Chapter 8: Even Her Foot Is More Accurate Than You

“Here’s a guide to the nearby shopping district; take it. If you want anything, just go out and buy it.”

After accompanying Zhou Yi to buy some daily necessities, Qian Jiang left behind a copy of the shopping district brief and took his leave. Before departing, he specifically reminded him to focus solely on his creative work and leave everything else to him.

The friendly, kind demeanor made Zhou Yi, who had just taken a sip of water, wonder inwardly: If Warner could just give him a little more living allowance, it’d be even better.

It wasn’t that he was stingy—it was simply that Warner’s treatment of him, like a beloved son, had left him utterly bewildered.

If he hadn’t been a complete nobody when he first joined Warner, Zhou Jianhui probably would’ve assigned him a personal driver too.

“Right now, among Warner’s new artists, I’m probably the only one besides Sun Yanzi who gets this kind of treatment.”

Placing the water cup on the coffee table, Zhou Yi sank into the sofa and looked around: a simple apartment layout, two bedrooms and a living room, plus a balcony.

The furniture was clearly all cheap, but at least everything was complete.

In terms of price alone, this neighborhood probably wasn’t cheap.

Warner truly had deep pockets.

The only thing that made Zhou Yi slightly uncomfortable was that too many households lived on this floor—he didn’t know how noisy it would be. If it was terrible, he doubted he could last a month here.

“Forget it, let’s think about what songs to use for my first album.”

Shaking his head, Zhou Yi sat on the sofa, closed his eyes, and rubbed his temple with one index finger—almost instantly, memories buried deep in his mind surfaced like a movie.

Songs he’d heard in his past life, TV shows and movies he’d watched, even news reports and more.

This was his most unique memory ability after rebirth—truly photographic recall.

He first eliminated all songs already released, then filtered out TV shows and news; the remaining songs became the tracklist for his new album.

“R&B already has Tao Zhe as a benchmark—I can just copy two or three others later. The real challenge is hip-hop…”

In the year 2000, hip-hop elements hadn’t yet entered mainstream music audiences’ awareness. If he wanted to be the first to break through, he needed to pick songs that could explode across the streets and alleys.

Among the singers of the early 2000s, Pan Weibo was undoubtedly the one with the most dazzling market performance among those who had released hip-hop hits.

Although over time his title as “Han-Hua King” gradually replaced the nickname “Pan Shuai,” there was no denying that his song “Happy Worship” had been an absolute sensation, becoming one of his personal retirement funds.

“Who cares who I copy? The original Korean versions haven’t come out yet—I’m the original.”

Opening his eyes, Zhou Yi made up his mind and grabbed paper and pen to write down the four characters: “Happy Worship.”

“If I’m copying ‘Happy Worship,’ why not just copy ‘My Microphone’ and ‘Reverse the Earth’ too?” Thinking this, he bit his pen cap and wrote down the titles of two more songs.

Both were also Pan Weibo’s signature tracks—perhaps not as famous as “Happy Worship,” but still widely sung at the time.

“If I’m copying ‘Happy Worship,’ I can’t miss Pan Weibo’s other bomb hit, ‘Have to Love’—if I’m going to steal, I’ll steal thoroughly; besides, this one’s also a Hanhua version.”

Realizing his entire album couldn’t be all hip-hop, Zhou Yi decisively added “Have to Love,” whose original version hadn’t been released yet.

“Huang Lixing also has a song called ‘Sound Wave’—not bad, I’ll copy that too.”

Recalling the classic lyric, “The sound wave is too strong, if you don’t sway, you’ll get knocked to the ground,” Zhou Yi promptly wrote down another song title.

With that, he had already locked in five of the ten songs for his album—half done in an instant.

But soon, he hit a snag.

Judging purely by popularity, the two absolute bomb tracks among these five were undoubtedly “Happy Worship” and “Have to Love.”

But here was the problem.

Both songs were duets.

Zhang Shaohan, who sang “Happy Worship,” was currently a nobody, signed by Foma Records and still undergoing vocal training, not yet officially debuted;

Xianzi, who sang “Have to Love,” was still in high school somewhere on the mainland.

“‘Have to Love’ is manageable—Xianzi’s vocal tone isn’t irreplaceable—but ‘Happy Worship’…”

Staring at the two song titles he’d written on the white paper, Zhou Yi, one hand propping up his cheek, fell into deep thought.

Zhang Shaohan’s vocal qualities were truly unique—extremely piercing. But he couldn’t figure out why Foma Records hadn’t initially promoted her singing; instead, they’d wanted her to debut as a drama idol.

“Hmm, if that’s the case, maybe Qian Jiang could approach Zhang Shaohan’s agent and get her to sing for a pittance—it wouldn’t be a problem.”

With a big tree to lean on, if he were with a small company, he probably couldn’t even get through Foma Records’ front door.

“As for ‘Have to Love’…”

Honestly, Zhou Yi couldn’t immediately think of a suitable female singer.

If he could get Zhang Shaohan to sing “Happy Worship,” why not just have her sing “Have to Love” too?

After all, singing one song costs a pittance; singing two is barely a fruit-and-vegetable price.

Honestly, if Sun Yanzi’s voice weren’t unsuitable for the female parts in these two songs, he wouldn’t need to think this hard—he could just assign them to her internally.

Relying on his musical knowledge from two lifetimes, Zhou Yi wrote while humming, first copying lyrics, then transcribing the melodies.

His exceptional memory-processing ability was precisely why he was confident he could handle both university studies and the music industry simultaneously.

Maybe this was the advantage of being a reincarnated person—his body was also in top shape, never once sick since childhood, ate everything with gusto.

By the time Zhou Yi finished copying all the lyrics, melodies, and production elements for these five songs, it wasn’t even dark outside.

“Baodao’s nightlife…”

Putting down his ballpoint pen, he rose from the sofa and walked to the balcony, overlooking the surrounding neighborhood—two flower beds teemed with pedestrians, and the basketball court blazed with shouts and cheers.

Time for dinner.

I wonder if Taiwanese girls really are as legendary as they say…

After organizing the sheet with the song details, grabbing his keys, Zhou Yi stepped out the door with the shopping district guide Qian Jiang had left behind.

Passing the basketball court, he suddenly heard a cry—

“Hey! Watch out! Get out of the way!”

The shout had a distinct Taiwanese accent, its sweet, high-pitched tone making Zhou Yi instinctively stop and turn: a young urban woman in sportswear looked frantic, a basketball spinning through the air toward him.

“?”

How the hell did a basketball get thrown this far outside the court?

Just as he was about to speak, Zhou Yi noticed another male figure rushing over—suddenly, his interest vanished.

He wasn’t Cao Cao; he had no such tastes.

With a smooth chest trap, he raised his right foot in white sneakers, bounced the ball twice until it obeyed perfectly, then kicked it back toward the court—

The brown basketball arced through the air in a perfect parabola and effortlessly swished through the hoop, leaving the two stunned onlookers speechless.

Without a word, Zhou Yi smiled at the pair across the distance, waved, and turned away.

“Henghong! Did it hit anyone?!”

Behind the two dazed people, a young man with bangs hanging over his forehead hurried over, confused by their expressions: “What’s wrong?”

“Jielun, if you’re going to play basketball, stop shooting with your hands—someone else could hit the basket with their foot better than you.”

“...???”