The clamor at the audience entrance of the concert hall surged like a tide, forming a cruel contrast with the suffocating silence of the backstage medical point.
Su Yuqing fled that room filled with the smell of disinfectant and Chiai’s paranoid remarks.
She needed space to breathe, an escape from the powerlessness and anger that felt as if they were crushing her.
She stopped at a corner in a relatively quiet corridor, leaning against the cold marble wall while trying to calm her ragged breathing and racing heart.
Just then, a gentle voice spoke beside her.
“Yuqing?”
Minazuki Ruri approached softly, her face showing clear concern.
She had obviously witnessed Su Yuqing rushing out of the medical room.
“I just… asked the staff nearby.”
She chose her words carefully, her voice soft as if afraid of disturbing something.
“They said… for tonight’s performance, the start time… everything is proceeding as scheduled. There’s been no notice of any changes.”
She paused to observe Su Yuqing’s reaction.
“Hey, Yuqing… are you listening to me?”
Su Yuqing didn’t turn around immediately.
She kept her head tilted back, staring at the cold lights on the ceiling as if trying to draw a sense of calm from them.
A few seconds later, she took a deep breath and responded in a raspy voice heavy with exhaustion.
“Yeah… I heard you.”
She had already expected this result the moment Chiai completely crushed her with the line “It’s not your place to worry.”
But hearing it confirmed still felt like a heavy blow.
“I just don’t get it, Ruri!”
She turned her head sharply toward Ruri, her eyes reddening with a mix of grievance and desperate confusion.
“What is she… what is Chiai thinking?! What on earth is her brain made of?! Is this person… really just… a big idiot whose brain capacity is no different from a cat’s? Does she not understand how to weigh the pros and cons at all? Does she only know how to act out based on instinct…!?”
She almost growled those last few words, letting her pent-up emotions find an outlet.
Ruri listened quietly, not interrupting the outburst.
Once Su Yuqing’s breathing calmed slightly, she let out a soft sigh and remarked with a look of understanding.
“It seems… your idol at home is quite… well, headstrong when it comes to certain matters of principle, or rather… things she cares about deeply.”
Her words were restrained, but they pointed out the truth.
“Headstrong? This is way beyond headstrong!”
Su Yuqing seemed triggered by the word.
Her voice rose again, filled with irony and powerlessness.
“This is sheer paranoia! It’s madness! It’s utter, reckless stupidity! She’s a… big, stupid cat who insists on catching nonexistent butterflies even though her leg is crippled!”
She combined her perception of Chiai’s cat-like traits with her current anger, spitting out the most fitting yet powerless metaphor.
“I know, I know,” Ruri said, nodding repeatedly to show she fully understood. But she didn’t stop at simple agreement.
Instead, she took a step forward, fixing her deep blue eyes on Su Yuqing.
She asked a deeper question, trying to lead her away from pure anger.
“But, Yuqing… calm down first and take a deep breath. Have you ever thought about it from another perspective… Why does Chiai… insist on acting like such a ‘big idiot’ as you call her?”
Her voice was light, yet it possessed a strange, penetrating power.
“Behind any seemingly irrational behavior, perhaps there’s a reason she must do it, even if it seems incredibly twisted to others?”
“I don’t care what her reasons are!”
Su Yuqing waved her hand irritably, refusing to delve deeper into the question.
She was now overwhelmed by more practical anxieties.
“I don’t care if she’s trying to prove something or competing with someone! All I know is… I know that in her current state, with her foot wrapped in such thick bandages, she still wants to go on stage and perform such high-intensity dancing!”
Her voice was full of fearful imagination.
“What if… what if she falls on stage, her movements are distorted, or her facial expressions break… causing a performance accident! If she fails on stage, then at that time, all the cameras of the media, the fans’ disappointed fury, the accountability from the agency’s upper management… in the end, won’t I, her namesake, incredibly unlucky exclusive manager, be the one who has to humbly clean up after her? I’ll have to face the entire mess!”
This was her professional fear as a manager, as well as the collateral liability she had to bear by being tied to Chiai’s side.
“Now, now, don’t think about such terrible scenarios yet,” Ruri said, trying to pull her back from the worst-case scenario with an encouraging tone.
“Maybe… we can try to think about it in a slightly better way? For example…”
She weighed her words.
“What if… I’m just saying what if, your idol really is… completely confident about tonight’s performance, even with her injury, for some reason we can’t understand? Maybe she has a backup plan we don’t know about, or an incredibly strong willpower to overcome it…”
Even as she said it, the hypothesis sounded a bit lacking in conviction.
“No—how is that even possible!?”
Su Yuqing blurted out, interrupting Ruri’s well-meaning hypothesis.
Her face was written with the expression that this was pure fantasy.
“That’s a ligament strain! Not a scratch! It will hurt every time she makes a move! Can willpower be used as a painkiller? That’s a stage, not a circus! Sigh…”
She let out a heavy sigh as a sense of defeat surged in her heart again.
“It’s… it’s impossible to talk to you… You don’t understand her kind of… her kind of paranoia where she won’t turn back until she hits a wall!”
She felt as if she and Ruri were in two separate worlds.
“Well, the situation is indeed complicated.”
Ruri sighed softly and stopped trying to convince her.
Instead, she changed the subject to something lighter, reaching for something in the large, exquisite handbag she was carrying.
“Here, take this for now.”
She handed over an object.
Su Yuqing took it instinctively.
She looked down and was stunned for a moment.
“This is… a lightstick?”
In her hand was a brand-new official lightstick with a chibi version of Kasahana Chiai’s head on it.
The color scheme was purple and gold, Chiai’s representative support colors.
“That’s right.”
Ruri smiled, her expression turning playful again.
She patted her bulging bag and spoke in a cheerful tone.
“And it’s not just this one lightstick, you know—look, my big bag is full—completely stuffed! It’s all your idol’s latest merchandise! Support towels, keychains, badges… I bought quite a lot!”
Su Yuqing looked at Ruri showing off her spoils and became even more confused.
It even briefly diluted her anxiety.
“Why… why did you buy so much of this stuff…?”
She picked up the lightstick and looked at it, her tone reflecting a manager’s understanding of the cost and value of such products.
“The cost of these things is actually not high at all. Most of it is just fans paying for their love… Ruri, if you really liked them and wanted to collect them, you should have just told me? Why waste your money?”
She even lowered her voice with the familiarity of an insider.
“Next time I go to the cooperative factory to inspect the production line, I’ll help you snatch some of the best-looking ones from the sample room. Wouldn’t that be better? I guarantee they’ll be more complete than what’s on the market.”
“Oh, it’s not the same!”
Ruri shook her head, a “you just don’t get it” smile on her face.
She waved another lightstick in her hand, the light reflecting in her eyes.
“I went through all the trouble of buying a ticket to watch a concert properly as an audience member. Isn’t it just for this sense of participation and excitement? This… well, ‘generating power for love’ process, spending a little bit of extra money to buy the atmosphere and happiness of the scene—it’s worth it. It’s nothing!”
Then, her gaze turned toward Su Yuqing, and her tone suddenly became serious, carrying a thread of gentle power that wouldn’t take no for an answer.
“As for you—”
“Huh? Me…?”
Su Yuqing didn’t react for a moment.
“Yes, you—Su Yuqing.”
Ruri nodded affirmatively.
Then, as if performing a magic trick, she pulled an exquisitely made cat-ear cheering hat from her bag.
A striking slogan was printed on the brim:
[Official Certification: Chiai’s Closest, Closest Family]
“Here, hurry up and put this on!”
Ruri handed the hat over, her eyes sparkling.
“Wait, wait, wait! This… this hat…”
Su Yuqing looked at the overly cute hat.
Embarrassment and resistance instantly flooded her face, and she instinctively took a half-step back.
‘Wearing this… especially after having such a fierce conflict with Chiai, it’s simply…’
“And these!”
Ruri didn’t give her a chance to refuse, stuffing several lightsticks glowing with purple and gold into her arms. Instantly, her empty hands were full.
“Hold them tight! These are Chiai’s exclusive support colors, symbolizing royalty and mystery!”
“It’s… it’s too much! These lightsticks are a bit too many… I can’t hold them all!”
Su Yuqing was in a flurry, her arms suddenly filled with flashing support items.
She looked completely at a loss.
Ruri looked at her flustered yet cute appearance and finally couldn’t help but laugh.
She reached out and gently pulled Su Yuqing’s wrist, her voice light and full of encouragement, as if to dispel all her gloom.
“Let’s go! Don’t just stand there! They’ve already started checking tickets for the VIP passage. If we’re any later, we’ll miss the opening!”
She pulled Su Yuqing toward the clamor and the sea of light at the entrance.
“Come with me to the first row of the audience!”
Ruri turned back and gave Su Yuqing a brilliant smile, her voice nearly drowning in the waves of excitement from the surrounding fans.
“Let’s give a good, hard cheer for your idol—the one who is headstrong, paranoid, and so stupid it’s worrying, but is currently risking everything to take the stage!”
Su Yuqing was pulled along by Ruri, merging into the surging crowd despite herself.
In her arms were heavy support items, and on her head was that cat-ear hat with “Closest Family” written on it, making her feel conflicted.
Ruri’s energetic voice and the fanatical cheers of the fans rang in her ears.
She turned back to glance at the deep corridor leading backstage, where pain, paranoia, and unresolved conflict were hidden.
Finally, she let Ruri pull her toward the audience seats that were drawing closer and closer…