Eight judges and twenty-six contestants took their seats on stage in turn, their arrivals punctuated by waves of cheers that filled the venue with an incredibly fervent atmosphere, especially when Qin Jiran led the entrance. A uniform chant rose, calling out Qin Jiran’s na again and again.
When the contestants made their entrance, the nas shouted from the audience seats were not as unified, but if one listened closely, a few could be heard louder than others, such as Tang Ya, Wu Xing, and also Li Tianchao and Leng Yue, who were particularly popular among the contestants.
The ranking match’s format was more brutal, consisting of one-on-one challenge matches. Starting with the contestant resurrected by the audience, that contestant got to choose an opponent, after which each of them perford a piece. Then, the eight judges and five hundred mbers of the audience voted collectively—nine votes in total. Whoever got more votes entered the safe zone, while the loser who lost twice consecutively would move to the elimination zone, effectively being knocked out of the competition.
After two rounds, if any contestant was eliminated, another who hadn’t competed yet was drawn to start a new round of challenges. However, challengers could only pick contestants who were not in the safe zone, and this continued until all contestants had participated in that round, marking the end of the first round of the competition.
It could be said that this was a survival of the fittest contest, where the competition was about ninety percent skill and ten percent popularity. The weakest would always be the first to be picked out for elimination, while the strongest often made it to the end.
As the competition began, things indeed unfolded as many had expected. The more formidable the opponent, the more likely they were to be left till the end, especially the four contestants Qin Jiran had his eye on, who were deliberately avoided by the others. After all, everyone was here to win, not to seek out a beating.
However, during the draw, these four inevitably picked challenge lots one after the other. The first to draw was Li Tianchao. When choosing his opponent, he seed to hesitate. Two of the twenty-six contestants had already been eliminated, leaving four in the safe zone. Among the contenders he could choose from, only Tang Ya specialized in dance like him; the others were either singers or instrunt perforrs, and he felt he couldn’t outperform Tang Ya. Yet, choosing one of the singers seed sowhat unsatisfying, hence his hesitation.
"Contestant Li Tianchao, which contestant do you choose to compete against? Hehe, you seem to hesitate, can you share your reasons with us?" Xu Qingyun, as the host, was very observant and imdiately pinpointed the crux of the issue.
"I want to challenge a contestant who, like , specializes in dance, but I also know my abilities may not match up to hers, so I hesitate," Li Tianchao didn’t disguise his feelings and spoke candidly, staring intently at Tang Ya. As soon as he spoke, everyone imdiately understood whom he was talking about.
"Hehe, Tianchao, for hesitating over this, Brother Qingyun admires you. Because if it were Brother Qingyun, he wouldn’t hesitate at all, you know? Do you know what Tang Ya’s fans call her now? They call her ’Little Queen.’ Ordinary people would definitely not dare to challenge her," explained Xu Qingyun. As the host, he was well aware of the contestants’ strengths. Tang Ya was now a favorite to win the championship, and most wouldn’t dare to challenge her!
"Brother Qingyun, thank you for the encouragent. To prove that I am not just anybody, this ti I choose to challenge Tang Ya!" Being a young man in his early twenties, Li Tianchao had that competitive nature; initially hesitant, he was spurred on by Xu Qingyun’s words and imdiately decided to go for the challenge.
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