Chapter 112: Can You Even Match During a Livestream?

Lin Ze shook his head.

The boss noticed the small exchange between the two but couldn't quite decipher what they meant, and his anxiety began to mount.

"Hmm..." Su Zitan held up two fingers. "One song!"

The boss’s eyes widened, and he took another look at the customers currently in the bar. He bit his lip, pondering for a moment. "Fine! Two thousand it is!"

"No, no, no, not two thousand," Lin Ze said, pulling the boss aside. "Two hundred per song."

"Didn't I ask earlier? I heard your resident performers usually get one hundred and fifty a song. We’re adding fifty, so that’s fair, right?"

The boss stared at Lin Ze, trying to tell if he was being teased.

"Two hundred a song..." The boss let out a sigh of relief. "All right, all right, no problem, absolutely no problem!"

Chang Zheng scratched his head. He hadn't expected that even after becoming famous, he would still be getting paid two hundred a song to perform in a bar.

"Sing something you're comfortable with. The main goal today is to showcase your vocal ability, and we'll finish with 'Old Boy'."

"Got it! No problem!" Chang Zheng patted his chest.

Being in the bar felt like being at home to Chang Zheng; he felt completely at ease.

"All right, you're free to do your thing now. We'll go find a seat."

"Mr. Lin, Mr. Lin!"

Just as they were about to head off, the boss approached them. "To ensure your safety, let me find you a spot."

With that, he led them behind the bar. It was the bartender's station, with only one young man working there. From inside the counter, they had a perfect side view of the stage.

Chang Zheng didn't stand on ceremony; he grabbed a beer from the front, downed half of it in one go, and then carried the bottle onto the stage.

"Hello everyone, I'm Chang Zheng."

As soon as he introduced himself, a wave of cheers erupted. It seemed some of his fans had indeed made it to the venue.

"Sing 'Old Boy'!"

"I will, I definitely will, but let's save it for the end. I have some other songs I'd like to share with you all tonight," Chang Zheng said with a smile.

"Hey, we came here just for—"

"Everyone, please be understanding. This is the boss's request, and he’s right there behind the bar. I promise I’ll sing it, so please just settle down."

With Chang Zheng having said that, the audience felt too embarrassed to press the issue further.

"For the first one, let's go with 'The Little Flower I Loved'."

Chang Zheng took a sip of beer, set the bottle aside, picked up his guitar, and began to play and sing.

...

"Hey! I'm going to flip this Earth upside down! I'll even punch a hole through the sky above my head!"

"I want to be a Superman! I don't know if you're still hiring!"

Inside the factory, Wu Qian was jumping around with great "dedication," his hands making various gestures as if he were playing a game of rock-paper-scissors, his voice rising wave after wave.

"Roar! Let's get hyped!"

Wu Qian landed with a thud, kicking up dust from the floor. At that exact moment, he took a sharp breath and sucked the dust straight into his throat.

"Cough, cough, cough... cough, what the f—"

[Hahaha, oh my god, I'm dying of laughter.]

[Why are you laughing? My idol is working so hard, what right do you have to mock him?]

[It must be because my idol's movements were too big that he choked a bit. You people mocking him should go watch Lin Ze—when has he ever been this professional while singing and dancing?]

Wu Qian took a bottle of water from his manager and downed half of it. Then, he turned off his microphone and glared at his manager. "Don't you know how to sweep the floor? Why is there so much dust?"

The manager’s mouth twitched. Didn't you say yesterday that this looked very "hip-hop"?

Wu Qian took this moment to glance at the live comments.

[What is he doing? Isn't this just someone jumping around on stage like a maniac while reciting tongue twisters?]

[What kind of garbage is he singing? Just chanting nonsense to keep the rhyme? You call this hip-hop? It’s actually just trash.]

[This is hip-hop? I’ve been listening for half a song and my phone charged up, but when I turned it upside down, nothing but dust came out of the charging port.]

"You don't know a damn thing! Do you even understand rap? Go listen to your trashy pop music!"

Unable to hold back, Wu Qian lashed out. As soon as he started cursing, the chat filled with question marks.

[Pop music is trash? Even if it were, it's not for a starving loser like you to say!]

[I'm always hungry, like a big, dumb fool.]

[Yo, yo, yo, I wonder whose "high-end" music can't even crack the top ten of the new song charts right now.]

Seeing this, Wu Qian grew even more furious and began muttering as he banned them one by one, giving everyone a 365-day ban package.

"You guys just don't understand! What a bunch of losers, if you don't like it, get out!"

Wu Qian even contacted his lead fan, appointing them as a moderator and assigning them to keep watch over the chat room—whoever cursed would be banned immediately!

[My idol is so domineering~]

[Brother Qian is so cool! That's exactly how it should be, ban all those haters!]

[Haters get out, don't come here looking for a verbal beating!]

Seeing that the live chat was now filled only with his fans, Wu Qian’s mood improved.

"Alright, babies, let's ignore them now. People of their low class can't understand our high-end music. Next, I'll sing another one for you all..."

[Actually, I'm just here for the looks, but I don't understand it either. It’s so noisy.]

"Ban him! Ban him for me!"

...

"A person as excellent as me."

"Should have had a brilliant life."

"How did it end up like this after twenty-some years..."

Chang Zheng was actually singing "A Person Like Me" in the bar.

Sung by him, it lacked a bit of the original's clarity, feeling even more bitter instead. All the songs he sang tonight were "drinking songs"—either folk or melancholic.

The bar's liquor sales were doing well, and the boss, standing behind the counter, couldn't stop grinning. He hoped that whenever there were similar events in the future, Lin Ze would keep their bar in mind.

[Oh man, listening to this guy sing makes me want to drink. I ran out of booze at home, so I took the half-bottle of rubbing alcohol from the cabinet, mixed it with some water, and drank it.]

[I drank my hand sanitizer.]

[Last time I steamed rice, I didn't wash the pot, and the leftover rice fermented, so I drank that too.]

[Damn, Wu Qian is panicking over there, saying our pop music is trash and their rap is high-end music.]

[??? Has Wu Qian lost his mind?]

The two groups of people had crossed paths by accident, but now that people were getting banned over there, they all flocked here. After saying a few words, many from this side would run over to the other live stream to hurl insults, then return once they were banned.

"It's getting late."

Chang Zheng had gone through two or three bottles of beer under his feet, and his voice was now hoarse.

"It's late now, why don't we..."