Chapter 212

Chapter 212

I thought about the conversation after receiving the call from a T1 staff member.

So they want us to be on a global K-pop survival reality show… as mentors. Of course, there had been plenty of survival shows in the past that had tried to be global. Idol Inc. was one good example, always going on about how they were selecting global K-pop stars. The format of this show, however, was somewhat unique.

And it’s not being broadcast by Tnet, but as a NetFlux original. The show seemed to have been thrown together after Idol Inc. had enjoyed some popularity in English-speaking countries. The composition of the show was pretty experimental, but what mattered more was what we’d been offered in regard to it.

“If you agree to be on the show, we’ll create an exclusive team for you right away.”

It was a neat arrangement. An appearance on a variety show in exchange for an exclusive management team of our own wasn’t a bad trade.

And TeSTAR won’t be the only mentors there. I wasn’t the only one who thought this, since all the members agreed it seemed doable when I told them about it.

“Hmm… That doesn’t sound too bad.”

“So we’ll get a team if we just appear on the show? I think it’ll be a huge win for us in the long run!” Raebin said.

But there were some concerns as well.

“Uh… I don’t really like the production team for the show.”

“I-I’m not good enough… t-to teach anyone. W-will it really be all right?”

I’d expected these complaints, and most of them were handled reasonably.

“I don’t think you need to worry about that. You’re plenty good enough.”

“That’s right. Given the nature of the show, I don’t think the mentors will be under scrutiny anyway,” Big Sejin said. “Isn’t that right?”

“That’s right.”

It seemed that new idols serving as mentors were actually the selling point of the show. Better still for us, the format didn’t really lend itself to evil edits targeting the mentors. As for exactly what kind of program it was, we got a full explanation in a meeting with the production team after we accepted the offer.

“We’re going to find some people who hate K-pop and train them to be K-pop artists. It’s only going to be a temporary arrangement, of course, aimed at getting laughs.”

The members were all slightly taken aback to hear the premise.

They’re the same as ever. Even so, the production team was being so blatant about it. I hadn’t met Ryu Seorin in a while, and her eyes seemed to gleam. Despite TeSTAR’s popularity, her attitude had seemingly only grown even rougher. Maybe it just feels that way because she doesn’t need to sweet-talk us like when she was trying to cast us.

Chungwoo in particular seemed quite uncomfortable around her. Big Sejin, perhaps aware of this, quickly said, “So those who don’t know K-pop will get to know the genre and grow fond of it, right?”

“You could say that.”

Obviously, she meant that the show was going to be far more shocking and bigger in scale than all that, not that we had any reason to want details at this point. The production team had requested only one thing from us.

“You need to kill it on stage, no matter what.”

And that was the one thing we weren’t really worried about.

“We’ll do our best with the script to make you look good.”

“Right! We know how amazing you are, TeSTAR! It’ll be up to us to film you properly!”

A few of the other members of the production team jumped in to praise us, perhaps taken aback by Seorin’s directness.

Chungwoo, who’d been quiet so far, asked gently, “And you won’t make us seem haughty on the show?”

“Of course not…” Seorin replied calmly. I could see she was taken aback, though.

Ah. So you were trying to intimidate us earlier. She’d spoken so directly on purpose, afraid that TeSTAR, who had no reason to like this production team, might be uncooperative.

Maybe I should have guessed this was going to happen the moment they offered to make a dedicated management team for us if we joined the show. It meant everyone involved in the show had already been told that TeSTAR wouldn’t be overly enthusiastic about participating. But they didn’t seem capable of screwing around when we made it clear we were uncomfortable. T1 had obviously warned them thoroughly to be on their best behavior regarding us.

No worries about the editing, then. The production team wasn’t stupid. They wouldn’t turn against their parent company.

“We’ve already cast the mentors, including you, of course, from various popular K-pop groups...”

“Right.”

The meeting went smoothly after that and ended without any problems. Articles were released en-masse a few days later.

[K-pop partners with NetFlux to create large-scale survival variety show]

[Star-ridden cast guaranteed… What is this new NetFlux K-pop reality show?]

[NetFlux invests big in the K-pop variety show Know KPOP Now… Is it after a slice of the K-pop market?]

Perhaps wanting to be known as an independent studio, they had apparently gone out of their way to avoid mentioning T1 at all. Rumors about the cast rapidly began to spread all over the internet. I suspected many of these conversations were prearranged.

- The V group is going to be on the show

└ LOL in your dreams. Why would the most popular boy group in the country be on such a cheap variety show?

└ You must be an idiot. NetFlux isn’t cheap. They’re the ones who made the documentary about that group LOL

- I hear the cast is so big that it’s ridiculous, and there’s a lot of nasty talk going on among the industry people. I’m curious

- Mighty Studio? I heard this place is f*cking packed with people from Idol Inc. It’s going to be hella fun LOL

└ TSuns and Y*ngrin will be on it, too. I guess everyone from that show has been forced on board.

└ This is going to break the internet

- So what kind of show is it, exactly? Is it even an audition show? How are they going to do a survival show with a lineup like that?

This excitement would have cooled quickly if anyone knew that the cast wouldn’t be making extended appearances, since they were only mentors. But they didn’t, and it had everyone excited.

They were smart not to release the details. A huge variety of idols’ names were being mentioned, but the articles about the exact cast were on embargo as the first day of filming approached. After an eleven-hour flight to LA, I realized the rumors had been right.

“Hey.”

F*ck.

VTIC was really here—but only Cheongryeo.

He wasn’t on the list we were told about in advance. I heard later that he agreed at the last minute and was flown over in a private jet. I couldn’t be sure, but it seemed reasonable to assume that one of the less popular mentors had been cut from the show as a result.

“I didn’t think you’d appear in an audition show as a mentor, especially when there are so many other idols already on this show, too.”

And this is a variety show, to boot.

Cheongryeo gave me the answer I’d been expecting. “Oh, I’ll be releasing a solo album soon. This will allow me to promote overseas.”

I had nothing to say to this.

“As you suggested, I’ve turned my attention outside the group. Haha.”

“Right.”

How did he manage to convince his agency? The agency hadn’t once budged, even when the fans regularly sent protest trucks, demanding solo activities from the members. But now they had let him join this show. Had he threatened to leave the group otherwise?

Wait a second… Don’t tell me it’s his doing that the group never released any solo albums. Maybe he’d forced such an arrangement so the members would focus only on their group activities.

Not that it’s any of my business, of course. I didn’t really care if he was on the show, though it was a bit annoying.

“Park Moondae! Let’s sit down!” Bae Sejin hollered.

“Right.”

I returned to my seat in our booth and sat down. Bae Sejin immediately covered his microphone and whispered, “Wh-why does that bastard keep talking to you?”

“I know, right? Does he want his skull crushed, I wonder?”

It was nice to have such strong moral support from the members who knew about the incident during my vacation.

This isn’t so bad. To be entirely honest, I didn’t care if the show flopped. It would be the production team’s fault if that happened despite having such an expensive cast. They couldn’t blame it on TeSTAR. More importantly, the agency had given the go-ahead to create an exclusive team for us yesterday. All we needed to do now was select suitable staff as our promotional cycle drew to a close.

That’s good enough for me. We’d profited where we could from the deal, so all I wanted now was to avoid criticism for being on the show. I resented the time we’d been forced to waste on the plane, but everything worked out in the end since we would film some stuff in America while we were here.

After reading the script, all the ire will definitely go to the other cast members. I wondered if the Idol Inc. production team were actually demons from hell.

“Standby!”

“Okay!”

The mentors were all standing around watching monitors where the contestants could be seen. They were following the script.

“I’m ready to be famous!”

“People might say it’s not cool, but I do lie to get likes on social media. Doesn’t everybody?”

“I want people to know me and just completely adore me. I’ll do anything to make that happen.”

The Korean subtitles on the screen, translating the English dialogue, made it clear exactly what kind of people they were. To put it simply, they were attention whores.

They could easily be considered people willing to sell their souls to become celebrities. The producers had apparently recruited contestants by saying celebrities would teach them how to be famous. There was another criterion that the production team had searched out without telling them—their musical preferences.

“K-pop? Nope! I don’t... uh... listen to that sort of thing. Never! Haha.”

“In school, you know? I know lots of kids listen to that sort of music in school.”

As Ryu Seorin had said, they disliked K-pop. Perhaps disliked was too soft a word. It was more like they disdained the genre. Eugene had given off similar vibes when he’d first talked about the American talk show we’d appeared on thanks to the game collab.

“Oh man, that’s mean!”

It was funny to hear him say this as he stared into the monitor. In any case, this meant the storyline of the show had already been decided. The contestants would appear on the reality show, hoping to become global stars through NetFlux, only to experience the harsh reality of K-pop training.

This is probably why she emphasized that we needed to impress on stage. Apparently, they wanted to see the contestants gaping in shock and declaring they would never dismiss K-pop again.

It’ll please anyone with a drop of national pride back home, that’s for sure. And it would also be a huge draw for overseas K-pop fans as well. It was up to the production team, of course, to keep the show from feeling cringy and give it widespread appeal somehow.

“Interesting.”

“I suppose they might hate it! That’s fair enough!”

The mentors looked pretty relaxed as they commentated, staring at the screens. All of us had known to expect this.

To be honest, I think it’s likely that the contestants already know about the entire arrangement, too. Not that it was any of my concern. All we needed to do was focus on our given role—appearing in teams by rising on the stage lifts as the contestants waited excitedly to see what celebrities were coming to see them. We would be accompanied by the fancy stage effects that overseas audiences connected with K-pop.

Fireworks went off.

“Please welcome them with a round of applause! These are the seven-star K-pop groups that will teach you how to be famous!” shouted the voice of the AI emcee sponsored by Oseong Life Insurance.

Fabric dropped from the ceiling, and the truth appeared on the large screen.

[Welcome to the ☆K-POP Training Camp☆]

As expected, the contestants’ reactions were not pleasant.

“Wow.”

“No way!”

But the recording moved on immediately from the contestants, who acted confused and bitter, putting on an exaggerated show of being surprised or forcing themselves to smile.

There’s no time. There was only so much time the show could afford to linger on all seven popular idol groups. Most of the mentors stepped off stage, with only a few of them changing into new clothes to actually appear on the show. In the meantime, the contestants were given instructions about the new content. This segment was called the Intro Stage.

“This challenge is designed to allow you to win the reality show on the spot and leave, if you wish, even before you enter the camp!”

In short, if they couldn’t accept that these K-pop stars were to be their mentors, they could simply win against us and get their prize money right away. I was the first person up.

“Please come on in, mentors!”

The set-up for the competition was childish but probably entertaining.

“You’ll have a hundred citizens from LA selected at random as your audience. You’ll be singing the same songs as the mentors!”

“These songs won’t be K-pop, of course... but English songs you selected ahead of time! I’m sure you all chose your best songs!”

“The mentors will learn what these songs are right now!”

It would be a humbling experience for the contestants.