Chapter 16
Act III: Rachmaninoff (3)
----------
After Wang Qingyun called Xiang Cai a "little swan" that day, Xiang Cai’s honest hands moved. ...
He cleared out the goofy dog emoji packs from his mobile phone, and collected a lot of silly photos of swans from the Internet. He made a specific emoji pack as his unique support for walking on rivers and lakes.
[bulldog call] became [goose call], [small bark] became [small quack] ... Xiang Cai tried his best to search for the emoji that could correspond one by one, and immersed himself in the emoji packs every day with joy.
Although the great god Wang Qingyun had not spoken in the group for a long time, Xiang Cai believed that one day, the great god would definitely see his contribution!
In the dog emoji pack, there was a gif called [dog trembling]. On the screen, a Corgi hid his head under a sofa cushion, revealing only a round big round bread-like butt, which made people want to knead it with their hands. This [dog trembling] stood for anxiety and fear, and was one of Xiang Cai’s most commonly used expressions.
It was just that the corresponding swan photo was not easy to find. He looked around and finally turned one over.
In the photo, a white swan fell to the ground somehow, with the wings facing upward, and its long neck stretched innocently. Its ass was pointed at the camera, and its tail feathers were in all directions, looking pitiful and ridiculous.
Xiang Cai decided to make this swan with its butt tilted into his emoji pack, and wrote the words [goose trembling] ...
His mobile phone was too old, just opening the p-map software, would render the screen to freeze for half a minute.
[T/N: ‘P-map’, or just ‘P’ is an image editing software, used for naming and sorting emoji I guess.]
The picture of the bottom-up swan was frozen there. Qi Ji glanced over and exclaimed: "You are so good!"
Xiang Cai: "... ????"
He asked aggrievedly, "Why are you scolding me?"
"No, no." Qi Ji quickly explained, "Have you ever seen The Temptation to Go Home? Don't you know Hong Shixian? ‘You are so good’ is a classic line from it. Look at this fat tender goose, showing his ass to the camera! It is more suitable for this sentence as an emoji!"
"..." Xiang Cai was at the age when his idol burden was the heaviest. He had bitten the bullet to admit that he liked to listen to radio dramas, but now he was biting the bullet again to confess that he had watched The Temptation to Go Home. "Just ... just Hong Shixian, who doesn't know him? I just didn't react right away."
He filled the four words beside the tender goose tenderly, but he felt guilty and did not dare to look at the innocent little eyes of the swan.
...... It would be nice if things ended here.
Five minutes later, a string of messages popped up on Xiang Cai’s phone.
Yiming Qingyun: guess, are you there?
Yiming Qingyun: I have a demo here, an animated voice-over I recorded for a friend.
Yiming Qingyun: Listen to it and give me your opinion.
Yiming Qingyun: But this demo is to be used to participate in a competition, so you can only watch it yourself, don’t pass it on to others.
Yiming Qingyun: [Share Video]
It was Wang Qingyun-sama! !! !! !! !!
Yun Da asked him to listen to his demo! !! !! !! !!
And only, let, him, only, one, person, watch! !! !!
This came as a surprise to Xiang Cai! First, he nodded his head in a silly way at the mobile phone, and then turned to the expressions pack in a hurry, wanting to send an expression like [quack crying] [goose fly nine days] or [swan nodding], before telling the great god that he would definitely watch carefully, and then seriously writing a 800-character long review.
As a result, his phone glitched, and his hand shook ...
guess: [Fat tender goose-you are so good].jpg
Yiming Qingyun: ...
Yiming Qingyun: ?
Xiang Cai: "..."
The boy's eyes went dark, and before he completely fainted, he scrambled to withdraw that inappropriate expression.
But unfortunately, Tan Yiming had already seen it.
On the other side of the ocean, Tan Yiming looked at the stupid swan on the screen that had difficulty turning. His previous extreme strained nerves suddenly relaxed after seeing the expression.
He thought of an analogy ... In a marathon, a water mist gate would be set up every two kilometers. When you were most nervous, most excited, and most unable to control yourself, the water mist fell from the sky, cooling your whole body, and keeping you awake.
At the early stage of the marathon, when it was not yet time to fully sprint, it was better to pay attention to the road below your feet than to a distant target. If you lost your calm at this point, how could you face the long journey ahead?
Tan Yiming pressed his finger on the picture and just wanted to save the silly goose. But As a result, the child on the other side of the screen had already withdrawn the emoji.
The screen was full of the child’s upside-down apologies, saying that he shouldn't have sent such an inappropriate emoji.
Tan Yiming recalled the swan pointing its ass. It wasn’t that inappropriate, but it was kind of gay.
Yiming Qingyun: Don't be nervous, don't apologize.
Yiming Qingyun: I'm not your teacher, nor your superior. I won't capture and decapitate you over an emoji.
Yiming Qingyun: And,
Yiming Qingyun: That silly goose was pretty cute.
guess: ...
guess ： [goose weeping].jpg
Tan Yiming was telling the truth. He didn't know where he found so many weird swan emoji packs, and the words accompanying them were particularly vivid.
The little swan on the other side of the screen did not know whether to believe it or not. Tan Yiming saw the prompt ‘typing’ flash for a long time before he saw a sentence pop out.
guess: Yun Da, I'm going to class early.
guess: Can I watch to the demo you passed over at night?
guess: No, I will watch it at noon today! !!
Yiming Qingyun: It doesn't matter.
Yiming Qingyun: Just watch when you have time.
Yiming Qingyun: I'm not in a hurry.
He was ... really in no hurry, now.
Yiming Qingyun: Just don't pass it on to others.
guess: [swan nodding].jpg
guess: En! This is for me alone!
guess: I won't show it to others!
At this moment, Xiang Cai had an exclusive secret, and this secret only existed between Wang Qingyun and himself.
He packed each piece of memory about Wang Qingyun into a candy, and then carefully stored it and put it in the deepest corner of his heart.
The first candy was when he was called ‘little swan’.
The second candy was this mysterious demo.
The candies fell into the sugar bowl and made a crisp sound. He didn’t know if there would be any more candies in the future. He hoped that one day, the candy bowl would fill up, and he would have to change to a bigger one to carry it; but he was also content with just these two alone.
Xiang Cai finally understood why Qi Ji was obsessed with the ‘two-dimensional world’, pinning one’s feelings on a distant and untouchable object, it would really make one forget the troubles of reality.
And the sweets related to Wang Qingyun were the best gifts and the best relievers of pain.
...
Xiang Cai put away his phone, this good mood continuing until the end of morning exercises.
After the morning exercises, there was a full vocal lesson. As everyone had expected, in the vocal lesson, the teacher announced that the assessment musical for this semester was Rachmaninoff.
Musical actors needed to sing, dance, and perform well, but not all musicals needed dancing.
For example, this Rachmaninoff was simply a musical stage show. The whole stage show had only two actors, one played Rach, and the other played his friend Dr. Dahl. All the soundtracks in the play were adapted from Rach's own piano works, making singing extremely difficult.
"This play is one with two actors."
"The screenwriters and composers are fans of Mozart, l'opéra rock, paying tribute to their idol."
[T/N: ‘Mozart, the rock opera’ is a french rock opera musical dramatizing Mozart’s life.]
"It's tiring to look at the character chart. Dahl actually has to play three roles by himself."
"It came out as a Korean small theater musical, those who are capable can work harder and do more."
"How about it, do you want to play Rach?"
"Rach has to sign and play the piano at the same time. I’ll be Dahl. Dahl plays the violin, and I think my violin level is okay."
Buzzing noises were heard from different corners of the classroom.
Everyone was discussing and organizing themselves into small groups. Xiang Cai looked around, and found that every classmate around him exude confidence.
As for himself, he was a blank piece of paper.
It turned out that the musical was Korean, he thought it was Russian.
What was a small theater musical? What did it have to do with Mozart, l'opéra rock?
Why should one person play so many roles, couldn’t they add more actors?
...... Xiang Cai sat with his back straight, these questions going around in his mind. He wanted to ask, but couldn't speak.
It had nothing to do with courage, it had to do with self-esteem.
Xiang Cai is four years behind his classmates. He used to think that he was left behind with only professional lessons. As long as he added training and practiced every day, he could make it up with his vocal skills and line performances.
But now he found that he also lacked four years of accumulated knowledge. For others, what they were discussion was basic knowledge that was effortless, easy to grasp.
They talked a lot about avant-garde dramas, small theater movements, localization of musicals, and about well-known directors and producers in China, Korea, and Japan.
Xiang Cai could only straighten his ears, and quietly write down the words they mentioned in his book, preparing to ask Baidu after returning to his bedroom at night.
[T/N: Baidu is a search engine.]
As for selecting performance partners ...
When the male students in the class touched his gaze, they all looked away, one after another.
No way, the ballet prince’s fame was too big, and his appearance was too outstanding. No matter who was in his group, they would be suppressed by his edge. Once, they could comfort themselves that Xiang Cai couldn't sing. However, now they couldn't even do that! Xiang Cai was born with good voice conditions, and with hard work, his singing level actually improved very quickly in just two months!
This was a double male lead drama! Who wanted to be reduced to a supporting role beside him?
Initially, the Musical Theatre Department enrolled only one class each year, with 28 students, equally divided into men and women. However Xiang Cai, who was transferred in midway, became the extra, the twenty-ninth person.
Grouping them in pairs would definitely leave one behind.
Seeing him alone, Qi Ji took the initiative and suggested, "Xiang Cai, you can join my group. We can give you Dahl’s two other roles."
Her partner was another girl in the class, who joked that she was a "Rich" version of "Rich".
Xiang Cai bowed his head to look at the score in front of him, a two-hour musical with nineteen songs.
Without an intermission, the two actors would use their singing to interpret a fragment of the life of one of the music masters of his generation.
"No need." The boy looked up, twinkling stars in the corners of his eyes. "——I can sing alone, whether it is Rach or Dahl."
----------
T/N: Comment if you get this phrase for the 'rich' paragraph. Originally 她们戏称自己是“姬情四 Sh_e ”版《拉赫》. I guess the musical was not Chinese (but the Chinese one does exist) ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
----------
After Wang Qingyun called Xiang Cai a "little swan" that day, Xiang Cai’s honest hands moved. ...
He cleared out the goofy dog emoji packs from his mobile phone, and collected a lot of silly photos of swans from the Internet. He made a specific emoji pack as his unique support for walking on rivers and lakes.
[bulldog call] became [goose call], [small bark] became [small quack] ... Xiang Cai tried his best to search for the emoji that could correspond one by one, and immersed himself in the emoji packs every day with joy.
Although the great god Wang Qingyun had not spoken in the group for a long time, Xiang Cai believed that one day, the great god would definitely see his contribution!
In the dog emoji pack, there was a gif called [dog trembling]. On the screen, a Corgi hid his head under a sofa cushion, revealing only a round big round bread-like butt, which made people want to knead it with their hands. This [dog trembling] stood for anxiety and fear, and was one of Xiang Cai’s most commonly used expressions.
It was just that the corresponding swan photo was not easy to find. He looked around and finally turned one over.
In the photo, a white swan fell to the ground somehow, with the wings facing upward, and its long neck stretched innocently. Its ass was pointed at the camera, and its tail feathers were in all directions, looking pitiful and ridiculous.
Xiang Cai decided to make this swan with its butt tilted into his emoji pack, and wrote the words [goose trembling] ...
His mobile phone was too old, just opening the p-map software, would render the screen to freeze for half a minute.
[T/N: ‘P-map’, or just ‘P’ is an image editing software, used for naming and sorting emoji I guess.]
The picture of the bottom-up swan was frozen there. Qi Ji glanced over and exclaimed: "You are so good!"
Xiang Cai: "... ????"
He asked aggrievedly, "Why are you scolding me?"
"No, no." Qi Ji quickly explained, "Have you ever seen The Temptation to Go Home? Don't you know Hong Shixian? ‘You are so good’ is a classic line from it. Look at this fat tender goose, showing his ass to the camera! It is more suitable for this sentence as an emoji!"
"..." Xiang Cai was at the age when his idol burden was the heaviest. He had bitten the bullet to admit that he liked to listen to radio dramas, but now he was biting the bullet again to confess that he had watched The Temptation to Go Home. "Just ... just Hong Shixian, who doesn't know him? I just didn't react right away."
He filled the four words beside the tender goose tenderly, but he felt guilty and did not dare to look at the innocent little eyes of the swan.
...... It would be nice if things ended here.
Five minutes later, a string of messages popped up on Xiang Cai’s phone.
Yiming Qingyun: guess, are you there?
Yiming Qingyun: I have a demo here, an animated voice-over I recorded for a friend.
Yiming Qingyun: Listen to it and give me your opinion.
Yiming Qingyun: But this demo is to be used to participate in a competition, so you can only watch it yourself, don’t pass it on to others.
Yiming Qingyun: [Share Video]
It was Wang Qingyun-sama! !! !! !! !!
Yun Da asked him to listen to his demo! !! !! !! !!
And only, let, him, only, one, person, watch! !! !!
This came as a surprise to Xiang Cai! First, he nodded his head in a silly way at the mobile phone, and then turned to the expressions pack in a hurry, wanting to send an expression like [quack crying] [goose fly nine days] or [swan nodding], before telling the great god that he would definitely watch carefully, and then seriously writing a 800-character long review.
As a result, his phone glitched, and his hand shook ...
guess: [Fat tender goose-you are so good].jpg
Yiming Qingyun: ...
Yiming Qingyun: ?
Xiang Cai: "..."
The boy's eyes went dark, and before he completely fainted, he scrambled to withdraw that inappropriate expression.
But unfortunately, Tan Yiming had already seen it.
On the other side of the ocean, Tan Yiming looked at the stupid swan on the screen that had difficulty turning. His previous extreme strained nerves suddenly relaxed after seeing the expression.
He thought of an analogy ... In a marathon, a water mist gate would be set up every two kilometers. When you were most nervous, most excited, and most unable to control yourself, the water mist fell from the sky, cooling your whole body, and keeping you awake.
At the early stage of the marathon, when it was not yet time to fully sprint, it was better to pay attention to the road below your feet than to a distant target. If you lost your calm at this point, how could you face the long journey ahead?
Tan Yiming pressed his finger on the picture and just wanted to save the silly goose. But As a result, the child on the other side of the screen had already withdrawn the emoji.
The screen was full of the child’s upside-down apologies, saying that he shouldn't have sent such an inappropriate emoji.
Tan Yiming recalled the swan pointing its ass. It wasn’t that inappropriate, but it was kind of gay.
Yiming Qingyun: Don't be nervous, don't apologize.
Yiming Qingyun: I'm not your teacher, nor your superior. I won't capture and decapitate you over an emoji.
Yiming Qingyun: And,
Yiming Qingyun: That silly goose was pretty cute.
guess: ...
guess ： [goose weeping].jpg
Tan Yiming was telling the truth. He didn't know where he found so many weird swan emoji packs, and the words accompanying them were particularly vivid.
The little swan on the other side of the screen did not know whether to believe it or not. Tan Yiming saw the prompt ‘typing’ flash for a long time before he saw a sentence pop out.
guess: Yun Da, I'm going to class early.
guess: Can I watch to the demo you passed over at night?
guess: No, I will watch it at noon today! !!
Yiming Qingyun: It doesn't matter.
Yiming Qingyun: Just watch when you have time.
Yiming Qingyun: I'm not in a hurry.
He was ... really in no hurry, now.
Yiming Qingyun: Just don't pass it on to others.
guess: [swan nodding].jpg
guess: En! This is for me alone!
guess: I won't show it to others!
At this moment, Xiang Cai had an exclusive secret, and this secret only existed between Wang Qingyun and himself.
He packed each piece of memory about Wang Qingyun into a candy, and then carefully stored it and put it in the deepest corner of his heart.
The first candy was when he was called ‘little swan’.
The second candy was this mysterious demo.
The candies fell into the sugar bowl and made a crisp sound. He didn’t know if there would be any more candies in the future. He hoped that one day, the candy bowl would fill up, and he would have to change to a bigger one to carry it; but he was also content with just these two alone.
Xiang Cai finally understood why Qi Ji was obsessed with the ‘two-dimensional world’, pinning one’s feelings on a distant and untouchable object, it would really make one forget the troubles of reality.
And the sweets related to Wang Qingyun were the best gifts and the best relievers of pain.
...
Xiang Cai put away his phone, this good mood continuing until the end of morning exercises.
After the morning exercises, there was a full vocal lesson. As everyone had expected, in the vocal lesson, the teacher announced that the assessment musical for this semester was Rachmaninoff.
Musical actors needed to sing, dance, and perform well, but not all musicals needed dancing.
For example, this Rachmaninoff was simply a musical stage show. The whole stage show had only two actors, one played Rach, and the other played his friend Dr. Dahl. All the soundtracks in the play were adapted from Rach's own piano works, making singing extremely difficult.
"This play is one with two actors."
"The screenwriters and composers are fans of Mozart, l'opéra rock, paying tribute to their idol."
[T/N: ‘Mozart, the rock opera’ is a french rock opera musical dramatizing Mozart’s life.]
"It's tiring to look at the character chart. Dahl actually has to play three roles by himself."
"It came out as a Korean small theater musical, those who are capable can work harder and do more."
"How about it, do you want to play Rach?"
"Rach has to sign and play the piano at the same time. I’ll be Dahl. Dahl plays the violin, and I think my violin level is okay."
Buzzing noises were heard from different corners of the classroom.
Everyone was discussing and organizing themselves into small groups. Xiang Cai looked around, and found that every classmate around him exude confidence.
As for himself, he was a blank piece of paper.
It turned out that the musical was Korean, he thought it was Russian.
What was a small theater musical? What did it have to do with Mozart, l'opéra rock?
Why should one person play so many roles, couldn’t they add more actors?
...... Xiang Cai sat with his back straight, these questions going around in his mind. He wanted to ask, but couldn't speak.
It had nothing to do with courage, it had to do with self-esteem.
Xiang Cai is four years behind his classmates. He used to think that he was left behind with only professional lessons. As long as he added training and practiced every day, he could make it up with his vocal skills and line performances.
But now he found that he also lacked four years of accumulated knowledge. For others, what they were discussion was basic knowledge that was effortless, easy to grasp.
They talked a lot about avant-garde dramas, small theater movements, localization of musicals, and about well-known directors and producers in China, Korea, and Japan.
Xiang Cai could only straighten his ears, and quietly write down the words they mentioned in his book, preparing to ask Baidu after returning to his bedroom at night.
[T/N: Baidu is a search engine.]
As for selecting performance partners ...
When the male students in the class touched his gaze, they all looked away, one after another.
No way, the ballet prince’s fame was too big, and his appearance was too outstanding. No matter who was in his group, they would be suppressed by his edge. Once, they could comfort themselves that Xiang Cai couldn't sing. However, now they couldn't even do that! Xiang Cai was born with good voice conditions, and with hard work, his singing level actually improved very quickly in just two months!
This was a double male lead drama! Who wanted to be reduced to a supporting role beside him?
Initially, the Musical Theatre Department enrolled only one class each year, with 28 students, equally divided into men and women. However Xiang Cai, who was transferred in midway, became the extra, the twenty-ninth person.
Grouping them in pairs would definitely leave one behind.
Seeing him alone, Qi Ji took the initiative and suggested, "Xiang Cai, you can join my group. We can give you Dahl’s two other roles."
Her partner was another girl in the class, who joked that she was a "Rich" version of "Rich".
Xiang Cai bowed his head to look at the score in front of him, a two-hour musical with nineteen songs.
Without an intermission, the two actors would use their singing to interpret a fragment of the life of one of the music masters of his generation.
"No need." The boy looked up, twinkling stars in the corners of his eyes. "——I can sing alone, whether it is Rach or Dahl."
----------
T/N: Comment if you get this phrase for the 'rich' paragraph. Originally 她们戏称自己是“姬情四 Sh_e ”版《拉赫》. I guess the musical was not Chinese (but the Chinese one does exist) ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
***
look how confident he is!!! <3 thank u for the chapter~
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