Rise of the Zillionaire Star

Chapter 67: The People’s Summit

The world had grown used to a tailored perfection.

The stadiums were drenched in corporate logos. Glossy stages were funded by billion-dollar sponsors, and star-studded concerts choreographed down to the second.

But the headlines flashing across feeds that morning told a different story,

“Jaylen Cruz to Lead People’s Summit - A Stage for the Unheard.”

The industry reeled. This wasn’t some sanctioned Zenith Circle showcase. This was a rebellion.

By midday, the streets overflowed with protest banners and hand-painted posters. Cardboard signs dripped with fresh paint, “No More Puppets!” “Music Belongs to Us!” “Real Voices, Real People.”

There were no velvet ropes, no security cordons and no VIP booths. It was just ordinary people converging like a cluster of waves rallying behind the idea that the music world could be stripped bare of corruption.

A System Prompt flared before Jaylen’s eyes as he tightened the straps of his jacket backstage,

“Event Quest: The People’s Stage

Objective: Perform without sponsorship and without streams. Prove that art survives without any boost.”

Jaylen stepped out from the transport van into a reclaimed shipping yard. This yard was not a stadium. It was like an old crane that's filled with junk. Inside the yard were strings of mismatched bulbs that lit up makeshift scaffolds and wooden pallets.

The air smelled of grilled food from vendors who had set up carts along the fences.

Fans had been here for hours, painting their faces and chanting lyrics in the air. One would think it was a war cry. They weren’t passive spectators, they were an army of believers.

Zee hummed in Jaylen's earpiece, the AI’s tone almost reverent.

“Energy reading: off the charts. Pure, unsponsored hype. Not a single industry booster. This is raw.”

Jaylen’s pulse quickened. This wasn’t just a gig. It was a test of whether music could live without the machine.

Children darted between legs wearing fan-made T-shirts with his name scrawled in spray paint.

Buskers set up on corners, strumming guitars and beating drums. Street artists painted murals directly onto shipping containers, turning the industrial yard into a canvas.

The vibe wasn’t only just curated, it was alive with intentional people.

When Jaylen moved through the crowd, people reached for him not as a distant celebrity but as one of their own. They carried his words on their tongues and their voices echoed in the street.

Meanwhile, the Zenith Circle, the self-proclaimed titans of the industry were unraveling in real time.

On the giant screens hanging above the yard. Newsfeeds blared exposés dropping hour by hour,

“Tax scandals.” “Predatory contracts.” “Bribes to silence whistleblowers.” “Backroom deals with corrupt politicians.’

The Circle’s untouchables fell one by one. Each headline is another nail in their coffin.

Jaylen clenched his fists. “Good. Let them choke on their lies.”

As the sun dipped, Jaylen’s crew gathered behind the makeshift stage. Their faces were tight with worry.

“Jay,” his manager whispered, “without cameras or streams, this might vanish into myth. What if no one believes it happened? What if it’s all erased by morning?”

Jaylen looked at the team, then passed them to the thousands who had gathered with nothing but hope in their throats.

He shook his head.

“Then the people here will carry it. Words of mouth are stronger than algorithms.”

He stepped forward. The System interface blinked.

“Blackout Protocol Level 3 Activated.

All recording disabled within radius. The event becomes ephemeral. Only live witnesses retain memory.”

The air shimmered faintly as the protocol spread. All devices within the plaza dimmed and their camera recorders were dead.

The Summit would live only in those who saw it.

Jaylen walked out to silence. There are no fireworks, no giant screens. It's just a lone microphone under a string of bulbs swaying in the night wind.

For a heartbeat, the crowd held its breath. Then Jaylen sang.

His voice was not polished nor was it perfect. It cracked at the edges, although raw with exhaustion and enough fire to fuel his tone. But it was real, and every lyric landed like a fist against the machine that had tried to break him.

The crowd surged as their voices joined his, creating a tidal roar. It wasn’t a concert anymore. It looked more like a revolt.

The people raised their phones without anyone telling them to, only to find their screens black from the blackout. But instead of lowering them, they lifted them higher, waving the dead screens like torches to the sky.

A sea of black rectangles shimmered across the plaza. It glowed faintly in reflection from the stage lights. It was a graveyard of false industry glamor, repurposed into a symbol of defiance.

Jaylen’s chest tightened. He had never seen anything so raw, so human.

The shipping yard trembled under the weight of their voices. The chants from the song shook the night,

“REAL VOICE! REAL VOICE! REAL VOICE!”

The barricades at the front collapsed as fans moved forward, but instead of problems, there was unity. They pulled Jaylen from the stage. It was not to tear him apart, but to carry him into their midst.

He didn’t resist them at all. He kept singing but abandoned his microphone. His voice started blending into theirs.

The summit wasn’t a performance anymore. It was communion.

The People’s Summit became a living legend. It was a story that would be retold even without proof.

The System flared in triumph,

“Quest Success!

Reward: Fame +12, Talent +5, Unlocked Aura: True Voice Resonance.”

By midnight, word of the Summit dominated every conversation on the globe.

There was no footage, no stream and no official archive. Yet stories went out, sketches drawn by fans, old audio captured through faulty devices and murals painted overnight in cities across the world.

The irony was unmistakable. Zee whispered in Jaylen’s earpiece. His voice tinged with awe.

“Irony confirmed. No cameras and yet you trend harder than anyone alive.”

Jaylen breathed deep. Sweat dripped from body trembling. He had proved what the Zenith Circle feared most - that music didn’t need them.

The Circle’s grip was broken.

As the crowd thinned and silence reclaimed the yard, Jaylen walked alone through the wreckage of the night. He stopped beneath a half-destroyed Zenith billboard. His own face glitching under static light.

Someone had spray-painted across it in rough black letters, “The Circle Is Broken.”

Jaylen stared with his fists clenched and his chest heaving.

For the first time, he wasn’t just fighting back. He had won.