Entertainment: Starting with a Song of Rice Fragrance

Zheng Ning's side is thriving.

But as the saying goes, for every person who laughs, there is someone who cries.

Meanwhile, a singer was sullenly complaining to his manager.

"Wait, Brother Bo, who exactly is this newcomer named Zheng Ning? Why is the company suddenly pushing him so hard? And the resources they promised me haven't been given yet, leaving my song stuck at number fifty-four, stuck in the middle..."

This person also appeared to be in their early twenties, with very fashionable highlighted silver-black hair. Their face was so handsome it was almost effeminate, and they wore a stylish cashmere trench coat, making them very eye-catching.

Meanwhile, the middle-aged man sitting next to him, whom he called Brother Bo, was around 35 years old and had a neat head of spiky short hair. At this moment, he was staring at him in a remote corner.

"Look, my song was so popular before, it climbed from outside the top 100 and has now reached this level..."

He pointed with his long, slender fingers to a song on his phone called "Love in Late Autumn," and complained rather indignantly.

"But now I'm just hovering between 50th and 60th place, I can't drop down, and I can't climb up... The company said before that as a C-level artist, I would have 5 million yuan in promotional funds, but I feel like the funds haven't all come in."

Wei Yibing's pretty face was full of hostility.

The song title "Love in Late Autumn" shows 135785 downloads, ranking 54th on the newcomer chart.

After all, as a super promising talent with outstanding looks and singing ability who was sought after by several companies, he rejected offers from other companies and accepted a contract with Feiyang Entertainment because it is one of the top three giants in the industry and can provide huge support for his debut work.

Initially, the collaboration went quite well, with the company's professional musicians providing him with this song that received a B rating.

And indeed, a lot of publicity and groundwork were laid for him, enabling him to break through from tens of thousands of entries and storm into the top 100.

This greatly excited him, and he secretly rejoiced many times, feeling that signing with Feiyang was the luckiest thing that had ever happened to him.

But there was no comparison before.

Although there is another newcomer, Wang Yushu, who is being heavily promoted by the company, he broke into the top 20 early on.

But he also knew that the other person was a relative, and that the third place winner was selected from a continent-wide singing competition, which he couldn't compare to at all, so he accepted it.

But now, someone who seems to have fallen from the sky, with no roots, no connections, no past achievements, and not even a vocal training course, has suddenly appeared and is ranked ahead of Wang Yushu, and is firmly suppressing him.

And now the company has actually contacted him and signed him. As a result, his performance has skyrocketed, and he has now even ranked 7th!

How could he possibly swallow this insult?

Why are you praising him but not me?

Li Bo, who was standing next to him, also sighed deeply and rubbed his temples with a headache.

Wei Yibing is good at everything; he's handsome and sings well, but he's just a bit too arrogant.

Just a month ago, he was an unsigned, completely independent singer who relied on posting videos on short video platforms to promote himself. He was only half-famous and was even begging for donations in his live streams, which was heartbreaking to see.

But after signing with Feiyang, he suddenly became arrogant, thinking he was now superior and wouldn't allow any other newcomers to surpass him?

Do you even know your place? You're just a newbie, what right do you have to dictate how the company arranges things for you?

If we don't consider it from the company's perspective, "Love in Late Autumn" is the work of the company's own composer and lyricist, and they need to protect its reputation.

As a pure listener, their song "Rice Fragrance" is 100 times better than your sad love song!

Moreover, this person brought their own investment and didn't rely on any company's promotion or packaging; they reached 13th place solely through natural online traffic!

In fact, the company is the one who benefited!

Your song relies on the company, and your promotion, packaging, and distribution also depend on the company's resources. How can you compare yourself to others?

But he knew he couldn't say that, otherwise he would dampen the boy's fighting spirit, since he was now his direct manager.

"Ugh, how could I have been so stupid back then!"

Thinking of Zheng Ning, he felt waves of heartfelt regret.

He had seen the video from that year online and was considering trying to sign him.

But I always felt that singers with such unorthodox methods probably wouldn't have much staying power.

In addition, the company assigned this old man to them, saying they thought highly of him and even gave him a B-level song—newcomers are usually given C-level or even D-level songs.

How did I become possessed back then? I hesitated for a day or two.

But by the time he finally made up his mind to sign the certificate, his colleague, Zhao Lu, who was also a senior agent, had already beaten him to it!

"What the hell is this...?"

He glanced at the clown beside him, still chattering on and on, and then thought of Zheng Ning's innocent and handsome face in the video, and his lyrics that seemed to come from a divine hand...

I just want to say a famous line, "I regret it so much, really, I regret it so much..."

"Alright, Xiao Wei, stop dawdling. The company keeps detailed accounts and clear expenditures for each singer's investment."

"They didn't use a single extra penny of your money. According to my inside information, the company saw that he was already good, and wanted to shift the focus from Wang Yushu to him, so that he could replace Wang Yushu and break into the top 10, or even the top 5."

"Brother Kebo, why are they promoting him and not me? I'm just as good! And look, he even submitted another song, 'Chengdu,' which is already in the top 20!"

Despite hearing what Brother Bo said, Wei Yibing remained unconvinced.

"Wasn't it said that each singer could only submit one song this time? Why can he submit two? And both of them made it into the top 20? Did his company spend a lot of money on his song 'Chengdu'?"

Seeing that his competitors were ranked so much higher than him, and by two songs no less.

Wei Yibing was burning with jealousy; his handsome face was twisted into a pretzel shape.

"You don't understand, do you? He's from Shuncheng. Do you know what Shuncheng was called in ancient times?"

Li Bo didn't want to get entangled with this person anymore. He had a ton of things to do, and now he had to appease this jealous kid. It was really annoying.

"Their song has now become the theme song for the official promotional video celebrating the 120th anniversary of their city's development!"

"Think about the scale of the promotion involved! Stop complaining about how much money the company is paying him. You should think about why your song isn't trending despite all that money!"

Li Bo no longer wanted to deal with this annoying guy. He stood up from his chair, pushed away the coffee cup that had gone cold before he even drank it, and strode out the door.