From Skid Row to Superstardom: An Idol System Novel-Chapter 140: Episode 1 (2)

After an excruciating ad break that Rachel spent reading more comments, the episode finally came back on, and she watched with a shocked expression as Ari’s team fought almost to the point of blows before everybody just left the practice room out of nowhere.

Before Rachel could even begin to try to understand what was going on, the scene transitioned into a peaceful, caring atmosphere as Benjamin led his team to practice.

Each person spoke calmly, shared their ideas, and even laughed as the British boy cracked jokes and teased Jamie, whose expressions were lively and amusing.

Just as she was getting comfortable, smiling at the contestants getting along, the scene would transition to another team having intense arguments, before shifting to a peaceful time with yet another team.

To be honest, Rachel had whiplash, trying to keep up with the drama happening on different teams, but she found that she couldn’t look away as the production team edited it in such an engaging way.

The scene then transitioned to the team evaluations, and she watched in shock at some of the terrible performances given by some teams.

She couldn’t believe that these contestants were the same ones who had such amazing performance videos because at first glance, it looked like a lot of them couldn’t sing or dance at all.

The only contestants who seemed to be doing well were those in the higher grade classes, while everyone in the lower classes struggled.

Plenty of teams performed, and just as she was wondering when Ari’s team was going to perform, they finally did, and Rachel couldn’t help but wince.

The dancing was unsynchronized and messy, the only good vocals were Ari’s, and Caleb, the boy who had gotten into a fight was yowling like an alley cat in his own world.

As he tried to sing a high note, the camera panned to the judges wincing and then to the disgusted expression on Ari’s painted face, Rachel couldn’t help but burst out laughing.

She realized it was a common occurrence because every time she caught sight of his eyes, she noticed that they were quite expressive and always revealed everything he was feeling.

He was either rolling them or staring in disbelief. freёweɓnovel_com

Thinking that Ari’s team was going to get scolded like the other teams that hadn’t performed well, Rachel just casually watched it.

But then, the scolding of a lifetime happened as the judges went in on the entire team.

From a contestant running away from practice.

To the accusations and fighting over the leader position between Ari and Caleb.

To the judge yelling and calling another contestant as a witness, to Ari being appointed as his team leader, and smiling happily as if he had won.

It was all dramatically edited, and for a second, she felt as if she were watching a reality TV show, not a survival idol show to select debut members.

Completely on the edge of her seat and wondering what was coming next, Rachel focused on the TV screen.

Unfortunately-

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An ad break interrupted everything.

When the episode returned, it featured the contestants and judges being interviewed about their impressions of their team leaders and their preparation process for the Warrior Performance video.

Some team leaders received positive reviews or were described as strict, hardworking, and detail-oriented, and scenes of the team leader working with the team to plan out details and communicate with the production team were shown alongside their Warrior performance video.

But when it was Ari’s turn, only one trainer spoke up for him.

Jaywalk: "Terrible dancer. He’s lazy, unprepared, overly ambitious with nothing to back it up, and doesn’t try as hard as others."

His teammates.

"Dictator."

"Nightmare."

"Captain Crashout."

"He’s a crashout."

"Scary."

"Crazy."

"Rude."

"A crashout."

"Arrogant."

As Rachel was wondering what could have prompted his own team members not to give him any positive feedback, a montage of Ari basically acting insane was displayed.

From him leading people to wake a team member by banging pots outside of the room door, waking everybody inside without a care in the world, to him literally dragging people out of the cafeteria and into the practice room, to grabbing people from stairwells, bathrooms, etc. by their necks, arms, and more.

He cut people off when they tried to talk, repeatedly made his teammates repeat things again and again without explaining why, caused people to cry, ignored their opinions, chose everything for the performance without telling them anything, and arbitrarily increased practice times whenever he felt like it.

Even when people collapsed, completely covered in sweat, he would roll his eyes before sticking a bag of ice down their backs until they got up.

Each time the faces of his teammates were shown, they looked like they were in hell.

Their hair and clothing were damp from sweat, and the bags under their eyes grew and darkened at a visible rate, while Ari always looked refreshed and energetic with fresh face paint whenever he took the strange green mask off.

Even though she was watching his actions through the TV screen, to her eyes, Ari looked like a crazy person.

- I would hate to be in a team with a person like him

- bruh, his poor teammates

- Why is he treating them like this? They’re not dogs!

- Why is production letting him act like this?

- ref! Do something! He’s a menace.

The entire chat was filled with complaints about his actions, with people saying he wasn’t skilled enough to be acting like a dictator, while others began defending Ari’s teammates, saying that they didn’t deserve to be treated like this.

The scene then transitions to Ari sitting in the interview room while speaking with the PD.

["This is what your team members are saying about you? How do you feel about it?"]

["Hmmm. How do I feel?"]

Even though she couldn’t see his face because of his green mask, Ari’s voice sounded murderous on the screen as he shrugged with his characteristic catlike movements.

["This is probably going to sound rude, but I don’t care at all. I didn’t come here to make friends, so if they want to hate me, so be it. I came here to debut and make money. That’s the goal, and like I said before, we’re going to be on top, so even if I have to drag people to hell to get them to do what I want and bring them up to the standard that I set, I will. If they don’t like it, then they shouldn’t have made me the team leader."]

At the harsh response, Rachel gasped in shock.

No! No! NO!

Why would Ari answer like that!!??!!

It was as if he had no concept of being edited in an evil manner or that the internet would hate him!

He was supposed to use this opportunity to explain his actions and better his image, not double down!

As if the PD was reading her mind, the female voice spoke again, ["Don’t you think your words are a bit too blunt and harsh? The public might hate you, and they’re the ones who have to vote for you, you know? Aren’t you afraid of being disliked?"]

"Is that right? Well..." Rachel watched as Ari laughed while taking off his green mask to smile mischievously at the camera, ["Even if they don’t like me. As long as the performance is good, then it will all work out. And if not....so what?"]

The episode ended like that.

"No way."

As the preview for the next episode began playing, Rachel couldn’t help but gasp and clutch her heart as the chat blew up once more.

It seemed that her fave had hit the triple x’s of idol survival shows; being hated by his own teammates, being hated by production, and now saying he didn’t care about how the public perceived him.

Ari! Please! Watch what you say!!!

You’re making it hard to defend you!

With a resigned sigh, Rachel cracked her fingers before getting on the community board, before beginning to defend her favorite contestant from the hate that was sure to come.

************

And Ari, who had watched the extra-long first episode, couldn’t help but laugh wildly at the tactics of the production team who had cut and spliced his words to suit their narrative.

At the end of the first episode, he had been painted as a rude, controlling dictator who sneakily coveted the leadership role, got it, harassed his teammates like a crazy person, and looked down on everybody from his teammates to the public, while claiming his team would be number one.

They had completely cut his full sentences or taken them out of context, ignored the contract made with his team and what they had agreed to, him praising their improvements, him breaking up fights, Jelissa complementing him often, him and Vishal working together to research, and more.

In fact, most of his team members were painted in a sympathetic light while he was villainized as a mean person.

Even Caleb’s antics were toned down, and only his slightly crazy(he was sleep deprived) actions were emphasized.

As Ari did some light scrolling to check the reactions, he saw that someone had already made a compilation of his glaring or rolling his eyes being caught by the camera, staring at people in disgust, dragging people, and generally being a kind of crazy person while people were complaining about him.

[Wow.]

[And you say I’m terrible?]

[Wow.]

[I can’t believe you did all that.]

[You should be in jail. You bully.]

"You shut up."

Thinking that there was nothing he could do about the situation, he closed down those tabs, and for the first time in a while, spent some time making some music, posted it on his new account before going to bed.

Tomorrow, he would have to go back to school.

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