Chapter 23: The Live Broadcast
The official team of Hey Brother, Let’s Debut! set up a live broadcast channel to accommodate audiences who couldn’t attend in person. They assigned a hundred staff members to stream from officially designated accounts on various platforms, providing multiple viewing angles.
Eager for traffic, most platforms were happy to cooperate with the show’s organizers and had already promoted the event in advance. Once the livestream began, the official accounts would be prioritized at the top of each platform’s recommendations.
However, some larger platforms dismissed the hype, barely promoting it and even privately mocking the others for being "easily impressed country bumpkins."
But when the livestream finally began, these overconfident platforms quickly realized their mistake. Within the first two hours of pre-show content, rival platforms saw their viewer counts skyrocket, while theirs stagnated in comparison.
By the time they scrambled to launch last-minute promotions, it was too late—fans had already downloaded other apps and were fully immersed in the livestream on multiple devices, leaving no room for latecomers.
Watching their audience drain away, the once-dismissive platforms could only wallow in regret.
One major platform, Mingsheng, had previously been promoting a livestream by a popular male idol selling merchandise. When his event overlapped with Hey Brother, Let’s Debut! and underperformed, Mingsheng quietly replaced his pinned promotion with the show’s livestream, highlighting its "front-row viewing angle" to lure viewers.
The tactic worked briefly, drawing in crowds, but it also angered the male idol’s fans, who flooded Weibo with scorn—not just for Mingsheng, but for Hey Brother, Let’s Debut! as well.
This incident later fueled long-term friction between the show’s fanbase and the idol’s stans, resurfacing in every future feud.
But that’s a story for later—for now, the stage takes center stage.
Amid the promotional frenzy, the first live performance of Hey Brother, Let’s Debut! officially began.
Yin Chengjue scanned the lineup and team assignments, noting they were identical to his past life’s memories. Despite the online controversies, Ming Qian’s position remained unchanged—partly because his fans’ antics hadn’t yet overshadowed his own clean image. If anything, some casual viewers sympathetic to his "unfairly maligned" looks had even joined his fandom as "rational supporters," bolstering his career.
To prevent overly lopsided matchups, the show structured the teams this way:
- The top six from Class A each picked two members from Class C, two from D, two from E, and three from F, forming ten-person teams.
- The top six from Class B assembled nine-person teams from Classes B through F.
This created 12 groups of 10 (after eliminating 46 trainees in the second round). Each pair of groups would perform the same song—pre-assigned by the producers but open to rearrangement.
The trainees had only a week to prepare, testing their endurance, grit, and pressure management.
Coincidentally—or perhaps not—Rong Yu’s team was pitted against Ming Qian’s, just as in the past life.
Staring at the setlist, Yin Chengjue’s thoughts drifted.
He vaguely remembered attending this event in his past life—back then, he’d come solely for Ming Qian, voting for him without hesitation and even mobilizing an army of paid supporters.
Yet even with all that, Ming Qian’s team had barely scraped by, winning by a mere five votes over Rong Yu’s.
This time, Yin Chengjue came alone. He told himself he was just here to cheer for Ming Qian’s rival—to hold up a light sign, offer some encouragement.
At least, that’s what he kept telling himself.
Hmm?
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