"Miss Jiang!"
"Miss Jiang!!"
...
Suddenly, the entire bar began to chant Miss Jiang's name.
Jiang Qin blinked. A soft smile graced her pale little face as the wind gently lifted the hair from her forehead.
It was as if she had returned to the stage from her first life.
Back then, most of what she did was arranged by her company or the event organizers. The majority of it was scripted.
But the fans in the audience had genuinely loved her.
At that time, she had always thought, 'If only there could be a day when I'm on stage and don't have to listen to anyone's arrangements, a day I can just be myself.'
Now, the people in the audience had changed, and she, on stage, could finally be herself.
After a moment of thought, Jiang Qin breathed lightly into the microphone, "Thank you, everyone, for your support of me and of Moonlight Bar."
"I'm feeling pretty good today, so how about another song? This one is called 'Thank You, the One Who Loves Me'."
"Our distance shifts, now far, now near
Sometimes we're thick as thieves
Sometimes a world apart
It's hard to define our relationship
I am your star, and you are my confidant..."
In the dim light, everyone listened in silence.
The person who had been shouting just moments ago was now ecstatic. If his friends weren't holding him down, he probably would have started yelling again.
Meanwhile, in a corner booth, a man with striking red hair tilted his head back and drained an expensive, blood-red Inhibitor in one go.
Beside him sat a man with short white hair and another with long blue hair. All three wore expensive combat suits, setting them apart from the typical mercenary males.
The red-haired male sneered, "This little female is pretty interesting. Listen to those lyrics, 'Thank You, the One Who Loves Me,' 'I am your star, and you are my confidant.'"
"She says thank you, but she's actually warning that male who was shouting earlier, isn't she?"
The white-haired male said nothing, silently sipping the Inhibitor in his hand.
The three of them were S-level males. They were just passing through on a mission and had randomly picked a bar to buy some Inhibitors. They looked down on the paltry calming effect of females.
The only thing worth seeing in this bar was the little female on stage, whose singing was admittedly very good.
Moreover, Bai Mufeng had actually been emotionally stirred just now, which surprised him.
If he weren't short on time, he would have genuinely considered staying here for a few more days.
The blue-haired male beside him, however, spoke in a gentle voice, "Perhaps you're overthinking it."
"Hah..." Gu Tianyou rolled his eyes crudely. "Give me a break. You know how disgusted these females are by low-tier males."
"In front of everyone, she probably wanted to act all benevolent and magnanimously let that male off the hook. But then she got scared he'd get delusional ideas, so she decided to sing a song to remind him of the distance between them."
"A star and a fan—isn't that a relationship of one looking up and the other being looked up to?"
"These kinds of females all love to put on an act. Just like Bai Sisi. She's so damn fake."
The more Gu Tianyou spoke, the more he became convinced it was the truth.
Even though she was a C-level female, that didn't stop her from acting all high and mighty, as if no male in the world was good enough for her.
After all, her singing was so good.
Jiang Qin had no idea someone in the audience was maliciously speculating about her motives. She had chosen to sing this song on a sudden impulse.
It wasn't one of the songs she had pre-recorded; she just felt the atmosphere was perfect for it.
She had once been just another member of her own idol's audience. Now, she was borrowing it to thank her own audience.
"Singing a song of love
Let me thank you with all my heart
To the one who loves me, I truly thank you
How I cherish our silent understanding..."
She wasn't sure if the bar's patrons would become her die-hard fans, but right now, they were her devoted listeners.
***
After Jiang Qin returned backstage to replenish her spiritual power, An Zeyu immediately checked his Purification Value with great anticipation.
After two songs, it had only dropped by 1%.
He was mentally prepared for this. There were too many people in the bar today, and Jiang Qin's spiritual power was limited, so her Calming Power was bound to be heavily diluted.
The fact that it still dropped by 1% was a pleasant surprise.
He felt incredibly conflicted. On one hand, he wanted more people to know about Jiang Qin, which would help boost her performance metrics.
On the other, he was afraid that if more people came, the calming effect would be even weaker.
In the end, reason won out over conscience. However, he took all the earnings he'd made from his livestreams over the past two days and spent them on Inhibitors to stock at the bar.
This was his way of supporting Jiang Qin.
Quite a few people had the same idea, and for a moment, the bar's entire stock was nearly sold out.
You Wei grinned so wide his eyes narrowed to slits, unable to close his mouth over his pearly white teeth. "Haha, we'll have to restock tomorrow! Let's see who dares to say our Moonlight is going out of business now!"
Back when the bar was struggling, the Inhibitor company had demanded he pay cash on delivery for all his supplies, fearing he wouldn't be able to cover the costs. The amount of scorn and ridicule he'd endured was immense.
Thinking of this, You Wei straightened his back. Hmph, tomorrow he would make those condescending pricks see him in a new light!
"You gotta admit, this little female's singing isn't half bad."
The blue-haired male reminded him with a smile, "Didn't she just say she doesn't like people calling her 'little female'?"
Gu Tianyou was unconcerned. "So what? I'm not pursuing her. I couldn't care less what she likes or dislikes."
"Are you finished drinking?"
Bai Mufeng, who had been silent all this time, asked.
"Hold on a minute. I didn't expect this, but even though this bar is a bit of a dump, the Inhibitors they sell are surprisingly effective. Seems better than the ones on the market."
"I wonder if they have some connection to Origin Company and got their hands on an improved version."
Bai Mufeng looked at Gu Tianyou, speechless.
"Did it not occur to you that this effect has nothing to do with the Inhibitor?"
Gu Tianyou retorted without a second thought, "If it's not the Inhibitor, what else could it be? It can't be because of the 'little female's' calming effect, can it?"
'What a joke. If a C-level female could stir the spiritual power of an S-level male, the old geezers at the research institute would probably come out to debunk it themselves.'
'Impossible.'
Bai Mufeng didn't say anything more. He just silently closed his eyes and leaned back against the sofa to rest.
The blue-haired male, however, was lost in thought.
A moment later, he took out his Light Computer to check his Riot Value.
A combination of an Inhibitor and Calming Power was needed to lower one's Riot Value. But since they hadn't been calmed, even drinking the highest-grade Inhibitor would only keep their current Riot Value from rising further.
So, when he saw his Riot Value hadn't changed at all, he wasn't surprised.
Lan Shaoyu also felt he must be going crazy to have even harbored such a suspicion.
He chuckled, then turned off his Light Computer.
***
Jiang Qin felt that she was in much better shape today than yesterday.
Yesterday, after just two songs, she had been completely drained. But today, after the same two songs, she actually felt like she had enough energy left for one more.
However, the contract she'd signed stipulated two performances per day.
'I'm getting a base salary, after all. There's no way I'm volunteering for overtime.'
Therefore, her work for the day was officially done.