From Skid Row to Superstardom: An Idol System Novel-Chapter 164: Face Card (2)

The reason for the post blowing up was linked to 2 simple events.

First was the release of episode 2, which was quite anticipated after the episode 1 cliff hanger.

Despite Ari being painted in a terrible light in episode 1 and being the top hated contestant as voted on community polls, in episode 2, when his teams full performance video was shown on TV in high resolution from the moment he spoke to the staff members to organize things to the pep(?) talk given to his teammates and weird beating of his chest, the minds of several people began to soften due to the quality of the team’s performance, especially when compared to other lower-ranked teams.

When the MC announced that the top two performance videos were between Benjamin’s team, which had several fan favorites, and Ari’s team, which nobody expected to actually do well, it helped turn some public opinion around.

- I mean, he was a bit harsh, but the result was good, right? If the tracking period had been longer, his team would have won.

- he’s basically like a drill sergeant I had when I did ROTC in high school

- Low key, my band instructor is 10x worse than he is. At least he didn’t yell?

- Guys, don’t fall for it! He literally said your opinions would change if the result was good!!!!

└ But it was a good performance (hides face)

└└ He may be a tyrant, but he can sing and deliver a good performance with his team (hides face).

Additionally, when it came time for team selection and they saw two of the popular contestants fighting to get him on their team, public opinion began to shift slightly, and people began to wonder what the big deal about him was.

Sure, his voice was pretty decent, but there were others who were good singers, so what was the big deal about him?

Expectations were set high, and the production team did not disappoint.

Without any context, the ranking ceremony began, and the MC called the person who came in 89th place.

While people were wondering what the criteria for the ranking were, the performance of the contestants’ signal song and choreography was broadcast.

- he’s kind of terrible?

- wth?

- he can’t even remember the lyrics or the dance, how embarrassing

- oof, I can see why he’s so low in ranking.

With no break, the MC called out the next highest-ranked person, whose performance video was also broadcast, and slowly but surely, they saw a remarkable improvement in the performances.

From contestants who couldn’t finish the song and forgot the choreography to contestants who completed it almost flawlessly.

By the time the ranking reached the single digits, viewers were upset because some of the contestants they expected to be at the very top, such as William, were not, and fans began arguing that the judges were sabotaging contestants.

Then the secret mission of learning the signal song in 8 hours was conveyed with the judges explaining their reasoning, and the 10 eliminated contestants giving their speeches before leaving.

As the viewers watched, before they had time to be sad about the eliminated contestants, the contestants began preparing for their new performance.

Some teams were peaceful and cohesive, but most of them were chaotic and full of drama.

Jamie’s team couldn’t agree on parts or music direction.

Justin’s team didn’t see his vision for the song and didn’t understand why they had to include lots of film references.

Leo’s team argued intensely about parts.

Amidst this, one of the most popular contestants, Benjamin, had a huge fight with William, who ended up stomping out of the room after accusing Benjamin of discrimination and almost knocking over the contestant with the strange green mask.

And just when they thought the episode was over, the screen transitioned to a camera peeking through the small window of a door where two people stood.

One person had their back to the window while the other was a sad Leo, who was on the verge of tears.

"...tell me how you really feel." Leo sniffed while wiping his face, and then a cruel response in a slightly accented voice came.

"You’re a lazy, procrastinating, pushover without a spine. Good luck, Leader."

Then, the person with their back turned gave a salute before turning around, and as the camera panned, a figure with a green mask was revealed.

And then the episode ended.

Naturally, the different communities following the progress of the program blew up with people analyzing each clip.

It was so busy that the first round of eliminated contestants were basically forgotten as people tried to figure out what caused the conflict between Benjamin and William, if the other teams would come together, and where Ari got the audacity to insult his team leader and the person who was ranked higher than him in that way.

The split fans were constantly posting about Benjamin and William, with both sides slandering the other, but the great unifier was coming together to criticize Ari, who dared to say harsh words on air.

Ari was criticized as rude, ugly, hateful, jealous, stuck-up, and more.

Then, the first round of eliminated contestants broke their silence as their identities were released to the public, and several old posts claiming to be Ari’s real face started trending again.

As the eliminated contestants began doing lives and a few interviews here and there to capitalize on their experience, a common question kept coming up.

[Have you seen contestant Ariel’s face beneath the makeup and green mask? What does he actually look like?]

And the response was all the same.

- he’s never shown his face, so I don’t know.

- he wears the mask to sleep, and when he takes it off, there’s always makeup underneath.

[Even to shower?]

- Yeah, his roommates say that they’ve never seen him without it.

- He wears it to the bathroom to shower and wears it back out.

Out of the 10 people that were eliminated, there was only one person who had a different story, and used the opportunity to capitalize on Ari’s name and brought it up every moment that he could.

[Contestant Caleb Adams - Yes, since we were teammates, I’ve seen Contestant Ariel without his mask, and he’s...hard on the eyes.]

[Contestant Caleb Adams - Those pictures are accurate. I wasn’t the one who posted them, but I saw it by accident when I visited his room.]

[Contestant Caleb Adams - He’s meaner than what you see, in fact, other contestants secretly called him Captain Crashout.]

It was the sudden birth of a crazy nickname for an idol contestant that drove even more interest toward unmasking Ariel and finding any traces of his online presence.

It wasn’t because they liked Ariel; it was simply because this was a puzzle that nobody had been able to solve.

It was as if he lived like a ghost with no social media whatsoever.

So, when a post came with pictures and videos of the contestants on an outing with someone who could plausibly be Ariel, the community began discussing once again.

Naturally, the videos claiming to be his real face circulated, but then others submitted their own videos of the green mask being taken off and his face being exposed.

Some people denied it.

Ari’s fans used it as evidence to defend him against the ugly allegations.

Commenters were going back and forth with no clear resolution.

Until someone claimed that they knew and went to school with Ariel.

With new facts being unveiled, naturally, that new poster was swarmed.

[You go to high school with him? What do you mean by that? Please post details and evidence.]

And the high schooler, who was a junior, who didn’t expect to be spammed with hundreds of messages, rushed to get her yearbook and quickly took a picture to post.

[Uhm, first here’s the evidence, he’s a senior at my high school - LA CENTRAL HIGH SCHOOL Yearbook screenshot.]

[Ariel Matisse.]

[Success is the best revenge.]

It was a picture of the individual senior photos and their quotes, with all the other faces, apart from Ari’s, manually blurred out.

While staring at the small photo, people found similar features to the crazy profile picture taken by Pop Star Academy, most notably the blunt-cut curly hair that hung in his face and sea-green eyes narrowed in a slight frown.

The only difference was that if the pop star academy profile photo, which had the crazy white and black makeup all over it, had a score of 0/10, the yearbook photo had a score of 9/10.

It looked like the face of a top model.

It was that insane of a face card, which was brought down by the ugly haircut that looked as if somebody took a pair of scissors and cut straight across the forehead.

Nobody in the community could believe that this was the person with the weird makeup, the person who always wore the green mask,

And suddenly, there was an influx of people buying tickets to see the performance, all in hopes of seeing the truth with their own eyes rather than waiting for the next episode of the show.

And people began bothering the high school student to find out more information about Ari.

[Hey, high school girl/boy? Can you tell us more about what Ari is like in your school? Is he as mean as he’s portrayed?]

This chapt𝒆r is updated by free(w)ebnovel(.)com