From Skid Row to Superstardom: An Idol System Novel-Chapter 353: Is This Your Prince (1)?

"Ready to watch?" Grace asked as she adjusted her tablet, phone, pc set up, and increased the volume of the TV in preparation.

"As ready as I’ll ever be. I’ve been preparing my heart, soul, and mind for vampire Ari." Rachel sighed as she stared at the blurry photo of Ari that she had managed to screenshot before the post was taken down by the community moderator.

"And I’m ready to see abs. Bare skin, oiled up, abs." Justine sighed happily as she glanced at her own blurry screenshot of Jamie.

While she was a firm Ari supporter and fangirl, she couldn’t deny the impact of Jamie’s gladiator appearance and was ready to see it in 4K HD.

"Good to see that you’re all in a good mood," Grace commented lightly.

While she also wanted to see the episode, especially after speaking with Esther, as someone who had caught the posts and comments that were happening right after the final performance in Korea, she was hoping with all her heart for two things.

Firstly, that the production team would just edit things fairly so that one, people could stop calling Ari misogynistic and insinuating that he was a copycat.

The Ari that she knew barely paid attention to people outside of his circle, so thinking he would copy someone was crazy.

As for him being misogynistic, Grace was sure they were taking lyrics out of context. The Ari she knew was an equal-opportunity professional who gave anybody and everybody his judgmental stare.

Secondly, she wanted people to finally see that Ari wasn’t in first place just because the general public pitied him. He was actually more talented and hardworking than people gave him credit for, and when given a fair chance, he could do just as well or even better than anyone else.

’Pick me, love me, choose me.’

As the signal song began playing with the contestants singing and dancing, Grace focused, noticing that Ari’s screen time in the signal song had increased just a smidgen.

From one second to about 3 seconds now?

While she was happy for the increase, it was still pretty jarring to see him wearing that odd face paint he used to wear in the beginning.

If he had just shown his face from the beginning, wouldn’t he have had a much better response than he did right now?

Well...such thoughts were useless.

It was time to focus on what the production team had edited.

******

As if they really wanted to set a negative tone and rile people up, the episode began with a recap of the team selection, in which Benjamin and Ari chose only 4 team members, while William ended up with 9.

Naturally, the fans of the contestants who hadn’t been chosen were furious at Benjamin and Ari, who had selfishly chosen most of the top-ranked contestants for their teams, and they began yelling at them in the chat.

└ Is that even allowed? 5 vs 5 vs 10?

└ Why would the PD let them even have such lopsided teams? With 10 people in one team, isn’t it going to be one line per person?

└ I always knew Benjamin had a dark spirit. Do you see how gleeful he was when he closed his team?

└└ There’s a reason him an Ari are close friends. Selfish, dark spirits. Do you notice how they didn’t even choose their supposed friend, Vishal?

└ This is not fair!

"You expect an idol survival show to be fair? Funny." Grace snorted to herself.

While she didn’t necessarily agree with Ari’s decision, it seemed that he and Benjamin had planned it, so at least they got to share the blame together.

Besides, as long as their performance was good enough for their fans, their ranks wouldn’t fall, and it was better than carrying dead weight on a team or someone who was difficult to work with, like William.

And as if they really wanted to add more fuel to the fire, the production team also showed a clip from the last episode in which they had asked the three producers a poignant question.

— Production Team: [Who do you think is the person to beat?]

The screen split in half, with Benjamin leaning forward, a serious expression on his handsome face on one side, while William leaned back with an irritated expression on the other side.

Interestingly enough, Benjamin was wearing red clothes while William was wearing blue, making the contrast between them mirror the classic battle between red vs blue, fire vs ice.

There was a pause before both boys opened their mouths and said one word.

— Benjamin / William: [Ariel.]

Bang!

And like the moon blocking the sun, or an ink blot staining the page, the video of Ari appeared in the middle, blocking out the two other contestants.

Dressed in all black with red curls hanging in his face, Ari was lounging on the director’s chair as if he owned the place.

When the production team repeated the words said by the other competitors, he laughed, green eyes squinting happily, before answering cheekily.

— Ariel: [Wow, I feel like a villain or the final boss. Haha, then I have to make sure to live up to their expectations and blow them out of the water.]

— Production Team: [Do you think you can do it? Win? Stay in first place?]

Suddenly, Ari became serious as he stared into the camera.

— Ariel: [Of course. I’m good at everything I work hard at. It might be difficult, but first place? I think I can do it.]

— Production Team: [Really?]

— Ariel: [Why not?]

— Production: [Shall we see?]

└ ugh, he’s as cocky as usual. I hope he fails.

└I don’t even know what the others see in him. He’s not that good.

└ Benjamin, I know he’s your friend, but there’s no need to hype him up needlessly. You and your team have way more talent and will definitely be first.

└└ Rather than hyping him up, isn’t Big Ben just saying that because he doesn’t like William?

└└└ Ohhhh true! I’ll think of it that way, thanks.

As people complained in the chat, the scene cut to a plain door with a window in the upper half.

As the camera zoomed in, it revealed a contestant sitting in a chair in a small room with a window on the door.

The person looked to be hard at work, completely in his own world, clicking and dragging things around on a laptop running a program filled with multicolored blocks, and nodding to themself.

To the side of the contestant, there were several torn sheets of paper, densely packed with scratched-out words and annotations, and sticky notes all over the walls with small, shorthand notes.

And at the bottom of the screen was the production team’s caption.

— Production Team: [The producing contestant is working extra hard to make songs.]

— Production Team: [However...]

The camera panned to a fast-forward clip of the cameraman and assistant walking in a circle before repeatedly knocking on the door and repeating the process, before another caption appeared.

— Production Team: [Knocking for 5 minutes straight with no response.]

— Production Team: [When will we be noticed (TT_TT)]

— Production Team: [Please notice me, senpai. I know you are working hard, but my legs are shaking, and the camera is heavy!]

At the humorous yet serious captions, the chat began filling up with messages, mainly from accounts with crown emojis

└ Notice me, senpai?? LOL, the editor has jokes.

└ That tired a** brown tracksuit with an animal face on the hood, the beat-up sneakers, it can only be one person.

└└ He’s the rudest person on the show. Of course, he’s ignoring the hard-working production team

└└└ Look at him pretending to be hardworking. I hate fakers so much. He’s just clicking his mouse around, but nothing’s happening.

└ I recognize that fur hat anywhere. He wore it forever, trying to hide a hair color that nobody cared about.

└└ You clearly cared enough to remember he changed his hair color. Plus, that’s not even him.

As a fight broke out in the chat, the 3 girls stared at the TV, confused.

"Why are they accusing Ari of being rude. That’s not even Ari," Grace commented as she glanced between her laptop and the TV.

What were these crazy people talking about? No matter how she stared, that wasn’t Ari.

"Right. The shape is similar at first glance, but when Ari sits, he appears a bit shorter because his legs are so much longer than his torso. Also, he’s much slimmer than this, even when wearing baggy clothes." Justine said while Rachel nodded.

"Also, Ari’s hands are more slender than that, and he usually uses his left hand when doing things alone. Plus, that is not his handwriting on the sticky notes; it’s way too messy!"

Those who were die-hard fans of a contestant would naturally know all the little things about them and be able to identify them from their hand shape to their leg length to even their habits when they sit.

As the chat devolved into a ’yes it is, no it’s not’ argument on whether the contestant was Ari-

The cameraperson finally caught the contestant’s attention, who got up, smiled gently, and walked over to open the door.

Then the caption appeared.

[Producer 1: William Forbes]

William was dressed in a loose-fitting, matching brown sweat suit set with white floral prints, a brown fur beanie, beat-up brown sneakers, black headphones, and stylish glasses that made him look refined, quite aristocratic, and very handsome.

At the sight of him, the tone of William’s fans in the chat naturally switched into one of praise.

└ My prince looks so good with glasses on.

└ This casual outfit looks so good on him.

└ Are those the limited edition GoldenGoosling sneakers? So stylish.

└└ Forget the sneakers, are those the animal kingdom Denim TearDrop sweat suit? He’s soooo cooooll!

└└└ Even his casual clothes have taste. Iktr!

└ William, are you hiding a new hair color? Please don’t dye your beautiful blonde!

└ Wow. He’s working so hard that he couldn’t hear the production team. Isn’t he about to drop the song of the century?

At the complete 180, many Ari fans couldn’t take it and began to clap back.

└ Weren’t you just saying that the brown sweat suit was ugly? All of a sudden, you recognize it as a designer, and it’s so cool!

└ Didn’t you just say that those sneakers had to have been fished out of the dumpster? Now it’s a limited edition? HAH!

└ Oh, so now that it’s William, the person isn’t pretending to work anymore, they’re making the song of the century? All of you royal family brats are hypocrites!

Unfortunately for the frustrated Ari fans, the royal family fans were so entrenched in their delusion that they just kept praise-bombing William while pretending they hadn’t tried to bash him when they thought it was Ari.

So with no choice but to swallow the bitterness, they continued watching the scene in which William was chatting with the production staff.

— Production Team: [William. How’s the song development process going?]

— William: [It’s going well. I had a productive meeting with my team to get some ideas, and now I’m making the song.]

— Production Team: [Wow! You’ve been working on it for a day, and it looks like you’ve already done a lot.]

— William: [Yes, I’ve ironed out most of the details already, now I’m doing clean up and tweaking a few things.]

William said with a proud smile.

— Production Team: [Amazing! You’re definitely way ahead of the other contestants. Can you give us a short preview? ]

Before William even answered, the chat began to fill up again as a few people who had experience making music began freaking out.

└ He’s only been working on it for a day? You’re joking!!!

└ My genius prince is really a genius. No wonder he looks so tired. He was creating perfection.

└ Do my eyes deceive me, or does that time say 4:17?

└He made a 4-minute song already?

└ In a day? After a day, I’m lucky if I even have a 20-second track that is usable.

While they began hyping him up again, those without knowledge of music creation and production started asking questions.

└ I don’t go here. What does this all mean?

└└ It means that he’s good at producing really quickly. In one day, he’s already made a song over 4 minutes long with so many custom stacks and tracks in it from what we can see.

└└└ And he follows industry standards. Everything is neatly labeled and properly separated! If you told me a professional did this, I would believe you!

└ So he’s good?

└└ Very good. Haven’t you noticed that all the production team can say is wow. Wow. Amazing. Wow. The prince is really a prince!

When William played part of his track, just for 20 seconds, the response was overwhelmingly positive.

└ Whoa! Is this trap pop?

└ It sounds o lively and fun! I can already imagine the choreography.

└ I love the drums in the intro

└ It really sounds professionally made.

Even the

— Production Team: [This is amazing production.]

— Production Team: [Do you mind if we watch while you talk us through your process and answer some questions? I think your fans would love to see your genius and how you work.]

— William: [Ah.]

William seemed to freeze before smiling and winking.

— William: [I prefer working privately and not in front of cameras. Plus, I’m not going to give away all my producer secrets, right? Just in case somebody takes my idea or steals my melody. But I promise that you can look forward to hearing an amazing completed version at the midterm evaluation.]

— Production Team: [Ah...understood. Would you like to say a few words to the viewers?]

— William: [Of course.]

William turned to directly face the camera before smiling confidently

— William: [To the royal family and all the other fans, please look forward to an amazing first-ranked performance with a song created by yours truly. I promise it will make you proud and defeat all the other contestants. Look forward to it!]

└ Ahhh, my prince! Of course I will.

└ The snippet sounds amazing, so I have no doubt the rest of the song will too!

└ Make sure to take care of yourself, my prince.

As the chat filled with comments cheering William on, Grace thought something was a bit weird, but since she couldn’t pinpoint why she felt that way, she was going to let it go, until she saw a particular comment.

└ Doesn’t the melody sound familiar?