I Am Really A Superstar

The live broadcast signal came on!

Dong Shanshan appeared on the television screen!

Amid the cheering and screaming, Dong Shanshan descended from above. She was, in fact, sitting on a platform that was being lowered from the rafters. The stage was covered with fog and mesmerizing lights were s.h.i.+ning. "Welcome to the King of Masked Singers, brought to you exclusively by Bright Fruit Cocoa. We"re in the theater of the live broadcast of tonight"s finale, and I am your most lovable, beautiful, s.e.xy, and slightly artistic host—Dong Shanshan!"

A burst of opening remarks.

The audience"s applause thundered!

Countless people were waving their LED lightboards and screaming in excitement!

Dong Shanshan"s current popularity was much different from before. On the LED lightboards the live audience members were holding up today, other than for the contestants, many had Dong Shanshan"s name on them. Some people were attending the event today just to support Dong Shanshan. They were all her diehard fans!

The platform was finally lowered down onto the stage.

Dong Shanshan elegantly walked off it and said as she strode onstage, "It"s the night of the grand finals, and we"ll see the most exciting battle between experts in this theater tonight. The grand champion of King of Masked Singers will emerge here tonight. The rules of the compet.i.tion are very simple: The winners and losers will be decided by our live viewers. When the compet.i.tion begins proper, the contestant"s number to vote for will be displayed onscreen. Cast your votes and choose your grand champion so that they may be crowned Masked King tonight!"

The venue was changed.

The stage setup was also changed.

Zhang Xia was seated in the audience in the first row.

Chen Guang, Amy, w.a.n.g Zhuishu, and the other judges were also seated in the audience. For tonight"s live broadcast, they were not tasked with commenting and were only here to watch the show.

The compet.i.tion"s rules for the grand finals had long since been leaked. The result of today"s compet.i.tion was no longer just for the live audience to decide, but for all viewers. The voting channel would be opened right from the first performance of the first round. Whichever contestant placed last in the celebrity guest partner round would immediately get eliminated and not be able to advance to the next round. Voting would only close after the last contestant performed their song in the second round. The contestant with the highest number of votes at the end would then be crowned Masked King, and the results for the first and second rounds were equally important as the votes were c.u.mulative Further, the program team had planned for a segment during which the contestants could take off their masks at any time between the first and second rounds, meaning they could reveal their ident.i.ties without needing to wait until the end of the show to do so!

A King of Masked Singers" discussion thread was created on Weibo.

"They"re about to begin!"

"Who"ll perform first?"

"They go according to the number of times that they"ve been crowned Masked King."

"Then the first person should be Spinach? She gained entry via the revival round and came in third."

"Who do you guys think will be eliminated in the first round?"

"Other than Petal Shower and The Clown, I think everyone else is in danger of being eliminated!"

"Haha, place your bets!"

"The betting"s open! I"ll bet on Flowing Time getting eliminated!"

"My bet is on Spinach."

At the venue.

The compet.i.tion had not yet begun, but the atmosphere was exploding and chaotic!

Zhang Ye"s parents, his uncles and aunts, as well as everyone else were all influenced by this atmosphere!

Dong Shanshan announced loudly, "As of now, the voting channels are open. Let"s welcome today"s first performer onstage—Spinach! And her guest partner—Celery!"

Dong Shanshan immediately exited the stage.

The onstage lights switched to a different style.

The audience was also very cooperative as they immediately turned quiet.

Suddenly, a voice singing in a cappella rang out!

Spinach stepped out onto the stage!

"You said the snow was pure.

"I said the skies were dark."

Another woman"s voice followed.

"I said our dreams were forever green.

"You said your soul was gray."

This song became very popular in the past two years and was one of the top ten most requested songs during karaoke. But when it was performed by the two of them, it sounded like it upstaged the original. They actually added some operatic elements into it and the song seemed to have a heavy feel of Peking opera to it. It was especially enjoyable to listen to.

The dancers came out onto the stage, all of them dressed like Peking opera singers!

This was a cla.s.sic example of a "traditional meets modern" performance!

Old Zhang had already gone to change into her costume. Zhang Ye was watching the TV alone in his waiting room and nodded approvingly. He rather liked this song that Spinach was performing today.

All of a sudden, without any warning.

Spinach"s partner was sustaining a high note when she ripped off her mask!

When the audience managed to react, they were stunned!

Chen Guang pointed to the stage. "Han Ke?"

Zhang Xia smiled. "That"s my old friend"s granddaughter!"

Han Ke, a C-list celebrity and the granddaughter of Han Aiguo, a famous singer of the older generation in China. Han Aiguo was on the same level as Zhang Xia and a friend of hers who debuted together with her. At the same time, Han Aiguo and Liao Yiqi"s grandfather were good friends of many years, so Han Ke and Liao Yiqi practically grew up together as best friends. This was why no one found it unexpected that Han Ke would be on the stage today, even though they were surprised!

Spinach smiled and also took off her mask. In fact, she had already taken off her mask, and everyone knew who she was already. But when her face was unmasked, the audience still cheered her on with screams and applause!

The viewers watching their TVs at home were also very excited!

"It"s Han Ke!"

"Han Ke really came onto the show?"

"They"re no doubt childhood friends! How supportive!"

"I like Han Ke a lot!"

"She was a child star, and I especially liked those TV dramas that she acted in when she was young! She"s still as pretty even after growing up! I"m fairly sure it"s only because of Liao Yiqi that she"s here. If it were anyone else, she probably would not agree to come onto the show as a celebrity guest! After all, she hasn"t sung for the past one or two years!"

"Let"s vote!"

"Right, let"s quickly vote!"

"Vote for Spinach!"

"I"m going to vote for Spinach just because of Han Ke!"

"Haha, I"m doing this for Han Ke too!"

At the bottom of the screen, the tally was being calculated and displayed in real-time.

In an instant, Spinach"s tally had jumped to the top—with 870,000 votes and almost breaking a million! Meanwhile, the remaining contestants who had not yet performed also received some votes, although they didn"t get much.

The live audience was shouting.

"Liao Yiqi!"

"Liao Yiqi!"

"Han Ke!"

"Han Ke!"

The duo of Spinach and Celery was really not to be underestimated.

When it came to the end of their song, Spinach"s tally had reached 990,000 votes. She was in first place for the time being with a rather eye-catching result!

Dong Shanshan came back onto the stage. "h.e.l.lo, Little Liao. h.e.l.lo, Little Han."

Han Ke raised her microphone. As she had already taken off her mask, the backstage crew switched off the voice transformer on her microphone. She greeted Shanshan with her real voice, "h.e.l.lo, Sister Shanshan."

Dong Shanshan smiled and said, "Long time no see."

Han Ke giggled and said, "Yeah, Sister Shanshan has become even more beautiful."

The two of them clearly knew each other. In the past, they had both done an endors.e.m.e.nt for the same product and filmed a commercial for it. Sometimes, this was just how small the industry was.

Dong Shanshan said happily, "So you"re here tonight to support your best friend?"

Han Ke nodded and looked at the audience. She said, "When Little Liao called me about this, I was actually filming outside of Beijing. After she told me the details, I rushed back without another word. It goes without saying I would"ve come back even if the sky was falling."

This episode, once a duo finished performing, they were allowed to say some words onstage. They could either have a short chat or canva.s.s for votes; anything was fine. It was not as restrictive as the past episodes. However, Spinach and Celery did not really talk about anything else. Perhaps they were embarra.s.sed about asking for votes, so the two of them just bowed to the audience and left the stage after a few words.