After the guest performance ended, the guests of "Knowledge Q&A" left with a sense of unfinished business. The competition wasn't over yet, and they felt that staying at the venue might let them witness some unexpected gossip.
"That stage performance by Lu Mingzhe and Wan Yurou just now was quite good."
"When Xie Xi was speaking, I noticed the expressions of those two mentors looked a bit off."
"How could they look normal? They're all musicians, yet none of them noticed the issue, only he said it was too fast. That's a slap in the face, isn't it?"
"I thought both accompaniments sounded pretty similar, didn't notice any problem."
On their way up, several people chatted casually, and some even directly asked Wan Yurou, who was with them, if she felt any difference between the accompaniments in the two rounds.
Wan Yurou had only changed her clothes; her stage makeup, with a touch of glamour at the corners of her eyes, was still on. She smiled and said, "My skills are limited; I didn't notice any difference."
This was a clever answer, offending no one. Even if there was a problem with the accompaniment, her first half provided the caveat of her 'limited skills.'
However, those around her clearly chose to hear only the latter half, immediately feeling emboldened to continue discussing whether Xie Xi was throwing his weight around or was merely overrated.
For someone standing at an unreachable peak, ordinary people not only look up in admiration but also sometimes harbor darker thoughts of wanting to pull that person down.
"Those two mentors' skills have always been inferior to Xie Xi's, haven't they? It's normal they couldn't hear it," Ye Qiusuo suddenly spoke up as they exited the elevator.
Everyone: "..." They were all too familiar with this tone. It felt like if they refuted even one sentence, Professor Ye would immediately list various data to prove them wrong.
"Hahaha, seems that's the case."
"Speaking of which, Xie Xi's songs are truly great to listen to."
The entire topic immediately shifted direction.
Wan Yurou turned to look at Ye Qiusuo and asked, as if casually, "Professor Ye, do you know Xie Xi?"
Professor Ye answered matter-of-factly, "His advertisements are plastered all over the streets and alleys."
Wan Yurou was left speechless. Was that the kind of 'knowing' she meant?
By the time they entered the recording set, the guests' small talk had already shifted from the accompaniment issue to how high Xie Xi's endorsement fees might actually be. However, after just a few sentences, everyone began preparing to record the program.
Only Professor Ye remained seated, her mind wandering: ...Xie Xi's fee for a single endorsement is actually that much? It's enough to cover half the funding for one of my projects.
"Welcome our five celebrity guests and twelve civilian guests to the sixth episode of 'Knowledge Q&A.'"
As soon as this voice sounded, the sense of achievement Wan Yurou had just gained from "Tomorrow's Star" instantly dissipated. This place had now become Ye Qiusuo's domain.
The recording proceeded in an orderly manner. Listening to Ye Qiusuo explain the answers, Wan Yurou felt numb inside, only wanting to finish recording this program as soon as possible and find the next show that could make her popular.
Ye Qiusuo answered all the questions, once again achieving a perfect score, moving one step closer to the one million prize. Her mood improved a little.
As soon as the director signaled the end of recording with the light, Professor Ye immediately walked out, ready to return to work. She had recently taken on several freelance jobs with good pay.
"Professor Ye."
A young man in his twenties called out to Ye Qiusuo at the doorway.
It was Xie Xi's assistant, Zhang Dong.
"Did you bring Xie Xi's homework?" Ye Qiusuo asked, then glanced at his empty hands.
"The homework... Brother Xi, uh, I left it next door. Professor Ye, could you wait here a moment?" Zhang Dong stammered, then turned and ran off.
Ye Qiusuo frowned, a flicker of confusion in her eyes, but she quickly masked it and stood to the side, waiting.
In an empty room nearby.
Xie Xi was hunched over a vacant counter, scribbling something.
"Brother Xi, are you done yet?" Zhang Dong hurried back in a fluster, urging Xie Xi. "Professor Ye is waiting outside!"
"Just a little bit more, what's the rush?" Xie Xi turned his head, looking strangely at his assistant.
Zhang Dong said awkwardly, "Brother Xi, I feel for you. Professor Ye really does seem intimidating." He even looked at Xie Xi with eyes full of sympathy.
"Did she get angry because you didn't bring the homework?" Xie Xi panicked a little; he had sent Zhang Dong to scope things out.
"Not really," Zhang Dong scratched his cheek. "Professor Ye even nodded at me."
Relieved that she hadn't gotten angry about the homework, Xie Xi asked, "Then what did you mean just now?"
"Brother Xi, don't you feel your legs go a bit weak when you see Professor Ye?" The assistant recalled how Professor Ye had first looked at his face, then his hands, with a gaze that seemed to see right through everything, eerily similar to a high school principal.
"No," Xie Xi glanced at his assistant. "No backbone."
His legs had never gone weak. At most... the back of his neck felt a chill.
Xie Xi sped up, finished writing the last line, rubbed his eyes, and tossed the homework to his assistant. "Give it to her."
After finishing the recording, he had rushed here to make up the homework. For him, looking at words was like watching them dance. After filling several pages, he felt dizzy and his eyes ached.
Zhang Dong took the homework and ran outside. Xie Xi thought for a moment and followed him out.
"Professor Ye, this is our Brother Xi's homework. Please take a look." Zhang Dong saw her actually start flipping through it and quickly added, "Our Brother Xi does the homework you assign every single day. He's very diligent."
Ye Qiusuo flipped to the last page, lightly brushed her fingertip across it, and a black smudge appeared. She raised a brow slightly. "Did he just finish making this up?"
"How could that be? Our Brother Xi finished writing all this yesterday. He's at home now." Although his legs felt a bit weak, Zhang Dong, as an assistant, bravely covered for Xie Xi.
Ye Qiusuo was merely asking, not intending to pursue the matter. Instead, someone exposed themselves.
Xie Xi, who had followed behind his assistant, had originally been standing around the corner. But seeing Zhang Dong's fawning smile—a smile he'd never even shown to Xie Xi himself—and unable to hear what the two were saying, he finally just walked straight over.
Just as Zhang Dong finished saying Xie Xi was at home, Xie Xi appeared right behind him.
Ye Qiusuo closed the homework book and handed it directly to the person behind Zhang Dong.
Zhang Dong turned around, confused. "?!"
"Don't rush your homework next time; it's easy to make mistakes." Professor Ye offered this advice, then prepared to turn and leave.
"Hey."
Ye Qiusuo turned to look at him.
"...Professor Ye." Under her gaze, Xie Xi immediately changed his tone, lacking the air of a big star entirely. "Besides writing this, you should teach me other things too. I paid for it."
Mentioning money, Xie Xi straightened his chest, the guilt from making up the homework instantly fading.
"Brother Xi, you can't even finish these few pages of homework," Zhang Dong leaned in to remind Xie Xi quietly.
Xie Xi pushed away the assistant who had leaned in and looked at Ye Qiusuo. "My previous private tutors used to read to me every week. Next week, you should read something to me too."
Ye Qiusuo looked at him for a moment, then nodded. "Fine."
So agreeable?
After Ye Qiusuo left, Xie Xi's confidence swelled.
"No backbone. What's there to be afraid of with a professor?" Xie Xi expressed his disdain for his leg-weakening assistant.
"Well, I'm still scared," Zhang Dong muttered quietly as he followed behind.
...
The first few days of the week passed uneventfully. When Saturday arrived, Xie Xi parked himself in front of the TV, ready to watch "Knowledge Q&A." He had recently become somewhat hooked on this show.
If nothing else, watching Ye Qiusuo lay out the answers point by point with evidence gave him a strangely satisfying feeling.
There's always this feeling: So this is what a genius is like?
"In the field of engineering, the system pressure for pneumatic transmission generally falls within the range of 0.4 to 0.7 MPa..."
Xie Xi had just started watching Ye Qiusuo explain a question about cylinder selection when his agent, Sister Wei, suddenly came in and turned off his TV.
"I'm studying," Xie Xi said with a straight face.
"Did you watch the program recorded last week?"
"The Star of Tomorrow" aired earlier than "Knowledge Q&A."
Sister Wei sighed. "I shouldn't have let you take on that show. I didn't expect the production team to be so reckless."
Originally, she thought it would be good for Xie Xi to try something new and assumed no one in the industry would dare openly bully the most popular singer in the music scene. Yet, "The Star of Tomorrow" dared to secretly trip him up, their editing twisting nothing into something.
"Now everyone is saying you threw a tantrum in front of the contestant."
"I was throwing a tantrum," Xie Xi said, growing impatient at the memory. "He himself couldn't even tell if he sang well or not, and he still wanted me to hug him and offer blessings?"
Sister Wei sighed again. "Forget it. If you changed, you wouldn't be Xie Xi anymore. I'll go find someone to handle this."
After Sister Wei left, Xie Xi wasn't in the mood to continue watching the program. He called his assistant over. "Read the trending searches to me."
Zhang Dong had just sneakily finished checking the trends and really didn't want to read them. "Brother Xi, maybe we could read them tomorrow morning?"
"Read," Xie Xi said, opening the trending list on his own phone and tossing it in front of Zhang Dong.
“Okay,” Zhang Dong replied, holding the phone with trembling hands as he read, “Xie Xi rejects eliminated contestant's hug; Lu Mingzhe and Wan Yurou hold hands and gaze tenderly at each other; challenged contestant openly expresses sadness...”
"I'm in the number one spot?"
"Brother Xi, your popularity is high, it's unavoidable."
Xie Xi scoffed. "They write about every trivial thing. Read the comments under my trending topic."
"...Xie Xi is getting more and more arrogant; feel bad for the contestant; XiXi started to help him by mentioning the accompaniment issue, but the contestant himself said it was fine, who wouldn't be upset by that?"
"Why are my fans' comments ranked so low?" Xie Xi asked upon hearing the third comment.
Xie Xi's fanbase was massive. In the past, whenever he clapped back at some shady reporters, fans would always come out to defend him, getting their comments liked to the top.
“Brother Xi, the wind direction in the industry has been a bit strange lately. There must be new capital entering the scene,” the assistant said helplessly. “Sister Wei suspects someone is specifically targeting you.”
Active fans can't always compete with team data.
This kind of situation had happened before, back when Xie Xi first rose to fame—widespread negative press—and only faded completely after he reached his current status.
"Brother Xi," Zhang Dong said, as the atmosphere between them grew increasingly serious, suddenly remembering a crucial matter. "Have you finished your homework?"
Xie Xi: "..."
Seeing his expression, Zhang Dong knew the answer was definitely no.
"Why didn't you remind me earlier?" Xie Xi shifted the blame.
"I reminded you the morning before yesterday, while you were gaming," Zhang Dong said, feeling wronged. He really didn't want to deliver homework to Professor Ye again; it always made him nervous. Last Sunday night, he even had a nightmare about being back in high school.
All that talk of negative press and trending searches became irrelevant to Xie Xi. Right now, his mind was solely focused on pulling an all-nighter to finish his homework.
