Lu Mingfei, why are you slaying dragons if you're not involved!

Chapter 19 This is no longer a "genius," this is no longer human!

The practice room was completely silent.

The boy lowered his head and lowered his finger.

The first note leaped from the fingertips, like a drop of silver water falling into the heart of a lake.

Ripples spread out in circles, his wrists rose and fell like butterfly wings, and Bach's "Minuet" lost its ancient sharpness in this beautiful rhythm, the piano keys rising and falling like a river tinged with moonlight...

But this boy is Lu Mingfei!
Liu Miaomiao's usually well-behaved eyes widened involuntarily as she stared at everything before her. Even though she had been watching from the beginning until now, she couldn't help but wonder if she was dreaming.

Bach's "Minuet" is generally classified as a "beginner piece," which is a level that Liu Miaomiao, a girl who achieved the tenth grade piano certificate in the second year of junior high school, could easily play with her eyes closed.

But Lu Mingfei is a beginner.

The Minuet requires both hands to play a polyphonic melody independently, especially the combination of the left hand's triple meter rhythm and the right hand's ornaments—which places high demands on beginners' hand-eye coordination, rhythmic stability, and note memorization.

For a normal, completely beginner piano student, it would take several months to learn this "beginner piece" proficiently, even if they practice for two hours every day, following the conventional steps.

And Lu Mingfei?

Liu Miaomiao stared blankly at the wall clock. The time... had only been a little over two hours!

"teacher."

Liu Miaomiao whispered to Aunt Shanshan, "In just two hours, Lu Mingfei went from a complete beginner to being able to play 'Minuet' fluently. Is he a piano prodigy?"

"Miaomiao..."

Aunt Shanshan glanced at Liu Miaomiao with a meaningful look in her eyes, "How long did it take you to go from beginner to mastering it?"

"Two months." Liu Miaomiao always spoke softly; she was the kind of pretty girl who was a bit delicate.

"It takes an average person three months. If you have two months, you are considered talented. But for someone with exceptional talent, who has been exposed to music since childhood or comes from a musical family, it takes about a month."

Aunt Shanshan said slowly.

"Going from zero to proficiency in two hours is beyond what can be described as 'genius,' because even the word 'genius' seems so pale and powerless at this point... Do you know Yevgeny Kissin?"
"of course I know."

"It is said that when he was eleven months old, he could hum the Bach fugues played by his sister. He started playing the melodies he heard on the piano at the age of two. Even before he could read music, he could play them entirely based on his amazing auditory memory."

At the age of four, without any formal training, he was able to improvise piano pieces with melodic structure and harmonic logic far exceeding those of his peers.

At the age of eleven, he mastered Chopin's Piano Concerto No. 1 in ten days... We generally rate such talent as 'superhuman,' or as commonly known, 'a gift from God.'

Aunt Shan Shan sighed.

"Two hours, from recognizing the keys to reading sheet music to playing... If your classmate behind you didn't learn beforehand, then he can't be described as a genius. He should sit at the same table as Kissin, because they are not human!"

“You mean…” Liu Miaomiao immediately understood what Aunt Shanshan meant.

But how is this possible?

Liu Miaomiao knew Lu Mingfei; strictly speaking, they had known each other since junior high school. Shilan Middle School had junior and senior high school divisions, and she and Lu Mingfei were classmates in junior high and still are now in senior high school.

From the first year of junior high to the third year of senior high, five and a half years had passed, so Liu Miaomiao certainly knew what kind of person Lu Mingfei was.

He's a coward and a jerk, with absolutely no talents other than playing video games. His grades are at the bottom of the class, he has practically no friends, and hardly anyone even talks to him. Oh, and he also has a crush on Chen Wenwen in high school…

But those "preconceived notions" were suddenly overturned in the past two days, like a sudden gust of wind. The salted fish that had been lying on the ground for five and a half years, barely clinging to life and almost being buried, suddenly jumped up and transformed into a dragon and soared into the sky!

But a salted fish can never transform into a dragon, just as a real ugly duckling will never become a swan.

Unless this salted fish is actually a dragon, just hiding all along... but how can that be explained?
Who would willingly fall into the mud and wallow in misery when they can live the life of a "chosen one" amidst the envious, jealous, and resentful gazes of others? They must be bored and have nothing better to do!

"he……"

After hesitating for a moment, Liu Miaomiao finally made her decision to clarify things for Lu Mingfei. Her voice was as soft as ever, "I've known him for almost six years, he shouldn't be that kind of person."

In fact, what Liu Miaomiao meant was very simple—Lu Mingfei's past appearance could not have been faked; he might truly be a rare genius who had suddenly attained enlightenment.

There are so many Chinese people, and every year there are always one or two "legends".

I'm sure every senior high school student has heard their teacher tell the story of a certain prodigal son who had been wasting his life for more than three years, but suddenly woke up in the last hundred days, improved his score by several hundred points, and got into a prestigious 985 university.

On the one hand, it's meant to motivate students, encouraging them not to give up even in a short time, and to improve by every single point. On the other hand... there are indeed true stories like this!

Compared to the completely illogical and incomprehensible "enduring humiliation and waiting for a reversal and a slap in the face," the probability of "hidden genius" is much higher.

But from Aunt Shan Shan's perspective, this explanation has another layer of meaning.

"It's been almost six years... We were classmates in junior high and high school?"

Aunt Shanshan's gaze towards Liu Miaomiao suddenly became more meaningful. She neither agreed nor disagreed with Liu Miaomiao's words, but the smile on her lips widened.

What an amazing, mutually devoted love story! This kind of shy, innocent love during adolescence is just so sweet! This is going to be the talk of the party tonight! I'll share it with my girlfriends later!
"Ah."

Liu Miaomiao nodded, staring blankly at Lu Mingfei's retreating figure as he played the piano. She didn't notice the hidden meaning in Aunt Shanshan's words; she was simply thinking—

If Lu Mingfei is truly an "unparalleled non-human genius" who suddenly attained enlightenment, then how far can he grow in the remaining six months?
Aunt Shanshan was quite "sensible" enough not to disturb them, only watching the two of them back and forth with a motherly smile. She had already successfully made the story logically consistent in her mind, and even automatically filled in some details.

Lu Mingfei was unaware of the conversation taking place behind him; he didn't even bother to observe anything around him.

At this moment, all he sees is the sheet music in front of him. The information on the staff is "automatically and instantly decoded" and converted into finger movements. He doesn't need to think about it; he can instinctively react to when to press which key.

The newly acquired "Accurate Hit" skill played a decisive role in this, even though I don't know why dropping a finger counts as a "throw"... but that's how it is.

Lu Mingfei only needs to know which key he wants to press, and his finger will not deviate in the slightest when it falls.

Everything unfolded so naturally, so captivatingly and easily drawing one in, to the point of oblivion. Lu Mingfei's reason for such focus was simple: he wasn't just performing a concert—

He's still trying to level up.

Each time his proficiency in the piano skill increased by ten points, two hours later, his proficiency had already exceeded ninety. Lu Mingfei had never experienced such a fast leveling speed before, and he was enjoying it!

As the last cadence chord fell, Lu Mingfei's fingers hovered in mid-air. The strings, still vibrating from the aftershocks, finally revealed the cold, mechanical voice he had been waiting for, carrying the words.

Congratulations! Through diligent practice, your [Piano] level has reached LV1.

You have obtained the term "Emotion Perception"!

[Entry: Emotion Perception]
Effect: Within a ten-meter radius, the longer the conversation lasts, the clearer you can perceive the other person's current emotional state.

(End of this chapter)