Amateur talent show? Top mentors are my students.

The rules for the finals were announced faster than expected.

Three days after the third round of competition, all twenty contestants gathered in the studio.

Shen Yiheng stood on the stage, holding a thin document in his hand, and briefly explained the competition rules for the finals: five groups, four people in each group, and the selection of people and songs would be based on the overall ranking of the three public performances, with the team leader being the contestant ranked first.

The order is almost a foregone conclusion.

Yang Sheng was the first to stand in front of the song selection table. He paused his finger on the screen for a moment, then selected a song with a very strong rhythm and extremely difficult choreography.

Qi Xunan followed suit, choosing a song with a stronger melody, a style that perfectly matched his own temperament.

Next up are Wang Yijun, Song Yingwen, and Li Bufan.

The selection process was completed in five minutes.

The five groups of people were lined up on both sides of the stage, and their positions were much more sparse than in the previous rounds.

With twenty people standing together, the tension in the air subsided, replaced by something more complex—tension, anticipation, and a slight sense of disorientation at the impending end.

He Xu stood by and watched the whole thing without saying a word.

For the first two days after the groups were formed, music started playing again in the practice building.

But He Xu did not offer any advice or suggestions.

The reason is that those groups are still in the dance-learning stage—analyzing the choreography demo frame by frame, picking out the movements and positioning, so it's not his turn to help.

Even if he went, he could only stand by and watch, saying things like "This is wrong" or "Let's start over there." It would be less efficient than letting them digest the framework on their own first.

So he did something else.

He found himself an empty practice room.

At the far fourth floor of the building on the far east side of the base, few people usually pass by, and the soundproofing is worse than that of the main building.

But precisely because of this, no one bothers them.

When He Xu pushed open the door and went inside, the room was filled with a faint smell of dust.

The floor was old and had a few scratches; the mirror, however, was clean and looked like it had just been wiped; there was an old-fashioned speaker in the corner, with an unplugged power cord next to it.

He Xu closed the door, took out his phone from his pocket, connected it to the speaker's Bluetooth, and then opened an audio file.

When the song title popped up, the light from the screen shone on his face—"Ouroboros".

The title track from Jiang Yanbai's album released two years ago.

The melody is somber, the arrangement is cold, and beneath the electronic sounds lies a constantly looping bass drum, like something revolving around an invisible center.

The song's structure is also unique—there is no traditional verse and chorus; there is only a melodic line that is constantly repeated, layered, and changed.

Just like the song title Ouroboros, it's like a snake biting its own tail, cycling through self-destruction.

When He Xu first heard this song, a picture immediately came to mind.

But he didn't speak out at that time.

Now, he has decided to jump out of it.

For the next few days, He Xu hardly left that practice room.

They go in at 8 a.m. and come out at 10 p.m.

Lunch was eaten in the practice room—usually Han Yu or Jiang Yanbai would take turns bringing it to him and leave it at the door. He would eat a few bites whenever he felt hungry and then continue.

When Jiang Yanbai came to deliver food on the first day, he peeked through the crack in the door and froze.

"Are you fucking dancing or practicing martial arts?" He pushed the door open a crack, his voice filled with disbelief. "That move you made, that turn you just did—is your back okay?"

He Xu was standing in front of the mirror adjusting the landing point of a fixed movement when he heard this, and without turning his head, he said: "Mind your own business."

"If you hurt your back, it won't be you on stage for the finals, it will be the ambulance."

"Then remember to call me a more upscale one, I don't want to sit in one of those with iron railings in the back."

Jiang Yanbai opened his mouth, only to find that He Xu had already put the headphones back on.

He watched He Xu's retreating figure—his T-shirt was soaked with sweat, making him look like he had just been pulled out of the water—then silently placed the lunchbox on the floor by the door, closed the door, and left.

After that, he never went in when He Xu was practicing again.

But He Xu knew that Jiang Yanbai would stand at the door for a while every day.

I would look quietly through the narrow glass window in the door for a few minutes, then turn and leave.

He Xu's choreography is very fast-paced.

This time, he didn't need to teach anyone, break down the movements, adjust the formations, or draw diagrams for the positioning.

He only needs to translate the image in his mind into the language of his body.

On the first day, he outlined the structure of the entire song—a three-part structure with an introduction, development, climax, and conclusion, and an emotional curve that rises from a low point, explodes at the peak, and then slowly falls back to the starting point.

The next day, he filled in the action.

On the third day, he began to scrutinize the details.

On the fourth day, he performed the entire dance.

He Xu stood in front of the mirror and waited for a moment of silence.

The moment the music burst from the speakers, he felt as if something had ignited him from within.

The electronic sound of the first verse unfolds as he slowly rises from the ground, his movements extremely slow, like a snake shedding its skin and pulling itself out of its old shell bit by bit.

Then the drumbeats burst in, and he twisted his waist and abdomen violently, his body exploding segment by segment from the spine, every muscle bending at the extreme angle under precise control.

What's most captivating is the continuous spinning and contracting section in the chorus.

His arms slowly rose from his sides, went over his head, and crossed in front of his chest, as if he were wrapped in an invisible ring.

Then it exploded outwards, its body leaning back almost parallel to the ground, before quickly pulling back, curling into a ball, kneeling on one knee, its back arched into a taut arc.

Every expansion is accompanied by an instant of contraction, and every release is followed by a deeper suppression, like the ouroboros constantly regenerating itself while devouring itself.

As the last note faded, his movements came to a complete stop. He slowly straightened up from his curled-up position and returned to the starting posture.

A complete circle.

From the first beat to the last sound, it lasted three minutes without any pause.

At that moment, he leaned against the mirror, his breathing unsteady, his chest heaving violently, and his sweat-soaked T-shirt clinging to his ribs.

He looked at himself in the mirror, his eyes filled with a light he hadn't felt in a long time, an almost burning light.

Then he heard applause coming from the doorway.

Snap, snap, snap—

Not too fast, not too slow.

He Xu turned his head away.

Jiang Yanbai stood at the door, one hand still on the doorknob, the other hanging at his side, his gaze fixed on He Xu.

He finally gave his assessment: "...What are you even capable of jumping?"

He Xu leaned against the mirror, looked at him, and took a breath: "Your song."

"I know it's my song." Jiang Yanbai's voice was a little dry. "But—when I wrote this song, I was thinking of a snake stupidly eating its own tail. The one you were dancing to just now—"

He paused for a moment, as if searching for the right words.

"—Why do I have the feeling that you're jumping on a snake that wants to eat me?"