From Skid Row to Superstardom: An Idol System Novel-Chapter 88: Signal Song (5)

As soon as Ari was gone, Larry Jackson burst out laughing, with literal tears coming out of his eyes.

"Puahahaha, did you see his outfit? What kind of crazy combination is that? Is this the fashion of the young kids these days?"

"Enough about his appearance, although the headband was a bit cute....." Selena smiled softly before clearing her throat.

"Ahem. Fine, fine, let’s review Ah-ri-el’s performance. Dance-wise, he’s clearly improved from the rubbish he showed us at first, but is it enough to get him out of F-class dance and to rank highly here?" Larry Jackson asked while looking at Jaywalk and Selena, who had worked with Ari the most.

"I would say not quite yet, even though we’ve come a long way from his kindergarten dance moves. He did memorize most of the choreography, but he mixed it up with the warm-up choreography, and his moves are still quite jerky, as if he’s copying a step-by-step tutorial without making the moves his own or understanding the why and how a move transitions from one move to another. At best, I would move him to D class and put him near the middle bottom." Selena spoke up while Jaywalk nodded.

"Okay, that’s fair. Then vocals. Jelissa, you’ve been his trainer since the beginning. I have thoughts, but I’ll let you go first." Larry Jackson turned to Jelissa with a frown.

Jelissa tapped her full lips with a slight frown.

"Ari usually has such a clear, beautiful singing voice, which would suit the signal song, but right now it’s...."

"Rough."

"Terrible."

"Sandpaper lite."

"Sounds like a frog."

The 5 judges were silent as they recalled the rough singing they had just heard.

Voice cracks, missing notes, a coughing fit, a squeaky sound coming from his throat, and finally, an entire octave change in the middle of the song.

Surprisingly, it was mostly in tune, but Ari’s voice was muffled because of his stuffed nose, and they could barely understand the words he was saying.

"I say we rank him at the bottom. Even if the dance was better, he still messed it up, and the vocals were some of the worst I’ve heard." Larry Jackson immediately said.

"Absolutely not." Jelissa shot back before continuing in a calmer tone, "Normally, Ari would not make any vocal mistakes; he’s basically a pitch machine and catches himself whenever he’s out of tune. We all watched the recording of his group performance; he basically carried that team on his back, and we know why he was like this today. The PD’s shared his team’s insane schedule, and he’s been practicing hard this whole week. Plus, his team had the only water stage, and apparently, the staff forgot to bring things for them to warm up afterward. Quite a few of his teammates were also sniffling and coughing, so it’s not just him who has a cold." Jelissa spoke softly as she defended Ari.

She had quite a soft spot for the boy who was always working hard and quietly helping others without caring about how they treated him.

He was always polite and respectful, which she appreciated because she had to deal with so many young boys with strong egos.

Despite partially agreeing with Jelissa’s words, Larry argued back fiercely.

"That’s not an excuse. In this industry, you must know how to manage your body and condition, and he clearly doesn’t. Nobody else was as sick as he was, so it’s clearly his fault for not managing himself well. He was the one who chose the water stage, so as the leader of his team, he should have brought towels and hot tea to take care of himself and his team instead of blaming the staff who were busy with other things. And who in the industry doesn’t have an insane schedule? It doesn’t matter how well he did yesterday or the day before; what matters is what he displayed today, which was quite lacking, especially with the expectations he set from his performance yesterday. He’s careless and inconsistent, so put him at the bottom, and if he’s eliminated, so be it."

Since Jelissa was usually soft spoken, he expected her to back down, but she actually glared at him while tapping the clipboard with Ari’s name on it.

"He is a child who is learning, and he doesn’t deserve to be at the bottom, especially when there are much worse contestants than him. If you look at the totality of his performance, he definitely doesn’t fall into elimination range, especially when the whole F-class just embarrassed themselves in front of us. You can say his performance was lacking, but I absolutely will not agree to put him last and eliminate him."

"You’re biased toward him! Don’t think I didn’t see you mouthing tips to him!" Larry Jackson yelled.

"And you’re biased against him! I mouthed tips to all the contestants. Whether or not they have the skill to utilize those tips is a different issue." Jelissa shot back.

The two of them glared at each other, and it was Jaywalk who broke it up.

"I agree with Jelissa. Compared to how he was in the beginning, Ari has improved his dance tremendously, even if his vocals were worse today. If you look at it with his past accomplishments, his performance wasn’t impressive, but compared to his peers at the same grade, with the circumstances we put them in, it was good enough for him not to be eliminated. There are quite a few who did worse than he did, and he clearly wasn’t the best, so taking that into consideration, how about this rank?" Jaywalk proposed a number, and after consideration, Jelissa nodded reluctantly while Larry Jackson smiled.

Still unhappy with Ari’s rank because she felt Larry Jackson was biased against him, Jelissa shuffled her papers until she found a different contestant’s profile. novelbuddy.cσ๓

"Fine. I’m okay with that. And if we’re looking at contestants compared to their past achievements and expectations, then William Forbes deserves to be moved to the bottom as well. His vocal and dance performance was lackluster, and he doesn’t have the excuse of being sick. Put him down here." Jelissa pointed to a lower rank, and Larry Jackson’s neck turned red.

"I don’t think it was that bad. Compared to others, he did quite well." Larry quickly defended William, but Jelissa shook her head.

"Compare what he displayed yesterday, what he’s shown in class, and what he showed today. There is a clearly visible downward trend. If he’s set the precedent high, then he should maintain it. Otherwise, he’s careless and inconsistent. And don’t give me the excuse that he’s tired or busy, everybody had the same amount of time to learn the dance and song, everyone was taught the warm-up that would help them learn the choreography, and he could barely do half of it. I don’t care if his first half was decent; the last part was rubbish, as you like to say, so drop his rank down. As a matter of fact, let’s reevaluate everyone with these new criteria."

At Jelissa’s harsh words, the rest of the judges blinked at the usually soft-spoken woman.

It seemed that she really liked Ari if she was willing to reevaluate all the contestants to match how he was graded.

Even though Larry Jackson wasn’t too pleased, since it was based on his own criteria, he couldn’t really say anything, and all the judges agreed to adjust the rank of William and the other contestants.

By the end of the signal song evaluations, some judges were pleased, some were pissed, and some were indifferent.

But the fate of the 10 contestants who would be eliminated was decided.

And on the internet, a small fire was growing as the public began watching the group performances of the contestants.