Transmigration; A Mother's Redemption and a perfect Wife.-Chapter 357; Conducting Auditions 4

"Focus on your stars, Fei Fei," he said, his voice lower, almost gentle. He gestured to the laptop. "That is your world. Let me manage the shadows in mine."

He rose from his chair, a signal that the discussion was over. He walked to the window, turning his back to the room, a king dismissing a subject.

Tang Fei stared at his broad back for a long moment, the joyful buzz of the auditions now feeling distant and hollow. She turned back to the screens.

The dancer in Hall 3 was leaping, a picture of defiant freedom. But all Tang Fei could see were the invisible chains, the ones on the dancer’s wrists in the performance, and the ones she was just beginning to feel around her own life.

Huo Wu, sensing the shift in atmosphere, quietly muted the laptop’s audio, allowing a heavy silence to fill the room, broken only by the silent, frantic movements on the screen.

The hunt for talent continued, but in the heart of the hunter, a new, more personal struggle had just begun.

Huo Ting Cheng settled back into his armchair, the leather sighing softly under his weight. The report on the Xu brothers lay discarded on a side table, its contents now a closed matter. His attention, however, did not return to his financial tablet. Instead, it remained fixed on his wife.

Tang Fei had not moved from her spot on the floor. The five silent screens cast a kaleidoscope of light and shadow across her face. She was watching, but her gaze was distant, looking through the performers rather than at them. The vibrant energy that had animated her during her speech had leached away, replaced by a quiet, unsettling stillness.

In Hall 3, the group of dancers reached their finale. The lead dancer executed a series of breathtakingly rapid turns, her body a blur of motion, before launching into a final, desperate leap. Her arms stretched upwards, fingers splayed as if trying to grasp something just out of reach before she collapsed to the floor in a controlled heap, the music cutting out abruptly. It was a performance about struggle and aspiration, ending in exhaustion.

A perfect, painful metaphor.

A faint, almost imperceptible sound escaped Tang Fei’s lips. It wasn’t a sigh of appreciation, but something thinner, more weary.

Huo Ting Cheng’s eyes narrowed. This was the dissonance he sought to eliminate. Her world was to be one of creation and admiration, not of melancholy and empathy for fictional struggles. He wanted her to see talent, not tragedy.

"Find the next one," he said, his voice cutting through the quiet. The command was not loud, but it was absolute, directed at the room.

Huo Wu, who had been meticulously noting down Tang Fei’s earlier reactions, immediately understood. He unmuted the laptop and quickly switched the feed on the main screen, bypassing the judges’ commentary on the dancer. Hall 2, the singing auditions, filled the display.

A cheerful, upbeat pop song began, performed by a girl with a bright smile and technically perfect pitch. It was all surface-level sunshine, devoid of the deep emotion that had captivated Tang Fei moments before.

Tang Fei’s gaze flickered to the screen, but it lacked its previous intensity. She offered a small, obligatory smile, but it didn’t reach her eyes. "Her voice is very clear," she commented, her tone polite but disengaged.

Huo Ting Cheng watched her, a complex mixture of triumph and frustration warring within him. He was successfully steering her away from distress, but in doing so, he was also dampening her passion. He was sanding down the rough, fascinating edges of her spirit to make her safe to handle.

He rose again and walked over to her, his shadow falling over her and the laptop. He didn’t sit beside her, but stood behind her, placing a firm, possessive hand on her shoulder. His touch was meant to be grounding, but in the context of the silent battle being waged, it felt more like an anchor, holding her in place.

"Your project is off to a remarkable start," he said, his voice a low murmur near her ear. "You’ve inspired them all. Now let the machinery you’ve built do its work. You don’t need to carry the weight of every performance."

Tang Fei leaned back slightly, her shoulder pressing into his hand, a subconscious gesture of seeking comfort. She was trying to reconcile the supportive husband with the ruthless strategist who had just coldly dismissed a potential family crisis.

"You’re right," she said softly, her eyes still on the cheerful singer. "It’s just... a lot to take in."

"That’s why I’m here," he replied, his thumb stroking a slow, deliberate circle on her shoulder. "To share the load." 𝕗𝗿𝕖𝐞𝐰𝗲𝕓𝐧𝕠𝕧𝗲𝐥.𝚌𝐨𝚖

But the load he was offering to share was not the one she felt. He was offering to carry the burden of her safety, her peace of mind, by walling her off from anything that might disturb it. He was offering a gilded cage, and mistaking her quiet acquiescence for gratitude.

On the screen, the pop song ended to enthusiastic applause. Tang Fei watched the girl bow, her expression unreadable. The hunt for talent continued, the silent screens a whirlwind of dreams and ambition.

But Tang Fei, the hunter, had momentarily forgotten how to pull the trigger, her focus blurred by the creeping realization that she, too, was being expertly managed, her every reaction observed, her every emotion curated by the man who loved her enough to imprison her in a world of his own design.

The cheerful pop song from Hall 2 faded, replaced by the polite, measured applause of the judges. The performance had been flawless, technically proficient, and utterly forgettable. A hollow shell where the earlier, raw ballads had held a soul.

Tang Fei’s gaze remained on the screen, but her mind was elsewhere, drifting in the unsettling silence Huo Ting Cheng had carved out within her. His hand on her shoulder was a brand, a constant reminder of the boundaries he was drawing around her world.