138: Chapter 137 The Transformation of the Bengshan Brothers: From Farmers to Dancers

The next day.

Six in the morning.

Morning Star No. 1 Training Room.

Su Chen pushed the door open and walked in.

Except for Guan Heng and the other four brothers, the rest of the people hadn't arrived yet.

The five of them were facing the mirror, stubbornly grinding away at yesterday's basic footwork, covered in sweat.

Su Chen walked over to the corner, picked up a black canvas bag, unzipped it, and threw it on the floor.

Ten black sandbags rolled out.

"Two for each person. Tie them to your ankles."

Su Chen pointed at the sandbags.

Guan Heng stopped what he was doing, walked over, picked up a sandbag, and weighed it in his hand.

Each one weighed a full five kilograms.

"Teacher Su."

Guan Heng spoke, his voice hoarse, "Aren't the others tying them on?"

"The others don't need to."

Su Chen looked at him, "You guys have zero foundation. If you want to catch up to them within a month, you have to put your lives on the line. If others do it ten times, you do it a hundred times. When others rest, you keep practicing. If you can't handle it, take off your shoes and leave right now."

Guan Heng didn't say a word, squatted down, and tightly tied the sandbags around his ankles.

The other four brothers followed suit and tied theirs up respectively.

Su Chen pressed the metronome.

"Basic lowering. Start."

Carrying a ten-kilogram load, the five of them sank down to the beat.

Their legs trembled visibly to the naked eye.

Sweat smashed onto the floor, leaving patches of water stains.

Seven-thirty.

Sixty-eight people arrived at the training room one after another.

Chen Yu, a professionally trained student, yawned and sneered when he saw the five brothers in front of the mirror with sandbags tied to them and their faces flushed red.

"Street Dance is art."

Chen Yu muttered to the companion beside him, "What's the use of just having brute strength? Look at their movements; their limbs look like they were just freshly attached, completely devoid of rhythm."

Guan Heng heard it, but didn't stop. He just stared at himself in the mirror, sinking down and exerting force once again.

Su Chen walked to the center of the venue.

"Today we're doing extra practice on force control."

Su Chen spoke directly, "Chen Yu. Come out and demonstrate."

Chen Yu stepped forward and performed a chest tremor according to the requirements.

The movement was standard, even carrying a bit of personal style in the glide processing.

"Guan Heng."

Su Chen called out the name, "You do it."

Guan Heng stepped forward, the sandbags on his ankles making a dull clashing sound.

He took a deep breath, and his chest muscles instantly tightened.

"Bang."

A muffled sound echoed out.

Guan Heng's movement was large and forceful, but his recovery was half a beat slow.

Chen Yu rolled his eyes.

"The strength is okay, but the control is utter crap."

Su Chen's tone was icy, "Guan Heng, redo it. One hundred times."

Guan Heng returned to his spot, tightening his chest cavity over and over again facing the mirror.

The following four weeks.

No. 1 Training Room turned into a high-pressure melting pot.

Up to sixteen hours of training every day.

Out of the team of sixty-eight people, some secretly hid in the bathroom to cry, some quit due to injuries, and the remaining number plummeted to forty-one people.

The five Bengshan Brothers did not quit.

The cheap T-shirts on their bodies could be wrung out of water every day, and they had worn through two pairs of shoe soles.

They didn't understand ergonomics or music theory analysis.

They only knew one thing: as long as you don't practice yourself to death, practice to the death.

Thirty days later.

Monthly assessment day.

Lin Hao set up a camera in the corner of No. 1 Training Room.

The livestream warm-up announcement was sent out in advance.

Less than five minutes after the broadcast started, two million netizens flooded into the livestream room.

[It's been a month! They're finally letting them out!]

[I heard a third of the people were eliminated? This training intensity is too terrifying.]

[I'm here to see Yan Yu! Is Yan Yu still here?]

[I wonder how much those professionally trained students have improved their levels now.]

[With God Su leading the team, there's bound to be a big move today!]

Su Chen sat at the assessment desk, holding a scoring sheet in his hand.

"There is only one test item today."

Su Chen raised his eyes, "Designated music choreography group dance. Groups of four. Random music. Chen Yu, your group goes first."

Chen Yu and the four of them walked to the center of the venue.

They were all Street Dance major students and often teamed up in the past.

Su Chen hit the keyboard.

A heavy-rhythm heavy metal Rap sounded.

The drumbeats were dense and full of aggressiveness.

Chen Yu and the four of them quickly cut in.

Breaking combined with Popping.

Smooth movements and skilled techniques.

However, due to the large physical stamina consumption, the movements of the four showed a clear divergence in the second half. Chen Yu was still insisting on texture, while the other three had already given up control just to keep up with the beat.

The music ended.

Chen Yu and the four of them stood still, panting heavily.

The livestream room's bullet comments scrolled past.

[Pretty good! The professional foundation is still solid.]

[It's just that the second half is a bit messy, stamina couldn't keep up, right.]

[After all, they were tortured for a month, it's not bad to be able to dance like this.]

Su Chen didn't comment, and wrote a few numbers on the paper.

"Next group. Guan Heng."

The five Bengshan Brothers walked toward the center.

Chen Yu retreated to the side of the field, wiping his sweat with a towel.

"Zero foundation for a month, and practicing with sandbags tied on."

Chen Yu shook his head, "With today's heavy metal accompaniment, it'll be a win if their wooden bodies can hit the beats."

The five Bengshan Brothers stood still, their hands hanging naturally by their sides.

The T-shirts on their bodies were changed to the studio's unified black short-sleeves, and their muscle lines were clearly visible.

Su Chen pressed the play button.

It was still an original piece he had never publicly released.

A crisp wooden fish percussion, followed by a heavy and violent bass guitar and a continuous ensemble of suona horns.

A hardcore trap track with a strong oriental eerie style.

The moment the music started.

The five Bengshan Brothers moved simultaneously.

No complex gliding steps, no flashy Breaking ultimate moves.

They performed a most basic lowering movement.

Five people, ten legs, lowered their center of gravity at the same time.

The angle of knee bend and the amplitude of arm extension were completely identical.

"Boom!"

The bass dropped.

The chests of the five people erupted with astonishing tremors in the exact same second.

This was not the gentle rhythm in the practice room.

This tremor carried the savage core strength they had cultivated while doing farm work on the yellow earth.

Once.

Twice.

Thrice.

Ten consecutive eight-counts.

The suona sound rose shrilly, and the drumbeats suddenly doubled in speed.

Guan Heng suddenly stepped forward, his arms raised.

The four behind him instantly changed formation, dispersing in a fan shape.

Without any dragging or sloppiness, the joints of the five people crazily locked in place amidst the dense drumbeats.

Every time they tightened, the contours of their muscles were clear and distinct under the overhead lights.

This was not a skill display of professionally trained students.

This was the absolute domination of music by pure physical strength.

The towel in Chen Yu's hand dropped to the ground.

He widened his eyes, staring intently at the five men in the center of the venue whose movements were completely uniform.

How was this possible?

The core of Street Dance is muscle control.

Professional dancers, when facing such high-speed switching broken beats, would also experience sluggishness caused by body inertia.

But these five people forcefully braked all the body's inertia with brute strength.

The music stopped.

The five Bengshan Brothers froze in the final movement.

The chests of the five heaved, but their postures were stable, and there was not a trace of floating under their feet.

The nationwide livestream room stuttered for a full ten seconds.

Following that was an overwhelming torrent of bullet comments.

[Holy shit! Holy shit! Holy shit!]

[This is zero foundation? You're telling me these are people who have only practiced for a month?]

[Scalp tingling! This uniformity, going straight to international competitions is no problem at all!]

[That lowering just now, the five of them were practically carved from the same mold!]

[Is this talent?]

[Talent my ass! This is core strength practiced with their lives!]

[Where are the professionally trained students who laughed at them just now? Come out and walk a few steps?]

Su Chen put down the pen in his hand.

He stood up and walked in front of Chen Yu.

"Did you see clearly?"

Su Chen stared at Chen Yu, "Street Dance requires talent. But the talent of these five people is that while others are resting, they are sweating. When you complain that it's too tiring, they are training their strength. One thousand weighted lowerings every day, have you ever done that?"

Chen Yu's face was flushed red, his lips moved, but he couldn't utter a single word.

Su Chen turned his head to look at the five Bengshan Brothers.

A trace of amusement flashed in his eyes, but his voice remained steady: "Well done. The sandbags can be taken off."

Guan Heng squatted down and untied the sandbags on his ankles.

The five of them looked at each other and grinned.

Back then, they were cheated out of all their money in Chengdu and went to a construction site to carry cement.

They met Su Chen, who gave them a bite to eat and a path they never dared to imagine.

Today, they stood firm.

Lin Hao held the equipment and pushed the camera forward.

Guan Heng's hands, full of thick calluses, appeared in the frame.

The audience in the livestream room fell silent.

Those hands were not the hands of an artist, but the hands of farmers.

But these hands had just dominated the entire stage.

[I concede.]

[Su Chen's eye for people is truly viciously accurate.]

[If this team really goes to fight in WDSC, I'll sell everything I own to buy tickets and support them on-site!]

The afternoon assessment ended.

Five people were eliminated from the team of forty-one, leaving thirty-six people to become the official preliminary shortlist for the Huaxia Team.

Everyone packed their backpacks, preparing to go to the cafeteria for dinner.

Chen Yu walked up to Guan Heng.

He awkwardly stopped for a few seconds, then extended his right hand.

"I take back what I said before."

Chen Yu's voice was dry, "You guys deserve this stage."

Guan Heng wiped the sweat from his hands on his trouser legs and shook Chen Yu's hand: "Let's strive together."

Su Chen stood on the second-floor corridor, watching this scene downstairs.

Lin Yue walked over with a stack of documents.

"The team has taken initial shape."

Lin Yue pushed her glasses, "But for the WDSC team competition, thirty-six people is too many. The rules limit the number of participants to between fifteen and twenty people. There will still be eliminations."

"No rush."

Su Chen looked out the window, "Internal integration is still not enough."

"There is one more thing."

Lin Yue opened the documents, "Just now, the front desk downstairs called saying someone is looking for you."

"Who?"

"Didn't give a name. Just said they brought people over."

Su Chen nodded and turned to go downstairs.

Pushing open the door of No. 1 Training Room, he walked toward the lobby at the end of the corridor.

In the lobby stood fourteen men.

Uniformly wearing jackets with flame logos and carrying oversized dance travel bags.

The person leading wore a black baseball cap with his hands tucked in his pockets.

Hearing footsteps, he raised his head.

It was Brother Cai.

The head of the top domestic choreography team, Buqi Dance Troupe.

He was also a veteran in the Street Dance circle who once secretly competed with Su Chen on a show and was ultimately beaten into submission.

Brother Cai watched Su Chen walking over and reached out to take off his baseball cap.

The lobby was so quiet that a pin drop could be heard.

The thirty-six team members who had just passed the assessment stopped in their tracks, stunned in place.

Buqi Dance Troupe's fame in the domestic Street Dance circle was too massive; they were the overlords who monopolized various championship tournaments year after year.

Brother Cai stepped forward.

"Brother Su."

Brother Cai spoke, his voice carrying a trace of desperate resolve, "The domestic circle has rotted to the core these past few years. Everyone is busy going on shows to grab cash, and no one seriously practices basic skills."

He stepped sideways and pointed at the thirteen brothers behind him.

"WDSC wildcard match."

Brother Cai stared at Su Chen.

"I brought the whole troupe."

"There aren't many spots, we will be assessed together with them. Whether we can stay depends on our ability."