Chapter 89
I spent the next moments just glaring at people. The Luminin guys who were making snide comments at us now couldn’t meet my eyes. Yes, this was how they should’ve responded from the beginning. I knew that there was currently a gap between our status on the show and in real life, but as this show progressed, I was confident that this gap would quickly dwindle.
Of course, we weren’t quite there yet. Even if we were the main characters of this show, we had so many weak points where people could attack us. We didn’t even debut yet and didn’t have a big fandom like Only One. Above all, our company was the smallest and worst of all the groups’ companies.
‘But I’m confident that we could turn all of this around,’ I thought. We planned to debut after this show and our fandom was steadily growing. And after we won this program, we could confidently change our agency to a big corporate one. Though everything wasn’t set in stone yet, everyone knew that it could happen and there was quite a high possibility of that happening too. Thus, I thought I was now in the position to get up and reestablish this fact to everyone like this.
Perhaps, Yeon-Hoon thought I was going to start a real fight at this rate and pulled on my clothes to tell me to stop. I pulled my eyes away from other people. I didn’t know how my behavior would be shown on the show, but knowing producer Park Soo-Chul’s personality, I knew he wouldn’t miss a chance to show some drama.
‘But still, he won’t abandon us.’ And if he had to choose who to save between Luminin and us, I knew who he would pick. Thus, there was no need for me to worry even about the editing. At most, the show would only show Luminin provoking us and me responding to it.
“Okay! So, did everyone enjoy the show?” Park Soo-Chul came to the scene and asked.
“Yes!”
“We had fun!”
“Thank you everyone!”
The stiff atmosphere instantly turned bright for the show. It was as if no one had been tense or shot out provocations. Seeing this, Park Soo-Chul smiled softly and continued. “Everyone worked really hard today too. Now, you all are free to return to continue practicing or sleep!”
“Yes, sir!”
“Thank you~”
People began to rise one by one. The first team to rise was Luminin’s team alliance. It seemed they knew there was nothing they could gain by staying any longer. I also bid my farewells to my Siren members.
“Good luck with your practice.”
“Let’s be more chill, Tae-Yoon.”
“See you tomorrow.”
My group members appeared a bit concerned with my conflict with Luminin, but I simply accepted their farewells and walked toward Kang Hyun-Sung’s team. Soon, this training camp would be over, and in the short time period left, I wanted to practice as much as possible.
Thus, I thought Kang Hyun-Sung would suggest we continue practicing at this late hour when he unexpectantly said, “Let’s rest for today.”
“Really?”
“What?”
“Are we really going to rest, leader?”
“Yes, let’s rest.”
“…” Kang Hyun-Sung suggested that we rest for today. I felt shocked and confused, but since I couldn’t force everyone to continue practicing, I just decided to accept his decision.
***
I lay on the bed. Though I took a shower, I didn’t feel refreshed. Perhaps, it was because I had been used to practicing late into the night and dropping unconscious onto the bed that I was feeling this way.
‘Or maybe not. My condition wasn’t great the whole day,’ I thought. The episode that aired today was definitely satisfactory. Though we gained some negative attention because we were edited as main characters again, that was a hundred times better than getting ignored. Furthermore, I didn’t feel as physically tired because we didn’t practice as much as usual. Yet, I didn’t feel good.
I lay on the bed and fumbled with my phone after a while. I looked at the pictures I took with my group members, surfed the internet, and looked at videos that made me laugh mindlessly. Yet, I couldn’t keep my interest for long and my mood immediately dropped again.
‘Rather than doing this, I should just practice.’ I thought it was better to move my body rather than fool around in my room like this, so I went down to the basement. I thought nobody would be there but the practice room door was open.
“…Ah.”
Kang Hyun-Sung was practicing by himself. It was awkward to see him like this, and Kang Hyun-Sung also appeared startled to see me.
‘Why did he tell others to not practice but went to practice by himself?’ A part of me thought he was cheating since we were going to get individually assessed in this round.
‘No, it’s ridiculous to count individual practice as cheating.’ It seemed I had a negative filter on whatever Kang Hyun-Sung did. Besides, I had come down to the basement to practice on my own too so I had no right to say this to anyone else.
As I stood awkwardly, Kang Hyun-Sung told me. “If you are going to practice, go ahead. But if you aren’t going to, why don’t you leave?” He was telling me to stop standing still in one spot.
“I'm going to practice.” I couldn’t go back after all this. Furthermore, if I just left without doing anything, I would become someone who escaped the scene because I was afraid of Kang Hyun-Sung. I didn’t want that to happen at all costs.
Kang Hyun-Sung had been practicing with his earphones in his ears, but he asked me, “Should I just turn on the speakers?”
If I said yes to this, we would really have to practice together. Thus, I said, “No, let’s use our individual earphones.”
“Do as you wish.”
Thus, I put some Bluetooth earphones into my ears and loosened up. This was our third-round song, "Never Mind". The song was edited and was now finished. I didn’t know what kind of song producer Kang Hyun-Sung contacted, but the song was rearranged splendidly. The end of the third verse was especially well done and fulfilled my suggestion of putting the chorus on an infinite loop.
Of course, the loop wasn’t actually infinite and repeated about five times before settling down slightly and disappearing altogether. All in all, I thought it was a great arrangement that captured both sentimental feelings and excitement.
And as if the song producer knew that a song could sound bland if the same melody and lyrics just repeated again and again, there was a slight change of melody and lyrics in the looping chorus part. And thanks to that, it felt like a completely different song in the third verse.
‘If they know how to make lyrics of this level and rearrange the song like this, it’s someone who knows how to make a whole song by themselves.’ If I could, I almost wanted to ask Kang Hyun-Sung for the song producer’s number and contact them separately.
I warmed up while listening to the song and inspected each of my moves. Though I didn’t want to admit it, Kang Hyun-Sung’s practice methods and tips had helped me. It helped me liven up my dance moves and hone the details. Besides that, I learned how to control my breathing, have better control over where to put more or less force, reserve my stamina, and so on. By just observing him and learning his tips and pieces of advice, I felt my skills rise.
Though my dancing was almost perfect because I used the power of Insight, this ability wasn’t a means to all problems. After learning about it a bit more, I realized that Insight allowed me to showcase the best performance I possibly could but nothing more. Thus, my dance moves were only able to become another level cleaner with Kang Hyun-Sung’s guidance. Of course, the result of that was always mouth-dropping because it awakened my potential to the highest level, but it couldn’t create talent that didn’t exist.
‘And I can’t beat a born genius.’ In other words, the Insight ability put me at the highest peak of skills that an ordinary person could reach by doing their best.
While I inspected my moves and followed the details that Kang Hyun-Sung taught me, Kang Hyun-Sung suddenly said, “Mr. Tae-Yoon. Are you going to dance like that in that part?”
“Why?”
“Don’t you think this is better?” Kang Hyun-Sung asked and showed me what to do by example. The details were slightly different from the ones he taught me during practice.
“I thought you told me to do this.”
“But that was when we were practicing in a group.”
“…?” What? Was he saying that our movements were supposed to change in a group and in an individual practice?
“When we practiced in a group, I told you the smoothest and cleanest way to move. But I think it’s better to have details that match you individually as a person when practicing separately.”
“…Are you supposed to differentiate between the two situations?”
“…Why wouldn’t you?”
“…I see.”
I changed my moves according to the direction Kang Hyun-Sung told me. My dance moves became obviously cleaner. How should I describe it? Before, it felt like I was wearing form-fitting clothes, but now, it felt as if I was wearing clothes that were perfectly tailored to me.
‘He really is a genius,’ I thought. Kang Hyun-Sung was someone who had already placed first in dancing in another show, Select Your Idol. Truthfully, one could say that his dancing skills were 90% of what made the current Kang Hyun-Sung. Like that, we practiced for a while longer and practiced quite a great deal. It was time to return now.
‘But what is this?’ I found myself competing against Kang Hyun-Sung on who could practice the longest. We didn’t say anything to each other nor made any declaration to do that but agreed on it through silent signals.
This was like how cars implicitly got into a speeding contest when driving. From the moment our eyes met while practicing, I sensed a strange sense of competition from our exchange and atmosphere. I had originally planned to go back to bed before 11 p.m., but it was now 11:30 p.m. At this point, I could practice until the next day. But I didn’t want to go back up like this. I wasn’t the type to feel competitive like this, but I didn’t want to lose today at all costs.
‘…This is really infuriating.’ And that was how 12 a.m. arrived. And it soon became 12:30 am, then 1 am, and then, 1:30 am.
‘He’s so headstrong…’ I thought I couldn’t bear it any longer when Kang Hyun-Sung hung the towel around his neck and left the practice room first.
“Good work,” he said.
As expected, hard work always paid off. I lay on the ground with my arms and legs stretched out. “Ha!” What happened today? I picked a fight with Luminin and strained myself after feeling a strange competitive spirit against Kang Hyun-Sung. I wasn’t usually the type to be swayed by my emotions this much.
‘But maybe it’s because of my hormones.’ It seemed I was getting influenced by my physical body since my body was nineteen, though my mind was twenty-four. I was at an age where hormones oozed out of me nonstop.
‘I should go up after five minutes,’ I thought. Since it would be awkward to meet Kang Hyun-Sung right after I went up, I decided to rest a bit. Five minutes later, I wiped my sweat with the towel and went up the stairs.
I planned to wash myself before sleeping when I suddenly thought, ‘Maybe I should use the jacuzzi.’
With all the sweat that I poured out, I wanted to soak myself in the warm water while feeling the cold air. I thought it would be a good change of mood and could clear up my mind. Thus, I changed into my swimming trunks and moved to the second floor’s veranda. I opened the door and went outside.
“Ah.”
“…Again?”
I saw Kang Hyun-Sung soaking himself inside the jacuzzi with his swimwear. Though I used the jacuzzi with other members before, I had never seen Kang Hyun-Sung use that area. He had always gone to his room by himself, saying he didn’t like these things.
“…I thought you said you didn’t like jacuzzis.”
“…” Yet, he was enjoying the jacuzzi with the most relaxed face I had ever seen on him.
“…I just don’t like other people’s bodies touching mine,” he replied.
I laughed humorlessly because I was too baffled to respond, but I couldn’t turn my feet since I also came here to relax.
Shaaa. Thus, I filled up another jacuzzi next to the one that Kang Hyun-Sung was using and went inside.
“…”
“…”
And that was how I had the most awkward time at the jacuzzi late at night.
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