Chapter 89: Piano class

Who exactly would be qualified to catch Gao Hongyi’s eye and earn her admiration?

Whether the person she claimed to like truly existed, or if that phrase—”I have someone I like”—was merely a shield used to block all romantic advances and marriage inquiries, remained a mystery.

In this school, youths like De Adrian and Tsukisetsu Soma were the dream lovers of almost half the girls on campus.

They were of noble birth, had top-tier grades, and possessed both grace and ambition.

Moreover, students capable of entering St. George’s International School could no longer, in a strict sense, represent only themselves.

They represented the continuation of their respective families, the direction of future capital and power, and marriages destined to be written into the maps of business and politics.

Here, every young person was born with financial freedom, but they were also born without the freedom of love.

They could not marry commoners.

They would attend mixers under the tacit consent and hints of their families while still young, picking someone the family deemed excellent enough to date.

Thus, in this school, the so-called optimal solution for one’s life was to discard perfectionist ideals of love as early as possible and choose someone who was both pleasing to the eye and respectable.

….

De Adrian and Tsukisetsu Soma were, without a doubt, the standard answers.

They were existences that the vast majority of girls could not refuse.

As long as they were willing to lower their status slightly, it was enough to make anyone feel flattered.

Their family backgrounds and international status were, on some levels, even higher than Gao Hongyi’s.

Yet, Gao Hongyi rejected them.

She treated the pearls and diamonds in the eyes of others as if they were circling flies.

Her expression made no effort to hide her disdain.

No one understood what Gao Hongyi was actually thinking.

But whenever she walked alone along the tree-lined boulevard, the crowd would subconsciously make a path for her.

It was not a deliberate avoidance, but a kind of instinctive stepping back.

The Horizon Core Technology Group might be dazzling within the Nation of Huaxia, but in the international market, it was not enough to make everyone worship them.

Even so, Gao Hongyi seemed to be shrouded in a natural aura.

She had no royal blood, nor did she come from a century-old clan.

Yet, she was born with a presence that made people afraid to overstep.

“Hongyi…”

People whispered the name softly.

In this school, as long as someone mentioned the “Piano Princess,” the person they referred to was inevitably Gao Hongyi.

At this moment, Gao Hongyi walked out of the red-brick main teaching building and onto the boulevard.

The sunlight was not blinding, but she was more eye-catching than the sun itself.

Next was her piano major class.

As a subject she intended to study deeply, she attended it three times a week.

It was also the course she valued most after returning to school from her leave.

The arts center was located on the eastern side of the main teaching building.

After passing through the tree-lined path behind the courtyard fountain, the cream-colored building came into view.

The Gothic arched windows and high floor-to-ceiling glass appeared restrained and elegant under the light, making one feel as if they were in Vienna.

Walking inside, the floor was gray marble from Rome.

To the left was the art studio, and to the right was the music rehearsal room.

Replicas of precious European oil paintings hung on both sides of the corridor.

She walked all the way to the end of the hall.

She finally reached the deepest part.

Rather than a music classroom, it was more like a small concert hall.

It could hold 500 people.

The audience seating was composed of alternating red and blue velvet chairs.

The stage was made of wooden flooring that gave off the scent of pine.

Adjustable acoustic reflectors were installed at the top.

In the center of the stage sat the piano—a black Steinway D-274.

The pure black lacquer was as clear as a mirror, and the lid was half-open.

A white-haired yet energetic European man stood to the side.

Jean-Luc de Verne, a lifetime honorary professor at the National Superior Conservatory of Paris, taught the class personally.

He was Gao Hongyi’s piano teacher.

He had once won a special jury prize at the Chopin International Piano Competition and was also a private music mentor for three old banking families in Europe.

The students studying piano entered one after another.

There were many of them, but only ten were truly qualified to perform.

This was because the old professor only accepted ten students each year.

Gao Hongyi happened to be one of them.

Gao Hongyi had already walked to the center of the stage.

‘Uncle Bai still hasn’t replied to my message…’

Normally, she would stand here as composed as a queen, but now, her face was full of anxiety.

The frequency with which she looked down at her phone was unnaturally high.

The last reply was 12 minutes and 15 seconds ago.

‘It’s happened again. I clearly reminded him many times. When I send a message, he must reply promptly. I really hope time passes faster. Get out of school soon. Get home soon. Then I’ll pounce into his arms. As a punishment, I must kiss him fiercely. I’ll steal all his breath so that only my scent remains between his nose and lips. Who told him not to reply to messages? It’s all his fault.’

“Mr. Rayan Al-Hariri, please come up to the stage.”

The piano major class had begun.

The phone still did not vibrate.

‘He wouldn’t be in any danger, would he? Or is he asleep and didn’t hear the message?’

A Middle Eastern youth sat in the center of the stage.

He came from a branch of the Saudi Arabian royal family in Riyadh.

His family held shares in Aramco.

His features were deep and well-defined, like a prince from an ancient Persian mural.

He performed Liszt’s Hungarian Rhapsody.

His hands pushed forward through octaves at high speed.

His left hand leaped across octaves in the bass range, while his right hand laid out dense arpeggios.

The pedal was pressed almost constantly.

The sound waves stacked up layer by layer.

The speed was startling, and the intent to show off his technique was heavy.

Why show off?

Because he would occasionally use those deep eyes to observe the red-haired girl standing in the center of the stage, who was looking down at her phone.

Professor De Verne nodded repeatedly.

Applause began to rise from the audience.

But Gao Hongyi only found it ear-piercing.

Soulcless noise.

It made her sick.

Her mind was entirely on Gu Yebai, but her ears still caught the melody.

‘Hungarian Rhapsody shouldn’t be played like that at all.’

“Miss Gao Hongyi, please come up. You know, we’ve been waiting for you for far too long.”

The professor stepped aside slightly, yielding the stage.

It was as if all his past achievements were insignificant in front of Gao Hongyi.

At the same time, the concert hall had become packed at some unknown point.

The fencing team captain, who should have been at equestrian class, had arrived.

The kendo club president, who should have been in German class, was also there.

As Gao Hongyi’s fanatical pursuers, their presence went without saying.

The campus beauties, also from prominent backgrounds, watched the piano on stage quietly.

Even the science and engineering geniuses who researched AI and intended to go to Silicon Valley in the future arrived one after another.

What was even more shocking was that even the principal was personally sitting in the audience.

He certainly saw the students skipping class to hear the performance, but he could not punish all of them.

After all, even he had set aside his official duties just to listen to Gao Hongyi’s playing.

In a strict sense, he had also violated school rules.

There was no other way.

If one could listen to her performance without being captivated, it only proved that the person’s aesthetic sense was flawed.

And someone with aesthetic problems could not establish a smooth foothold at St. George’s International School.

Gao Hongyi walked forward gracefully.

She reached the piano.

The Saudi royal youth, the future heir to an oil empire, stood up respectfully to give her his seat and bowed deeply.

It was as if he were not from Saudi Arabia, but from Sakura Country.

However, Gao Hongyi did not even let her gaze linger on him.

She simply took a snow-white handkerchief from her handbag and unfolded it gently.

Then, she slowly and methodically wiped the keys and the piano bench.

She was unwilling to touch anything that had been touched by an opposite-sex individual other than Gu Yebai—even if it was just a piano.