CH 57

Chapter 57 – A Massive Rock Falls Down

It’s my duty to tell you

In a split second, the meeting room fell into an uproar.

Fang Juexia frowned, took out his cellphone, logged into Weibo, searched for [Kaleido new album], and found that everyone was really discussing the leaked song in real time. He felt his scalp go numb and just couldn’t bring himself to believe that such a thing had happened.

Chen Zhengyun’s brow was locked in a frown. “When did you discover this? On which platform, and have you contacted that platform yet?”

The staff member placed the laptop in front of Chen Zhengyun. “We just checked it, but we are unable to trace it back to its original source now. However, what we do know for sure is that at 9:47 a.m., a big marketing account released the song in the form of a video. Just now we found the company this marketing account belongs to, and then we paid to talk with them. Now, that video has already been deleted, but many people have already downloaded it through that account, and now it’s continuously spreading. In addition, the other party is claiming that he wasn’t the one who started it, and that he had just forwarded this video.”

He Ziyan had also found the video. “B station also already has it, and its popularity is still very high. It might even make it onto the homepage.”

Fang Juexia listened to the video for a bit. This was the second version of the early demo; the lyrics were still in English, and it was the previous composer’s version.

Cheng Qiang felt this very strange. “We have been strictly confidential from the beginning to the end, and the composers we cooperated with are also recognized as people with very high professional ethics within the industry. How could our song get leaked?”

Fang Juexia said, “The leaked song is the demo from before, not the final studio version. Fortunately, this means we can exclude the recording technicians, composer, and the recording management department from any suspicion, and our list of suspects can be narrowed down to the staff members who were selected to modify the demo in the early stages.”

Jiang Miao also nodded, adding, “That’s right. If we think about it calmly, we just finished recording the last song yesterday. If the person who leaked the song had enough power, they should have been able to directly leak the full version of our main song, which would have had a greater impact on us.”

Ling Yi was a little worried. “What should we do now? Although this demo isn’t the finished song, it getting released ahead of time completely disrupts our plan, and the number of people who will buy the album and listen to the whole official song will also decrease.”

Chen Zhengyun thought about it and then instructed Cheng Qiang, “Contact each platform hosting this video, and tell them they have to remove this copyright-infringement demo off of their shelves as soon as possible. Next, two announcements must be made, along with sending out a lawyer’s notice. One will be posted in Kaleido’s official Weibo, and the other will be posted on Star Chart’s company Weibo, both emphasizing the illegal status of the leaked song. Inform the big fanclubs and stations, and call on the fans to report and boycott the leaked song, and to not be a second disseminator.”

This was already the fastest reaction they could execute. Yet, because of how rapidly the Internet was changing nowadays, it was hard for one to even imagine how fast information spread. Let alone the fact that the release of this leaked song had obviously been well thought out and prepared beforehand. More than a dozen marketing accounts had released the demo at the same time, all listed with tags that Kaleido still had trending on the Hot Search list. Upon deleting one, another one popped up, and there was an unending stream of the video on all the major platforms. 

Chen Zhengyun pinched his own Jingming acupoint, lowered his head, and said in a deep voice, “It’s because they saw you were going to become explosively popular, so they deliberately tried to prevent this explosion before the comeback even happened and strike a blow against everyone’s music chart numbers.”

Pei Tingsong spun the pen in his hand, and he seemed to be especially carefree in this crowd of despondent faces. “If they want to leak, then leak it bei. If they set their mind on doing this, we can’t hide from it. Maybe it will get on the Hot Search list later, and frankly, no matter how fast we move, we can’t kill all the cockroaches.”

Cheng Qiang motioned for him to shut up. “Xiao Pei, don’t be sarcastic right now…”

“What he meant was that we might as well flip the tables.” Fang Juexia looked at Chen Zhengyun and suggested, “Xiao Pei is right. Since the other party’s hands have already stretched all the way into our company to steal a song, they are determined to let this demo spread. They will definitely buy a spot on the Hot Search list to build momentum. We might as well take advantage of this and inflame it a bit to let more people know that we are going to release songs soon.”

He Ziyan shook his head. “But it’s too risky to proceed like this. If you follow the normal process, it’s better to not exceed five days from the day of the song release to release the MV, so as to continue the popularity. In this case, when we do release the notice of our comeback and the MV at the beginning of April, we will have, by then, passed the peak of our freshness and popularity, and no passers-by will go to see it.”

“You’re right.” Fang Juexia’s face was calm, but his next words were astonishing, “So we must make our comeback ahead of time.”

Chen Zhengyun looked at Fang Juexia in silence. This child had already announced to everyone what he wanted to say, but couldn’t bear to utter. In this Internet era, the success of a song was not only due to its excellent quality, but also due to its careful publicity, especially so for idol music, which only possessed a small potential of gathering an audience of passers-by. Thus, the first day the publicity started was regarded as the beginning of a song’s life. And a leaked song meant that the life cycle of this song was rapidly shortened, even leading to its premature death.

A lot of leaked songs were abandoned in the end.

However, they couldn’t just casually give up. This song was these children’s heart’s blood, and their best chance at changing their fortunes. The only option left to them was to change the schedule and the publicity period in order to try and save the album from ending up with a reduced life cycle as much as possible.

This also meant that the originally abundant half a month of prep time would now be compressed to only three or four days. Kaleido would have to hurry and shoot the MV regardless of whether it was day or night, and the whole company would have to work desperately together to ensure that the comeback took place before the popularity died off.

“Inform the people in the public relations department to urgently deal with the audio source of the leaked song, and that its transmission must be minimized. People in the stylist group don’t have to come to the meeting, decide all the clothing styles before 5 p.m., and we’ll start shooting the MV at 8 p.m.”

Chen Zhengyun’s eyes swept over the boys present at the meeting. “It’s 10:35 a.m now., and you’ll have to be in the styling room at 4:00 p.m., so the hours in-between are the last hours you’ll have to rest. I hope everyone will have a good sleep, because a tough battle is what’s waiting for all of you ahead. Although we are not a powerful company, no matter what happens, Star Chart will always be your backer.”

When they came out of the meeting room, everyone’s mood was a bit unstable. Even Cheng Qiang wanted to start cursing, but in order not to affect them, he only picked out good things to say, comforting them that it was free publicity and so on when they were in the car. He sent the six people back to the dormitory and rushed back to the company to deal with the urgent affairs.

Fang Juexia had kept silent since he had gotten into the car. He turned on his cellphone and stared at the previous day’s missed call.

Of course, the people who leaked the song knew that Kaleido’s only way to save themselves was to push their comeback to an earlier date. However, once they made their comeback early, they would inevitably run into Seven Luminaries. There was no doubt that, at least for the moment, the number of their fans couldn’t be compared at all. If you hit a stone with an egg, the beneficiary could only be the stone.

Astar might have even prepared the press release by now. 

Combined with Liang Ruo’s abnormality in recent days, Fang Juexia became even more convinced that his judgment was correct. As soon as Cheng Qiang left, he went to the balcony and dialed Liang Ruo’s number.

The other party seemed to have guessed that he would call, for his tone carried a little regret in his greeting. “Juexia, you are finally willing to contact me.”

“Make the long story short, tell me who did it.”

The other side laughed as he asked, “Don’t you regret it? If you had come to me earlier, things may have played out differently.”

This sentence violently stabbed into Fang Juexia’s sore spot. As a lump formed in his throat, he heard Liang Ruo give an address.

“I have evidence that can help you ferret out that person responsible for this in my hand. Although your company isn’t big, it’s been badly battered right now, and the possibility of you guys figuring out the leaker’s identity is too small. If you still want to find that bad egg, come find me. By the way, don’t bring your cellphone. I don’t want to hurt myself while helping you.”

Pei Tingsong completely couldn’t sleep after everything that had happened. He recalled all of what he had seen and heard in the company these past few days, trying to figure out if there had been any suspicious people or things.

But somehow, he suddenly recalled the message from Liang Ruo that he had seen in Fang Juexia’s cellphone.

When he went to Fang Juexia’s room, he only saw Ling Yi there, who was getting ready to rest. “Where’s Juexia?”

“He just went out and said he’s going downstairs to buy something.”

“When did he leave?”

Ling Yi thought for a bit. “It’s been a while ba.”

Pei Tingsong’s heart sank, and he asked, “Do you have Liang Ruo’s contact information?”

“Liang Ruo?” Ling Yi frowned. “You’re talking about 7L’s Liang Ruo?”

“Who else?”

Ling Yi sat up and said, “I don’t have it, but I can ask some friends. What do you want it for…” Before he could finish talking, Pei Tingsong left, tossing behind the sentence, “Send it to me when you find it.”

Pei Tingsong went downstairs, and sure enough, saw that Fang Juexia’s car had disappeared. He got into his own car, and he had just started it up when he received the number from social butterfly Ling Yi. He put on his earphones and was about to dial it when he paused, and finally changed to calling Fang Juexia’s number.

No one answered the phone the entire time. Pei Tingsong called again after he drove out, and the one who answered the phone was actually Ling Yi. “He didn’t take his cellphone with him when he went downstairs.”

Pei Tingsong totally didn’t believe the excuse that he had gone downstairs to buy things. He parked his car on the side of the road. He originally wanted to call his older sister, but after thinking about it, he gave up and dialed Liang Ruo. He called three times before someone finally answered.

Liang Ruo was in the hotel suite he had booked for the past two days, waiting for Fang Juexia. A strange number kept calling him, and he finally answered, “Hello? Who is it?”

“Pei Tingsong.” The other party went straight to the point, and his tone wasn’t good. Liang Ruo was surprised for a moment, thought about it and then felt it was no surprise, asking, “You’re looking for me?”

“Who the hell is looking for you, where’s Fang Juexia? Did you call him away?”

Liang Ruo laughed. “You got to the bottom of the matter so quickly, he wasn’t such a person before ah.”

Pei Tingsong hated hearing Liang Ruo talk about the past the most; he had never been part of Fang Juexia’s past. 

“Be more well-behaved and tell me where you guys are. Don’t force me to find someone to search for you.”

“Okay, I’m afraid of you, who made you a young master? You can force me to death just by moving your fingers around a bit.” Liang Ruo generously gave him the address. “I also have to thank you for coming to me instead of directly using your great capital background to kill me, this ant.”

Just then, there was a knock on the door. Liang Ruo’s voice carried a smile as he said, “Aiya, Juexia is here.”

“You!”

Liang Ruo didn’t end the call, but put his cellphone into the pocket of his bathrobe as he went to open the door.

Sure enough, it was Fang Juexia who stood outside the door. His face was cold, and it seemed that he did not even want to step inside the room. “Give me the things, and I won’t tell anyone it was you.”

“You come inside.” Liang Ruo pulled at him, and Fang Juexia lifted his hand to push him away before entering by himself. 

“I know you won’t tell anyone it was me, and I know you don’t have a cellphone with you right now.” Liang Ruo closed the door. “I understand you so well.”

Fang Juexia didn’t want to hear all this from him, and his patience was already running out. “Don’t waste your time on useless matters.”

“What useless matters?” Liang Ruo sat on the sofa and said, “Juexia, it’s not only your time that is precious. My time is very precious, too. Do you know how many paparazzi have their eyes pinned on me? In order to have a good talk with you, I booked this room many days in advance and kept trying to get in contact with you, but you didn’t even bother replying with a word. “

Fang Juexia looked away from him and stood in the same place without saying a word.

Liang Ruo also stood up. “I’m not asking for much. Just stand here and listen to what I want to say, and I’ll give it to you.”

“Speak.”

Liang Ruo seemed to have drunk a bit of alcohol, for his whole face was red. He took a deep breath. “I like you. Since a long time ago, when we were still trainees, I have liked you.” Upon seeing Fang Juexia frown at this, Liang Ruo laughed. “You didn’t know ba. There are too many things you don’t know. Back then, how badly I wanted to debut with you ah, every single day, I dreamed of standing on the stage with you. Yes, I wasn’t qualified; forget about being compared with you, I couldn’t even compare against many other trainees. Even if you comforted me and encouraged me, I knew I couldn’t debut.”

“I was so anxious that I could hardly stand it. Then guess what?” He shrugged as he spoke, “President Jin said that he could help me and wanted me to come find him. I didn’t know what he meant by help at that time, I wholeheartedly just wanted to debut with you, so I went.”

Then Liang Ruo began to laugh bitterly. “Only when I woke up lying on his bed did I know how he helped me.”

Fang Juexia was a bit startled. Back then, he hadn’t asked Liang Ruo much about how those things had happened. 

“I was very scared. But President Jin told me that I would definitely be able to make my debut. So, for this opportunity, I sold myself. But I don’t know why other people knew about it, and you also knew about it.” Liang Ruo suddenly shed some tears, and he hastily wiped them away. “As soon as I knew you knew, I felt like I was finished. I didn’t dare to face you, and even more so, I didn’t expect that you would go up to the senior management and make a report because of me, and stand up for me.”

At that time, the president of Astar was not surnamed Jin. Fang Juexia just couldn’t stand the higher-ups treating trainees this way. Almost everyone thought that this matter had nothing to do with them personally, and felt that as long as the fire didn’t burn themselves, they could bear with it. But Fang Juexia couldn’t. He knew that the harder he pushed on this issue, the easier he would be to break, but he couldn’t give up his ‘self’ for this so-called future.

“I know when you went to make the report. I went to President Jin, and I kept pleading with him. You don’t know what he did to me, but I endured all of it, because he told me that as long as I was obedient, he would let you debut smoothly, just that they wouldn’t promote you that much anymore.” Liang Ruo’s eyes grew more and more red as he continued, “But I didn’t expect you to leave by yourself.”

He laughed, his voice shaking a bit. “I’ve tried to find you so many times after that, just because I wanted to explain it all to you. But you, you didn’t seem to care at all.”

Fang Juexia was a person who could quickly and completely remove himself from any relationship or emotion; this was a skill he had learned from spending his childhood in the dark. But in other people’s eyes, he appeared to be too cold when he was like this.

“It was only later that I found out that when you weren’t around, there was no point in me debuting ah. Everyone already knew that I had sold my body to get to the top. Even if they had all signed a confidentiality agreement, when we came away from the cameras, all of them sneered at me and made innuendos about me, and I didn’t even have a way to keep on living in the dormitory. Since everyone thought I advanced this way, I just became a demon, and decided that no one else should try to feel good either.”

Liang Ruo let out a breath. “I said a bit too much right now. Just a few days ago, President Jin was drunk, and only then did I find out he wanted to prevent you guys from becoming popular. I knew that if I told you guys about this matter in advance, I might be finished. I hesitated for several days, and still decided that I wanted to tell you.”

He took out a USB flash drive from his pocket. “There are some recordings here; I took advantage of when he was sleeping to record his WeChat voice messages. Originally, there should have been screenshots as well, but if I sent those to you, I might really end up dying. There are some people mentioned in the voice messages, and you should be able to figure them out.”

Fang Juexia held the USB that was given to him, and his mood turned complicated. He didn’t know what to say. He had pretty much nearly forgotten all those minor details of what had happened that year, but he had never regretted leaving the company. After he had stood up on this issue, no one had helped him, and although Liang Ruo seemed to have silently accepted the hidden rules situation, all the dirty water had been poured on Fang Juexia instead. Fang Juexia had also gritted his teeth and endured, not even trying to explain it clearly, because he knew that once he explained it, Liang Ruo would be torn to pieces. 

This was already hitting the bottom line of his tolerance about that situation.

“Alright.” Liang Ruo laughed and stated, “I finally told you all these things. I’ve been afraid to say it out loud for two years, and I also didn’t know how to say it to you. Don’t worry, me confessing to you was because it had grown too uncomfortable for me to hold it all in, but I don’t need any response from you. You are too good, and I don’t deserve you.”

He stepped closer. “I’m not a good person, but I’m not as bad as everyone thinks I am. Juexia, thank you.”

Fang Juexia finally opened his mouth. “I didn’t do anything.”

“You have. You have helped me a lot, and you are the best and the kindest person in the world. In the future, there shouldn’t be any more opportunities where our paths cross in the future.” Liang Ruo stretched out his hand. “Can you hold me one last time? Just like before.”

Looking at Liang Ruo’s red eyes, Fang Juexia found that he couldn’t harden his heart in the end. He reached out and hugged him for a short while.

“Thank you.”

A satisfied smile appeared on Liang Ruo’s face. He took a look at the time, went to the door, and opened it. Fang Juexia thought this action was strange, but when he looked in that direction, he discovered that Pei Tingsong was standing outside the door, wearing a hat and mask, his eyes indifferent.

He was a little surprised. “Pei Tingsong…”

“I told him the address.” Liang Ruo looked at Pei Tingsong, took out his cellphone from his bathrobe pocket and ended the call. “It’s over. I’m giving you your one-sixth back.”

Only then did Fang Juexia realize that Pei Tingsong had heard the entire conversation between the two of them. His heart suddenly seized, and even though he clearly knew that he hadn’t done anything, he still felt flustered.

Pei Tingsong didn’t lose his temper; on the contrary, he appeared to be very calm. He went to Fang Juexia, grabbed his wrist, and pulled him out of the room and the hotel. He didn’t speak the entire way to the car, which only served to make Fang Juexia feel even more uncomfortable.

When they got to the underground parking lot, Fang Juexia tried to get out of his grasp. “My car is over there.”

“We’re taking my car back, let Xiao Wen drive your car back later.” Then he opened the front passenger’s door and directed Fang Juexia to get in. After that, he walked around and got into the car himself, wearing a cold expression as he said, “Fasten your seat belt.”

“What’s the matter with you?” Fang Juexia didn’t move and  just turned his head to look at him.

Pei Tingsong saw that he wasn’t moving, so he leaned over to help him fasten his seatbelt, after which he prepared to start the car. However, Fang Juexia pulled the key out. “You’re in an upset mood right now, and it’s not safe to drive like that.” He didn’t understand what had actually happened to Pei Tingsong and what part of everything Liang Ruo had just said in the call right now had provoked him. “Why are you angry?”

Pei Tingsong leaned back against the driver’s seat. He was extremely irritated on the inside, and so he pulled off his mask as he stated, “I’m not angry.”

“You’re angry.” Fang Juexia’s tone was definite on this. However, he just couldn’t figure out what was going on. “If you’re dissatisfied with anything, just say it, it’s okay even if you want to mock me or curse me out like you used to.”

Pei Tingsong let out a bitter laugh and then looked at him. “Fang Juexia, do you really think I’ll become my past self again?”

Fang Juexia was stunned. On seeing Pei Tingsong’s eyes, his heart ached inexplicably.

Pei Tingsong looked down, then looked up at him again. “I’m not feeling right, right now. Even I don’t know what’s fucking wrong with me. I’m just especially angry, especially…” He couldn’t go on. After a pause, he let out a breath. “You came to find him alone, not even bringing your cellphone with you; did you just not worry that something would happen to you? You trust him that much?”

Fang Juexia was dumbstruck, and he tried to explain, “No, I was…”

“Why didn’t you tell me in advance? Do you know how hard it was for me to find this place? Do you know that the entire way here, I was so afraid that something would happen to you, I was almost about to ask my Jie for a favor, and my hands kept shaking the whole time I was driving. Why, why didn’t you…” Pei Tingsong’s smile looked rather bleak. “Am I so unworthy of your trust?”

This sentence somehow pierced straight through Fang Juexia’s heart. He felt very bad; plainly speaking, he was a person who didn’t like to explain things, but now, because of Pei Tingsong’s tumultuous emotions, he desperately searched his mind to come up with the appropriate words to explain the situation. “No, Pei Tingsong, listen to me, I had just come out of the meeting, and I was very tense. The moment I confirmed that this matter had something to do with Astar, my first reaction was to go deal with it, and you know, I just have that kind of personality, I’m…”

He found that every word he uttered sounded so lifeless, so he couldn’t keep going on. He just didn’t want to make Pei Tingsong sad. As he kept talking, Fang Juexia’s own voice began to shake. “Can you….not think that way?”

Hearing him like this, Pei Tingsong suddenly couldn’t get angry anymore. He buried his head into his arms and lay on top of the steering wheel, feeling like a shameless madman. He had just heard a confession that had nothing to do with him, and without any warning, he had an emotional breakdown. He just didn’t expect to hear that Liang Ruo really liked Fang Juexia, and it was even that kind of like.

How could he like Fang Juexia?

Why could the likes of Liang Ruo even like him?

With these thoughts in his mind, he just silently kept listening to every word of the other party’s sincere confession, listened to their past, and the hug at the end, not able to do anything about it all—he was just like a bystander who had nothing to do with this matter. He had, with great care, piled up so many beautiful memory fragments related to Fang Juexia, continuously gathering more and more, making it seem as if they could keep on like this, holding their “friendship” up high and never falling down.

But when he heard Liang Ruo’s words, he suddenly realized that he was the stupidest fool in the world. He had directed and acted out this so-called pure friendship, endured the small torture brought by Fang Juexia’s proximity, and he hadn’t even known what he really wanted.

The beautiful fragments that he had saved up in his heart had also, one by one, left a wound there. For so many days, his attitude blowing hot and cold, his mood that kept getting tugged around, his heartbeat being affected by every one of Fang Juexia’s words and deeds, his torment caused by trying to control his desires, his insomnia, his shame and resentment, his anxiety— all of these had deepened and grown overstocked, and it was only now that he finally discovered the source.

Seeing him remain silent this entire time, Fang Juexia’s heart was left hanging in the air. He wondered if Pei Tingsong had misunderstood his relationship with Liang Ruo. “I didn’t expect to hear that when I came over here. As I have already said before, I haven’t cared about these past matters for a long time now. Even if I heard some details I didn’t know about the past today, they won’t change anything.”

At this point, Fang Juexia felt that he had really gone crazy. He hadn’t even wanted to explain to anyone that the rumors about him and hidden rules were unfounded, but here, he actually spoke so much nonsense and did so many illogical things with Pei Tingsong. All of a sudden, he felt that he didn’t want to struggle any longer. He just wanted to get out of the car and get some air, so he lowered his head and undid his seat belt.

With a click, the strap was released. However, at this very moment, his hand was grabbed by Pei Tingsong.

“Don’t go.” Pei Tingsong covered his head. “I’m sorry, you didn’t do anything wrong. There’s no need to explain all this to me. It’s me who was wrong, I just went off on you.”

This was already the second time that he had heard Pei Tingsong formally apologize to him. It seems that this child, who was born rebellious, was always apologizing to him.

“You didn’t go off on me.” Fang Juexia corrected his words and held his hand instead. “You’re just sulking.”

“I exploded at you in my heart, it’s just that you don’t know about it.” Pei Tingsong said in a muffled voice, “So, I still have to say, I’m sorry.”

With that, Pei Tingsong raised his head and looked at him, then continued, “There’s something else too. If I say it now, you may think I’m crazy or have experienced too much excitement recently. That’s alright, because I also just understood it in the past three minutes. I don’t want to hide and tuck myself in and pretend that I can’t see things clearly even now.”

This all was too absurd. Waking up to a realisation at any other time would have been fine, but he just had to choose this moment. Their group was suffering from the biggest attack so far, a tough battle was imminent, everyone was firmly stretched tight, and this was a moment where even a straw landing on a heap could cause a collapse. 

Pei Tingsong had moved the rock that had been lying across his heart.

Looking at Fang Juexia’s penetrating eyes, Pei Tingsong let out a “fuck”, rubbed his face, looked up at him again, and said, “Fang Juexia, every word I’m going to say after this is serious. You have to believe that I’m not joking or pranking you, okay?”

Fang Juexia didn’t know what he was going to say, but he still nodded.

Pei Tingsong sincerely confessed, “I, Pei Tingsong, chose a point on the number axis today. It wasn’t chosen arbitrarily, it was a very serious decision. I don’t know if he’s rational or irrational, and to be honest, I don’t care. But it’s my duty to tell you.”

He raised the hand that Fang Juexia was holding. “This is that chosen point.”