White ballance or metering?

I was out shooting some dragon boat event and mid way through there was a lion dance performance.

The two images below are shot more or less at the same time. My question is, is it the white balance that's causing the images to appear different or the way I was metering the scene? (They were intentionally under-exposed by a stop)

Byte size: ZERO | Content warning: NOT AN IMAGE

Byte size: ZERO | Content warning: NOT AN IMAGE

I'm sure it's metering. Notice you have a dark subject in the center of your first picture and the ground is lighter. In the second you have a lighter subject and the ground is darker. The camera metered off the center of the frame. Situation like this is a good use of manual. You could use an 18% grey card and meter off of it and just use those settings.

That analysis is absolutely correct.

Thanks!

I will need to practice more in manual mode.