Chapter Ninety-One: The Sky City

To the audience, Uncle A sitting at the piano somehow possessed a strange, almost eerie beauty.

Beneath that mask, butterflylike gilt patterns spread at the corners of his eyes.

Those deep, dark eyes, cast onto the giant screen, seemed to make people see flashes of light flickering within them, stirring a nameless excitement among many fans in the hall.

“Please welcome singer Tian Jing, performing the original song Sky.”

After the host’s announcement, Tian Jing stood before the piano and nodded to Liao Yuan.

Then she gathered her hands before her abdomen, drew her breath deep into her dantian, and began to hum softly in a style reminiscent of a mountain ballad.

Her melody was graceful and lovely, like a lone wild goose circling the sky in solitude.

Suddenly it crossed the vast plains, soared over towering mountains, and drifted away toward the edge of the world.

This was a wordless vocal piece, demanding exceptional fundamentals, lung capacity, and more from the singer. Tian Jing truly deserved to be a teacher at the Capital Music Conservatory; the moment she opened her mouth, her skill was unrivaled and stunned everyone.

Liao Yuan did not linger; he followed her singing and began to accompany her.

He used jazz harmony, a tonal harmony leaning toward popular music and fundamentally different from classical music. It arose among ordinary people and was loved more by ordinary people as well.

His fingertips danced across the keys, light and color spinning at his touch, as though he were playing out an entire midsummer. Paired with Tian Jing’s humming, it gave the audience the uncanny sensation of hearing pagoda tree leaves trembling outside the window and cicadas calling without end.

This was the sky of high summer.

The pianists all wore expressions of admiration.

Yet just as Liao Yuan had only begun to establish the piece’s character, he suddenly looked puzzled and lifted his gaze toward Tian Jing.

Her face was gradually turning grim.

Though she still hummed, it was like a trapped beast making its last struggle; every note she sang repeated endlessly within a tiny circle.

“Has she lost the key?”

The hall erupted in uproar.

Tian Jing’s cheeks burned hot with embarrassment.

She had only received the score for Sky yesterday, and after merely one night of practice she had believed herself fully prepared. She never expected that under the powerful accompaniment of this masked contestant, she would become distracted.

Her mind had actually gone blank for a brief instant.

Then the notes she had once known by heart seemed like a broken string, stopping all at once.

As for what came next, no matter how she searched her memory, she could not recall it.

Just as Tian Jing was preparing to give up, sorrowful piano tones suddenly reached her ears.

Those notes streamed in like a small bridge over flowing water, slowly pouring into her heart.

The piano carried a lonely sadness, the passage of time, inward solitude, and the helplessness of the world. In that instant, the surrounding clamor seemed to vanish at once, and what came rushing forward was only boundless desolation and melancholy.

Tian Jing opened her mouth again. Between chest and abdomen, streams of breath rose continuously; after passing through the shaping of her throat, each harmony, carried on the piano’s wings, flowed into the listeners’ ears.

“My heart aches. What a poignantly beautiful piece!”

“My God, it sounds so inexplicably sad!”

“The singer has found her footing again, but this piano line is completely different from before!”

“No way. Uncle A is actually carrying the singer!”

“Wait, is the singer supposed to be accompanying Uncle A?”

“For some reason, listening to it feels like being wrapped in sorrow, like a wave of bleakness washing over my whole body.”

“This piece is too heartbreaking! I don’t like it!”

“I’ve decided. I’m playing this at my funeral so everyone will cry. Cry for me, all of you!”

“Another masterpiece from Uncle A. A divine piece that makes you burst into tears halfway through listening!”

“My chest feels a little tight listening to it…”

While Liao Yuan was playing, the official J Station livestream was flooded with bullet comments across the entire screen.

And the number of viewers online soared directly from five million to eight million, causing a marked drop in viewers in the Northern Division and the Hong Kong, Macao, and Taiwan Division.

After noticing Tian Jing had lost the key, Liao Yuan felt rather helpless as well.

If this kind of performance mishap were counted in the scoring, he felt he might be more wronged than the legendary Lady Dou.

After waiting a moment and seeing that Tian Jing seemed on the verge of giving up her humming, Liao Yuan refused to give up. His hands leaped across the keys, and he hurriedly modulated the music.

Thus, a piece from his previous life that had swept the world, Sky City, lingered lovingly beneath Liao Yuan’s fingertips.

At that moment, Tian Jing, who had lost the key, was drawn in by the melody’s sudden change from Uncle A, and in an instant she seemed to find herself in a special world.

She felt her body grow wonderfully light, and with the breeze brushing past her, she seemed to rise involuntarily toward the azure sky.

And above that sky was a city floating in the air.

It was a quiet and beautiful world, filled everywhere with flowers, grass, and butterflies, and suffused with the fresh fragrance of blossoms.

Here, people could forget unpleasant memories, set down their heavy burdens, and wander through this pure land.

Tian Jing closed her eyes and, following the notes sounding in her ears, continued to sing.

Gradually, her nostrils trembled, and traces of tears appeared upon her eyelashes.

At the same time, all seven thousand people in the hall fell silent.

They looked at Liao Yuan playing before the piano, at Teacher Tian Jing with one hand resting on the piano frame and the other pressed to her chest as she sang with her eyes closed, and a tide of sorrow surged up within them.

Many people unconsciously closed their eyes and experienced the piece in utter stillness.

At this moment, Sky City carried everyone into an ideal kingdom of utmost goodness and purity.

They felt sorrow because they knew that world did not exist, yet their hearts longed for it so deeply.

Even more sorrowful was the fact that, once they opened their eyes, they would still have to continue struggling through this noisy, dusty world.

When the song ended, the hall was utterly silent.

Tang Hong, broad-shouldered and powerfully built, wearing a red tracksuit, could not help but grow misty-eyed, her entire being trembling with emotion.

This was the ideal piano piece in her heart.

This was the very quality and foundation a great pianist should possess.

Every piece Uncle A played carried a power that shook the soul.

Tang Hong could not help clenching her callused hands.

Her brief career as a professional athlete had brought her endless glory, but it had also left her with a body full of ailments.

Not long after winning her Olympic gold medal, Tang Hong was ordered by doctors to retire early because her physical functions had been overdrawn beyond their limit.

Before she joined the national team, the instrument she loved most was the piano.

But her family had been too poor to support that dream. After she achieved fame and success, when the nation asked what she wanted, she said, I want to learn the piano.

And so, everything was arranged with perfect clarity.

Although she now had expert instruction and ample practice time, the illnesses left by her athletic career and her less-than-agile hands meant that even after a year of study, Tang Hong still could not meet the standard for amateur grade ten.

And yet, even so, she still cherished every stage that allowed her to play.

So after Uncle A’s performance, Tang Hong, moved though she was, nevertheless endured the pressure bearing down on her and insisted on sitting before the piano. Under Tian Jing’s humming, she did her utmost to play the accompaniment she had always dreamed of.

However, with Sky City standing before her like a priceless gem, Tang Hong, though she played well, still had no hope of a reversal.

In the end, Tang Hong was eliminated.

The host hurried onto the stage and announced the result of the competition to the entire hall.

After the result was announced, Tang Hong, though defeated, still held herself with honor. She excitedly reached out to shake Liao Yuan’s hand and asked, “What was that piece you just played? It was so beautiful!”

At that moment, Tian Jing and the host both looked over, and the eyes of the entire audience were filled with expectation.

“Sky City.”

Liao Yuan paused, then said, “Tonight I’ll upload the full piece to J Station for everyone to enjoy.”

The entire venue erupted at once in thunderous cheers.

The bullet comments in the official livestream also immediately expressed their joy with a flood of “666.”