The Gulangyu Art Center Exhibition Hall had been rented out by the iQIYI production team, who built an impressive stage inside. And by "impressive," it meant expensive—every piece of lighting and sound equipment screamed money. A good stage, after all, was built on piles of cash.
But because of the hall's limited size, the audience capacity had to be cut from three thousand to two.
The venue was divided into three main sections. From top to bottom: the main stage and contestant waiting area, the mentor platform, and the audience seats. The lighting design made each zone distinct, with the audience area left deliberately dim.
Every seat was filled, the air thick with tension and anticipation.
"I'm so nervous, it's my first time performing in front of a live audience. They say there are over a thousand people out there. If I mess up, my face'll be all over the internet tomorrow!"
"I'm not nervous at all, what's there to be afraid of?"
"Please, you're not even performing today, you go on tomorrow."
"I swear I'm about to faint."
"Quick, hold me down, my inner power's about to explode!"
Their chaotic chatter revealed exactly how they felt—nervous, excited, and eager for the stage.
The performance order had been set two days ago during a group activity. The show was split into two days, with twenty-five trainees performing today. Miao Chen was number twenty on the list.
Each contestant got about five minutes for an introduction and a song. With twenty-five of them, that added up to more than four hours of performances. Then again, it wasn't unheard of for a recording to run six or seven hours, so iQIYI's arrangement was already generous, especially considering the competition format.
Time slipped by amid the chatter until a synthesized clapping sound, "pa pa pa—", echoed through the hall.
Four mentors—Gu Peng, Lin Xia, Chen Qi-hua, and Han Lulu—stepped onto the stage with trainee representative Nan Kui.
Each mentor performed one of their representative works to kick off the show.
Gu Peng and Lin Xia needed no introduction. The first was the socially anxious "folk prince," and the second, a former top idol.
The other two, though, deserved a closer look.
Han Lulu was born in Hong Kong in 1991, part of the early '90s generation. Now thirty-four, she was one of the most successful female singers in the Chinese music world. She held the record as the most streamed Chinese-language female artist on Spotify and had twice won the Mnet Asian Music Award for Best Asian Artist. One of her music videos had even been certified by Guinness as the most viewed Chinese MV on YouTube—until it was overtaken by Chu Zhi's The Brightest Star in the Night Sky.
Then there was Chen Qi-hua. Fans called her "the pride of Mainland female singers" and "the award machine." Her critics said she was "a connected insider who can't sing."
In her thirteen-year career, she'd won 314 awards both domestic and international, becoming the first artist to sweep all four major honors: Best Female Singer and Most Popular Female Singer from the Huaxia Music Media Awards, Chinese Music Top Chart, Chinese Song Music Festival, and Global Chinese Music Chart Awards.
"Teacher Lin Xia not releasing new songs is such a waste, his voice always feels like summer," one fan whispered.
"Goddess Han Lulu is forever the queen, every note she sings tells a story."
"I really wanna be a songwriter like Teacher Gu Peng someday."
"Teacher Han Lulu's famous in our country too," said trainee Jonglawimon from Thailand's biggest entertainment company, Grammy. "I didn't know Teacher Chen Qi-hua before, but her live performance was incredible."
That's exactly why so many agencies fought to get their trainees into iQIYI's Idol Forward March. The show had pulled in sponsors and viewers from all across Asia and even included twelve foreign trainees.
Hearing his foreign colleague praise Chinese singers, trainee Xu Kong couldn't help feeling proud.
He said, "Teacher Chen Qi-hua's the first female singer in China to achieve the four-award grand slam. The first male singer who managed the same thing was Chu Zhi. What do you think about that?"
"Teacher Chen Qi-hua's that strong?" Jonglawimon didn't quite grasp the prestige of the awards at first, but the moment he heard Chu Zhi's name, he immediately understood.
Anyone who could match Chu Zhi's achievements was definitely a top-tier diva.
The mentors' stage heated up the audience quickly. The response was fantastic, except for trainee representative Nan Kui, who fell short. As the lead vocalist of Scarlet Boyz, he was decent compared to his teammates, but next to the four mentors, he sounded painfully ordinary. He even dodged the high notes with vocal runs.
The first trainee to perform was a baby-faced boy with big round eyes and soft cheeks.
"Hello, mentors, thank you for your time. I'm Jia Xu, a trainee from Southern Sky Entertainment, twenty-four years old."
He looked seventeen or eighteen at most, stammering nervously through his introduction.
"Southern Sky Entertainment? If I remember right, this trainee's your junior, isn't he, Teacher Nan?" Chen Qi-hua asked.
"Really? If Teacher Han hadn't mentioned it, I'd still be clueless," Lin Xia joked, studying the boy's face. "Kids these days sure make us look old."
He smiled. "I'm looking forward to this performance, just like I'm looking forward to Jia Xu."
That was Lin Xia—never missing a chance to add some nonsense to his "rambling mentor" persona.
"I know him," Nan Kui said. "Jia Xu's one of Southern Sky's most talented in both singing and dancing. He won't let you down, Teacher Lin."
Jia Xu performed one of Scarlet Boyz's hit songs—a smart move for his company since using their own group's copyrighted material cost little to nothing.
It was a dance song, but the lighting didn't quite match the choreography, making the stage look flat. Still, the two thousand audience members clapped enthusiastically.
"Since he's my junior, I'll refrain from commenting," Nan Kui said. "Please, teachers, go ahead."
"His fundamentals are solid, and his breathing's steady even while dancing," Chen Qi-hua said. "But he could put more emotion into the song."
"Relax," Lin Xia added. "Singing needs to feel easy. You can't sound powerful unless you're relaxed."
"Thank you, Teachers Chen and Lin," Jia Xu said, bowing.
"What do you two think, Teachers Gu and Han?" Lin Xia turned to them. "Or did my comment already cover everything?"
Neither Gu Peng nor Han Lulu liked talking much. The first was socially anxious, the second naturally quiet. They usually only spoke when prompted.
"N-no, you've already said it well. Nothing to add," Gu Peng mumbled without even looking at the trainee. If you gave him a keyboard, though, he'd probably write a thousand-word critique.
"His tone's thin and neutral," Han Lulu said curtly. "Wrong song choice."
Short, sharp, and accurate. Everyone could tell Jia Xu probably wanted to sing folk songs, but Southern Sky didn't have any folk singers, so the company went for what was marketable.
Jia Xu ended with seventy-one points out of ninety: Lin Xia 16, Chen Qi-hua 15, Gu Peng 15, Han Lulu 17, and Nan Kui 8.
Trainees went up one by one, and it was obvious that every agency had sent their best. Two original songs appeared among the first ten performances. The eleventh contestant, surnamed Wang, even had an original choreography, earning seventy-seven points.
"Wow, he actually hired a choreographer and made his own routine. Sneaky bastard," Xu Kong muttered.
The others nodded in mock outrage, all pretending to condemn him while secretly jealous.
After all, agencies with money could buy hit songs for their trainees. Singing a popular track was a surefire way to catch attention early on. The richer ones even commissioned original pieces for their star trainees.
The first stage of Idol Forward was really just a showcase of how much each company was willing to invest.
The mentors' comment styles were already well-known by now. Lin Xia was the gentle one who mixed encouragement with jokes. Han Lulu was funny with her dry Beijing-style humor, despite being born in Hong Kong.
"I agree," Gu Peng often said, adding a sentence or two of support.
Chen Qi-hua's comments, in contrast, were blunt and precise, always pointing out what needed improvement.
As for Nan Kui, he was basically there to make noise. His feedback was pure filler: "Pay attention to rhythm," "Your rhythm's off," "Good rhythm, keep working on it," "You lack rhythm." Nobody really knew what "rhythm" even meant to him anymore.
Then came Jonglawimon, the sixteenth performer, who broke Wang's record with seventy-eight points—the highest score so far.
Grammy's got power, after all. They'd bought the rights for him to perform My Destiny (Thai Version) , the theme song from the Thai remake of My Love from the Star.
The original drama had made "Professor Do" every Asian teen's dream guy, and Thailand's remake had gotten huge. Grammy had noticed that Chinese viewers rarely watched Thai dramas, but they'd recognize the melody instantly. Paired with Jonglawimon's vocals, his debut stage was explosive.
When he returned to his seat, none of the other contestants dared to underestimate him anymore. Talent was talent.
Then came Mao Ye, who performed a rearranged version of the classic Old Bridge.
"I know the original songwriter," Gu Peng said unexpectedly. "Not close friends, but we've talked about music. He wrote Old Bridge for his late grandmother. It uses harmonic minor progressions, and the chorus goes, 'The people's bridge remains only in the wind and rain of my heart.' The Fengdu Baoluan Bridge was once called the People's Bridge, a historical landmark in his hometown. When he crossed it again years later, he couldn't remember its history, only the feeling of his grandmother holding his hand."
He frowned. "I don't know who rearranged this version, but it's awful. It completely ruins the original emotion. Personally, I hate this kind of reckless tampering."
His voice was sharp, and his score even sharper—twelve points.
Mao Ye panicked and apologized immediately. His agent backstage almost called the company to ask if they'd somehow offended Gu Peng before. There's no way he'd criticize someone that hard just out of "artistic integrity," right?
Mao Ye ended with fifty-five points, second-lowest of the day.
A few more contestants went up, then it was finally Miao Chen's turn.
"Hello, teachers. I'm Miao Chen, number twenty. 'Miao' like rice seedling, 'Chen' like morning. I'm from Aiguo Media."
The moment he stepped on stage, the entire room's attention shifted. Partly because of the Aiguo name, but mostly because of his look.
He wore a crooked suit, scuffed leather shoes, and messy clown makeup that didn't quite work.
He looked like a clown who'd spent the whole day trying to make people laugh, only to be pushed around and left with nothing but smeared paint and wrinkled clothes.
"He really went through with it... oh no, oh no. If her debut score's low, Boss Niu's gonna kill me."
In the backstage area, his agent Lao Caitou was pacing in panic. He was a veteran in the industry who'd recently joined Aiguo. Even if it was for performance effect, the mentors wouldn't take kindly to a messy, clownish image.
He'd already rejected this concept once when Miao Chen proposed it last week. "The mentors won't like it," he'd said. "You won't get a good score."
But he'd turned his back for one moment before the show, and Miao Chen had changed into that same ridiculous outfit anyway.
Song: "In Tune"
Lyrics: Chu Zhi
Composer: Chu Zhi
Arrangement: Chu Zhi
Performer: Miao Chen
When the song info appeared on the screen, not only did the other forty-nine trainees start whispering, but even the four mentors and the trainee representative looked stunned.
They'd all been curious to see what kind of talent Aiguo Media's "chosen one" had. None of them expected that Chu Zhi would actually write him a song. After seeing that, Miao Chen's weird outfit didn't even matter anymore.
"It's actually a song by brother Jiu?" Lin Xia leaned back. "That's insane, way too much."
"Six," Gu Peng muttered in his usual cold tone, blurting out a random number as countless thoughts flashed through his mind.
"With my connections, could I get brother Jiu to write a song for me too? Probably... maybe?"
"Teacher Chu's songs are the most valuable in the whole entertainment industry," Han Lulu said jokingly. "I heard someone once spent several million and still couldn't get one. Is this the perk of being Aiguo's artist? I kinda wanna switch companies now."
Chen Qihua smiled faintly. "I'm looking forward to it."
Nan Kui, the trainee representative, said nothing. He was furious. Back when his group was still around, they'd pooled money together trying to commission a song from Chu Zhi and still failed. If Chu Zhi had agreed back then, their group wouldn't have disbanded.
Of course, in his mind, that whole mess was Chu Zhi's fault. He hadn't done anything wrong himself.
He glanced at Miao Chen again and frowned. This trainee didn't look like much. Comparing himself to Miao Chen, Nan Kui decided that Chu Zhi clearly had no taste.
The lights dimmed. A single spotlight fell on Miao Chen as he began to sing.
🎵 "Wearing slippers with a suit, one word from me can freeze the crowd."
"Wiping my face with a rag, drinking water from a wine glass, how cool is that?"
"I might be first from the bottom, but heroes always start against the wind. Acting dumb when I
know better, that's just how I live." 🎵
The lyrics fit his clownish outfit perfectly.
He didn't look at the audience at all, keeping his head down like a stalk of wheat bent by the wind.
Then his voice suddenly rose, his head lifting slightly.
🎵 "You ever met someone more in tune than me? I write songs with one-six-four-five, and yeah, the lyrics sound pretty cheap."
"Who cares?"
"So what if I've got no talent? I'll carve my own path. Who's giving me their dull baggage? Don't know the score? They're the ones off-key!" 🎵
He sat on the plastic steps, legs spread out like a lazy street punk.
Compared to the other contestants' flashy props and lighting, his stage setup was ridiculously simple. Just a fake staircase, molded to look like bluestone.
He looked like a drifter howling at the world. The electric guitar crashed into the melody, bringing chaos and unrest.
This song wasn't simple. Chen Qihua especially liked the guitar riff—it felt like the start of a new motif, opening a fresh movement.
🎵 "They take cabs while I walk, they hide from the rain while I stroll through it. They call me a monster, but they're not even as good as clowns." 🎵
He flipped his thumb toward himself.
🎵 "Being dumb's a kind of gift, to eat the tiger you've gotta act like a pig. Failure's lonely as hell, mockery hurts but I won't lose my style." 🎵
He tugged at his wrinkled collar, mic in one hand, brushing his messy hair back with the other. Whether he had "style" left was debatable, but his clown makeup made the act even more absurd—and somehow, more powerful.
Suddenly he jumped up, his sharp gaze locked on the crowd.
🎵 "You ever met someone more in tune than me? I write songs with one-six-four-five, and yeah, the lyrics sound pretty cheap."
"Who cares? So what if I've got no talent? I'll carve my own path!"
"Who's giving me their dull baggage? Don't know the score—" 🎵
He dragged out the final note, his voice cracking with raw frustration and defiance.
🎵 "They're the ones off-key, they're the ones off-key, and I'm the only one who's right in tune!"
"Who's more in tune than me? They're the ones off-key!" 🎵
He went completely wild. Miao Chen threw himself into the performance, limbs thrashing, stomping the stage so hard the mic nearly flew out of his hand.
He looked like a possessed puppet, his exaggerated movements so strange that even Han Lulu felt a chill, the uncanny valley creeping in.
He shouted in rhythm, "ba-ba-ba-ba-bala-bala-ba, they're the ones off-key!"
"ba-ba-ba-ba-bala-bala-ba, I'm the one in tune!"
The weird chant repeated, like a clown backed into a corner by life and finally exploding.
Step by step, he climbed the staircase, muttering his strange sounds until he reached the top. Then, unexpectedly, he switched to an operatic tone:
🎵 "They laugh at me for being mad, I laugh at them for not seeing through. Where are the heroes of Wuling buried? No flowers, no wine, only fields to till." 🎵
As he sang the lines from The Peach Blossom Hermitage Song, his exaggerated posture softened. His voice trembled, weak and distant, like the graves of old heroes fading into farmland.
🎵 "They're the ones off-key, who's more in tune than me?" 🎵
Then he threw his head back and laughed madly. "Hahaha—hahahaha!"
With that clown makeup, the laugh turned his painted smile into something fierce and grotesque.
The hall went silent. No one clapped.
"Is this trainee... mentally okay?" That was Nan Kui's first thought. If he sang that song himself, he'd never get that kind of effect—because he was sane.
Lin Xia was the first to react, standing up and clapping hard.
The applause spread like wildfire. Cheers followed, roaring through the hall.
"Brother Jiu's lyrics are amazing, and this song suits you perfectly," Lin Xia said. "When you sang, it felt like the clown himself stood up and told us his story. I loved it."
"Excellent," Han Lulu said. "There were a few flaws in the singing, but they don't matter. This song should've been saved for the final. Using it here's a waste."
"I agree with Teacher Han," Gu Peng said, half zoning out again.
"Your acting was stronger than your singing," Chen Qihua added after a pause. "I'm not sure if that kind of madness is good though. Maybe if you toned it down a bit? I really can't tell."
Miao Chen's final score was eighty-four—the highest so far and the first trainee to break eighty.
Backstage, Lao Caitou finally exhaled. The giant rock pressing on his chest rolled away. Thank god. At least they got a good score.
The chief director watching the backstage monitors was grinning from ear to ear. Whether it was Chu Zhi's songwriting or the contestant's performance, both were perfect for boosting ratings. With Idol Onward! set to air in mid-December, there was no doubt it'd be an instant hit.
While Miao Chen was recording, ticket sales opened for the tenth and final leg of the In Harmony with Chu · World Tour. The venues were massive—Beijing's Bird's Nest with 100,000 seats, Tokyo Dome with 60,000, Seoul Olympic Stadium with another 100,000, Bukit Jalil National Stadium in Malaysia with 80,000, and Munich Stadium with 65,000. Over 400,000 tickets in total.
Little Fruits all over the world were fired up, especially the ones overseas. After all, it'd been eight years since Chu Zhi's debut, and this was his first world tour since then. Who knew when the next one would happen? Everyone went all out for tickets, using every trick they could think of.
Of course, the overseas fans didn't know the full story. Back when Chu Zhi had just debuted, he'd already done a world tour—five stops in total. Still, their worry wasn't wrong. No one knew how many years it'd take for the next one.
Four hundred thousand tickets sounded like a lot, so fans assumed they'd have a good chance.
And technically, they weren't wrong. The tickets didn't sell out instantly this time—it took three seconds instead of one.
Out of those 400,000 seats, 300,000 were overseas. Many overseas fans had been waiting for years, and the only reason the servers didn't crash immediately was that international ticketing websites made payments such a pain.
Germany's Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung even wrote about the upcoming Munich concert:
"Even the lizard next door knows that the Chinese superstar Chu Zhi is coming."
For most singers, being able to hold a few ten-thousand-seat concerts was already a brag-worthy achievement, both in China and abroad. Even Michael Jackson's comeback was set for London's O2 Arena, which held about twenty thousand people.
Chu Zhi, on the other hand, was doing over forty shows, each with more than fifty thousand people. That kind of scale hadn't been seen since the golden age of pop in the '80s and '90s.
In the blink of an eye, it was December 7th. The year was almost over. Chu Zhi received invitations from both the Kōhaku Uta Gassen and the Super Bowl halftime show. But that was wishful thinking—he'd already turned down the Spring Festival Gala two or three times, even when they wanted him to perform as the "Emperor Beast." There was no way he'd show up for those either.
Even after declining the invitations, he didn't take a break. His schedule was packed, and since his film shoot was delayed, he decided to film as many ads as possible in the meantime.
By the time he got home that night, it was already past ten. After taking a shower, he ordered some late-night food. While waiting for it to arrive, he sat down at his desk and started writing as the Emperor Beast.
He opened a new document and typed:
Year-End Summary:
2025 was, from a personal standpoint, kind of disappointing. No major progress, though at least I didn't regress. You could say it was a year of standing still.
Right now, my popularity's probably above the level of a global superstar, though whether I've become a true "pop culture icon" is still debatable.
Completed work:
– Released English singles Amazing Grace, Jesus Loves Me, and She Taught Me How to Yodel
– Released Japanese single Come, Sweet Death
– Produced and released Chinese album Besieged on All Sides
– Became chairman of the Asian Music Association and launched the first "Asian Music Competition"
– Completed In Harmony with Chu · World Tour
– Launched Little Fruits Star Project
He thought about adding things like The Masked Singer (American version), award shows, and charity events, but decided against it. Those were all about fame, not artistry. They didn't matter much to his career as a singer.
He continued writing.
Declined due to time conflicts, but wanted to attend:
– CCTV's large-scale variety show Young Leaders
– Journey Among the Stars 2 as a guest performer
– China's Best Songs 4 as a mentor
– Cultural exchange events like the China–France and China–Italy forums
Achievements:
– Male lead in Unsinkable, now the second-highest-grossing film in history
– Singles performed decently in Japan and Western markets, and the first physical Chinese album did well too
That list didn't even include the thirty-plus music awards he'd won this year, among them several Grammys that were mailed to him while he was still in the hospital recovering.
As for the "decent sales," that was an understatement. Both his singles and albums had shattered records.
Especially Amazing Grace, which he'd recorded using angelic gospel harmonics. It had become the best-selling single in the world, breaking every previous record.
The old record holder was Billie, the "Daughter of America," whose single had sold 9.77 million copies. Chu Zhi's Amazing Grace hit 13.77 million in under a year.
Add in the yearly copyright royalties from churches, and the Emperor Beast could practically live off that one song for two lifetimes.
He added another section:
Things to improve:
– Don't get killed
– Take care of health, since poor health affects productivity
Chu Zhi had written year-end summaries every year, but this was the first time he'd gone into such detail. Honestly, it'd be even better to write one every month. Back in his previous life as a CEO, he did exactly that.
This kind of self-reflection was like keeping financial records—useless to others, but incredibly valuable to oneself.
He murmured to himself while typing, "Next year's Woodstock Music Festival will be held in the Sahel region. Gotta be careful. Even with security from Zhongnanhai, I can't afford to get careless."
"Four Great Classics album, international album, and The Matrix shoot… Just finish those three things properly next year."
Then he heard a notification ping. "Ah, delivery's here! No way I'm skipping a midnight snack."
He went downstairs to grab it. The delivery riders couldn't enter the complex, but thankfully the security guards always placed the orders in the food locker by the entrance. Otherwise, it'd be too far a walk.
Time slipped by as the Emperor Beast pushed through his endless schedule. Soon, it was December 14th—the air date of Idol Forward!'s very first episode.