Tom scoffed, "So, you're suggesting Mr. Cugat didn't arrange it well?"

Caught off guard, Sadie had no reply.

The host, sensing the mounting tension, swiftly intervened, prompting Sadie to provide her score.

With a smirk, Sadie gave them a mere two points.

A collective gasp echoed.

She coolly explained, “Think of this as motivation. A high score might make you complacent. I'm doing you a favor."

The audacity of her rationale stunned the audience. Given that the show's rules didn't exclude the extremes, Sadie's score significantly impacted the group's average.

Disheartenment and anger marred the performers’ expressions. They had put in five days of dedicated rehearsals, only to be casually dismissed.

Tom's frustration was palpable. He couldn't take it any longer.

Scoffing, he made a hasty exit from the stage, indifferent to the ongoing broadcast.

Even the show's production team didn't anticipate that the first episode would be so awkward.

The comments under the live broadcast created a buzz. The general consensus was that while the team's performance in the show was surprisingly brilliant, the controversy that followed had turned it into a social media explosion.

The controversy led to heated debates in the comment sections amongst the netizens. As a result, the show's popularity soared and it quickly exceeded 100 million viewership, with so many people watching the livestream the pressure became more and more intense.

One by one, the remaining teams quickly completed their performance.

Overall, Ariana's team wasn't bad, but the two points Sadie gave them put them in a bad spot.

When the final rankings were announced, no one was surprised that Ariana's team placed Last.

The other teams all received decent scores from unbiased judges.

However, Sadie deliberately lowered Ariana's team's score while still scoring the other teams fairly.

Despite Ariana's team getting relatively high scores from the other judges, the two points Sadie gave them kept them from catching up to the other teams.

The morale of Ariana's six rookies was at rock bottom, and Ariana also felt outraged inside. Of course, she clearly knew that Sadie was intentionally targeting her.