CHAPTER 229: I CAN’T DO THAT

"Let’s have the judges say some words. Jelissa, you’ve looked quite worried this whole time. Would you like to go first?

"Firstly, Ari, how’s you’re eye? Are you okay?" Jelissa asked. When Ari had gotten hit, she had to be restrained by Selena.

"Never better. Well, that’s a lie, but I feel fine." Ari gave her two thumbs up before stepping back so Rex was in front as the leader, making her smile in relief.

"Good. I’m glad you’re more or less okay."

"I don’t know why you baby him. Artists get things thrown at them on stage all the time." Larry Jackson grumbled.

"That doesn’t mean it should be encouraged. Be nice." Jelissa quickly smacked Larry’s arm.

"Sigh. Fine. Let’s talk about the performance. All things considered, it was good." Larry put his microphone down as if he were done speaking, and everyone could only stare at him in shock.

Good?

That was it?

Just good?

Where was the rest of the overly harsh criticism that was usually spewed out when he talked?

It didn’t make any sense, and nobody believed it.

"That it’s? Just good?" Selena glanced over at him suspiciously.

"It was a decent performance!" Larry Jackson began complaining defensively when he saw everyone staring at him, "What do you want me to say? They were the only team that pushed through adversity, and Ah-ri-el has already thanked everyone on his team for their hard work. Wouldn’t I look like a disgustingly horrible person if I criticized them? Sure, there’s room for criticism for some of the individual performances, but overall, it was good and I’m sure you’ll praise them enough for all of us, so stop staring at me, Jelissa."

"Well, if you insist, then I’ll go. It was quite a good performance all around. I was happy to see those who usually wouldn’t sing, sing so beautifully. Benjamin, Jerome, Levi, you all did so well today, so you should really be proud of yourselves, and I hope you all continue to hone your rap skills alongside your vocal skills."

At the compliment, the three boys smiled happily, muttering a thank you.

"Unfortunately, when there are people who do well, there are also people who don’t. Rex, your performance was disappointing today. Although I understand that everyone has their off days when they don’t feel well, today you just blend into the background and looked as if you had lost your spark. I hope you can resolve the issue. William..." Jelissa paused to take a deep breath and control her anger before she continued speaking, "There’s too much to get into here, so I’ll talk to you later in private."

William angrily frowned before controlling his facial expression while the other judges stared at Jelissa in confusion, wondering what the issue was.

Even if she had to give negative feedback, her delivery was always gentle, so for her to look and sound angry, it was clear that there was a bigger issue between her and William.

Not paying attention to the stares that she got, Jelissa continued in a much warmer tone.

"And Ari, I think this was probably the most vocally impressive performance you’ve given so far. It was almost like your voice went up to another level, and you looked like you were possessed by something, and I couldn’t look away no matter what. Good job on that, and doubly good job for not quitting when an incident happened. I hope "

"Thank you."

Ari smiled happily, marveling at the fact that she had noticed that he had used his newly earned stat point, which took his vocals from [Vocals: A - A+].

The extra point had made an enormous difference, and things that he had previously strained his vocal cords to accomplish were easily achieved now.

It made him want to dump even more points to see what S rank vocals would sound like, which meant he really needed to complete his mission board.

Absentmindedly, he began wondering why no one had found his account yet, especially since he had posted a photo of himself and five other contestants.

Was it because his algorithm was on the French part of the world, and this was an American-based show?

Did he need to leak it somehow?

As he was zoning out, Ari felt someone bump his shoulders, and he immediately snapped to attention and saw Larry Jackson glaring at him.

"You-you don’t have a serious bone in your body, do you? What’s wrong with your head?"

Larry Jackson was doing his best to figure out how to reluctantly compliment Ari on his performance after being attacked, but here he was daydreaming without paying him a lick of attention.

Seriously, what kind of contestant was this?

"I think I was probably dropped on my head several times as a child, and broke all of my serious bones, so unfortunately, my personality came out this way. Sorry."

"And you always have to have the last word, don’t you?"

Sensing that this was a rhetorical question, Ari just stared at the judge and stayed silent.

"Sigh. Whatever. I’ll be the bigger person. Jaywalks, X-ponent? Anything to add?"

The two men shook their heads, and seeing that it was wrapping up, Bing Yongsun grabbed the microphone before speaking in his slow and steady manner.

"This performance.... I can see that it was to this team that the majority of the budget went."

"Well, actually, we were quite under budget because the water stage was something that everybody used. We really could have gotten a few more things," Justin interjected before snapping his mouth and hiding behind Rex as shut as Bing Yongsun stared at him.

For some reason, he found the old man to be very intimidating.

It was something about his eyes that was coldly looking over him as if he were an interesting bug.

"Is that right? Well, this performance... It was good. I almost feel like it was wasted here. This is something that should be shown at an award show or a festival."

At the unexpected compliment from the creative director of one of the biggest boy groups, broad smiles filled the faces of the team.

"Visually, it was quite captivating the way you played with the different elements of smoke and water, levels while dancing, and even different vocal techniques. For me, it’s clear from watching past performances that this was the creation of both Contestant Ariel and Contestant Justin, and I believe that everyone will agree, just like he promised, Contestant Ariel was the star of the show with how you handled everything that happened. I’m curious about your thought process on what to do after the incident happened. After all, you performed the remaining portion of the performance blindfolded."

Ari didn’t really think about his response; he just explained his thought process.

"I just felt like I couldn’t let the performance stop, no matter what. We put in too much time and effort to let our struggle and sleepless nights go to waste, so I just did the only thing I could to let everyone know that I was okay, nothing was wrong, which was to dance and sing harder than before. And I wasn’t really blindfolded, the scarf was pretty thin, so I could see through it a little bit, even though my eyes were covered. I’m just glad it all worked out in the end and that our hard work wasn’t wasted."

"Hmmm. I see. I previously told you that I was excited to see your next performance and hoped you would impress me. I’m happy to let you know that you blew my expectations out of the water. Congratulations to you and your team, and I want to say, based on this performance alone, if I were able to choose the person I wanted to debut the most, especially from this team, without a doubt, it would be you. All things considered, you’re quite the lucky charm when it comes to performances."

Giving the creative director a cheeky smile, Ari answered in his classic lackadaisical way, "Thank you. Since you can’t guarantee my spot, I’d appreciate it if you could do something else for me?"

"Asking for a favor? Quite bold of you, isn’t it?"

Ignoring the gazes he could feel on him, Ari just shrugged.

"You never know until you ask is the motto I live by."

"Interesting. I’ll bite, what do you want?"

"Better security. I’d rather not get things thrown at me or anyone else again. It’s a bit stressful for everyone all around."

"Is it now?"

"It is. If it could happen to us on stage, it could happen to you, the other judges, or even audience members, don’t you think? Unless you’re interested in seeing a live-action sequel to today’s events?"

As everyone gasped, wondering why he was talking to the director of a company like a crazy person, surprisingly, Bing Yongsun only laughed before speaking again.

"No, I am not. I’ll let the production team know to up the security. And I’m sorry that that happened to you."

"Thank you. I appreciate it."

"Naturally."

Taking a step back, Ari handed the microphone back over to Rex and waited peacefully for the rest of the feed feedback to finish and for the MC to make his announcement, so that he could leave.

He assumed that their team would win due to being heavily stacked with top 10 contestants, and Benjamin would probably get the best performer award.

As for the worst performer, it was either William for the terrible vocals or Rex for his worst-than-usual performance.

Hiding a yawn, the announcement he was waiting for finally came.

"The winning team for the night - Team Sexy Pirates."

Perfect, two more to go.

"The worst performer on the team - William"

Even more perfect.

Ari’s entire week was spent at the beautiful sounds coming from the MC’s mouth.

"For the first time in the history of the show, the unanimous best performer on a team, as voted by the 600 audience members and the judges, earning an extra 100,000 votes for himself... is contestant Ariel. Ariel, would you like to say a few words?"

As a microphone was shoved into his face and the audience’s cheers subsided, Ari blinked in confusion before replying slowly.

"Uh, thanks to my teammates who worked hard, thanks to the people who voted for me and the team, thanks to the judges, special thanks to Bing Yongsun and Jelissa, and since I’m feeling generous right now, thanks to the person who threw the water bottle at me."

"Awwww, it seems that we’re back to the short and sweet messages from contestant Ari. Thank you all so much for coming, but we really must wrap up. Goodbye, everyone, and see you next time."

As everything was finally over, Ari sighed in relief at the thought of finally leaving.

The clean-up time went smoothly, and just as he was about to enter the shuttle to head back to the dorms, Ari was once again pulled aside by PD Emily.

The moment he raised both hands up in an effort to proclaim his innocence, she rolled her eyes, "This is not about your little speech on stage. This is about the person who threw a bottle at you. They’re in police custody and demanding to meet you, and the police want to know if you want to press charges. Do you want to go and meet them?"

"No, not really. I’m quite tired, so I really want to sleep off this headache. Can this wait until tomorrow, or am I being forced to deal with it today?" Ari replied as calmly as he could.

Pretending to be happy on stage to avoid worrying the audience was one thing, but Ari was actually furious about the situation and wanted to know who had thrown the bottle at him for one simple reason.

He wanted to punch them hard in both eyes to make them understand his pain.

But assuming that was his headache talking, he figured that it was best to rest and deal with the issue when he had a clear head.

"Okay. Board the bus and get some rest. Several people will want to speak with you tomorrow."

"Okay. Thank you."

With a sloppy wave, Ari joined Jamie, who was waiting for him, and boarded the bus.

As he dozed off, he remembered that he hadn’t told the PD what happened with William.

Well...Jelissa would handle it.

*************

"You wanted to speak to me?"

BAM!

Jelissa slammed a nondescript flash drive onto PD Emily’s desk; her gentle expression morphed into one of extreme anger.

"Yes, I do. You need to get rid of William. I can’t stand a contestant who not only cheats but is willing to sabotage his own teammates while other kids are crying tears of blood and getting injured while trying to follow their dreams. You need to get rid of him."

PD Emily grabbed the flash, tossing it up into the air and catching it repeatedly.

Without even checking the contents, she could guess what was going on.

After all, if it wasn’t about music, very few things would upset Jelissa like this, and the contestant that was being complained about had a track record.

While PD Emily sympathized, at the end of the day, business was business, and people couldn’t act on emotion.

Which meant-

CRACK!

The tiny flash drive was snapped in two.

"Unfortunately, I can’t do that."

Jelissa was bound to be disappointed.