A Star Reborn: The Queen’s Return

Onstage, fireworks and smoke crisscrossed to form a dreamy backdrop.

Xia Ling was dressed in a long chiffon dress with silver accessories as she sang melodious and moving songs.

Offstage, there was a huge patch of darkness, with sporadic lightsticks waving about, creating a quiet and mysterious setting, like the everlasting twinkling starlight. There were laser boards emblazoned with the words “Xiao Ling, you can do it,” “Xiao Ling, I love you” raised in the crowd, swaying to the beat of the music.

Suddenly, the sea of lightsticks became a chaotic mess.

At first, it was just a small part in the northeast corner of the concert hall where the lightsticks seemed to have malfunctioned and started to flicker, no longer being able to sway steadily to the beat. However, that soon spread and, very soon, most of the lightsticks appeared to have the same problem.

There was noise in the distance.

The surround-sound system onstage prevented Xia Ling from being able to hear the crowd properly. She felt a little uneasy with the flickering lightsticks given the many incidents that had occurred in recent days. She did not want anything to happen at this concert. However, things didn’t go as she hoped. She saw security officers running towards the center point of where the commotion seemed to be coming from, and the noise offstage increased in volume.

She sang a little off-tune with the distraction.

A female fan came onstage to give her flowers and said in a low voice, “Miss Ye, I’m one of your staff members. The commotion is just due to someone fainting from low blood sugar. It’s nothing serious. Just focus on your singing.”

As such, she ignored the commotion, steadied herself, and continued with the concert.

The concert concluded.

When Xia Ling came backstage, she found Sister Mai Na with a grave expression, frantically calling on her mobile and throwing long strings of instructions to the people on the other end of the line. Seeing her appear, Sister Mai Na hung up abruptly and hurriedly told her, “Xiao Ling, something bad has happened. When you were singing, a group of your die-hard fans bashed up two anti-fans. Now, the two anti-fans are seriously injured with broken bones in the hospital and in critical condition.”

Xia Ling’s heart sank as she recalled the commotion offstage, realizing what had happened.

“The lady that came onstage earlier with flowers told me that someone fainted due to low blood sugar?” She clarified with Sister Mai Na.

Sister Mai Na asked, “What lady with flowers?”

“She said that she was a staff member and I saw her with a staff pass around her neck.” Xia Ling said.

Sister Mai Na replied, “I didn’t send anyone onstage to pass you a message. Maybe they were sent by the organizers.” She was up to her neck trying to deal with the situation and didn’t have the spare capacity to think of such details. She said, “I’ll get someone to send you back to the hotel. Don’t go out today and don’t go online to update your Weibo. We need to prevent netizens from reacting too strongly to this.”

Xia Ling nodded.

“I’ll update you once there is any news.” With that, Sister Mai Na patted her on the shoulder and signaled for her to follow her assistant back to the hotel.

Xia Ling was still feeling uneasy back at the hotel. How were the two anti-fans? How was the progress of the situation? She could not resist going online to see if there were any updates of the incident.

As expected, there were already reports of the fight at her concert.

According to the reports, the fight arose because the two anti-fans were having a private conversation and criticizing her by saying things like: “she’s still singing as if nothing’s happened even though she’s caused the death of two kids”, “she doesn’t deserve to stay in the entertainment circle”, and “she needs to pay for the death of the two kids”, as well as booing her loudly. Xia Ling’s die-hard fans had overheard the conversation and gotten angry at their comments.

They got into a spat, and the curses hurled by the two anti-fans went from bad to worse.

Some of her die-hard fans couldn’t hold in their anger and it evolved into a massive brawl. The adrenaline-filled situation pushed things beyond control and some of the die-hard fans started to pummel the two anti-fans excessively. If the security officers hadn’t got there in time to pull them away, the two anti-fans might well have been pummeled to death on the spot.

Xia Ling held her breath as she read the reports of the brawl. Her greatest fear was for there to be another death related to her.

The two kids that had lost their lives due to the de-worming incident haunted her dreams. If two more died, she would surely lose her mind.

She buried her head in her arms as she hugged herself in an attempt to stop herself from shaking.

Her mobile rang and she picked it up. The person on the other end of the line spoke in a high-pitched and anxious voice. “Miss Ye, can you comment on your thoughts of the brawl at your concert? Many of your fans say that the two victims deserved to have been hit and should have been pummeled to death. What are your thoughts on the matter? Please, can you…”

She hung up.

She didn’t know who had leaked her personal mobile number such that reporters were able to call her directly.

She stared at the empty hotel room with a heavy heart and dialed Li Lei’s number. The phone rang for a long time but no one picked up.

She threw her mobile to the side and fell into a daze while hugging her knees.

Sister Mai Na was trying to resolve this PR crisis, whereas she could only wait here doing nothing? She could hardly sit this down. Why was it that everyone was working so hard for her and all she could do was watch helplessly? She rang Sister Mai Na and sought her permission before logging into her Weibo and uploading a post, saying: “I implore everyone to follow artistes rationally.”

Some liked her post, whereas there were others who said that she was being a hypocrite and trying to act like she was an innocent party.

She shut the computer down.

Her emotions were in turmoil, and she started to miss Li Lei again.

Someone knocked on the door.

She peered out of the peep-hole and saw that it was Pei Ziheng at the door. He stood under the dim yellow lights in the corridor, wearing a simple light-colored shirt. He looked dependable and kindly.

She said to him through the wooden door, “Pei Ziheng, don’t come here again. I’ve told you, he won’t be happy.”

“Has he cared if you’re happy or not?” Pei Ziheng calmly responded. “Xiao Ling, I heard that there was a problem at the concert, and I’m only here to see how you are doing.”

Xia Ling lowered her head and stared at her toes.

She thought of the result of her ringing Li Lei earlier — he didn’t reply. He was really busy and so couldn’t pick up her call, right? She shouldn’t introduce any additional complications at this juncture.

“Just leave.” She said before walking away from the door, going back to the bedroom.

There was silence outside the hotel door. It seemed that Pei Ziheng had left.

Xia Ling felt empty and sad that she had no one to turn to and lean on in such a hard time as this. She found a pen and paper and started to write a song. She wanted to write a song of grief for the two children. Perhaps she would feel better after doing that.

Time passed quickly.

Before she knew it, it was the next morning.

Sister Mai Na came to look for her with a darker expression than the day before. “Xiao Ling, you need to be exceptionally careful about anything you say or post. You need to get my permission before doing anything. The situation is much worse than we thought. I think someone is targeting you.”

Xia Ling gave a start. “What happened now?”

Sister Mai Na said, “Why don’t you read the report for yourself?” She passed the newspapers to Xia Ling.

Xia Ling took the papers from her and saw that “staff member” who had come on stage to give her flowers speaking to the media angrily. “I heard that there was a brawl in the audience and that two people were being victimized. I wanted to tell Ye Xingling about it by giving her flowers onstage, hoping that she would say something to stop them from fighting. The ones being aggressive were her fans and, as long as she said something, they would listen to her. But she didn’t say a thing. She continued to sing as if nothing had happened! She was willing to sacrifice two lives just so she could have a smooth concert! I’ve never seen such a hard-hearted and cruel singer before!”