TL: Hua
Gao Yu had his back to the door, so he didn’t see Lin Yanran standing behind him when he was talking.
But the other trainees did. They looked up and saw their mentor and the staff at the door. They were stunned for a moment, then immediately stood up in a panic and bowed.
“Teacher Yanran, you’re… you’re here.”
“Welcome, welcome.”
The situation was so sudden that no one had time to compose themselves, and their tone and expressions were extremely unnatural.
Gao Yu, who had been so brash just moments before, froze like he’d been struck by lightning when he heard Lin Yanran’s name. Guiltily, he lowered his head and stood completely still.
Lin Yanran’s gaze swept over each person’s face. Seeing the trainees looking nervous and worried he’d be angry, he curved his lips and slowly walked toward them.
“You’ve all worked hard. How’s the practice going?”
A gentle, relaxed smile appeared on his face. His attitude was easygoing, and his tone was friendly, as if nothing had happened.
Seeing that Lin Yanran was so magnanimous and wasn’t going to make a fuss, the trainees finally breathed a sigh of relief.
After all, if the mentor were petty and had a direct confrontation with Gao Yu, they wouldn’t be able to continue filming or practicing.
Gao Yu was discreetly pulled on his shirt by Jin Letian, which brought him back to his senses. Feeling incredibly guilty, he didn’t dare to look at Lin Yanran’s face and just followed Jin Letian to an inconspicuous corner, hoping to minimize his presence.
However, as soon as he reached the corner and was about to sit down, he saw Lin Yanran standing in front of the practice room’s wall mirror, clapping his hands.
“Let’s see what you’ve accomplished today first.”
The trainees immediately began to wail.
“Teacher, we can’t. We’re not ready.”
“We haven’t rehearsed much, so the results will be bad.”
“Let us practice a little more. I still can’t even remember the lyrics…”
Lin Yanran shook his head. “Let’s run through it once together. I want to see the result.”
Before the trainees could say anything else, he added, “I want to understand your current situation.”
His beautiful eyes looked at everyone. They held a smile, and his tone was still gentle, but after meeting his gaze, everyone immediately stopped making excuses.
The mentor in front of them now seemed to have an aura, like a magical force that made people want to obey him.
The trainees didn’t dare to grumble anymore. As soon as the music started, they began to dance to the beat.
Except for a few who could barely get through the entire singing and dancing routine, the rest of the trainees had many problems.
And since Lin Yanran was standing in front of everyone, he clearly saw every mistake they made during their performance.
Lu Tianlang could only sing and couldn’t remember any of the dance moves.
Ji Shuai was the opposite—he only danced and didn’t sing a single word.
The three rappers, Fan Xiang, Gao Yu, and Jin Letian, didn’t stay on beat even once after combining their singing and dancing.
Not to mention Xia Xingxing and Ren Chuxi, who were so flustered that they just muddled through the entire scene…
It was obvious that without the professional guidance of a vocal or dance teacher, the trainees had wasted most of their day.
It was already evening, and they only had a little over two days left. In this state, there was no way they could perform on stage.
After the performance, none of the trainees spoke. They all hung their heads, looking dejected.
They knew their own skill level best. They didn’t need the mentor to critique them to know how bad it was, and the practice room had wall mirrors, so they could see their every move clearly.
They heard that the people in Pei Luo’s group could already sing and dance to the music, while their own group was still at the stage where they couldn’t even sing in sync…
They had barely rested all day, yet the results were still so awful.
The trainees sat on the floor in frustration, feeling both angry and wronged.
“I’m sorry.”
“Why am I so useless…”
“Can we really perform on stage?”
“Teacher, we’re really no good…”
At first, some people spoke softly, but the more they spoke, the more demoralized they became, and they eventually stopped talking altogether.
The room fell into a deathly silence.
Lin Yanran listened quietly to their complaints without saying a word, resting his chin on one hand, deep in thought.
Seeing Lin Yanran’s serious face and silence, the trainees were worried that he would criticize them for not working hard enough.
However, Lin Yanran’s next move surprised everyone.
He reached out his right hand, bent down, and helped the dispirited trainees on the floor stand up one by one.
Finally, Lin Yanran reached out his hand to Gao Yu.
“Stand up.”
Gao Yu met Lin Yanran’s gaze and saw him still trying to take his hand. His face turned red and then pale.
In the end, he didn’t dare to take the hand and just quickly patted his bottom and got up on his own.
Once everyone was standing straight again, Lin Yanran asked them in a deep voice, “Tell me, are you willing to give up just like this?”
Are you willing to give up just like this?
The trainees silently asked themselves the same question.
Of course not!
Even if the final result was elimination, they weren’t willing to go out like this.
But their opponents were just too strong…
Just as this thought crossed the trainees’ minds, they heard Lin Yanran ask, “If you don’t even believe in yourselves, how can the audience and fans trust in you?”
His words were a wake-up call, and everyone looked up at Lin Yanran.
Lin Yanran nodded at them, a slight smile in his eyes. “Even though everyone in our group has some problems, they can be solved through repeated practice. For us, as long as we find the right method, there are shortcuts for both singing and dancing. We still have time; we can still make it.”
We still have time; we can still make it.
Under such high pressure, positive encouragement was still the most effective way to motivate them.
Many trainees’ eyes gradually began to burn with a defiant light once more.
Seeing that their spirits were no longer so low, Lin Yanran didn’t waste any more time and went straight to the problem.
“Are the lyrics and your positions something you’ve already agreed on?”
The trainees nodded.
The first thing they did in the morning was divide up their parts.
Although there were many disagreements and unhappy moments when they were dividing the lyrics, time was short, and they didn’t want to waste it, so they compromised and settled for what they had.
Lin Yanran clearly did not support this method of division.
So he picked up a pen and started drawing on the lyric sheet, redividing the lyrics into different parts.
“You may have already noticed that our performance isn’t very harmonious; it lacks a sense of integration.”
The trainees immediately nodded in agreement. This was a problem they had noticed but hadn’t been able to solve.
As their mentor, Lin Yanran offered them a solution.
“I suggest we reassign the lyrics.”
When he brought up this suggestion, many trainees looked troubled.
They had already practiced for a full day according to the parts they had divided in the morning. Now, Lin Yanran wanted to completely change it, which meant their entire day’s practice had been for nothing!
This was a very bold suggestion.
If the new division didn’t work out, it would basically mean wasting a lot of their remaining precious time.
Not only that, the trainees didn’t trust Lin Yanran’s professional abilities, so his suggestion was met with a lot of opposition.
“Teacher, wouldn’t that be a bad idea? We don’t have time to try these things anymore,” Lu Tianlang said, carefully choosing his words to express his protest.
Fan Xiang also nodded in agreement. “We’re already quite familiar with our own parts. If we start all over again, I’m afraid the result will be even worse.”
Gao Yu also strongly opposed it. He wanted to stand up and say a few words, but when he thought about how he badmouthed Lin Yanran behind his back and was heard by him, he held back. He just nodded along with Fan Xiang.
Seeing that many people were against it, Lin Yanran didn’t argue. He just negotiated with them, “Let’s try it once and see the effect. If it really doesn’t work, we can switch back to the original way. How about that?”
With Lin Yanran saying so, those who wanted to object felt embarrassed to continue.
While many in the group initially opposed the idea, a significant number of them also felt that the original assignment was unreasonable and wanted a new distribution of parts.
So, they agreed to Lin Yanran’s proposal to let him reassign the lyrics.
Lin Yanran worked efficiently and rearranged the lyrics in an orderly manner.
The assignment for the first half of the song went smoothly, but they ran into a problem with the high note in section E.
“For the high note in section E, Ji Shuai, you’ll take it.”
Ji Shuai, who had expected to be assigned to background vocals, was suddenly wide-eyed when he heard Lin Yanran say his name.
He looked at Lin Yanran in surprise, thinking he had heard wrong. “Me?”
Lin Yanran nodded at him. “Yes, you. Your high note is very unique. You can try it here.”
After receiving a firm confirmation, Ji Shuai’s heart began to pound.
He had always wanted to try that high note.
However, he wasn’t confident in his abilities and was too shy to compete with others for it, so he had gone with the flow and let the group’s main vocalist, Lu Xiaomeng, take the part.
He had never expected that the mentor would believe in him and give him another chance when reassigning the lyrics.
Faced with this second chance, Ji Shuai happily agreed right away.
Ji Shuai was happy, but Lu Xiaomeng, who had been singing that part, was not.
The reason everyone wanted to sing that high note was that if you sang it well, you would easily stand out.
Everyone wants to make a lasting impression on stage, and he was no exception.
So when he heard that his part was taken, he became anxious.
“Teacher, I’ve already been practicing this part for a whole day.”
What Lu Xiaomeng really wanted to ask was, why would you think I’m not good enough when you’re giving it to someone who sings worse than me?
However, because of the cameras and Lin Yanran’s status as a mentor, he didn’t dare to say it out loud.
Lin Yanran saw through Lu Xiaomeng’s thoughts but didn’t argue. He calmly reassured him, “There’s a spot in this song that’s essential for you, but it’s not here.”
He then told him his new part.
Lu Xiaomeng tried to fight for his old part, but his teammates held him back.
After reassigning the lyrics, Lin Yanran had the staff play the backing track again.
“Follow what I just said and do a run-through with the track.”
Everyone picked up their lyric sheets, and with doubt and confusion, they began to sing along with the background music.
At first, the trainees had no expression on their faces, treating it as a useless practice run.
But as they sang, everyone’s attitude changed.
Parts that they had found awkward to sing before were now much smoother after the change.
People who had felt like they weren’t suitable for this song suddenly felt like they were.
Even the staff on-site noticed that this time, their singing sounded much more pleasant than before. The group as a whole was very harmonious, and there was no longer the disjointed feeling of people and song clashing.
It was as if every trainee had suddenly found their own groove, discovered the parts they were best suited for, and excelled at them.
Especially when Ji Shuai’s high note came out, anyone with ears could tell that it was a much better fit than Lu Xiaomeng’s had been.
After one run-through, all the trainees looked at each other in astonishment.
The 15 people who had been convinced that their group could never blend together finally experienced what true teamwork felt like.
It felt as if they had been training together for years.
The results from this one run-through completely surpassed their entire day’s worth of practice.
And all Lin Yanran did was simply adjust each trainee’s vocal part.
The people who had doubted Lin Yanran’s abilities were now looking at him with admiration.
Teacher Yanran wasn’t exaggerating; when you find the right method, there really is a shortcut to singing!
Lin Yanran then had everyone continue singing with the backing track. This time, no one had any doubts, and they all cooperated enthusiastically.
Once they were familiar with the song through the group chorus, Lin Yanran sat down at the piano and began playing the melody, helping the trainees perfect the details one phrase at a time.
Watching Lin Yanran’s skilled movements at the piano and the beautiful melody that he could play quickly and accurately for any part of the song, almost no one in their group questioned his professional musical abilities anymore.
In the large practice room, no one was slacking off or chatting. Everyone was focused on Lin Yanran, listening intently to his guidance.
“Lu Xiaomeng, sing it again. When you enter this section, be careful to start softer and create more of a dynamic.”
“Ji Shuai, when you sing, pull back a little and let Lu Tianlang shine.”
“Gao Yu, your rap isn’t clear enough. Try it like this…”
Again and again, Lin Yanran patiently corrected and taught them. The vocalists in the entire group made rapid progress and now had the momentum to rival members of Class A.
Gao Yu, standing in the crowd, quietly looked at Lin Yanran, who was playing the piano with his head down. A wave of guilt and unease washed over him.
He had previously belittled the mentor and deemed him useless, but the professional ability, understanding, and control of music that he had shown tonight were far beyond those of the other groups’ mentors.
He could watch their training once and find the strengths and weaknesses of every single trainee. He could then use this to his advantage when reassigning the lyrics, finding the most suitable part for everyone and arranging it perfectly…
This was something that only a truly talented musician could do.
He remembered how confidently he had said, Do you really think he can help us?
Gao Yu wanted to slap himself.
Teacher Yanran was completely different from what the rumors said!
At 3 a.m., the singing in the practice room finally stopped.
Lin Yanran, who disliked staying up late, rubbed his eyes and said to the trainees, “It’s too late. We’re done for today.”
Seeing that the trainees were still not ready to stop, he smiled and said, “Let’s rest today and get our energy back. We’ll continue tomorrow.”
With that, he got up and prepared to leave.
At that moment, Gao Yu rushed up and stopped him.
He then bowed deeply to Lin Yanran.
“Teacher Yanran, I’m sorry.”
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