Chapter 4: The Last Diva

The sun was setting in the west.

The lights in the apartment were dimly lit.

Chu Yuanqing was wearing an apron with cute flowers and bears on it. She was wearing small cartoon slippers and had a light blue satin ribbon in her mouth. She gathered her long hair with her fingers and tied it into a ponytail, making sure it was safe from any grease and oil from cooking.

These strangely cute aprons, slippers, and ribbons were all items she got from exchanging loyalty points at a supermarket before it closed up, along with some eggs.

Originally, she thought they would bring joy to her daughter, but their relationship had been strained. It was only now that they finally served their purpose.

Fate can be really strange sometimes.

Chu Yuanqing didn’t think there was anything out of the ordinary. She had been using this apron even before becoming a magical girl. She only cared about its ability to protect against grease and stains, so she didn’t pay attention to the design on it.

The girl put on oven mitts, turned on the stove, and skillfully cooked the food. In the middle of the process, she expressionlessly tiptoed and used her magic to levitate herself higher, reaching for a seasoning bottle on a high shelf. Then, she silently landed back on the ground and continued cooking.

Because her daughter was living at school, dinner was a simple fried rice with leftover vegetables.

Chu Yuanqing finished her meal alone, and then habitually picked up cleaning tools to carefully clean the room, as if she was a diligent young wife in charge of housekeeping.

Although the girl appeared calm and didn’t show any loneliness, her petite figure and tender face still created an inexplicable atmosphere of solitude in the room, as if she were a left-behind child from a television advertisement.

"Should I continue to call Little Shu?"

Chu Yuanqing felt troubled because all the calls she made to the child before were ignored, and she only received one cold and disdainful text message.

— Don’t worry about me.

Honestly, if Chu Yuanqing hadn’t asked the child’s teacher and confirmed that the child had returned to the dormitory, she almost wouldn’t help but call the police due to the slow response of that text message.

Regardless, the fact that her daughter had "run away from home" was definitely not a good thing.

If Chu Yuanqing hadn’t just become a magical girl and also had to prepare for a talent show, she would have definitely gone to see the other person’s condition on that day to feel at ease.

Chu Yuanqing untied her apron, neatly arranged the clean mop, looked at the clean and tidy living room, and decided.

"Let’s wait until tomorrow. After getting used to my magical body and ensuring there are no flaws, I will go to the school to see that child."

As for now...

Chu Yuanqing looked at the text message sent by the official of "Dazzling Stage." The first episode of the show she participated in was confidential. The content could only be known after arriving at the scene.

However, judging from the conversations of the other contestants during the audition scene, this kind of show stays true to its core. The first episode is about introducing all the trainees and determining their levels, which is crucial.

The so-called level determination is to allow trainees to showcase their singing and dancing abilities through performance. The show’s mentors will provide comments and grade them based on their strengths and weaknesses.

From highest to lowest, the grades are Grade A, Grade B, Grade C, Grade D, and Grade F.

Grade F stood for "failed" and was almost the same as being discarded.

Chu Yuanqing was aware of her own abilities and knew she belonged at the bottom rank in Grade F.

After all, having zero experience in singing and dancing, joining a program to choose idols was no different from a husky mixing in with a wolf pack, it’s really not competitive.

At least she had a monthly salary of up to twelve thousand. She couldn’t just open her mouth and babble when it was her turn to perform and had to rely on her cuteness alone to pass the test, right?

So, she had to learn at least one song and one dance within two weeks, preferably reaching the minimum standard of the program, to facilitate her continued presence and earn a salary.

For the former savior, the current magical girl, this was not a very difficult task.

The key to all of this was...

—— How could she overcome the embarrassment of dancing while being watched?

Chu Yuanqing thought of this, her cold expression feeling a bit warm, on her doll-like face, showing some annoyance and embarrassment.

She was once the one who wielded the magic sword Levatin, burning down the colossal disasters, and also the one who held up the Wall of Sighs, protecting humanity, entrusted with the last hope and successfully changing the predetermined ending.(note: I think this sword’s name should be Laevatein, a weapon crafted by Loki in Norse myth)

But now, she had to put on a light and floaty little dress, stand on the stage shining with starlight, and dance to show the allure of a woman. The huge contrast in all of this was simply magical and hard to understand.

Even though she was already prepared to face everything before choosing to transform into a magical girl, she still felt that her future was so dark when thinking about such a scene appearing.

Chu Yuanqing’s vision went black for a moment, until she silently recalled the workplace KPI, sales performance indicators, reprimands from company leaders, cleaning up her colleagues’ mess, and being squeezed in the subway almost to death. Suddenly, amidst the bitter and desperate life of a corporate worker, she found the courage to step back on stage.

(Translated by Gravity Tales 😉)

Take a deep breath, take a deep breath!

It’s just dancing, compared to working 996... there’s really nothing to be afraid of!

Chu Yuanqing gave up on treatment and slumped on the sofa like a depressed cat. She sighed with melancholy and raised her small hand, searching diligently for past performances of contestants on "Dazzling Stage" with her old phone, which had a shattered tempered glass screen protector.

"Oh? This show is actually global?"

The girl looked at the webpage, blinking in confusion. Before she became unemployed, she was always in a high-intensity work state and hardly had any leisure time. However, she still managed to learn about the existence of this show through the streets and fragmented information.

She initially thought it was just an ordinary variety show, but from the official website information and various news sources, it turns out to be an epic extravaganza organized by governments from different countries!

According to the information on the internet, the length of time that "Dazzling Stage" was expected to run was longer than before, and its upper limit was so high that it could reach billions of viewers.

Unlike regular talent shows, "Dazzling Stage" was more like a general large-scale idol project.

Governments from various countries around the world were funding and endorsing this project, organizing pilot programs and auditions in major cities, and selecting a few winners from hundreds of trainees.

Donghong Federation was composed of 48 countries, while Holy Union was composed of 27 countries.

Among them, Daxia Country where Chu Yuanqing was located had two megacities, Sea City and Kyoto.

Even with the strong presence of Daxia Country, there were dozens of other "Dazzling Stage" audition programs happening around the world, which could be described as grand and overwhelming.

It could be said that the winners chosen from each audition of this project,if in a normal talent show, were already ready to debut with their popularity, but in "Dazzling Stage," they were still in the stage of building up their momentum.

- Springtime for Idols.

This was how internet users evaluate it.

And for her who only wanted to live a carefree life, the limits and popularity of the plan were not worth caring about.

- It should have been like this.

But some memories were like rapeseed flowers, blooming everywhere when you least expect it. She suddenly remembered the friend who fought alongside her to the end.

The slender and graceful body of the young girl burned in the fierce fire. The rapidly carbonized remains sprouted in the wind, turning into crystallized flowers that bloomed and shattered before her eyes. At that time, her nose could not smell the smell of blood, only the scent of clear cedar, burnt roses, and... shattered hopes.

Even though the world has been corrected, the past sorrows and hardships were still engraved in the marrow, entwining the nerve endings, causing a dull ache with the transmission of pheromones.

The Last Diva.

After years had passed, the scene that emerged from the deep well played out her ending once again.

Chu Yuanqing’s gaze drifted away as she murmured:

"’Dazzling Stage’... It sounds like it was prepared just for you."

"But whether this show exists or not, in a world without disaster beasts, someone like you who loves the stage so much will definitely become the best idol, right?"

At this moment, as her emotions changed, her beautiful pupils were gradually blurred by black lines, like light golden amber mottled by the years. Almost the next breath, her hands slipped due to daze, and the phone hit her face. There was a loud bang, a clear and heavy sound.

Tears welled up in the girl’s eyes, and her eye color returned to normal. She hurriedly covered her nose and rolled around in pain on the sofa. Then, she fell onto the cold floor, looking just like a little cat that had been deceived by a laser pointer and was jumping around in disarray.