From A Producer To A Global Superstar-Chapter 339: Welcome China

Dayo remembered Shun Li the way you remember a name that once saved you from embarrassment.

Not loudly. Not dramatically.

Just suddenly, like a light switching on inside your head.

It happened while he was still in Korea, while Jang Wook was drowning in schedules and confirmations and Min Jae was making impossible things look normal. Dayo sat alone for a moment, phone in his hand, thinking about Shanghai.

Thinking about how China was not Korea.

China was scale. China was speed. China was a country where you could get swallowed if you arrived unprepared.

And the last time Dayo faced something that big, something that fragile, something that needed to look perfect under pressure, Shun Li had been there.

The memory came clean.

World Cup night.

Backstage heat, people shouting in three languages, dancers confused about spacing, a timing error that could have ruined the whole segment if it went live the way it was. Everyone had been panicking, moving too much, talking too much, making the air heavy with fear.

Then Shun Li walked in.

No noise.

No begging.

No drama.

He looked at the floor marks, looked at the screens, looked at the dancers, then spoke once, calm and sharp, and the room moved like it had been waiting for him all along. He corrected transitions, reworked spacing, adjusted the choreography without making anybody feel small, then fixed the timing with such confidence that even the nervous staff started breathing again.

That night, Dayo had watched him and thought, this is the kind of person you keep close.

Not because they praise you.

Because they make your life easier when the world is trying to crush you.

Now, in the present, Dayo stared at his phone for a second.

Then he called.

It rang once.

Twice.

Then the line connected.

A short pause came first, like the person on the other end already knew it was him.

Then Shun Li spoke, voice smooth, slightly amused.

"So you finally remembered me."

Dayo smiled. "Don’t start. You know I didn’t forget you."

"You forgot," Shun Li replied, still calm. "I tried to buy tickets for Shanghai. Sold out. I couldn’t even click."

Dayo’s smile widened a little. "Stop. You already have VIP. You don’t need to fight online like a civilian."

There was a quiet chuckle from Shun Li.

"You call me after the storm starts," Shun Li said. "Movie. Album. Tour. Your name is everywhere. So tell me. What do you need."

Dayo didn’t waste time.

"Shanghai," he said. "I need you on the ground. I need someone I trust. I need fast organization and I need stage structure and movement to feel clean. Creative and logistics. Both."

Shun Li answered like he had been waiting.

"Done."

Dayo’s tone softened slightly. "Are you sure you can move that fast."

"You forgot who fixed your World Cup stage," Shun Li replied. "I’ll handle arrangements. Just land. I’ll be ready."

Dayo exhaled, relieved without showing it too much.

"I owe you."

"You already do," Shun Li said. "Just don’t disappear again after this."

Dayo laughed quietly. "I won’t."

The call ended.

Two days later, Dayo landed in Shanghai.

The airport was already alive before he even stepped out.

This was not just a crowd.

It was a waiting wall of energy.

Fans were packed behind barriers, phones raised, banners lifted high, voices blending into one loud, chaotic ocean. Some signs were in Chinese. Some were in Korean. Some were in English. A few were handwritten like the person had rushed to write them the moment the tour was announced.

They had not come to be polite.

They had come to be part of the moment.

The crew moved first.

Min Jae, calm as always, stepping out like he owned the air.

Then the rest followed, artists, staff, security, everyone moving in a coordinated line.

Then Dayo appeared.

And the noise doubled.

People screamed his name like it was a chant.

Some were shouting Min Jae’s name too.

Some screamed Yuri’s name.

Some screamed the movie title.

Some screamed everything at once.

It was chaos with love inside it.

Dayo waved as they walked, controlled, steady, not rushing, not provoking panic, but not hiding either. Cameras flashed. Phones shook. People jumped just to see him over shoulders.

Near the front, a small girl was sitting on her father’s shoulders, clutching a handmade sign, shouting excited Mandarin, her voice loud and cute, like she was sure he would not understand her.

The father smiled, amused, because to him this was normal.

Foreign star. Foreign language.

Dayo slowed. 𝑓𝓇𝘦ℯ𝘸𝘦𝑏𝓃𝑜𝘷ℯ𝑙.𝑐𝑜𝓂

He looked right at the girl.

And he answered in Mandarin, clearly.

"谢谢你.我很高兴来到上海.你今天很可爱."

Thank you. I’m happy to be in Shanghai. You look very cute today.

The father froze.

The girl froze.

For one second the section around them went quiet, like the air itself paused to confirm what just happened.

Then the reaction exploded.

People screamed louder, not even about the tour anymore, but about that single moment.

He speaks Chinese.

He really speaks Chinese.

Phones lifted higher. People tried to move closer. Security tightened fast, trying to keep order before the crowd surged too hard.

The girl covered her face with both hands, embarrassed and happy at the same time, while her father laughed in disbelief.

Dayo just smiled softly and kept walking.

Inside the car, Min Jae turned his head slightly.

"You didn’t tell anyone you speak Mandarin."

Dayo shrugged. "It’s not the important part."

Min Jae laughed once. "Shanghai will disagree."

They did not waste time.

Hotel straight.

No long rest.

No comfort.

Just a quick change, a quick briefing, and movement again.

Because Shanghai was not the kind of place you keep waiting.

Shun Li met them before the real rush could even begin.

He was already in work mode, calm face, sharp eyes, everything organized like he had been preparing for days even though it had only been hours.

"You’re late," Shun Li said in Mandarin, but his tone wasn’t serious. It was familiar.

Dayo replied in the same language, smooth.

"You always talk like you’re my manager."

Shun Li gave a small smile. "Someone has to."

They moved immediately.

Straight from the hotel to rehearsal.

The venue was already buzzing behind closed doors, crew running cables, sound checks happening, stage lights being tested. Even without the audience inside yet, the place already felt like a storm being built.

Dayo stepped onto the stage and looked out at the empty seats that would soon become a sea of bodies.

Shanghai.

This was the next level.

He breathed in once, steady.

Then he looked at Shun Li.

"Show me what you fixed."

Shun Li nodded.

And the rehearsal started.

***

While Dayo and the team were still inside the Shanghai venue running through transitions and lighting cues, the internet was doing what it always did best.

Exploding.

The airport clip — the exact moment he turned, replied in Mandarin, and thanked the little girl — had already been reposted across platforms. The pause. The silence. The realization. The eruption. Every angle was circulating.

Within hours, it wasn’t just trending in China.

It was global.

And the comments were chaos.

Liang Wei posted first on Weibo:

"他真的会说中文?而且不是那种背台词的,是自然的口音.我震惊了."

(He actually speaks Chinese? And not memorized lines — it sounded natural. I’m shocked.)

Zhang Yuxi wrote:

"I thought it was a PR trick. But the way he replied? That was fluent. How many languages does he know?"

Over on X, Marcus Johnson tweeted:

"Wait... so he speaks Korean, English, and now Mandarin?? Bro is collecting languages like Infinity Stones."

Emily Carter replied:

"I swear he sang part of that World Cup performance in Spanish too. Am I crazy or does he know FOUR languages?"

Ahmed El-Sayed chimed in:

"The World Cup was in Qatar that year. Didn’t he greet the crowd in Arabic? Somebody confirm."

Nadia Hassan responded seconds later:

"Yes! I remember that clip. He said ’شكراً’ properly. This man is dangerous."

Kim Hyun-woo posted in Korean:

"영어, 한국어, 중국어... 그리고 스페인어도 조금 하지 않았나? 도대체 몇 개야?"

(English, Korean, Chinese... and didn’t he do some Spanish too? How many is that?)

Sakura Tanaka added from Japan:

"At this point I won’t be surprised if he suddenly speaks Japanese tomorrow."

Daniel Brooks tweeted:

"I need an official count. English. Korean. Mandarin. Spanish? Arabic greeting? Is he hiding a fifth one somewhere?"

Chen Rong wrote:

"最可怕的是,他说中文的时候很自然,不像外国人那种生硬的感觉."

(The scariest part is how natural his Chinese sounded. Not stiff like a foreigner.)

Kayla Thompson posted:

"I used to think the ’global artist’ label was marketing. Now I’m starting to think it’s literal."

Ethan Miller added:

"How do you break into Asia by actually speaking their languages? That’s not normal behavior. That’s strategy."

Park Ji-eun commented:

"이 남자 공부를 언제 했어? 무대도 하고 영화도 찍고 언어도 배우고?"

(When did he study all this? He performs, shoots movies, learns languages too?)

And then the jokes started.

Jason Rivera:

"Bro probably ordering food in five languages without looking at the menu."

Liu Ming:

"If he starts speaking Cantonese next I’m retiring."

Hannah Lee:

"Somebody check if he’s secretly part diplomat."

Underneath the humor was something else.

Respect.

People weren’t just impressed.

They were recalculating him.

Back inside the Shanghai venue, lights flashed across the empty seats as rehearsal continued, bass echoing through steel beams. Dayo adjusted his in-ear monitor while Shun Li gave instructions to the stage crew.

He didn’t check his phone.

But outside, millions of people were asking the same question in different languages.

How far does he actually go?