If that happened, then at the very least, the two orchestras would be at the same level.
That was, of course, under the assumption that Wu Haiwould return in time for tomorrow’s assessment.
When Yao Ranarrived later, she found her teammates in low spirits and heard thatWu Haihad left abruptly because of a family matter.
She also found out about Xiao Jing, and how he had brought substitutes, which leveled the ground for theGlory Orchestra.
Yao Ran’s expression turned ugly as she thought back to her performance in the recent Math Olympiad competition.
If the Shanna Orchestrafailed to pass the assessment,Qin Manwould have her head.
Perhaps Yao Ranwouldn’t have been so flustered in the past, back when she believed that she wasQin Man’s biological daughter.
But things were different now.
Not only was she not Qin Man’s daughter, but she wasn’t related to theYao familyin any way, either.
As a precaution, Yao Ranhad also had a DNA test done betweenYao Yuanand herself.
The results were clear as day—they had no blood relation whatsoever.
That being the case, Yao Ranfelt pressured to do better than the real, biological daughter at every turn and winQin Man’s unequivocal favor.
Yao Ran’s determination ramped up at the thought.
She looked at the members of the Shanna Orchestraand asked, “Does anyone know what happened to Captain Wu’s family?”
They all shook their heads dejectedly.
Yao Ran sighed and tried to rein in her frustration.
“All right, the first thing we need to do is to find out what happened. Then, we’ll figure out how to help him settle his affairs. That’s so much better than waiting here and moping, don’t you think?”
Everyone jolted back to their senses after hearing this.
They had been so overwhelmed by Xiao Jing’s unexpected appearance andWu Hai’s sudden departure that none of them thought to do something about their situation.
Soon enough, a boy who was close to Wu Haispoke up. “I know a little about his relationship with his family. I’m sure that if it wasn’t something important, he wouldn’t have left in a rush.”
Since he had walked out on his team the day before the prestigious Music AssociationAssessment, they were naturally concerned for him.
They knew, too, that he wouldn’t have dropped them for some trivial issue, so they presumed that the matter was a big deal.
Unless…
This was the same scenario that they had concocted for those four unfortunate people from the Glory Orchestra.
They fell silent as they pondered over the possibilities.
If Wu Hai’s matter was in retaliation to their previous schemes…
Then it was highly likely that they couldn’t do anything to help him.
Yao Ran was about to explode from anger.
It was true that they had plotted against the families of those Glory Orchestramembers, but even if they had gone back home, there was nothing they could do.
Yao Ran and her teammates had made sure of that.
They had manipulated the circumstances specifically to keep those four from participating in the assessment.
But Wu Haiwas not like them.
He came from a fairly influential family. Surely, they couldn’t have been threatened, right?
In any case, they couldn’t possibly expect him to return within the day. They had no choice but to ask him to come to the competition tomorrow and hope that he showed up.
It was a prominent event, after all, so his family shouldn’t have qualms about letting him participate.
Yao Ran made up her mind and relayed the plan to the others.
“We might not be able to help him on such short notice, and we can’t expect him to be in today’s rehearsal, either. The most we can do is to call him up and ask him to compete with us tomorrow.”
This seemed to appease the members of the Shanna Orchestra, and their faces lit up with renewed excitement.
“Right, I’ll go and see if I can find out what happened to him.”
“I’ll try and give Captain Wu a call and see if we can help, if only a little.”
Deep down, however, their main goal was to ensure that he was with them at tomorrow’s assessment.
They sprang into action, while Yao Ranmoved to a quiet corner, listening to their discussions and speculations about the incident.
