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Translator: Vine
Chapter: 10
Chapter Title: Monthly Evaluation (1)
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The days were busy enough with just practice, but there was a mountain of other things to take care of.
The most significant of these was the monthly evaluation. And just in time, a new task related to it was assigned.
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[SYSTEM] A ‘New Task’ has been assigned.
▷ Establish a plan for the monthly evaluation
▷ Reward: EXP (10)
[SYSTEM] A ‘New Task’ has been assigned.
▷ Achieve a passing score on the monthly evaluation
▷ Reward: EXP (30)
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Getting a passing score must be pretty important. Even after the EXP adjustments, it was offering a whopping 30 EXP.
More importantly, failing to pass means I'll fail my KPI right away. You think I’m not going to make a proper plan?
UA's evaluation had two components: vocals and dance. And recently, I had been focusing more on dance practice.
There were two main reasons for this.
First, while I could at least pretend to sing, I had never once danced in my entire life.
If you were given two assignments, one in Korean composition and one in German, you'd naturally buy a German vocabulary book first.
I was at least more confident in memorizing lyrics than choreography.
So, I invested most of the early part of my allotted practice time into dancing. Having successfully memorized the choreography, I had passed the first hurdle.
Second, I was scheduled to have fewer vocal lessons than dance lessons before the monthly evaluation.
This meant I would have less feedback to listen to and apply compared to the dance classes.
And in reality, after one lesson of each, I had indeed received less feedback in the vocal class.
‘It's better to properly master what I've been taught than to get cocky and mess around on my own.’
A rookie who's taught one thing and perfects it is better than one who's taught ten things, goes off and learns some nonsense, and ends up ruining all ten.
Besides, the issues brought up in my vocal lessons were, thankfully, still within a range I could handle on my own.
So, while I diversified my efforts, I put a few more eggs in the dance basket.
My ultimate goal was to drag my weaknesses up by the collar and show that I could at least pull half my weight.
Once I had a clear direction, I could focus on my dance practice, which made it very effective.
The culmination of all these plans pointed in one direction.
My position.
I was aiming for one thing and one thing only: sub-vocalist.
Spark's vocal line was quite solid. After all, they were ambitiously planned by UA, a powerhouse known for its vocalists.
The group's position balance was also good.
In the vocal line, Park Juwoo and Jeong Seongbin were the anchors, while Choi Jeho and Kang Giyeon held down the dance line.
If Lee Cheonghyun, the rapper, had perfectly executed his raps and presented a flawless image, everyone would have been at peace, but...
In reality, there were quite a few ups and downs. The vocal difficulty of the songs UA gave Spark in their early days was truly atrocious.
Perhaps wanting to rebrand itself as a small but powerful idol powerhouse through Spark, UA saddled them with a heap of songs that made you wonder, ‘How are they supposed to sing this while dancing?’
≫ Those UA bastards, do they have a vendetta against the members' vocal cords?
└ If I were them and got hit with three consecutive high notes for four songs in a row, I would've sued UA already.
The brilliantly talented members of Spark amazingly managed to pull off both dolphin-like high notes and powerful dance moves every time.
In the process, Lee Cheonghyun had to juggle four roles: lyricist, composer, rapper, and vocalist. And Jeong Seongbin developed vocal cord nodules.
Knowing that injuries could occur, the position issue was already latently resolved in my mind.
‘If I can just lighten their vocal load a little, the members won't have to play four roles each.’
So I decided to prepare for the sub-vocalist position, one that would give the members some breathing room.
Besides, that was the only area where I could really help anyway.
Once I set my goal to be ‘a member who fills in the vocals while staying out of the spotlight as much as possible,’ my task became clear.
I felt I could become a member who just filled in the vocals, as long as I shed some blood, sweat, and tears.
After all, among the many songs Spark would sing in the future, there were bound to be parts I could handle with my vocal range.
It was a huge relief that the evaluation only had these two categories. If fan service had been included, I would've had to bite my tongue and be reborn.
But wait, why don't they actually test fan service? Isn't that a basic skill for an idol?
I don't know what kind of magical effect Spark's fan service had, but I did know that the fans desperately wanted it.
It wasn't like those guys were heartless statues with faces of steel; they seemed to be trying *something*. But objectively, their attempts were so crude it was a waste of their good looks.
This is why Spark's fan service failed, the fandom atmosphere soured, trolls were drawn in, negative articles came out every day, and the kids ended up disbanding...
Just thinking about it makes my blood boil again. Deep breaths, deep breaths.
Anyway. The remaining task was to be as inconspicuous as possible within the team.
A stiff pollack creaking amongst a group of sparkling idols would be impossible not to notice, so I had to practice dancing like my life depended on it.
As soon as I reached this latent conclusion, the task to establish an evaluation plan was marked as complete.
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[SYSTEM] ‘Task’ has been completed.
▷ Reward: EXP (10) granted
▷ Accumulated EXP: 10
▷ Accumulated Points: 0
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Now I just needed to gather 90 more EXP to even out my dance and vocal proficiencies.
The first milestone was just around the corner.
* * *
Since moving out at twenty, I had lived alone for about seven years, excluding my time in the military.
In that time, I had forgotten one basic piece of etiquette.
When you have roommates, you need to match their sleep schedules.
Thanks to that, I had to pretend to be asleep—something I'd never expected to do—and wait for the guys to fall asleep.
And when Choi Jeho and Lee Cheonghyun's tossing and turning finally ceased, I carefully slipped out of the room.
The living room, now past one in the morning, was dark and quiet.
Turning on the lights would have brightened the whole dorm, so I had no choice but to turn on just the laptop.
Fortunately, the agency had provided one for the dorm to be used for searching videos.
I wanted to use Webcel, but unfortunately, the laptop didn't have the NS program installed.
I had a strong urge to submit a purchase request for a license.
‘If I need to use this just one more time, I'm buying it with my own money.’
Left with no other option, I opened a spreadsheet and began filling in the columns.
Song Title, Lyric Memorization, Fundamentals, and Total.
Next, under Song Title, I listed all the songs I knew and then struck out any for which I hadn't memorized at least 70% of the lyrics.
Since my time was limited, I planned to pour my resources into improving my proficiency rather than memorizing lyrics.
Finally, using the fundamentals I learned in my vocal lesson as a baseline, I scored each song on how suitable it was for showcasing those skills.
‘I should probably think of a method other than this brute-force brainstorming.’
As I was typing, feeling a familiar sense of stability despite my strained eyes, a hand emerged from the darkness and tapped the table next to my laptop.
I looked up to see Jeong Seongbin, his eyes half-open, standing on the opposite side of the dining table.
You scared me. You're pretty quiet, aren't you?
“What is it?”
I asked in a small voice, and Jeong Seongbin blinked his eyes slowly before speaking.
“Sorry to bother you. But what are you doing, hyung…?”
“Trying to pick a song for the evaluation. You need the living room?”
“It’s not that… It’s just, it’s late and I saw someone was in the living room.”
Sleep was caked all over Jeong Seongbin's voice and face.
I glanced at the clock; it was already three in the morning.
I had no idea how the time had flown by.
Anyway, in this damn world, prices and time—everything but me—races ahead.
“I’ll wrap this up and head in soon. If you just woke up, hurry back to bed. A good night's sleep today makes for a 180-centimeter tomorrow.”
Jeong Seongbin, having just received a lecture in the middle of the night, didn't immediately turn back. He glanced between me and the clock, then pulled out the chair opposite me and sat down at the table.
“Do you have any candidates in mind?”
“Huh?”
“Song candidates.”
Jeong Seongbin asked, rubbing his eyes.
To my surprise, it seemed Jeong Seongbin was willing to stay up and help me, even though he'd just woken up.
I'm much more comfortable when I'm alone.
But no matter how much resentment I held for Spark, ignoring someone right in front of me was just plain rude.
I showed Jeong Seongbin the list of about seventy songs that had survived the fierce elimination process.
“The scores… Ah, you based them on what the instructor talked about.”
“Yeah. And mostly songs that felt similar in vocal range to the ones we sang in class.”
Jeong Seongbin nodded occasionally at my explanation as he read through the list. Then, in a voice that was clearly still half-asleep, he murmured.
“I think I have a good idea of what kind of song you’re looking for. Considering the vocal range I heard in class, I think you could sing this song… too. Have you ever heard it?”
“Are you trying to help me right now?”
“It might not be much help. If you wanted to choose from songs you already know to avoid messing up the lyrics… how about this one?”
“...”
“The lyrics for the first and second verses of this song are almost identical. And they’re short, too.”
I knew he had a warm personality from the nickname ‘Sweet Seongbin’ that always popped up in their self-produced content.
But I had assumed that was only in comparison to the other members.
Looking at the dozing Jeong Seongbin, I briefly wondered if it would be better to just carry him back to his room.
Still, I meticulously jotted down his spell-like feedback.
After that, K-Pop’s star instructor, Jeong Seongbin, continued to fidget with his lips as he marked my candidate list with circles and triangles, adding and removing songs until he had narrowed it down to thirty. My success rate seemed to be about 0.41.
Even with my guidelines, the speed at which Jeong Seongbin could output appropriate results under suddenly imposed conditions was extraordinary.
‘Seongbin-hyung is a real K-pop monster! He’s basically a noraebang master.’
‘He even knows songs that came out before he was born.’
‘Hyung, do you do nothing but listen to music after you eat? Ah… you *do* only listen to music.’
‘Then let’s make Seongbin’s nickname Noraebang Master!’
Seeing it firsthand, I now understood just how formidable a master could be.
It seemed you had to become an intellectual of this caliber to survive in the harsh world of idols.
“I think it might be good to choose from these. What do you think, hyung? Maybe a more recent song would be better…?”
I could only interpret Jeong Seongbin's help as an act of goodwill.
After all, if he tried to get something from me in return, the only thing he could take were my organs.
Jeong Seongbin possessed a character rarely seen in someone who danced and sang all day on just four to five hours of sleep and a low-calorie diet.
At least, it would have been impossible for me. Especially when I was eighteen, Jeong Seongbin's current age.
So this is what it takes to be a leader. As I was marveling inwardly, my eyes met Jeong Seongbin's.
His sleepiness must have vanished, because his eyes were sparkling.
I had seen a photo where countless light sticks were reflected in those eyes. It was when I was making his birthday ad, the one that would hang at Gangnam Station's Exit 4.
“Hyung?”
“Oh, yeah. I’ll listen to the ones you recommended and then decide. Thanks.”
“It’s nothing. Good luck.”
Though for now, they only reflected the pitch-black kitchen and the dim light of the laptop screen.
I felt the urge to ask Jeong Seongbin, ‘Why are you being so kind to a passing klutz like me?’
But I held back, worried that if I didn't send him to bed now, the kid might not grow to his full height in the future.
An idol's growth period is precious, after all. It must be protected.
