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Translator: Vine
Chapter: 6
Chapter Title: The Condescending System (5)
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[SYSTEM] ‘Task’ has been completed.
▷ Reward: 20 EXP awarded
▷ Cumulative EXP: 60
▷ Cumulative Points: 0
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So far, so good. I was slowly getting used to the meager points, after all.
What pissed me off was the message that popped up next.
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[SYSTEM] A directive from the ‘Supervisor’ has arrived.
▶ Newbies these days don’t know how to do anything. Back in my day, we learned by looking over our seniors’ shoulders, even if they didn’t teach us. Work life has gotten too easy, hasn’t it? You should try harder too, Assistant Manager Kim. Be grateful you have someone to give you this kind of advice.
▷ Consolation Money: 40 EXP awarded
▷ Cumulative EXP: 100
▷ Cumulative Points: 1
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Consolation money.
Anyone could see it was the system’s way of telling me to get my act together after being publicly humiliated.
This bastard was clearly enjoying the situation.
Still, I was the one at a disadvantage. I had no choice but to scrape together even the consolation prize for my humiliation and invest the single welfare point I’d earned into my dance proficiency.
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Performance Evaluation (100)
― Vocal Proficiency: 4/20
― Dance Proficiency: 2(▲)/20
― Self-PR: 12/20
― Attendance Management: 18/20
― Adaptability within the Organization: 10/20
Cumulative EXP: 0
Cumulative Points: 0
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The effect of that one-point increase in proficiency was immediately apparent in the individual practice that followed.
I could now follow the video without getting my directions mixed up.
Me, the guy who flailed around even while watching the mirrored version!
‘Can’t you even remember which hand you eat with?’
‘How is it that you follow the regular video but do the opposite for the mirror mode?’
It was the end of Choi Jeho’s endless stream of persecution. I was overcome with emotion.
As I was reveling in the joy of growth and diligently watching the video our trainer had recorded for us, Park Juwoo approached me.
“...Are you starting to get the hang of it?”
Park Juwoo asked in his characteristically relaxed tone. Then he squatted down next to me.
“I’m not trying to be funny, but not at all.”
If you were asking if I understood it in my head, then sure. After watching it a few times, I could roughly grasp how the movements connected.
But whether my body could actually execute them was another story.
Just because you see it doesn’t mean you can do it.
If I could, I would’ve been doing something other than being a doormat at Hanpyeong Industries.
As I was bitterly reflecting on my career path, Park Juwoo spoke.
“If there’s a part you’re struggling with… I can teach you from there.”
His saintly patience in dealing with a clumsy trainee who had just barged in moved this rookie, just a little.
But I wasn't so childish as to steal precious time from a budding young talent.
Even between mortal enemies, there were lines one shouldn't cross.
Park Juwoo wasn't someone who needed to manage a fleeting connection like Kim Iwol; he was a talent who needed to devote himself to practice and hone his fiery high notes.
So, I politely declined the offer from Park Juwoo, for whom every minute and second must be precious.
Besides, I doubted Park Juwoo actually wanted to teach a beginner who harbored nothing but animosity toward him.
“No, it’s fine. I was enough of a burden yesterday.”
“...Then just one part.”
With that, Park Juwoo fumbled with a spare phone and played the video.
“Here, you move your left foot, and one, two… Yes, like that.”
“Really? Is this right?”
“The move… is correct.”
The silence that followed ‘the move’ was thick with his complex feelings.
No matter how positively I tried to spin it, Park Juwoo’s words could only be interpreted as me having a hell of a long way to go.
To a guy who could sing and dance well, my future—unable to sing and even worse at dancing—must have looked bleak.
But this was truly a huge improvement. After all, just yesterday, it had taken me over thirty minutes to move my feet twice.
And that was with Choi Jeho and Kang Giyeon holding me on either side and moving me themselves. Thanks to them, I got a full-fledged puppet experience.
‘Can a person really improve this much with just one proficiency point?’
Whatever you said about it, the system was indeed a life cheat code.
I repented for whining just a few hours ago about how my life was the hardest.
Just as I completed a single step, shaking like a newborn giraffe, Park Juwoo asked.
“Aren’t you tired?”
“Judging by your face, you look more exhausted than I do.”
“You really have… great stamina, hyung.”
Park Juwoo gave a strained smile, looking completely drained.
Perhaps because he was still young, he reminded me of a happy baby puppy you might find at a country house.
But a one-on-one training session and a single smile couldn’t make me forgive him for saying only five words during a fifty-minute radio show.
If I ever got the time and opportunity, I would get my revenge by making him practice smiling for thirty hours straight.
Still, that day’s practice ended rather smoothly, thanks to the fact that I had shown noticeable improvement after setting everyone’s expectations rock bottom.
I practiced for two more hours, just like yesterday, before finally wrapping up the long day.
I didn’t get another overtime reward, but it couldn't be helped.
I wasn’t going to debut just by learning how to move my feet twice.
***
The only time I had to think deeply about the system was in the dead of night.
During the day, I was too busy rolling left and right, so I had to keep a tight grip on my sanity.
At night, I had to stay behind alone in the practice room, swaying to the dance music playing from the spare phone.
“Hoo.”
So, the moment I finished washing up, I flopped onto my assigned bed. I needed time to sort through my jumbled thoughts.
‘The system said I was designated as a producing member.’
If so, it was highly likely that this factor was considered when I was street-cast, the event that had started this whole idol business.
In fact, Spark had never had a member in charge of producing before.
The problem, if you could call it one, was that UA also had no experience producing idols.
I still remembered a post that went up on the very day UA had dropped a surprise comeback promotion live stream.
≫ UA has f*cking terrible sense, right? While all the other male idols are doing individual live streams, they won’t even let Spark do one without staff present, even five years after their debut, right? If they’re going to be like this, they should just announce a monthly live stream schedule. Don't piss me off by adding [Surprise] and starting a broadcast without any warning.
If the company had just posted a few pictures of Spark eating, they would’ve gotten away with being called clueless rather than heartless. They were a truly incompetent company.
I had no idea what they saw in me to give me this position, but it seemed I had to aim for the producing side of things, as the system instructed, if I wanted to debut safely.
I racked my brain, a brain I couldn't even remember the last time I’d used properly. It took a lot of effort to get my dusty, office-worker brain to turn.
The one silver lining was that Lee Cheonghyun would eventually take charge of composing for the team.
It was a great comfort to know that I wouldn't have to come up with ideas, write songs, write lyrics, and create concepts all by myself—not that it was even possible for me.
Of course, even if I did write a song, there was no guarantee it would be a singable piece of work.
They say every cloud has a silver lining, and that was exactly right.
As I was recalling Spark’s dizzying array of past concepts, the system appeared again.
At least now, the sight of the system didn’t make my anger flare up. I think it was because I had started to equate it with a welfare point notification.
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[SYSTEM] A directive from the ‘Supervisor’ has arrived.
▶ I don’t care what you did before, Assistant Manager Kim. Kids who’ve done some half-assed internship somewhere just pick up bad habits. Let’s throw out whatever you were doing before and start fresh. A little refresh, you get me?
[SYSTEM] ‘New Task’ has been assigned.
▷ Confirm current personal information.
▷ Consolation Money: 60 EXP awarded
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Nope. I was fucking pissed.
It was a special talent to say only the most irritating things. My anger surged.
But what was most ominous was the whopping 60 EXP.
And its attribute was ‘Consolation Money,’ no less.
The thought that something even worse than my public humiliation in dance class was about to happen made my vision go dark.
At this rate, by next month, I might find myself on the UA rooftop shouting, ‘I love you guys!’
Although, unless they offered me four consecutive weeks of seven-day workweeks without overtime, there was no way I’d ever shout that I loved Spark.
‘What do I need to confirm in my personal information?’
The back of the resident registration card I’d checked yesterday had a sticker with the address of Spark’s current dorm. That meant the change of address had been completed.
My resident registration number was the same, and my name had been legally changed.
‘Name, ID number, address, education, military service, work history…’
My thoughts, which had been ticking off the basic personal details one by one, came to a halt at a certain point.
Education.
‘What’s today’s date…?’
February, nine years ago. The second week of February in the year I had just turned twenty.
That was the week I was street-cast on my way to meet my sister.
The week I borrowed 15 million won from her.
And the week I had registered for university after getting accepted through regular admissions.
‘No way.’
My mind went blank.
With trembling hands, I opened my phone. It showed February 13th.
Unfortunately, if my memory served me right, this was two days past the regular admissions registration deadline.
I prayed to every god I knew as I borrowed Lee Cheonghyun’s laptop.
And I logged into the admissions confirmation page.
After a few clicks, the same acceptance confirmation page I had seen nine years ago appeared.
My test-taker number on the screen had been switched to ‘Registration Forfeited.’
I refreshed the page again and again, logged in and out repeatedly, but nothing changed. My academic background, the very thing that had gotten me into Hanpyeong Industries, was gone.
I also learned a fact I’d rather not have known.
The 15 million won I had borrowed from my sister was sitting untouched in an account under my name.
‘My three years of high school were for nothing.’
My head felt empty.
The penalty for not debuting as an idol was rejoining Hanpyeong Industries.
When I first saw that, I thought it was the worst possible ending to my life.
But it turns out that just when you think you’ve hit rock bottom, you can fall even further.
At this rate, I wouldn’t be able to get into Hanpyeong Industries even if I wanted to. I wasn’t that great of a talent.
What company would hire me, an incompetent man with no outstanding skills, if I didn’t even have my small and precious degree?
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[SYSTEM] ‘Task’ has been completed.
▷ Consolation Money: 60 EXP awarded
▷ Cumulative EXP: 60
▷ Cumulative Points: 0
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Tears welled in my eyes, and I looked up.
It was a despair so deep that 60 EXP was no consolation at all.
