Chapter 199

Chapter 199

The bomb I’d prepared went off a little while later, as we practiced for the encore concert with behind-the-scenes cameras filming us.

“Now, kick out to the right… Then move left again. Careful, Sejin!”

“Oof!”

Bae Sejin tried again, his ears red. He’d nearly tripped. Even though his dancing stat was C now, the difficulty of our choreography had gone up alongside it, and he was struggling.

Not that I’m in any position to comment. I was thinking to myself that I’d have to have another look at my own stats if I was going to do a subunit stage with Eugene when a small commotion beyond the choreography practice room door caught my attention. Someone seemed to be raising their voice.

Is he here? I got the feeling I knew what was happening, but there was no need for any of us to pretend for the cameras, I realized.

“Huh?”

“What?”

The cameras had tactfully been turned off, for starters, since the noise was too loud to ignore. We’d completed the choreography just past the chorus, anyway, and the members glanced at the door with both worry and confusion as they stopped dancing.

“D-do you think someone’s having a conversation out there?”

“There should be no one else here besides us right now.”

“One second.”

Chungwoo eyed us and got up, intending to figure out what was going on. The door opened, and a man we didn’t know came inside.

He was in his early to mid-thirties. The first manager was behind him, his face alternating between red and pale as he rushed inside. The man ignored the first manager, bowed to us, and began handing out take-out drinks.

“Oh, hello, TeSTAR! It’s so great to meet you. I brought you some drinks to cheer you on while you practice.”

“Who are you?” Eugene asked, taking the drink first.

“Oh, I’m the new manager.”

“I’m sorry?”

Naturally, we were confused. The office head’s cousin had come in with donuts only a little while ago.

“Uh, you’re not the same person we met a few days back.”

“He’ll be the road manager. I’m the chief!”

In other words, he was the new manager in charge. And that also meant our first manager, who’d been our only manager for a while, now suddenly had to report to this new guy.

“Given how busy your schedule is, you need at least three managers to keep things rolling smoothly… My goodness. But don’t worry. I’ve got everything handled. Please let me know if you have trouble with anything. Anything at all!”

“Wait…” The first manager still looked confused. Apparently, he hadn’t gotten the memo.

The chief manager finally turned to him and said in a commiserating tone, “Mr. Kim, I understand how hard it must have been for you to handle all of this alone. Let’s take a more systematic approach to meeting our artists’ needs from now on. We’ll check on any injuries and their physical condition frequently as well.”

He had essentially just openly declared that the first manager had been overlooked for a promotion because he’d failed to care for the group properly. Indeed, this was the excuse that the head of the Management Office would be using from now on.

Artist-focused care!

If I’d stopped at simply nudging him in the right direction, the situation might have developed into a rivalry between TeSTAR and the new group. The director was behind the latter, so the head would have likely chosen the older group—TeSTAR. The situation would then have gotten pretty tiresome, with both groups caught in the crossfire of a political battle of sorts. Another factor introduced into the equation, however, changed things.

The new group should also say a few nice things to the head of the office. I’d contacted the second-place winner from the recent season of Idol Inc. as soon as I came back into the country.

“I’m sorry, Moondae. Despite your advice, I couldn’t arrange things how we wanted…”

“No. You accomplished something. You persuaded them. I do feel for you, though. You must be upset because the agency refused to let the group have their way.”

“Yes… Uh, I mean, that can’t be helped! I’m sorry we bothered you and your fans!”

“It’s bad for us both. If you still feel frustrated, you could speak to the Management Office.”

“The Management Office?”

“Yes. They’re in charge of caring for the groups. If you take your time to discuss the matter with him, I’m sure they’ll take your side.”

The key was to tell her that while it was too late to change the teaser, they might be able to ask that this situation never be repeated ever again, since it was causing them to have such a hard time.

The girl, having been somewhat successful following my advice once already, would give it a try.

“Thank you! I’ll give it a shot when I have the chance.”

She seemed the meticulous sort, and I didn’t doubt she’d done as I’d suggested. It would dawn on the head of the office very quickly that he had a vision that applied to both groups.

The director is repressing the artists’ free will! They can produce their own music, but the incompetent director is overextending to try to take all the credit!

No doubt he’d liked the idea of this very much. Put into gentler, more official terms, the words we’d heard earlier were the result.

Let’s focus on the artists more! The unspoken part of this new direction was the following: And not the director. Not that the man was really all that interested in caring for the artists. What mattered was that he’d taken this stance in order to beat the director.

The A&R Team, who had a soft spot for TeSTAR, and the Production and Marketing Team, who were being overworked as they were forced to repackage a concept that had already been released once, would side with him.

That’ll result in the formation of real factions. My strategy seemed to have been quite effective, too, given how the role of manager—a key part of artist care—had been reorganized in this way.

The chief manager, who represented this change, nudged the first manager and continued, “Since the three of us are a team now, why don’t we go for a drink or two today? We can talk and get to know each other.”

“Uh… Yeah. Sure,” the first manager eventually said with a wry expression on his face. His anger had cooled, and he’d probably realized that making a scene would do him no good.

He had it coming. I watched the scene unfold with a proud smile. I could almost picture how things would unfold at the agency after this.

Hopefully, they’ll turn against one another and try to tear each other to pieces. As for the head of the Management Office, I wasn’t worried that he’d take over the agency in the director’s place and get his way. Not at all.

That bastard’s an incompetent idiot. All I needed was for the higher-ups, who both wanted to collect accomplishments in the entertainment industry, to duke it out among themselves and tire themselves out. In the meantime, the groups would take control of their own affairs, and the employees could focus on their jobs.

“Good luck with practice, then! I’ll be back soon!”

“Okay!”

“See you later!”

The chief manager gave us his number, told us to call anytime we pleased, and left. The first manager took this opportunity to try and get crafty.

“Guys, didn’t you find that a little awkward? He just showed up out of nowhere.”

The first manager was asking us to take his side. Big Sejin smiled brightly.

“Well, we’ve never met him before, but I’m sure we’ll get to know each other better! I like how he seems to care a lot about our wellbeing. I’m looking forward to having him, and grateful as well.”

“This shake is yummy!” Eugene said, waving his drink around.

The first manager stormed from the room, looking like he’d have liked nothing better than to cuss at us.

Moron. I tutted. We weren’t idiots. We all knew Chungwoo did more work than he did, even if not all of us stopped to consider whether that was fair.

“Ah!”

For instance, Raebin, who’d just exclaimed in surprise, probably had no idea.

“I get it now!”

I paused, concerned by the odd timing of his comment.

Looking impressed, Raebin said, “What you said in the recording room led up to this—”

“Wait.”

There were currently seven staff members standing around us. I couldn’t let him bring it up now.

But more importantly… He understood the situation? I highly doubted it, but Raebin was far from done speaking.

“Oh, did Moondae say something?”

“Yes! Moondae was talking about the difficulty and psychological pain we’ve been through, and that probably resulted in these changes in the agency!”

I stared at him silently.

“Ah, really? Did Moondae complain and stuff?” Big Sejin asked.

“Yes! He asked me for my opinion, too. I realize now that one needs to be clear about one’s difficulties for the message to really carry.”

“Hey now, that’s cool!”

“Hmm.”

Oh boy. This guy had only understood the basic underlying tactic I’d employed.

In his mind, TeSTAR had made their discomfort clear, and the agency had responded by paying more attention to caring for us. It was a bare-bones theory, but the others who were on a similar level socially began to react to hearing that I’d had a hard time.

“M-Moondae…”

“We didn’t know…”

There was nothing they hadn’t known. Not in the way they were thinking, at least.

“Thank you for always teaching us something new,” Raebin said.

You shouldn’t be feeling so good about yourself right now, either.

Big Sejin grinned and clapped his hands together. “Wow, you’re right! This is all thanks to Moondae! Amazing.”

The bastard was doing this on purpose. So annoying.

But his next words had slightly more bite. “There’s no need to overextend, though. Moondae, you can talk to us, too. Tell us, not just Raebin!”

“Yeah, Moondae,” Chungwoo said, making eye contact and nodding.

“We’re a group. There are seven of us, so if we discuss something, maybe we’ll arrive at a better solution.”

Given my previous track record, the tactful members seem to have already caught on that I’d purposefully let our complaints slip. I wasn’t going to deny Chungwoo this request, since he was being pretty reasonable.

Maybe I rushed into it. It was so much easier and faster to handle things alone, and I kept on forgetting that my actions impacted the entire group. These guys would be influenced by my actions, so they had the right to hear about it first.

Perhaps I’ll discuss things with them beforehand next time. We saw each other every day, and it wouldn’t take much time to fill them in, either.

I nodded.

“Yes, you’re right.”

“Yeah!”

Chungwoo added playfully, “We all contribute something to the group. That’s why our…shareholders chose this composition, don’t you think?”

“I’m smart!” Eugene declared.

“Cha Eugene has never officially measured his intelligence. It’s a subjective opinion—”

“Smarter than Kim Raebin.”

“Yeah? Why don’t we do a psychological test later and make content while we’re at it? We can take the MBTI test, too. In an official capacity,” Chungwoo suggested.

“Sounds good!”

“That sounds like fun!”

The quarrel was instantly defused.

No wonder he’s the leader. I eyed Chungwoo, impressed. The more I felt like I belonged to this group, the more my repulsion toward him disappeared.

Hmm. This is good news. The way I felt about him had returned to what it was before the big reveal, I had to admit, if only to myself.

Ahyeon was nodding eagerly next to me, his eyes gleaming.

“F-from now on... L-let’s be sure to t-talk to each other when things get tough!”

“Yeah.”

A warm mood suffused the practice room. The staff quietly mourned that they hadn’t been able to get it on camera, but we soon resumed our practice.

A few days passed similarly.

“Ah.”

There were no traces of “Magical Boys” in the music video for Miry-nay’s title track when it was released.

“The first draft still had a short video using the magical concept as a cutscene in the middle! I was very worried, and it’s thanks to you that everything worked out! Thank you!”

The Miry-nay member sent me a message through our managers, sounding as though she wanted to prostrate herself at my feet

Neatly done. The articles that tried to connect Miry-nay and TeSTAR in some way, which had been subtly encouraged by the agency, vanished from the front pages of the many portal websites.

TeSTAR fans, seeing that no more unpleasant articles had appeared, decided T1 was just being T1 and moved on for now. All their interest had now turned to the subunit stages at the upcoming encore concert.

- Holy sh*t, Moon Puppy and Cha Kitty? They’re here to set a new standard for K-pop. Watch it or die

Reactions like this made me feel like I needed to practice even harder.

“Hahaha!”

Glancing at Eugene, who was laughing on his bed, I summoned the status window for the first time in a while. But I checked his first instead of mine.

I’ll compare our stats before we finalize our subunit stage and come up with a strategy. His stats had already been shockingly good before. It was time to see how much they’d changed.