Dating within idol groups is okay
Kwon Soon-young x Lee Ji-hoon
As soon as the song ended, I collapsed to the floor. A pleasant exhaustion that came after intense dancing washed over me. My limbs were completely weak, and my head, which was finally starting to get oxygen, felt dizzy. Every time I inhaled and exhaled, my back rose and fell significantly. Beads of sweat formed on my forehead and fell to the floor. I rubbed them with my sneakers, and the circular evidence of my efforts, engraved on the floor, disappeared without a trace.
“Jihoon-hyung, aren’t you going yet?”
I wiped the sweat off my face with the back of my hand and turned my head toward the direction of the sound.
The owner of the young voice was a 15-year-old trainee junior who was decided as the youngest member of the debut group the day before yesterday.
“I should go soon. What were you doing instead of going?”
“Oh, I practiced singing a bit more. He told me to practice singing harder in the future because he was going to definitely upload it live during our showcase.”
A junior who says everything smoothly and then makes a face as if saying "Oh no."
It's a bit awkward to call him a junior. After all, he'll be making his official debut in a few months. When that time comes, I'll have to respectfully call that young, fledgling trainee, "senior." No, do I even have the right to call him "senior"? I'm still just a trainee. I've dreamed of becoming an idol my whole life.
All I can do now is try to quickly ventilate this awkward atmosphere.
“The director said he was really going to make it this time. You know how good our director is. Even though it’s hard now, things will be okay.”
He has pride in his appearance, so he pretends to be a cool 'trainee senior' until the end.
shit.
A subtle light of sympathy begins to seep into the eyes of the little girl looking at me.
“I’ll clean up here and go. Come on in.”
When I spoke with a deliberately brighter smile, the little boy smiled awkwardly and nodded.
“Uh...then...you should go in quickly. I’ll go first...”
After hesitating for a while and barely managing to say hello, the fifteen-year-old youngest turned around and left the practice room.
Maybe he has ears too, so he knows what people are talking about.
This time, they thought Lee Ji-hoon would debut, but he was cut because of his age. They said that since the concept of this boy group was a refreshing boy and immature youth, a 23-year-old wouldn't fit the concept. So they decided to put in the youngest member, a 15-year-old who had only recently joined the company and still had a lot of practice to do, but was also young and fit the group's color well.
Of course, it's not the youngest's fault. Of course, it's not my fault either. And strictly speaking, it's not the company's fault either. The company simply diligently thought hard and made the best choice to fit the product's concept. It doesn't matter how long you've been an idol trainee. What's more important is whether you can debut at the right time with the right concept at the right age. In the end, it's all about luck.
Ha, shit. I feel like drinking.
* * *
Twenty-three years old.
The world says that twenty-three is the age of youth itself, full of bright and passionate energy, positive about everything, and even if you fail, that failure can be a beautiful experience, a pretty age where you can do anything, but at least I am not like that.
At least that's the case on this floor.
Twenty-three was the age that was practically the last line of defense for debuting. Even then, if I debuted, I would definitely be the eldest and take on the role of leader. But I failed at even that.
I put down the two bottles of soju I bought at the convenience store on the cold floor of my dorm and ripped open a bag of shrimp crackers to snack on. The one-room dorm was dark and cold, but I didn't really want to turn on the light. It was originally a house where four people lived, but two of them left their companies last year, and the remaining one went down to his parents' house for his last vacation before debuting because he was going to be part of the debut group. So, I, Lee Ji-hoon, a perennial trainee, was left alone in the dorm.
I opened the cap and gulped down the whole bottle of soju. If I drank like this at this hour, my face would definitely be puffy the next day. But who would a trainee care about things like puffiness? Wasasak, wasasak. I savored the taste of the Saeukkang crumbling in my mouth and blankly stared at my phone. I flicked back and forth between a message from my mom telling me to eat well and a notification that several hundred thousand won had been deposited in my dad's name, and I gulped down another soju.
Fifteen. That was the age I started seriously attending a dance academy, dreaming of becoming an idol. My goal was to train for two or three years and then debut around seventeen or eighteen. Many people felt sorry for me leaving home and living alone in Seoul at such a young age, but I was confident that I was on the path to my dream, so it was okay. But that was where it ended.
Twenty-three years old.
Should I just join the military? After joining the military, should I go to college? If I go to a department like practical music or practical dance and get a diploma, then wouldn't there be something else I can do after that?
Now, none of the people at my company, who have become like family to me, say anything to me. I know. It won't be easy to comfort me, but they know my efforts too well to suggest that I find another way.
A bottle of soju was quickly emptied. I knew this would happen, so I bought another. I didn't hesitate and opened the top. After dancing for a long time, sweating profusely, without even eating a proper meal, I drank soju, and I got drunk faster than usual, and I felt dizzy. I sighed and the smell of hot alcohol wafted out.
Just throw away all your pride and just, I don't have to debut, I'll just beat up the trainees and ask them to give me a job. Maybe I can be the manager of the kids who are debuting this time.
That doesn't even make sense.
I opened and closed the message window with the manager who had liked me for a long time several times, and then I just smiled.
Lee Ji-hoon, wake up. Manager? You're talking nonsense.
Jiying.
It was at that moment that the phone in my hand vibrated. Oh, no way, I wasn't really texting the director about being his manager while drunk, was I? I shook my head a few more times to clear my blurry vision. The phone screen, which had been blurry, gradually became clearer. Fortunately, the message window with the director was not displayed on the phone. Instead...
[I want to become an idol loved by everyone!]
What if I opened my eyes one day and found myself a popular member of an idol group?
......I've seen something like this.
I think they said that web novels and webtoons with otaku-like phrases like that, like possession or reincarnation, are popular these days. Is it like an advertisement for web novels? By the way, how did they know that I want to be an idol and show me those customized ads? Algorithms these days are really scary.
Somehow, I got goosebumps and shivered slightly.
As I stared at the LCD screen, the white screen completely blackened and then turned white. Then, letters appeared one by one, along with a clicking sound effect as if someone was typing on a keyboard.
Would you like to participate in Dear my Carat?
[Yes/No]
What the heck. It turns out it wasn't a web novel ad, but a game ad. It seems like it's some kind of idol training simulation game. Since the real Lee Ji-hoon can't become an idol, he's telling me to make a game character into one, what the heck. Fuck. It really feels like everything is just teasing me. Of course it's a no. Even if I didn't make it into the debut group, this isn't the time to be leisurely playing a game or something. I lifted my right index finger and pressed the screen.
Ah, shit
[Yes]
I pressed the wrong button. This is why I have to quit drinking.
I've been feeling dizzy and my vision is blurry for a while now. Hey, I guess I'll just have to delete the game.
Mr. Lee Ji-hoon, welcome to !
[Build up your affection with the twelve members of Dear my Carat to reach a happy ending.]
[There is a new quest.]
What the heck, how did this game know my name and apply right away without even having to create an ID? What's with the favorability rating? Wasn't this an idol training simulation? And it's a quest right away without a tutorial?
Even though I wasn't much of a gamer, I could tell that the game flowed a little differently from other games. I was just blinking blankly without doing anything, and the screen changed on its own.
Quest Success Conditions:
Debuting with and receiving the Rookie of the Year award a year later!]
Quest Success Reward:
Seventeen popularity +100,000
Loyalty of fandom +100000
Rare Item - ???]
[We look forward to Lee Ji-hoon's great performance!]
You're drunk, you're drunk.
I just relaxed my eyes, which were already trying to close. I'll be fine after I just take a nap. I won't see these things and I won't have any random thoughts. Okay. First, I'll take a deep sleep and wake up to see where my life is going.
Let's think about it objectively and calmly again, whether it would be better to let it flow.
Unable to support my heavy head that was falling on its own, I curled up on the floor. I thought I heard the sound of an empty soju bottle rolling around, but soon nothing came to mind.
Dating within idol groups is okay
Kwon Soon-young x Lee Ji-hoon
We Drop it like HOT HOT HOT Oh Feelin' so HOT now
I suddenly opened my eyes to the ear-splitting sound of an alarm clock. A ceiling that was both familiar and unfamiliar came into view. I sat up with a shaky hand on my throbbing hair. I shook my head from side to side to shake it off, and only after rubbing my eyes was I able to come to my senses. But I couldn't shake the feeling that something was wrong. I clearly remember drinking soju alone and lamenting my fate last night, but what was this strange feeling of déjà vu? I blankly looked around the room and quickly realized what the feeling of déjà vu was. The bunk beds that had filled the room were nowhere to be found, and there was only an old single bed. Even if I debuted alone, how could they take away my bed in one night? And while I was drunk and asleep? That was ridiculous. I jumped up and paced around the room.
This song Burnin' like HOT HOT HOT HOT Boom Brr Boom Boom
All that remained in the dorm were my belongings. I even went out to the small but decent living room and the entrance, but there was absolutely no trace of the other trainees, as if I had lived there alone from the beginning. This was truly unbelievable.
We Drop it like HOT HOT HOT Oh Feelin' so HOT now
And here's another reason for this sense of foreboding. That morning call that's been ringing so loudly for a while now wasn't something I set up. This song, which I'm hearing for the first time in my life,
'Yeah I'm runnin' too HOT HOT HOT HOT Boom Brr Boom Boom'
It was a really shockingly bad song. I sighed and picked up my phone.
‘Light it towards the sun, very hot~!!’
What keeps being so hot? I stared at the screen of my phone as if it was going to heat up, and I slammed the alarm down so hard that my fingers almost snapped. It felt much better once it was quiet. I pressed my head with one hand as a hangover was rising.
A window appeared in the air with a jingle, like a cheerful bell. It was a white square with a sky blue border, like something out of a science fiction movie, a window that looked like a hologram.
[DAY1 Mission Occurrence!]
[This is Lee Ji-hoon's first day at work after being street-casted by Hive Entertainment.]
Mission: Be at the practice room by 9 AM on time!
Hive Entertainment? That's the first time I've heard that name. There was no entertainment company like that in South Korea. I raised my hand and slapped my cheek a couple of times, but it only made me more alert.
[Please arrive at the practice room by 9 AM on time!]
As I didn't even think about getting up, the system window flashed before my eyes again as if urging me on, and then disappeared. I checked the time on my phone and it was 8 AM. I blankly opened the map app and searched for Hive Entertainment. When I looked up the route from my location to that company called Hive or something, I couldn't help but be shocked. Hive Entertainment was in the exact same location as P.D. Entertainment, where I was a trainee. Did the company name change without me knowing? No way. I quickly washed my face and changed clothes. First, I needed to find out why the company name had changed and what that unrealistic system window was.
* * *