength, really. I’ll try to do better, but he should just get out of the way next time. He has eyes, doesn’t he?}

Feeling several eyes on him each time William’s words replayed on the large screen, Ari blinked innocently before responding.

"Why are you staring at me like that? I have nothing to do with this."

[The lying show is on again.]

[But I don’t mind.]

[They’re not the only people who can edit videos.]

[Let’s set this place on fire and burn it down to ashes.]

[Hehe.]