Ch10 - Meow Meow Meow Meow

“Haunted?”

“Yes yes.” Xu Lele nodded vigorously, wanting to tell Lu Xu all of the gossip he knew. “My groupmate’s relative works as a director with Dongcheng TV, and he told him to be extremely careful when filming.”

Although the exterior of the apartment building in front of them had been renovated, it was obvious from the architectural style that it was quite an old building. Dongcheng had many of these old buildings, so there was nothing special about it at first glance.

Seeing that Lu Xu didn’t say anything, Xu Lele thought he must be an atheist, and said hurriedly, “I’m really not lying to you. This building has been empty for years, and no one wanted to buy it. Rumour has it that ghosts will come out every night, a lot of people have seen them. Do you want to know why they’re making us stay here?”

“Why?”

“Sigh, aren’t we a bunch of vigorous men? There’ll be a lot of life energy when we’re gathered together, so they want us to suppress these ghosts.” What Xu Lele was saying was straightforward. He glanced at the apartment building not too far away, and couldn’t help but hug himself and shiver slightly. “I hope there aren’t any female ghosts in there, and even if there are, I really hope they don’t take notice of me.”

“Tch, what era is it already, there are still people in this world who believe in ghosts?” The one who spoke was a BTT member, Xu Haoming. He was tall and looked like someone who worked out often. Xu Lele had been too focused on speaking that he hadn’t even noticed those five people arriving.

He was a bit embarrassed, but also wanted to explain. “I’m really not talking nonsense, a lot of people have seen them…”

Seeing Xu Lele trying to explain, Xu Haoming immediately shot back, “Who has seen them? You?”

Xu Lele was speechless. “Well, no, but…”

“Since you haven’t seen any, then don’t come here and cause panic.” When he spoke, Xu Haoming didn’t forget to side-eye Lu Xu. He sounded impatient. “There are no such things as ghosts in this world, okay.”

Lu Xu, who had been quiet the entire time, smiled slightly, and turned his bright eyes towards Xu Haoming. “Don’t be so sure about things. Who knows, you might see one tonight!”

When Lu Xu said that, a gust of wind suddenly rose, the roses growing along the roadside barriers swaying in the breeze. Lu Xu had his back towards the light. He had a smile on his face, but there was a look in his eyes that made people feel that there was a deeper meaning behind his words.

Under his gaze, Xu Haoming felt a chill rise up his spine, and he forgot what he had wanted to say.

Once he regained his senses, he felt that his reaction had been a bit too panicked, and couldn’t help but say angrily, “What is that supposed to mean?”

Lu Xu simply smiled as he looked at them, clearly not taking this situation to heart.

Song Zhe was standing at the side watching this conflict go down. He saw that there were a few other trainees who were coming up from behind, so he quickly pulled Xu Haoming back. “All right, let’s go.”

Xu Haoming followed behind his groupmates. For some reason, he could not stop thinking about what Lu Xu had just said—

You might see one tonight…

Crazy!

Xu Lele didn’t think the situation would have escalated like that, so he rubbed his ears and tugged at Lu Xu. “Aiya, Xu ge, let’s not care about them. Just take the talisman and take it easy.”

The talisman in his hand was small, and there was something written on it with a brush pen. Xu Lele swore that it had been blessed by a master. It was obvious that he had spent a lot of money on it.

Lu Xu didn’t really need it at all, but he didn’t want to disappoint Xu Lele and his good intentions, so he stuffed it into his pocket. “Thank you.”

The apartment building was four storeys tall.

The first floor was designated as the activity room and restaurant. The second floor was where the trainees and mentors would be staying in. The third floor had been remodelled into several dance studios so they could train.

As the supervisor and director of the show, Fan Zeng personally came to explain the training camp to the trainees.

Someone asked, “Director Fan, what’s the fourth floor for?”

Fan Zeng’s face suddenly showed some doubt, but he quickly composed himself. “Three floors are enough for all of you, so we didn’t renovate the fourth floor.”

“So it’s to save money? Haha.”

Everyone burst into laughter. No one took this matter seriously.

“Everyone must be tired from a whole day of filming. Later, please follow the staff members’ directions to your dorm rooms. Rest early today. Tomorrow, we’ll be preparing to record the theme song.” After Fan Zeng was finished and about to leave, he seemed to remember something and added, “Please hand in your phones at 10 o’clock. Talk to your family and friends so they won’t have to worry when they can’t contact you.”

“Huh, we have to give up our phones too?”

“No way, I’ll be bored to death without my phone!”

Everyone was addicted to their phones. None of them had ever thought about what their days without their phones would be like.

But the production team was firm on this, and even if they had objections, they could only hold them in.

This time, the rooms were separated according to rank, with mostly six people to one room and one room of four.

Coincidentally, Lu Xu was in that group of four. The other three roommates were all BTT members. Aside from Song Zhe and Xu Haoming, the other one was a boy called Han Tianyu.

Lu Xu had no opinion towards this arrangement. He was currently busy examining the environment.

It was clear that this apartment building had gone through renovations. There was a fresh and simple look to it, and it looked bright and clean.

However, Lu Xu still felt that there was something in here other than living people.

It was barely 8 o’clock right now. He guessed  it wasn’t time for those things to come out yet.

Lu Xu’s dorm room was right across the elevator, and was the first room when coming out of the elevator.

The trainees in A-rank were the highlight of the show, so they would, of course, get more screen time than the others.

The others all had one VJ assigned to three or four dorm rooms, while Lu Xu and the rest had one VJ each.

The BBT members went upstairs first. By the time Lu Xu joined them, they had already decided on their bunks.

The VJ had their camera up, filming content in the dorm room. Seeing Lu Xu enter through the door, he panned the camera to the other three.

Xu Haoming had taken the lower bunk, and was very reluctant to share the dorm room life with Lu Xu. His home environment was not bad, as he was a typical second-generation son of a rich family, so he basically did everything he wanted.

His relationship with the other members wasn’t that great either, but since they still had a professional attitude, they appeared to get along in front of the camera.

Noticing the situation, Song Zhe gave him a light kick, reminding him that he had to control his emotions. Other than the VJ, there were cameras set up in the room that filmed everything they did, so if the cameras filmed a conflict, who knew how badly their reputation would be affected.

Xu Haoming pursed his lips, and when he raised his head, he had a completely different expression on his face. He greeted Lu Xu politely, “We’ll be roommates from now on. If you need help with anything, just ask. Us geges will take good care of you.”

On Lu Xu’s profile, it said that he was only 18 years old. So there was no problem with Xu Haoming calling himself gege.

Song Zhe stood up to help Lu Xu with his luggage, and gestured to the bunk beds. “We’re in the same bunk, you can pick first.”

Han Tianyu also greeted Lu Xu warmly, smiling as he said that he was his fan.

The three of them had treated him so coldly earlier, but it was like they were completely different people now.

Interesting.

Lu Xu didn’t really take this difference to heart. Seeing that Song Zhe had already placed his things on the bottom bunk, he pointed to the bed on top and made his choice.

Because they were giving up their phones at 10 o’clock, after everyone had arranged their belongings, they took their phones out to call their families.

Song Zhe gave a call to his mother, Xu Haoming called his sister, and even Han Tianyu called the grandmother who had raised him.

Seeing that Lu Xu didn’t make any movements, the VJ couldn’t help but ask, “Lu Xu, who are you going to call?”

Truth be told, Lu Xu didn’t have anyone he wanted to call.

But because the production team needed footage to edit, the VJ had no choice but to stand there and wait for Lu Xu to make a call.

Lu Xu had no choice either, so he took out his phone and made a call.

The VJ aimed the camera at Lu Xu’s phone screen where the words ‘Ba Mei’ were displayed.

So, Lu Xu was calling his younger sister?

“God of love, listen to my song. God of death, dance with me…”

The ringtone was an artificial female voice singing a rendition of ‘The Ballad of Death’. Although the tune was the same, this version seemed to lack the soul that Lu Xu had.

The ringtone played for ten seconds, before the line was picked up. “Meow?”

Lu Xu smiled warmly. “Ba Mei, it’s me.”

On the other end of the line, there was a soft voice that kept going ‘meow’.

Never mind the VJ who was dumbfounded, even the other three in the room couldn’t help but stop what they were doing to focus their attentions on Lu Xu.

“I’m in the competition, so I can’t come back home for now. Be good and stay at home. If you don’t have enough cat food, make sure to tell Xie An in advance, okay?”

There was more meowing from the other end of the line, the voice soft and fluffy, like cotton candy in spring, cute and sweet.

This so-called Ba Mei was only meowing, but Lu Xu seemed to understand everything and was listening attentively. On camera, this boy was already so astoundingly handsome, and became even more gentle when he picked up the phone. It really made people’s hearts tremble.

When Lu Xu finally hung up the phone, Song Zhe couldn’t help but ask. “Lu Xu, who did you call just now?”

“My cat.”

Bullshit.

Xu Haoming snorted in response to that answer. How could cats pick up the phone? It had probably been arranged in advance for someone else to pick up the phone.

That was what he was thinking, but it didn’t show on his face as he asked, “This phone call is quite precious, why didn’t you call your family?”

“There’s only Ba Mei and myself in my family.” As Lu Xu said this, he shrugged, obviously not planning on elaborating.

Everyone there wasn’t stupid. They understood his meaning immediately.

So he wanted to call his cat, but it was because he didn’t have any family…

Even Xu Haoming felt a bit bad, and was frustrated with himself for bringing this up. He wanted to apologise, but didn’t know how to, so he could only say awkwardly, “Your cat is very intelligent…”

“This Lu Xu boy is really such a pitiful thing.” Fan Zeng originally just wanted to get a feel for the trainees’ situations, and also think ahead of how to edit the show. He didn’t think that Lu Xu’s life was actually so bleak.

The friend who composed the song was gone, and even his family had passed on. To have experienced so many partings at such a young age, it was unthinkable how much Liu Yan had to fake it before becoming the strong person he was today.

Fan Zeng felt his nose sting a bit, and before he could even decide whether he wanted to air this segment, there was a ‘Woooo’ sound like someone was crying behind him—the voice was sharp and hoarse.

“All right all right, not even Lu Xu cried so why are you crying so hard?” There was only Fang Zeng and an assistant inside the room. Fan Zeng didn’t even turn his head to look, thinking that it must have been his assistant who was crying.

However, the crying did not stop. He turned around impatiently, only to see his assistant trembling, her hand over her mouth as she shook her head. “Fan ge, that wasn’t me…”

nao: if ba mei participated in birth of an idol i’d 打call for him. stan ba mei i hope he debuts as center ???? cael approves this message btw

the title of this chapter is actually a play off a common phrase—自言自语 means to converse with oneself (muttering to oneself) but the title is 喵言喵语—conversing with…meows. so, meow meow meow meow because why not