Single-Threaded

As for Xu Yang, she really hadn’t gone to class that morning.

But not because she’d been scared; she simply couldn’t face anyone. Apparently, by now, there wasn’t a single person on the entire production team who didn’t know about last night’s ghost encounter.

Her cool young-man persona had gone down the drain for good. Even the girls who used to be too intimidated by her looks to talk to her had come over to comfort her, and every one of them was clearly trying not to laugh.

Xu Yang seriously suspected that everyone now treated her like a coward and whispered about it behind her back!

She’d even considered pretending to be sick, but the production team had an on-site medical unit. If she got caught faking it, wouldn’t that be even more humiliating?

In the end, she gave up and spent the entire morning moping in the dorm.

She still had to go downstairs for lunch.

Her roommates wouldn’t even bring her food!

They’d even dressed it up nicely, saying she should go downstairs and get some exercise, interact with people more, build up her vitality, and make herself less likely to have nightmares or run into ghosts at night...

Xu Yang walked out with a miserable face and headed downstairs, only to run into Yu Mao walking in front of her.

The other girl didn’t spare her a glance, and Xu Yang wasn’t in the mood to greet her either.

As they walked, Xu Yang kept noticing Yu Mao’s loose, long hair swaying in front of her eyes. In a daze, it overlapped with the “ghost” she’d seen last night, and her brows slowly drew together.

A thought almost forced its way to the surface, along with some conclusion she couldn’t bear to face; it made her stop dead, all the color draining from her face.

The next second, she set her face and shook her head, forcibly tossing the thought away.

What was she thinking? What she’d seen was clearly just a tiny tuft of hair. What did that have to do with Yu Mao?

Absolutely impossible!

Xu Yang quickened her pace, walked around Yu Mao without looking at her, and strode ahead.

Yu Mao noticed her retreating back; her eyebrows twitched, and a trace of resentment appeared in her eyes.

She hated cowards who screamed and yelled.

She’d better keep her distance from Xu Yang in the future, she thought, all the way to the first floor.

At lunchtime, the cafeteria was at its busiest; the place was noisy and packed. Yu Mao subconsciously searched the crowd for Nan Changgeng.

But before she found her, someone else noticed her first.

“Yu Mao!”

Yirui An was holding a drink. From far away, she tiptoed and waved hello, then ran over excitedly.

Yu Mao glanced at her when she heard the call, then looked away again. She took a tray and went to the self-service counter, continuing to search the crowd.

Yirui An was used to being ignored by her, so she took it in stride and followed after her without changing expression. She’d only come over to get a drink in the middle of her meal, so she wasn’t in any hurry to head back yet.

“The chicken wings for lunch are really tender and delicious today. Do you want to try some?”

Yu Mao shook her head and refused, heading straight for the fruit section, where she picked up a plate full of bright orange tangerine segments. They were late-season Wogan tangerines, in season now; juicy, thick-fleshed, and sweet-looking at a glance.

Yirui An watched as she finished choosing them and walked off without even pausing for the other tempting dishes, not lingering for a single second.

A little worried, she followed with her drink in hand and even brought over the half-eaten meal she’d been working on, forcing herself to sit at the same table as Yu Mao.

Yu Mao didn’t pay her any attention. She had already spotted where Nan Changgeng was sitting; once again, she carefully chose the seat one table away and sat down. She picked up a tangerine segment, sniffed it beneath her nose, then put it in her mouth.

She felt rather disappointed; they were too far away, so she couldn’t smell the orange scent on the woman.

Yirui An sat beside her. Following her gaze, she looked over once, then at the way she kept eating tangerines, and her expression grew stranger by the second.

“Are you using Sister Nan as a side dish?”

Yu Mao ignored her.

Yirui An gritted her teeth, feeling deeply stifled. She’d been so attentive, and yet she was still being ignored; Nan Changgeng had done nothing at all, but she had managed to attract all of Yu Mao’s attention.

She was practically banging her head against the wall and couldn’t even keep going.

And yet she still refused to give up. She decided to force herself to use Nan Changgeng as an opening.

“Are you Sister Nan’s fan?”

Yu Mao was like an AI whose keyword had been triggered; she turned her eyes toward her and finally answered, “Sort of.”

Yirui An felt even more stifled. But she still had to keep the conversation going, or Yu Mao wouldn’t even bother responding to her.

She suddenly understood what it meant to feel like vomiting blood. She forced out a smile.

“What do you mean, ‘sort of’?”

Yu Mao thought for a moment, then licked the orange juice from her lips. “I’m not sure whether my feelings qualify as those of a fan.”

“...What?”

Yirui An looked utterly disbelieving; she even seemed a little panicked.

If it wasn’t the feelings of a fan... then what was this? What was this stare-until-you-can’t-look-away behavior supposed to be!?

Could she be secretly in love with Nan Changgeng!? Then what about herself...

No, no. Yu Mao only said she wasn’t sure; that didn’t prove it definitely wasn’t fan-like affection.

Besides, what fan doesn’t want to date their idol? That’s all just wishful thinking in the daytime; in real life, when it comes to finding someone to date, people still keep looking.

“Why do you say that?” Yirui An forced herself to calm down and coaxed her patiently. “Is it because you’re suddenly so close to your idol that you’re a little confused?”

Yu Mao looked at her in confusion, not understanding what she was trying to say.

“Confused about what?”

She simply couldn’t be certain whether the word fan matched her feelings. If she were to define it herself and look for a more suitable word in human language, she thought it should be... believer.

While thinking that, she once again ignored several things Yirui An said next.

Outside of being with Nan Changgeng, she was a little single-threaded; she was used to conserving energy.

This made Yirui An extremely miserable.

Spacing out again... spacing out again! Was talking to her really that boring!? She couldn’t even be bothered to put on a front!

In grief and indignation, she shoved a big mouthful of rice into her mouth.

Too much!

With her emotions surging, she swallowed too quickly and choked so badly her eyes rolled upward; hurriedly, she took a sip of her drink to force it down, tears springing into her eyes.

Feeling the moisture at the corners of her eyes, her gaze flickered. Trying her luck, she reached out and tugged at Yu Mao’s sleeve.

“Hey, I just choked. It was awful.”

Yu Mao turned back and looked at her blankly.

“Why are you telling me this?”

“..."

“Shit!”

Yirui An shot up in fury and couldn’t stay another second. She picked up her tray and left.

If she were in a better mood right now, maybe she could have endured it; maybe even found a bitter kind of amusement in the thought that she could shape Yu Mao from scratch, like training an AI.

But at this very moment, she simply couldn’t keep speaking to Yu Mao politely.

A blank sheet of paper really did make people want to draw on it; but it was also genuinely infuriating.

Yu Mao frowned in confusion, then indifferently withdrew her gaze and looked back toward Nan Changgeng’s back, eating her tangerines.

Yirui An didn’t realize at that moment that Yu Mao had never been a blank sheet of paper.

She had long since been soaked through with the color of one person alone; perhaps because that color was too pure, it instead gave off a strange kind of clarity.

And this answer, which Yirui An could misread, would of course be misread by netizens with even sharper instincts. Two people with no connection in the entertainment industry could be dragged together and shipped into flowers; not to mention that Yu Mao’s behavior made it all so obvious.

[No way, does what Yu Mao mean match what I’m thinking? Confessing and coming out on the show?]

[That’s not really surprising. She’s been acting obvious enough already]

[Could it be a misunderstanding? I feel like that’s not what she meant]

[Then what else could it be? If it’s not a fan, not a crush, what other situation fits her behavior? A master-servant relationship?]

[Hiss... you know what, that’s kind of intriguing. That scene this morning really had a vibe]

[I want to ship it too, but as a mom fan, the moment I think of Little Cat being in unrequited love, I just get deflated]

By the time Nan Changgeng finished eating and got up to leave, Yu Mao had eaten her last tangerine segment.

She stood up too, put away her tray, and then trailed far behind Nan Changgeng like a little tail.

Silently, she followed her into the practice room.

It was still the lunch break free-chat period; there were already contestants inside who had come back early after eating. When they saw Yu Mao walk in, the room fell quiet at once.

Nan Changgeng also sensed something and turned back. A slight look of surprise lifted her brows, and she smiled. “You got here so early?”

She had noticed Yu Mao going to the cafeteria, but hadn’t realized Yu Mao had followed her here.

Yu Mao gave a slight nod. Even in this situation, she didn’t seem to know what embarrassment was; she walked in without the slightest awkwardness, found a corner by the wall, sat down, pulled her knees up, and rested her chin between them.

Then she continued the cafeteria behavior: staring.

Nan Changgeng was a little uncomfortable at first. Every time her gaze swept past that corner, she met a pair of unblinking eyes, making her scalp prickle.

However, this kind of fan behavior at a safe distance was something she’d seen plenty of when she was still active in the industry, so it wasn’t hard to accept.

Besides, once she had things to do, she no longer had the spare energy to keep paying attention to Yu Mao.

The Flying Flower twin duo came over to find her, discussing preparations for the first public stage and asking for advice on their original song.

The two of them clearly had great confidence in their own strength; they didn’t seem worried about the initial evaluations at all and had already started preparing for the first stage, their ambition fully on display.

They were also smart enough to pick the one contestant who definitely wouldn’t care about the ranking.

After all, all the glory Nan Changgeng was owed had already been earned years ago; coming back into the industry now was practically forced attendance. How could she care about the results of some broken idol music show?

After listening to the demo they’d recorded, Nan Changgeng found it quite interesting. The music was very nice and not a style she often encountered. It centered on guqin and percussion, wild and archaic yet solemn and mysterious, like the natural sound of the world taking shape.

Nai Ye and Nai Lin even matched their styling to the music. Their hair had been done to resemble wild people; loud, uneven, like a failed perm taking a small step toward an explosive afro and a high-layer wolf tail.

Earlier, some contestants had wondered whether the styling had gone wrong. Only after asking did they learn that this had been done deliberately.

And they were very satisfied with it too.

Nan Changgeng couldn’t really comment on the hairstyle, and the same was true for their music. She wasn’t good at this kind of folk-influenced music, and she was a little puzzled by the twins’ purpose in coming to her.

“I think it sounds very good, but if you want my opinion, I don’t know much about this kind of music. I probably won’t be able to help much.”

The older sister, Nai Ye, explained, “We think your timbre is especially beautiful, Teacher Nan, so we wanted to ask you to record a section of backing vocals.”

Nai Lin immediately nodded. “Yes, yes. We’ve listened to many of your songs, especially your later ones with a darker style. There are so many chanting parts in them, and your voice is just too beautiful. We’ve wanted to work with you for a long time, but we never had the chance before.”

The two of them wore a practiced air of respect and humility. They truly did admire Nan Changgeng’s skill and achievements, and their address of “Teacher” was sincere.

“That’s simple; no problem.” Nan Changgeng agreed readily. She was quite happy to participate in this kind of collaborative song too.

“That’s great.” Nai Lin clapped her hands and bounced up and down, her hair swaying like a little wild thing.

Nai Ye was much steadier than her; she only smiled in delight.

“Oh, and there’s one more thing.” Nai Ye spoke carefully. “We also want to incorporate a cello section into the accompaniment. Would we be honored to have you record that, Teacher?”

Nan Changgeng’s expression froze for a moment. After hesitating briefly, she simply said plainly, “I’m afraid I can’t do that. I can’t play anymore. I’m sorry.”

A few days ago, she still hadn’t been able to face this matter directly; when Mo Lei brought it up, she’d avoided it. But now, saying it out loud in front of the two young girls was much easier.