Chapter 3

Act I: The Sound of Music (1)

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Their first encounter in this story originated five years ago.

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"Xiang Cai, your transfer application has been approved on our side." Chu Ping came over from the desk. She wanted to pat the boy's shoulder, but when she met his quiet eyes, all her hand could do was fall weakly and land on his arm. "... In short, on behalf of the Musical Theatre Department of Huawu Affiliated Academy, I welcome you."

"Thank you." Xiang Cai’s eyes bent, his eyelashes blinked slightly, and he showed a seemingly well-behaved smile. "Ms. Chu, please give me more advice in the next two years."

"Yes, I will." Chu Ping was called the class teacher, but in fact, she was only a few years older than the group of students. She looked at the 17-year-old boy in front of her and had a lot to say. However, in the end, she just pushed her glasses and asked softly, "Do you know anything about musical theatre?"

Xiang Cai answered, "To be honest, no."

"Have you read any preparatory books?"

"To be honest, no."

"Uh..." Chu Ping was helpless, but she had a good temper and explained kindly, "Our Musical Theatre Department mainly trains performers with a modern dance aesthetic. Singing, acting, and dancing are all important."

As she spoke, Xiang Cai stood there quietly, listening intently.

Chu Ping sighed inwardly and subconsciously looked him over.

The seventeen-year-old boy was fully developed. Because he practiced ballet from a young age, Xiang Cai’s figure was very good. When he was first admitted to the Huawu Affiliated Academy as a ballet student at the age of eleven, his legs’ length exceeded his upper body’s by 18 centimeters. He was born to dance. He was very hard-working and had a persevering aura. Before his accident, the head of the Huawu Affiliated Academy Ballet Department had visited him many times, and the transfer procedures were almost completed.

Unfortunately...

Thinking of this, Chu Ping glanced at the boy's feet with a subtle look.

She softened her voice again and said, "In short, most of our students major in acting after graduation. But now many of the ‘small flowers’ and ‘fresh meat’ are from the Ballet Department! Of course, there is a small number of students that go to the Musical Theatre Department... Your application for transfer is written, are you sure you want to apply to Musical Theatre in the future? "

"Yes." Mentioning the future, Xiang Cai’s eyes finally lit up. He did not want to give up dancing, but because of the accident that shouldn’t have happened, his feet lost the ability to jump on the stage. In the long run, The Musical Theatre Department was the only goal left in his journey.

"That's good," Chu Ping nodded. "You and your classmates have dropped too many professional classes in the pursuit of acting. You must catch up with everyone as soon as possible. By the way, how many musicals have you seen by now?"

"..."

Seeing his eyes flicker a little, Chu Ping guessed that he didn't do much homework.

"It's okay, say it boldly." Chu Ping calmed him. "Ten, twenty, five, or eight?" She paused and asked suspiciously, "You can’t have seen none. Have you seen any? "

Xiang Cai said, "I have seen one."

"Oh? Which one?"

"The Sound of Music."

"..." Chu Ping thought, ‘If you just grabbed a primary school student, wouldn’t they have seen The Sound of Music?’

After completing the transfer formalities, Chu Ping took Xiang Cai towards the singing and dancing specialty classrooms.

Huawu Affiliated Academy had a residential system. Classes were held six days a week, and they had two days off right before the end of the month. All students took three of their department’s classes a day. By the time they had a small cultural class in the afternoon of, they were exhausted and sleepy.

Xiang Cai looked for his bubble gum, pulled out a piece, threw it in his mouth, and chewed. He chewed a few mouthfuls, blew a bubble, and after it burst, he blew another.

Chu Ping heard the ‘snap’ and another‘snap’; she wanted to tell him to stop, but eventually swallowed it back.
 

Cai’s transfer department application was approved by the school leader. Prior to him, there had never been any students in the school who had switched departments. The only ones who weren’t satisfied hadn’t had good skills or couldn't keep up with the school's teaching standards; they had cried and were long gone from the school.

When the school leader handed Xiang Cai’s file to Chu Ping, he repeatedly told her, "You also know the child's condition. He was born on the stage, but unfortunately, he has such parents ... The school held meetings and studied for several days: I can’t bear to let his life go down like this, so I put him in your hands. At the beginning of this day, he will definitely have some trouble, so you must do your teaching well. "

Chu Ping was a young teacher. She originally would not have been the class teacher, but the teacher in charge of the Musical Theatre Department was pregnant and expecting to give birth, so she pushed this to Chu Ping just a few years after she had graduated.

It was better to say that she was a sister than a teacher-- when she graduated from the Huawu Affiliated Academy, she had heard that there was a dazzling little swan amidst the ugly ducklings on the first day. He was eye-catching ".

Art schools had always been a gathering place for handsome men and beauties. But when Xiang Cai entered school at the age of 11, he already had sisters who were several years older than him go to the dance studio to watch him.

He wore same practice clothes, and had the same long-handed, long-footed, small-faced physique, but Xiang Cai still looked better than everyone else. They kindly called him the little ballet prince: when they lined up for lunch in the cafeteria, the aunt in the cafeteria would give him a spoonful of the smoothest fish and plumpest shrimp. Each time the TV station came to interview, he was also the one who appeared as a student representative.

But it was such a proud and noble little prince who, after a year off of school, turned to the Musical Theatre Department.

Immediately after the accident, the school leader sent someone to visit the hospital. It was said that Mr. Yang, who taught Quality Skills, cried all afternoon in the office after returning from the hospital.

Such a glorious future star who everyone expected to shine had fallen.

Fortunately, Xiang Cai finally returned to campus. They just didn’t know, could he really integrate into the Musical Theatre Department?

Chu Ping led Xiang Cai into the classroom.

This was a self-study class. Of course, there was no difference between a self-study class without a teacher and a free-activity class. People sat in their rows, chatted, sat in the back of the classroom, played backgammon...

But after Xiang Cai entered the classroom, all this stopped.

These lawless little guys seemed to be thrown into outer space with no oxygen and no sound. They could only open their mouths and look awkwardly at the boy who entered the classroom.

Xiang Cai didn't let Chu Ping introduce him, nor did Chu Ping plan to introduce him at all.

His name, his appearance, his department, his story ... When he didn't know it, he had already spread his influence around the campus.

It was just that these young people had never thought that one day, they would become the classmates of the previous legendary top student Xiang Cai.

"That... Xiang Cai, you go sit in the third row." Chu Ping took care of him and pointed him to the best position in the class.

"Thank you, teacher, but I’d like to sit in the back." Xiang Cai said, carrying his bag and walking to the last row.

Chu Ping felt helpless. She felt that Xiang Cai’s actual character was completely different from the rumors.

But if one thought about it, he had experienced such terrible things, and he was still in his sensitive adolescent age; his personality change was normal.

The seat Cai selected was by the window. At the same table was a girl with a round body and a small round face, who looked like an orange cat.

Xiang Cai threw his flat, empty school bag on the ground. Before he sat, the round girl used the desk as a cover to hand over a bag of spicy dried fish.

"I'm Qi Ji." She said, "Come, eat!"

Xiang Cai took a look at the package of dried fish, and asked cautiously, "Can I take the liberty to ask, do you not need to measure your body weight every week?"

Qi Ji’s eyes grew wide and stared: "... You're so presumptuous."

"..."

"Our department is not so strict," Qi Ji said. "I heard that you measure at the Ballet Department once a week?"

"Yes." Xiang Cai said in a more arrogant tone than he had just used, "For a girl as tall as you, their weight would be controlled to be below 42 kg."

The girl sighed twice. "I have never seen this number on a weight scale, only on a thermometer."

"..." Xiang Cai thought, ‘My seatmate sure has a lot of words.’

While they were chatting, the other students in the class had been buzzing. It's just that in the presence of the class teacher, none of them dared to speak loudly. They all pressed their voices into their throats, and when talking, they sounded like bees and flies.

When Chu Ping left, the class directly exploded.

Countless pairs of eyes, and those whispering mouths that were seen after the eyes, like the continuous heavy rain in the middle of the night, stuck to Xiang Cai.

But Xiang Cai was used to it.

This year he had been so accustomed to the sight of regret and sadness.

Pretending not to hear them, he turned to look at his new seatmate, "What are you listening to?" He pointed to the headphones in her ears.

Her cell phone was hidden in her trouser pocket, and a long black headphone cord came out from the neckline of her uniform and hung on her ears under the cover of her hair.

In school, they were not allowed to bring cell phones. When the class teacher came in, she had hurriedly torn the headphone cord out.

Qi Ji did not expect that the male god of the campus would take the initiative to talk to herself. She blushed a little and whispered, "You can't tell the teacher. I have been confiscated of three mobile phones. My favorite cv has finished the active radio drama. I'm listening to the recording and broadcasting ft!"

"..."

This was really awesome. In one sentence, it touched four knowledge blind spots of Xiang Cai.

What was a cv, what was ‘active’, what was a radio drama, and what was the recording ft?

But Xiang Cai had always been proud of himself.

So he said in a very familiar and sophisticated tone, "What a coincidence, I also like radio dramas."

"Really?!" Qi Ji asked incredulously, "Which cv do you like?"

Xiang Cai unhurriedly replied: "I don't follow a certain cv, but I know about those on the leaderboard."

If Qi Ji wanted to discuss a team, game, or a star with him, he would answer with the same sentence.

Qi Ji was really bluffed by him. She looked at the ballet prince who was as delicate as a ceramic doll, and then looked at the earphones she bought for ten dollars from a stand. After hesitating for a while, she still handed him the headphones and asked, "Would you like to listen?"

The headphones lightly touched the boy's ears, and the rustling noise caused by poor-quality earphones made him subconsciously frown.

In that second, a gentle, calm, male voice came from the headphones.

The sound spread through the radio waves, penetrating time and space, like lightning and thunder that was enough to split the dark clouds. It penetrated Xiang Cai’s eardrums and shocked his soul at the same time.

——Stop joking around with me, I'm really bad at singing, but let me read it as a poem for you. From The Sound of Music, I am reading "My Favorite Things" for everyone. 

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The author has something to say:

You must find that Cai Cai has changed a lot between this chapter and the last. Because from this chapter, it is about what happened to Cai Cai at the age of 17. At that time for Cai Cai, pride, stubbornness, rebellion, and other things were buried deep in his heart.

The musical in this chapter is The Sound of Music!

Everyone should know this musical, the most famous song in it is “Do-Re-Mi”~ It tells the story of Sister Maria going to the home of a colonel and teaching 7 children as their nanny.

T/N: Hi, thanks for reading my translation of Cai Cai. I mtl, but I hope there’s not much that gets lost in the process, because I spend a long time editing (I think). Btw, half the times it mentions ‘musical theatre department’, it was originally ‘song and dance majors’, but I will keep it as departments to avoid confusion. Unless they turn out to be actually different things. 

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