ECG -Chapter 185 A Piano Duel Needs to Be Explosive

Lin Hao stood up. “Then I find it strange. Mr. Qian mentioned several of your professional teachers, so why did he completely avoid mentioning Teacher Fan Gang?”

Qian Xiaoqiang did not answer that question. Instead, he turned toward the microphone and shouted, “Where are the staff? Please pass the microphone to the parent who raised the question about teaching!”

The theater fell completely silent. Not a single staff member stepped forward.

Lin Hao put his hands behind his back and walked onto the stage with large strides, his back straight.

Advertisement

“Y-you are?” Looking at Lin Hao standing in front of him, sweat had already appeared on Qian Xiaoqiang’s forehead.

“My name is Lin Hao. I am Teacher Fan’s student!” Lin Hao spoke neither hurriedly nor slowly, and his voice clearly traveled through the microphone into everyone’s ears.

Yang Qianyi was completely dumbfounded. She had no idea what was happening, so she looked toward Qin Ruoyun.

Qin Ruoyun turned her head and whispered, “Just watch the show first. I’ll explain everything when we get back.”

The 1,428 audience members seated throughout the Baoli Theater were all whispering among themselves. For a moment, the entire place was filled with endless murmuring.

Advertisement

“Junior brother?!” Qian Xiaoqiang exclaimed in surprise.

Hearing the words “junior brother,” Lin Hao suddenly burst out laughing. But as he laughed, his nose began to sting. He remembered the tears that night in his teacher’s eyes…

He pointed at Qian Xiaoqiang. A layer of frost covered his face as he gritted his teeth and said word by word:

“Call me junior brother? You… are… worthy?”

Being pointed at by him, Qian Xiaoqiang felt a sudden panic and reached out to steady himself against the piano.

“This man!” Lin Hao continued pointing at him, but his face turned toward the audience. “He studied his undergraduate and graduate courses at Long Province Arts Institute. His teacher was Fan Gang, and he is also my current professional teacher!”

“Wow—”

The audience’s discussions grew even louder.

Lin Hao’s voice became deeper and deeper. “During those six years, Teacher treated him like his own son. He ate at Teacher’s home, lived at Teacher’s home, and even the new clothes he wore for the New Year were bought by Teacher for him…”

“But him!” Lin Hao’s voice suddenly rose by an octave. “This ungrateful bastard disappeared without a trace after going abroad!”

“Teacher thought about him every day and night, hoping that after he finished his doctorate, he would come back and contribute to his country. But what about him?”

Lin Hao looked at Qian Xiaoqiang again.

“Our Dr. Qian became an American citizen long ago. He has already forgotten that he is a Chinese person with yellow skin and black eyes! He forgot the land of his birth! He forgot the teacher and alma mater who worked tirelessly for him day and night!”

“Clap! Clap! Clap!”

Qin Ruoyun was the first to start applauding. Then—

The applause shook the entire theater, and waves of angry curses from the audience followed.

“Mr. Qian, you just said that learning piano requires going abroad. Then let me ask you—without the foundation you built in your own country, would you have achieved what you have today?”

“Besides, I have never believed that learning piano domestically means being inferior to foreign countries. You are already in your thirties. You have spent so many years abroad, yet I think your piano skills are only average…”

Qian Xiaoqiang felt that someone must have set him up. Otherwise, how could it be possible that not a single staff member had appeared until now?

He had also been careless. To save costs and to test the waters before returning, he had come back alone.

Now, hearing this kid speak such arrogant words, his anger burned even hotter. He laughed loudly.

“You really don’t know the height of heaven and the depth of earth! All of you Chinese people who play piano—every single one of you—if you don’t go abroad to study, you’re only fit to fool some little kids at small music schools!”

Lin Hao chuckled. He slowly repeated four words:

“You… Chinese… people?”

Sure enough, with Lin Hao’s deliberate emphasis, the four words Qian Xiaoqiang had blurted out without thinking aroused even greater disgust.

In an instant, the entire venue was filled with angry curses.

“Fake foreign devil, get out!”

“What the hell are you?”

“Go back and lick your foreign master’s ass!”

“Get out! Don’t come here to mislead our children!”

“Get out! Get out!”

“Get out!”

“…”

Qian Xiaoqiang never expected that one sentence would provoke such public outrage. The shouting and curses from below made his heartbeat accelerate even more.

“Whoosh!”

Someone threw the mineral water bottle in their hand onto the stage.

Immediately afterward, more and more mineral water bottles started flying toward the stage. Two of them almost hit Lin Hao in the head.

While dodging, Lin Hao secretly laughed. This was exactly what he had been waiting for—the so-called Dr. Qian losing his composure and provoking public outrage!

“Everyone, everyone, everyone, please calm down!” Lin Hao stretched out his hand to soothe the audience below. After seeing that their emotions had stabilized slightly, he stared at Qian Xiaoqiang and said, “Since Mr. Qian looks down so much on those of us domestic piano students as ‘country bumpkins,’ then I’ll have to compete with you. Let’s see whether my level as someone who studied piano domestically is higher, or whether your level as a ‘sea turtle’ is better. What do you say? Are you brave enough?”

(The term “sea turtle” 海龟 is internet slang in China for someone who studied overseas and returned, often implying they look down on domestic talent.)

When the audience below heard Lin Hao say this, they all started cheering in approval. For a moment, the scene became chaotic again and was close to getting out of control. Mineral water bottles began flying once more…

Lin Hao hurriedly spoke up to calm the audience down again. After all, he only wanted to slap Qian Xiaoqiang in the face with his piano skills; he didn’t want the man to be beaten to death by mineral water bottles.

He looked back at Qian Xiaoqiang, his face full of mockery.

“How about it, Dr. Qian? Dare to do it?”

Qian Xiaoqiang began weighing the pros and cons in his mind. If he left now, could he even get out of this venue? That wasn’t certain! And if he just walked away in disgrace, it would mean he had openly admitted defeat. This matter would definitely spread. How would he come back to make money in the future?

But if he agreed to compete with him, it felt too meaningless. How old was this kid? At most twenty-one or twenty-two years old. Winning against him would hardly be something to be proud of!

Then he thought about how this brat had openly exposed his secrets just now, and his anger rose again. Gritting his back teeth, he said, “Fine. Then let me see just how good my junior brother’s skills are!”

“Don’t!” Lin Hao hurriedly raised his hand to stop him. “Please don’t call me junior brother anymore. Every time you say that, I feel sick inside!”

The audience burst into laughter.

Yang Qianyi tilted her head toward Qin Ruoyun and said, “This kid is really nasty!”

Qin Ruoyun also giggled.

Qian Xiaoqiang’s refined-looking face stretched long with anger. He snorted coldly, cursing this ignorant brat in his heart for not knowing the vastness of the heavens and earth.

“Dr. Qian, you go first!” Lin Hao gestured toward him, his expression calm with a hint of disdain.

Seeing that there was still excitement to watch, the audience began applauding again. Some even whistled loudly. Originally, some parents had been worried that the situation would turn into a fight and were planning to take their children away, but now that the situation had taken a sudden turn and become a piano duel, they all sat back down.

A fat man wearing glasses shouted loudly:

“Little brother, crush him!”

“Yeah!” A long-haired young man stood up, waving his fist and yelling, “Let this fake foreign devil know how powerful we are!”

“Yeah!”

“Take him down!”

“……”

Hearing the shouting and yelling from below, Qian Xiaoqiang’s face instantly turned red. The hatred in his eyes when he looked at Lin Hao became completely undisguised.

He began adjusting his mental state. No matter what, he could not lose this competition. Otherwise, his reputation would be completely ruined. If he won, he could still walk out of this venue with his head held high, and there would still be room to recover.

Just now, he had even said that if one wanted to learn piano, they had to go abroad for further studies. If he couldn’t even beat a child more than ten years younger than himself, then in front of more than a thousand people, this kid named Lin Hao would have slapped him in the face again and again.

What should he play?

At this moment, Qian Xiaoqiang could no longer hear the noisy chatter from below. He quickly adjusted his condition.

Lin Hao stood beside the piano and coldly watched him. At this moment, he secretly nodded to himself. This man’s mental strength was actually quite impressive.

Qian Xiaoqiang thought carefully. If two people were having a piano duel, then pieces with too much artistic atmosphere were not suitable. Especially in a chaotic environment like this, he couldn’t expect these audiences to appreciate the thunder hidden within subtle details. Not to mention whether they had that kind of appreciation ability—the essence of a piano duel itself was different.

A piano duel should be explosive!

Got it!

This one!

Qian Xiaoqiang slowly raised both hands and placed them on the keys. When the audience in the theater saw that he was about to begin playing, the entire venue instantly became quiet.

Suddenly, the sound of the piano rang out.

It was an etude that Lin Hao had never heard before. Qian Xiaoqiang’s ten fingers moved across the keys at an incredibly fast speed…

The entire theater fell silent. This was no longer simply a performance—it was more like an acrobatic display. Qian Xiaoqiang’s ten nimble fingers pushed all eighty-eight piano keys to their absolute limit.

This was a terrifying speed, even much faster than when Lin Hao had played “Flight of the Bumblebee.” The most frightening thing was that there wasn’t even a single wrong note!