Chapter 204

Chapter 204

TeSTAR’s Idol Working Holiday had gotten great reviews on WeTube and become pretty well known among overseas K-pop fans as well.

- So at this shop, we simply have to say the word “hotteok” to get TeSTAR to smile at us? (crying face emoji)

- The Loviewers shout, “obviously” every time a customer says TeSTAR is handsome

- Anonymous: In Asia, they’re most talented with chopsticks

Raebin: measures thirty grams with just his hands

Anonymous:

- Nobody’s talking about how kind Chungwoo is. Everyone’s only talking about how hot he is (face with tears of joy emoji)

Many believed that TeSTAR, who’d made an impression overseas with their game collab song and “Present,” had opened the way for much more foreign fan engagement through the reality show. However, this did not mean we had enough clout now to be considered mainstream internationally, of course. We were simply recognized by those who were fans of K-pop, and that was all.

That was why I’d wondered what it meant that we’d been featured on an American show, and assumed that perhaps our hotteok had gone viral. After I looked into it, however, I realized that something I hadn’t expected at all had garnered a lot of interest. Something rather trivial.

“Here! Look!”

Eugene showed me a short video as soon as I got to the dorm. It was circulating on social media with English subtitles, and was a scene from season two of the reality show when we’d eaten with Eugene’s mother.

Because we divided up into teams, Eugene, Chungwoo, and I had joined her for the meal, but it had been rather… special.

[“I won a lucky draw! It would be nice if we went together.”]

We’d eaten a free meal provided by an American cooking survival show. The production team had excitedly worked out the details and filmed us for a bit, but frankly, the whole experience hadn’t been all that comfortable.

[“Wait, Chungwoo, that’s not cooked properly.”]

[“Yeah?”]

[“Oh my, let’s ask that it be cooked, then!”]

Chungwoo had ordered a white fish dish, but he sent it back to the kitchen after realizing it wasn’t fully cooked. A loud shout had followed shortly after.

[“This fish is so cold, I’m getting frostbite just looking at it!”]

I supposed survival shows were mostly similar everywhere. It was an interesting experience and one that reminded me of the days when the trainers had verbally abused us on Idol Inc. whenever we messed up.

This scene had apparently been shown on the cooking show without any edits. There was a slight misunderstanding, though, since the show had taken us to be brothers.

Eugene’s mother had written, My son is finally coming home, and I’d like to eat with him :) when she applied for the free meal. This gave the rebuke some unintended context.

[“You see those customers out there? They’ve been working overseas, and this is their first time eating with their mother at home in over a year!”]

[“You’re ruining their precious meal together!”]

[“Enough! All of you, out of my kitchen! Now!”]

Apparently, the judges had this to say. A clip that had shown our faces, visibly unconcerned despite the ruckus in the kitchen, was the icing on the cake.

[“Reminds me of old times.”]

[“You’re right.”]

The dialogue had even kindly been given subtitles. Our calm conversation had contrasted with the chaos in the kitchen and apparently made for quite a funny moment. The result was a meme about Asians that was briefly popular on the internet.

- There’s a reason Asian starts with A LOL

Comments like this had spread quickly, as people seemed to believe that an American survival show was a walk in the park to Asians with their intense daily lives. All this had probably very easily caught the attention of K-pop fans who knew about TeSTAR.

- My god, that’s TeSTAR

- Idiots! They won a real survival show haha

- They were talking about their experience on that show! This misunderstanding is hilarious (rolling on the floor laughing emoji)

- This same scene has already come out in their own reality show (link)

- It’s so interesting to see Moondae, who’s such a great cook himself, notice that the fish wasn’t fully cooked

- Their survival show had some absurd rules. I’m so proud of TeSTAR for pushing through it ♡

The incident was talked about online among the Americans thanks to its interesting twist. That wasn’t all there was to it, however—the climax of the whole affair was that it had nearly become a controversy.

- Am I the only one who thinks it’s racist that they just assumed Asians who are about the same age are brothers?

It was explained later that this misunderstanding was owing to Cha Eugene’s mom, but the scene seemed to go viral thanks to all the press, humorous and otherwise, it received.

[“In this segment, we introduce some famous stories that have been trending on the internet!”]

In the end, it was covered briefly on the news, in a segment that dealt with internet gossip. The video Eugene showed me was from this show.

“It’s so cool!”

“I guess you’re right.”

It was interesting, all the different ways people ended up going viral online. I wasn’t sure if this was worth getting so excited over, but maybe it was funnier if your native language was English.

Eugene hummed “Shining Star” under his breath as he explored an English website, and I shook my head, heading to the kitchen.

“Moondae, there’s more barley tea here. I’ll be generous and let you have some!”

Generous, my ass.

“I’m good.”

“No way. Are you refusing my mom’s kindness?”

I gritted my teeth and took the barley tea from the fridge. Big Sejin laughed out loud.

Darn it. It was annoying, but this situation was only possible because we were all relaxing in the dorm despite it being midday.

I haven’t felt so relaxed in a while. This was one nice consequence of having the system’s goddamned truth reveal pushed back for a while. There would probably be no problems as long as I put some more effort into working on our comeback single starting the day after tomorrow.

The song’s already done. We’ll just have to do the final edits. The single was meant partly as fan service and partly to see just how much we’d grown since the reality show. It would fall somewhere between the group’s recent emphasis on concepts and our next full album. If things went according to plan, the latter half of our promotional cycle would overlap with college festivals, which would help me fill up the status abnormality quota considerably.

Good. Things seemed peaceful enough in the short term, with the exception of the nutty game system, the actions of which I could never seem to predict. I had no idea, of course, that a rude awakening would hit the very next day—we received word that the director had lost his mind.

***

The problem was the American meme. Naturally, it hadn’t become a truly viral meme or anything, since it resonated with only a few people. The popularity had died down quickly. But a handful of people online had continued to take an interest in it.

- I’m a VTIC fan to the core, but I’m interested in TeSTAR, too.

- I was wondering about how popular Burning Chefs is among foreigners, so I looked up their show. It has over ten million views! (Screen capture of the first episode of Idol Working Holiday)

- They’re called TeSTAR? Who knew I’d be searching for a K-pop group on the internet? (laughing face emoji)

- That sort of survival show were they on that they were reminded of old times by such harsh criticism?

People who were interested in K-pop to begin with, as well as bored netizens looking for new stimulation, had dug a little deeper. In the end, they discovered Relisted! Idol Incorporated on NetFlux.

- I found the survival show they were on. It had a negative voting system! My god (shocked GIF)

A small American following had formed in online communities, centered around the show. While it might not have been perfectly to their tastes, Idol Inc. was provocative, if nothing else. And chatter had kicked off about it for a bit.

- So they reveal the hate vote rankings as well. It’s crazy

- They have to vote for only one person on the team who’ll get to survive no matter what? We need this system on American shows XD

└ You’ve lost your mind

└ There’s absolutely no need to implement it here. Just so you know, Korean TV is full of survival shows like this…

This new popularity wasn’t enough for the show to appear on the popular shows of the day on American NetFlux. However, any American viewer who’d watched at least one Korean drama or variety show was now recommended Idol Inc. by the algorithm.

The director seemed to have interpreted all this a little differently, however. He thought that his idea to use the reality show to attract American audiences had actually succeeded. The reality show itself wasn’t growing popular over there, and his idea had been altered before it even reached production, but he’d probably forgotten that already.

Actually, no. He probably thinks the show would have been even more popular if we hadn’t changed his original idea… An executive filled with conviction that he’d been right and giddy with a sense of accomplishment was no different from a train going off the rails. This was exacerbated by the fact that Miry-nay had debuted fairly successfully.

F*ck. Fortunately, the head of the Management Office seemed to be doing his best to discredit the director. It felt worth all the trouble I’d gone to, that I already had someone chipping away at him.

“The head of the office says nobody who steals credit due to an artist should manage a company,” said the third manager, the head in question’s cousin, reading lazily from a text on his phone.

“Wow.”

Looks like they’ve grown to become real enemies now. I hoped that they continued to fight among themselves as planned, and nothing got done at all. This would all blow over once we released our single and began our promotions.

Just fend him off for four more weeks.

“I’m grateful he’s so considerate to us.”

“Well, yeah,” manager number three said, sounding disinterested. Then he returned to his phone game.

He really has no interest in this line of work, does he? At least he made sure to do anything we asked him to, without making any excuses. He was more useful than our first manager. Better still, his lack of social experience meant he’d often show us texts like this one, not knowing it was improper to share them.

“Let’s get moving, guys.”

“All right.”

The first manager, on the other hand, seemed extremely stressed by the changes to his environment. He screwed around far less, which was also a positive change. The new chief manager was excellent at his job, too.

Chungwoo still does too much, though. The two road managers who accompanied us only did as they were told, which meant their leader still had to take charge of many things. The correct arrangement would have been for the managers to look into everything themselves, so Chungwoo would only have to give feedback.

I’ll have to hunt down some skilled employees for the team that manages TeSTAR. I would take my time in making it happen. For now, preparations for the next promotional cycle came first. Our current meeting was regarding the clothes we’d wear during promotions.

“I want to do red hair!” Eugene said.

“Sure. As you like, Eugene.”

“Hehe.”

“Sejin… Bae Sejin. How would you like to try a slightly brighter hair color? We think it would look great on you,” a staff member said.

“I think it’ll look weird—I mean, I’ll do it if necessary, but…”

“We’re not forcing you to do anything! We thought a makeover might be nice.”

“That sounds great! How about getting some piercings? What do you say, Moondae?” Lee Sejin suggested mischievously.

“You get all the piercings you want,” I said.

“S-so you d-don’t like piercings?” Ahyeon asked.

“I neither like them nor dislike them. Do you like them?” I asked.

“N-no! I’ve never gotten one…”

“Wow. Look at you, Moondae. So biased.”

Given that we had more say overall than before, the opinions of the members themselves regarding the hair and makeup were being taken into consideration more often.

“Good work, guys!”

“See you in two days!”

Hmm. Piercings, huh? After the meeting was over, I mulled over everything that hadn’t been decided on yet as we made our way toward the recording booths.

“Uh, I’m sorry about this, but do you have a moment to come into the Management Office?”

“Oh. Sure.”

A cautious summons came from the Management Office.

What’s this about? I had a bad feeling about the sudden request, and it appeared I was right to feel this way.

“Don’t you worry, TeSTAR!”

The head of the Management Office smiled eagerly as soon as he saw us.

Why is this bastard in such a great mood?

“I’m sure you’ve been quite distressed since the director continues to insist we should target American audiences with the next comeback.”

“Uh… It’s all right,” Chungwoo said uncertainly.

The director hadn’t actually told us to do anything like that, anyway. Also, we couldn’t exactly laugh along when the man was criticizing our boss in our faces. He put more emphasis on his words when he spoke again.

“No. It’s important to respect the abilities and wishes of the artist! In our most recent meeting, I got my message across for sure.”

“Huh?”

I was nonplussed. Had the man called us here to brag? But more importantly, I was pretty terrified of whatever message he had supposedly been championing. Then he dropped the bombshell.

“I told him that TeSTAR’s upcoming single would be popular in America, even if the director didn’t send you all over there!”

We stared.

“So TeSTAR, you don’t have to worry about debuting in the US. Just carry on working on the album just like before.”

You son of a b*tch. Now we’d have to turn a fan service single into a global hit.