Chapter 109

Chapter 109

Chungwoo wore an unreadable expression.

“Riding horseback and shooting bows?”

“Yes!”

“Wow!”

“I love horses!” Eugene exclaimed.

“Did they request us to come on the show because of Chungwoo?” Bae Sejin asked, but the manager shook his head.

“No. This show is sort of like a spiritual successor to KBC’s Idol Olympics. Most idols will be participating, probably.”

“Aha!”

That meant they might face difficulties appearing on music shows in the future if we refused the invitation. I see.

“But they’re filming the show now? Aren’t the idol sports shows usually holiday specials? It’s way past the holidays.”

“I guess the broadcasting studio has their reasons.”

“Hmm.”

Most of the members seemed to accept this explanation easily enough, but Chungwoo was still wearing an odd expression.

“Hey, is there something wrong?”

“Huh?” Chungwoo murmured, eyes focusing on me. “Well... I’m a little worried.”

I guessed that the side effects from the car accident he was involved in were bothering him. Even if he wasn’t in pain anymore, maybe the situation was still difficult for him. Sports-focused variety shows like this were infamous for inviting a bunch of idols to compete in physically taxing activities and always came with a risk of injury.

But at this time, the manager spoke up with a hesitant look on his face. “Well... about the show… Chungwoo, they’re banning you from competing. The broadcaster said it wouldn’t be fair because you’re too good. They’d love for you to give a demonstration, though.”

The members gasped, unable to believe the broadcasters were making such a sensible request. No doubt the others had all believed the show was banking somewhat on Chungwoo’s skills in archery.

The leader’s expression didn’t relax, however. “I’d rather take part myself... We can’t just refuse to be on the show, right?”

“Hmm, if we want to be invited to KBC’s other shows, I think not. Why do you ask?”

Chungwoo shook his head. “It’s too dangerous. It’s hard enough to ride a horse, and it’s even more dangerous to shoot while doing it. How long do we have to train beforehand?”

“They said... you could learn on set...”

Chungwoo’s silence was telling regarding his thoughts on the matter.

“Hang on a sec...” The manager herded us into the van and then made a call to the agency, which went on for a long time. When he returned, he was wearing a bright smile. “Oh, don’t worry, guys. Things are all set.”

“Oh?”

“KBC’s a public broadcasting service. They say they won’t ask you to do anything hard or dangerous, so let’s give it a shot!” The manager sounded overly confident, which meant whatever had been said had assured him of our safety. Since no one was giving us any details, it appeared that we’d be expected to react on camera to whatever was being asked of us.

Did they invite a pro athlete in horseback riding or something? They wouldn’t do something as stupid as inviting a current national athlete to meet with an idol who’d retired from that position because of a car accident, would they? Or try to portray such a meeting as some kind of heart-warming affair?

After all the shocking things Tnet had done for views, I found myself worrying unnecessarily about something nefarious going down.

“And there will be other sports for you to compete in as well! You can take part in those, Chungwoo!”

“Uh, all right...” Chungwoo still looked concerned but acquiesced in the end. We were met with a huge surprise on the day of filming.

***

We were filming at Daegwallyeong, a hilly region famous for its sheep ranches. Even more interesting was the completely unexpected costumes we were given to wear.

“Hwarang?”

“Yes. That’s the theme of the show. You are Hwarang, elite warriors during the Silla Dynasty competing against each other!”

“Whoa...”

Who knew they’d utilize Korean history to set themselves apart from the show’s predecessor, Idol Olympics? We were forced to first pick up our costumes in Seoul and then drive east to Daegwallyeong after having our hair and makeup done.

“Don’t lean too far back. It’ll mess up your hair!”

My head felt so heavy from the wig they’d given me to help emulate the traditional Hwarang hairstyle, that I felt like my neck might snap.

When we arrived on set, we found a pink carousel turning on its own waiting for us.

“Uh...”

“Those are the horses you’ll be riding!”

The members wore utterly blank expressions, which the cameras tracked eagerly. Before long, we were handed bows—colorful toy versions of the real thing. It looked extremely out of place to be holding them while dressed like we’d just stepped out of a historical drama.

The members stared in judgmental silence.

“Won’t our ancestors be angry at us for this?”

He’s got a point. Regardless of our reservations, filming turned out to be safe, as KBC had promised. In a way, watching idols decked out in Hwarang uniforms while riding a glittering carousel and shooting plastic arrows at toy animals made for a bizarre kind of comedy.

Why’d they drag us all the way to Daegwallyeong, though? Surely as such a big company, KBC had their pick of theme parks. Big Sejin watched the other members, snickering to himself, before stretching languidly.

“At least no fans were invited out here. I hear that the whole mess is pretty unpleasant for everyone involved.”

“Oh,” I said. I remembered. Though I’d never had the time to go myself, I had known of people who took fancams at recordings like these and sold them.

“Moondae, let’s take some photos for our Loviewers.”

“We should.”

Hmm. Honestly, it was a good idea.

“Wow, you seem eager today, Moondae! You like this Hwarang outfit, don’t you? Does it make you feel cool, or something?”

As always, I found Big Sejin’s teasing a little annoying.

“M-me too!” Ahyeon said.

“Are you taking photos?” Raebin asked.

“I want to see my hair!” Eugene exclaimed.

A few of the members gathered together and we took a few group photos. Then we noticed we’d garnered stares from a handful of other people—the other idol teams.

I guess this is just like the music show corridors. Because everyone was waiting around in the same location, it was a hot spot for different idols to get to know one another. There weren’t even any fans watching.

The other members, however, didn’t seem at all interested in the other idols, not even Big Sejin. If I had to guess, he’d probably decided against getting to know anyone else appearing on the show since none of the other idols were similar in level to TeSTAR. He was pleasant enough and greeted everyone politely, but he completely ignored the other idols after that.

I guess popularity is really important to him when it comes to making decisions. I wasn’t any better, of course, but Big Sejin really was on a different level. At least it meant we were able to have some peace and quiet, since nobody approached to talk to us.

After a little while chilling and waiting, our turn came up.

“Up next, we have... Ah, they’re certainly very famous! Welcome the nation’s stock! The TeSTAR Hwarang!”

I wasn’t sure if a public broadcast should be allowed to use the capitalistic catchphrase coined by a cable show, but nevertheless, it was our turn to go up.

Chungwoo had been left out in order to keep things fair and Bae Sejin had offered to sit this one out since only five people were allowed per team. They’d compete in the next event.

“Good luck. And be careful,” Chungwoo cautioned.

“All right...”

I wondered how he could keep a straight face while warning us to be careful after seeing the carousel, but was quickly reminded of his pretty tragic history.

“Let’s go!”

We climbed onto the carousel, tugging on seat belts, as a staff member proceeded to explain that if there was a problem, we could signal and they would stop the carousel. Then the whole platform began to turn.

A cute music box tune began to play and the horses moved up and down. I felt embarrassed. We were informed of the next rule as we rode in circles.

“Now, Hwarangs! What do you need to do before you shoot an arrow?”

“Answer a quiz question!”

“Yes, you need to get the answer right!”

We couldn’t just fire arrows at random. If we got a question right, we earned a ten-second window in which to shoot. The group that managed to hit five targets within the shortest time would win.

“That’s right! As Hwarang, who were well-versed in academia in addition to their riding skills, you’ll have to get the answers right and also shoot quickly and accurately!”

“You mean shoot the targets accurately, right—” Big Sejin began.

“Hahaha! Give us the first question!” The TV actor who was serving the role of emcee cut him short, raising his hand.

“Now, the first question is about a person! He is one of the most famous Hwarang who led the unification of the three kingdoms under Silla. He defeated an army led by Gyebaek at the Battle of Hwangsanbeol. What is his name?”

The level of difficulty was truly ridiculous. Not that it was impossible to answer, but in comparison, the group right before us had been given easy questions—they’d been asked to name the region we were in right now.

Are they purposely trying to screw us over because we debuted on a cable TV show? The staff at KBC weren’t idiots. They wouldn’t do something like this intentionally. It was probably just a matter of bad luck, pure and simple.

Shockingly, Eugene lifted his hand before anyone else. “Is Gyebaek supposed to be a person’s name—”

“I have the answer! Kim Yu-sin!” I called hastily.

“Ah, Hwarang Park Moondae! That’s correct!”

Thankfully, I was able to interrupt before Eugene could ask an idiotic question.

Phew. With a sigh, I lifted my bow.

“You have ten seconds to shoot! Begin!”

“Whoa!” The carousel suddenly sped up. It had slowed down to a crawl before, but now I felt like we were sitting on the back of a speeding motorbike. I’d noticed as such while waiting for our turn earlier, but this show was trying too hard to be funny.

“This is way faster than expected!”

“Hahaha! That’s one!”

Eugene somehow managed to hit a target right away.

“One!”

I sighed and fired my toy bow. I missed, of course. Sh*t.

“That was fun!”

“Yeah!”

Big Sejin and Eugene grinned as they got off the merry-go-round, waving at the camera energetically. Shockingly, we set a record by hitting all targets within two minutes and seven seconds. Even more shocking was that Eugene was the one to get the second question right.

“Now, here is the second question! When you browse the internet, you’ll often see the letters ‘www’ preceding a URL—”

“World Wide Web!”

“That’s correct!”

It had been an unexpected win, but I’d managed to hit one of the animal figures. There was a trick to hitting them that took a little practice to master.

“Good work. You did great!” Chungwoo cried as we trudged back to him.

“Yeah, we did!” Eugene replied.

“That wasn’t too bad!” Raebin commented idly.

“We weren’t bad, were we?”

The members stood boasting about how good they were with a bow in front of a former national athlete.

Bae Sejin quietly asked, “Was it fun?”

I shrugged. What do you think?

Bae Sejin nodded without saying a word.

“I-I think w-we did okay this time,” Ahyeon said.

“Yeah. Let’s keep it up!”

“Woohoo!”

Everyone seemed excited now that we’d successfully completed this initial round. I had the ominous feeling that if I didn’t act as eager as my members, people would start saying that I’d lost my enthusiasm.

I’ll have to put a little more spirit into my reactions. Chungwoo was up next, to give a demonstration of his skills. Outrageously, he laughed out loud and hit all five targets within the first ten seconds.

I began to wonder if becoming a national archery athlete also made you superhuman.

***

As the day went by we took part in a sheep shearing competition—I had no idea why they included this segment—and a game of yut on an oversized board before beginning the final category.

“Next up we have... the Color Wars!”

“Whoa!”

While this might have sounded impressive, it was just a game of paintball using bows. We’d be shooting paint at each other and the team that survived would win. This time, each team had seven members, so Chungwoo and Bae Sejin were able to take part as well. Chungwoo was allowed to play the game with us this time since luck was a large factor.

It’s nice that we have exactly seven members. Many of the other teams had been forced to join forces with other groups.

“Will Chungwoo shoot everyone down for us if we just kick back and stay out of his way this round?” Big Sejin asked cheekily.

“I’ll shoot, too!” Eugene cried with his usual over-enthusiasm.

“Good luck...” Bae Sejin said to Chungwoo, looking grave. He didn’t seem overly confident.

Chungwoo looked taken aback, and said awkwardly, “Let’s just have fun, guys. What does it matter if we lose?”

“Eh, that’s weak!” Eugene heckled playfully.

“I want to win!” Raebin cried.

“L-let’s do it!” Ahyeon also chimed in.

Chungwoo was forced to go along with their shenanigans since even Ahyeon was joining in. “Haha! Fine. Let’s win, guys!”

“Yay!!”

The cameras filmed this whole interaction eagerly.

It won’t look good for us if we do win. TeSTAR was already far ahead of any of the other groups on the show in terms of points, so it was probably best for us to avoid winning anything else.

We got second place in yut, too. If we won again, some people would start to think we weren’t giving the other groups a chance to catch screen time, when some of them really needed it. But the public wouldn’t like it if we half-assed it, either, so the best outcome was to give it our best, but still lose. I nodded as though inspired by our leader’s words and shook my fists in the air.

I’ll just roll around a lot. I could pretend to do my best, without actually being helpful. No doubt people would think I’d done my best if I ducked and rolled while wearing this costume.

Five minutes later, I was doing just that.

“Moondae, are you all right?”

“Yes...”

Everyone on our team was out except for Chungwoo and me. The other five had been so eager to hit the enemy that they hadn’t thought to avoid the incoming arrows themselves. Now it looked like I’d actually been trying my best.

As for my leader, he was barking orders to roll right and left whenever an arrow flew our way, trying his damnedest to keep me alive. He was doing the same thing, which meant I couldn’t just pretend to fumble about and let someone hit me.

Wow... Show some tact and let someone hit you already, damn it. But Ryu Chungwoo was way more immersed in the game than I’d realized.