Some were crying, some were laughing. Others held up their phones, but the record button hadn't even been pressed; they were too busy listening.

After finishing his water, Lu Zhixian handed the bottle back and stood at the edge of the stage with the microphone.

"I've sung a dozen songs now. My throat is still holding up; how about your ears?"

The crowd roared in unison, "They're fine!"

"Then let's continue."

He turned and walked back to the center of the stage as the intro to the fifteenth song began.

This one was a slow song.

Lu Zhixian took the microphone off the stand, held it in his hand, and walked a few steps toward the left side of the stage.

The spotlight followed him.

As he approached the third row on the left, a girl with glasses in the front row suddenly nudged her friend with her elbow.

"Look at that... the one in the baseball cap..."

"Which one?"

"The one on the side of the second row. Look at her chin."

The girl with glasses secretly zoomed in with her phone camera, and a face mostly obscured by the brim of a hat appeared on the screen.

No matter how low the brim was pressed, it couldn't hide the contour of that chin.

"Holy shit... Lin Shiya???"

Her friend snatched the phone away, stared at the screen for three seconds, and her mouth fell open into an 'O' shape.

"Who's that next to Lin Shiya? Zoom in a bit more..."

The camera steadied and focused on the seat next to the baseball cap.

A woman with a low ponytail had her profile turned toward the stage, her chin slightly tilted up.

The girl with glasses gasped.

"Su... Su Wan?"

The impact of those two names appearing together at Lu Zhixian's concert was more powerful than the speakers on stage.

With trembling hands, the girl typed a message and sent it to a group chat. Thirty seconds later, the group exploded.

It wasn't just them.

In the middle-back section of the venue, a boy glanced at the rows to his right during an instrumental break and suddenly froze.

He nudged his buddy beside him.

"That... the one in the grey hoodie and mask, don't you think he looks like Wang Yizhou?"

"Stop messing around. Why would Wang Yizhou be here?"

"I'm not. See for yourself. I saw him when he took off his mask to drink water; it's definitely him."

His buddy tilted his head to look for two seconds, and the lightstick in his hand almost fell to the ground.

News began to spread before the concert had even ended.

On social media, a post featuring a blurry photo from the scene was being shared like crazy.

"Help! Lin Shiya + Su Wan + Wang Yizhou are sitting in the audience at Lu Zhixian's concert. Am I dreaming???"

The comment section below grew so fast it was impossible to keep up.

"Is this fake? All three of them appearing in a three-thousand-person Livehouse at the same time?"

"It's not fake. My friend is there too, and she said she also saw the editor-in-chief of 'Music Billboard' and people from Warner."

"So half the music industry came to hear him sing???"

"A rookie who debuted less than half a year ago, with two Divas and a Heavenly King in the audience... What kind of lineup is this..."

"The point is, they didn't come to show support; they bought or asked for tickets themselves. Think about that."

The heat of the discussion reached the real-time trending list within minutes.

But the three thousand people in the venue didn't have time to check their phones.

Because Lu Zhixian was still singing.

The sixteenth song. The seventeenth song.

With each song's conclusion, the applause and screams were louder than the last.

After finishing the seventeenth song, Lu Zhixian placed the microphone back on the stand.

The lights dimmed.

The venue fell silent.

According to the previously announced setlist, seventeen of the eighteen songs had been performed. The last one should be the song that won him the big music festival award.

Everyone was waiting.

But there was no movement on stage.

Five seconds.

Ten seconds.

People began to whisper.

"What's wrong?"

"Is there an equipment problem?"

Fifteen seconds later, a beam of white light illuminated the center of the stage again.

Lu Zhixian stood in front of the microphone stand.

He didn't take the microphone.

With his hands in his pockets, he stood there, looking at the audience for a few seconds.

Then he spoke. His voice wasn't amplified by the microphone, but the acoustics of the Livehouse allowed the front rows to hear him clearly.

"For the last song, I want to sing something different."

He paused.

"This song isn't on the album. I only decided to sing it today two days ago."

The atmosphere in the crowd changed.

It shifted from excitement to a sort of bated-breath anticipation.

"A new song?" someone in the front row whispered.

"No way, there wasn't even a whisper of this before..."

Lu Zhixian took the microphone off the stand and held it in his hand.

"The song is called..."

He paused for a beat.

"‘exaggerated’."

No one in the audience had heard that name before.

In this world, no one had heard it; it was a masterpiece Lu Zhixian had obtained from a gacha draw a few days ago.

But the moment those words left Lu Zhixian's mouth...

Zhou Yang straightened his back on the drum stool.

This song wasn't in the rehearsals, nor was it on the setlist.

Lu Zhixian had approached Zhou Yang privately two days ago to show him the score and arrangement. At the time, he only said "it might be used," so Zhou Yang didn't ask much; he memorized the score and had the band run through it a few times.

Now, "might" had become "certain."

Zhou Yang took a deep breath and signaled to the band members.

The intro began.

The piano entered first, with a few simple chords providing the foundation.

Then Lu Zhixian began to sing.

When the first verse came out, his voice was suppressed. Low and muffled, as if he had a belly full of words but didn't know how to speak.

The lyrics hammered into the ears of the three thousand people.

"If someone asks me, I will tell them..."

"I wait until I'm frustrated, with words to say but no place to put them..."

The melody of the verse wasn't complex, but every line of the lyrics felt like it was piercing the heart.

Lu Zhixian's voice in this section carried a very restrained suppression, like someone standing in the middle of a crowd speaking loudly, yet no one turns to look at him.

Reaching the bridge, the melody began to rise.

The emotions rose along with it.

The band began to intensify.

Then the chorus arrived.

Lu Zhixian's voice exploded.

"Just treat me as exaggerated!"

The entire venue went silent.

Lu Zhixian stood in the center of the stage, the microphone hanging at his side.

He didn't bow.

He didn't speak.

He just stood there.

The silence lasted for four seconds.

Then the applause started.

It wasn't the kind of applause that gathered gradually; three thousand pairs of hands clapped almost at the exact same moment.

The sound waves crashed back and forth under the ceiling of the Livehouse, lingering for a long time.

Lu Zhixian put the microphone back on the stand.

"Thank you."

Just those two words.

The lights went out.

All the lights on stage were turned off.

Staff began to guide the crowd out through the side aisles, and the exit lights on both sides of the venue lit up.

But no one moved.

Three thousand people sat in their seats or stood in the aisles; no one walked toward the exits.

It wasn't that they didn't want to leave.

It was that they hadn't processed it yet.

Five seconds passed.

Ten seconds passed.

The boy in the front row who had been taking photos the whole time gripped his phone; the screen was dark, and he stared blankly at the empty stage.

His girlfriend tugged on his arm twice, but he didn't react.

A girl in the middle section sat in her seat, tears still hanging on her face, which she didn't even bother to wipe.

A few people in the back rows stood still, as if waiting for something. But they couldn't even say what they were waiting for.

Fifteen seconds later, the staff broadcasted the exit announcement for the second time.

Finally, people began to slowly shuffle out.

One step, two steps—they were still looking back at the stage as they reached the exits.

Lin Shiya pressed her baseball cap down and exchanged a look with Su Wan.

Neither of them said a word.

Su Wan's legs were a bit numb when she stood up; she stood by her seat for a few seconds to stretch.

Lin Shiya walked ahead, suddenly stopping near the exit.

"That last song."

Su Wan walked up from behind.

"Yeah."

"We've never heard it before, right? It hasn't been released anywhere?"

"No. It's brand new."

Lin Shiya fell silent.

The two of them walked out of the venue in silence.

The night breeze at the entrance blew over, feeling chilly.

Su Wan untied her ponytail, letting her hair fall loose. She gathered it together and sighed.

"Shiya."

"Yeah?"

"This person can write so many good songs in less than half a year. In another two years, who do you think in this industry will be able to suppress him?"

Lin Shiya didn't answer.

She lowered her head to pull out her phone and hailed a car.

The light from the screen illuminated her face, the shadow of the brim hiding most of her expression.

After a while, she muttered softly.

"If he can't be suppressed, then he can't."

"Anyway, there's no rule saying anyone has to be suppressed."

Su Wan glanced at her and suddenly smiled.

"You've changed."

Lin Shiya pulled open the car door and didn't respond.

After the car had driven a dozen meters, she looked back through the rear window at the Starlight Livehouse sign.

The lights were still on.

A group of audience members who were unwilling to leave still stood at the entrance, huddled in small groups; some were wiping tears, others were on the phone recounting the performance to friends.

She withdrew her gaze, leaned back in her seat, and closed her eyes.

Her phone vibrated.

Lu Zhixian had sent a message.

"How did it feel?"

Lin Shiya stared at those four words for a few seconds, typed a line and deleted it, deleted it and typed again, and finally sent it.

"Next time don't keep it hidden. Tell me in advance if there's a new song so I can be mentally prepared."

The other side didn't reply immediately.

After about half a minute, a message popped up.

"Then will you come to hear it in person next time?"

Lin Shiya locked her screen and flipped her phone over onto her lap.

The streetlights outside the window receded one by one.

In the half-hour following the end of the concert, discussion posts about it on social media platforms were popping up at a rate of over a hundred per minute.

One of them was upvoted to the very top.

The poster had only written one sentence.

"He sang a new song that no one had ever heard at the end. After the three thousand people finished listening, not a single one stood up to leave."

The first comment below was just a few words.

"I spent ten thousand yuan, and it was worth it."