Do You Want to Be Special? (5)

Cutting to Lee Doha's POV for a moment.

Lee Doha was, honestly, just happy to have run into a friend his own age who fit his taste for once.

He knew Taehyun had cleared his stuff out of the dorm to quit being a trainee, carrying some serious hurt (Doha didn't know exactly what had happened). (They'd been dorm roommates, after all.) And he'd picked up on the fact that Hajin had played a big part in bringing him back — Taehyun had been stuck to Hajin ever since.

Taehyun came off easygoing with everyone, but the truth was he drew a hard line between his people and everyone else. Watching Hajin handle a Taehyun like that the way a butler handles a cat he's tamed, one thought filled Doha's head:

'I want us to be close!'

Kang Hajin hadn't been a stranger to Lee Doha in the first place. Before Hajin ever set foot in Miro, Miro staffers who'd already seen him had been dropping comments to Doha one after another.

'A friend the same age as you is coming in — apparently ridiculously talented.'

'Taeil vouched for him and Team Lead Ji personally scouted him, so, y'know, the skills…'

'Position's vocal too, they said. Doha — did you finally find someone besides Siwoo to do guide vocals for you?'

Amid all the chatter, one word stuck in Lee Doha's ear.

Guide vocal….

Guide vocal…?

Guide vocal…!

'Get close, ask for guide vocals…!'

Skills he'd honed on his own since childhood had gotten recognized, and Doha had gratefully been getting to learn more producing and composition at Miro while working on his own tracks — but sadly, he was a real hip-hop kid who hadn't even tried the singing rap trending these days.

For rap-only tracks it didn't matter, but the moment he'd committed to being an idol, he couldn't just keep writing rap-only songs. Up till now he'd been asking Jung Siwoo — the best vocalist in the special class, and the one he was closest to — but he'd been starting to feel like leaning on the same person forever wasn't quite polite.

And then, right in the middle of all that — a new guide-vocal candidate had shown up!

'If sunbae Taeil vouched for him, the skills go without saying.'

On top of that, this was a vocalist his most respected sunbae — Seo Taeil, the very man who'd made him pivot from real hip-hop to idol life — had wanted for himself. How could he not want in?

Which was why:

"So, to get to it — I was hoping you could play me some of your work first."

In Hajin — who'd marched into his studio out of nowhere and told him to play his tracks — Lee Doha caught the exact scent of a boss demanding to see a new hire's half-baked proposal just to grill them on it.

"……"

"…Lee Doha?"

"Oh, y-yeah."

"Hey, watch it!"

Tense in a way that wasn't like him, Doha fumbled around helplessly. He'd logged hundreds of hours in this studio — he could place every object with his eyes closed — but in his fluster, spinning a chair hit the shelf, and the stacked albums came crashing down.

"Sorry — I'll pick them up."

"No. I'm the one who barged into your tiny studio."

After we fumbled the albums back into a stack, another awkward silence settled in. Doha, for his part, was dying to know how Hajin would react to his work and unable to sit still; and Hajin, for his own reasons, had plenty on his own mind.

At that moment, one thing had taken over Kang Hajin's head:

'What the hell is with this bastard?'

The single data panel in front of him.

label: Lee Doha (Affiliation: Miro) Vocals: 17% (Rap 64%) Dance: 47% Expression: 35% Special: Composition, Producing (34%) Appeal Point: 'Steel heart' — Delivery, on-stage adaptability, performance actualization (80%)

'What garbage numbers is he squatting on a special-class spot with?'

Not one score cleared 50%, unless you counted the performance-actualization thing under Special. Was this supposed to make sense? Either Miro had lost its mind or the System had — one of the two.

Hajin decided to listen to Doha's tracks first. If, matching the numbers, this bastard's work was garbage, then Lee Doha's special-class squat was on the Head of Department, and he'd have to rework the strategy on the spot.

"It's fine — just play me the most recent thing you've been working on. You were in the special class so I don't know your stuff well; I'm just trying to get a sense of what kind of music you usually work on."

At my long-winded explanation, Doha finally got that huge hand of his moving and grabbed the mouse. Looking oddly nervous, he said "So this isn't the finished version, just…" about eighty-two times, and only after I reassured him about a hundred and twenty-one times that I'd take all that into account did I finally get to hear Lee Doha's first track.

♬♪♬♩—

Over an emotional piano melody, a grounding drum beat layered in, one part at a time. Lyrics didn't seem to be down yet — a smooth-voiced hum floated in something that was neither English nor Korean.

"Is that you? The voice?"

"No, Siwoo-hyung. He always helps me with my guides."

Over the crisp, popping sound, a low voice and cleanly articulated rap laid on top. Still not the finished lyrics either, by the look of it — gaps here and there — but just from that, Hajin already knew.

'This is fucking good.'

The kind of wistful-refreshing sound you'd never dream came out of some hole-in-the-wall Miro studio. This is what a trainee who hasn't even debuted put together? I'd have grabbed him and refused to let him leave, too.

But Hajin still couldn't ignore the disconnect with the numbers sitting right in front of him.

"Sorry — could I hear another one? Ideally one with the lyrics all done."

"…Was it bad?"

No, it's weird that it's fucking good, punk.

…couldn't exactly say that out loud, so once again Hajin locked in the social-life smile and shook his head.

"No, it's good — I just want to hear a lot to get a feel for your taste. Your rap style too. If possible, one where the rap's finished."

The sharp, hard glare Lee Doha had been leveling at me softened a little.

This kid — bracing himself that hard because he was worried I'd tell him his song was bad? Saying it again: a lot of Miro's trainees have really intense faces, and when they set out to stare you down like that, it was genuinely scary.

"Hmm… then this one."

Lee Doha considered for a moment, then played another file.

A beat, echoing weakly like it was being played underwater, gradually swelled — and then dropped into a heavily effected, tearing electric guitar. And a soaring, fast, high-pitched melody burst through.

Hwweeeeeo—!

An easy-to-catch whistle came in next, and a band sound rushed on. Just listening called up the image of a tightly drilled boy-group choreo. As the tempo kept climbing and the beat splintered, and even the listener was starting to feel breathless—

Shhhh—,

every sound sank away again as if plunged underwater, followed by a slow bass and a heavy voice laying on top.

In the night that fell apart by a hair's breadth, melodies shattered past counting.

More lyrical than expected. Low voice, rapping neither fast nor slow. Delivery that never dropped even under the weight of that heavy voice, and lyrics laced with just-right wordplay.

Here, Kang Hajin was certain.

'This crazy bastard's fucking good…?'

There was no way this wasn't a bug from that little System bastard.

---

'Let's think this through.'

Drifting out of Doha's studio in a daze and ending up back not at Room A but at Ju Eunchan's place first, Hajin lay down on the sofa that had by now practically become his own and thought.

'Right — there were some numbers that didn't quite add up.'

Come to think of it, Seo Taeil's and Seo Taehyun's numbers hadn't been easy to swallow either. The fact that they showed up as percentages at all was a little weird. Normally isn't this kind of thing high/mid/low? Or the usual absolute A/B/C/D grade?

"Lee Doha's dance is in the 30s and Seo Taehyun's is only 67 — how does that make sense?"

Hajin had already gotten his groupmates' regular practice videos and finished going through all of them. Lee Doha's dance wasn't the disaster he'd expected — but there was no way it should sit at a full 2x gap behind a Seo Taehyun who'd fought his way to a survival final.

"What's the benchmark. The benchmark."

The system window went dead silent, of course — right when it mattered most. Wondering how he could get away with smacking that thing just once, he pulled up the three sets of data again.

label: Seo Taeil (Group: Upia) Vocals: 93% Dance: 83% Expression: 91% Special: Composition, Producing (63%) Appeal Point: 'The world is in the palm of my hand!' — Leadership, charisma, stage command label: Seo Taehyun (Affiliation: Miro) Vocals: 45% Dance: 67% Expression: 52% Special: Acting, Showman Streak (82%) Appeal Point: 'Your eyes go straight to him, guaranteed!' — Tone, dance lines, stage expression label: Lee Doha (Affiliation: Miro) Vocals: 17% (Rap 64%) Dance: 47% Expression: 35% Special: Composition, Producing (34%) Appeal Point: 'Steel heart' — Delivery, on-stage adaptability, performance actualization (80%)

Peering carefully at the system window and lining the numbers up against their actual skills, Hajin cycled through hypothesis after hypothesis, drawing them up and crossing them out. When do percentages usually get used? Somewhere around the seventh strikethrough—

"Ah, right. Battery. Should've charged it."

Hajin picked up his phone to check the messenger over all those alarms going off, saw the battery, and clicked his tongue. Then, remembering he'd left his charger back at the practice room, he was getting up from the sofa to grab the spare at Eunchan's place — right at that moment.

"…Percentage."

Another hypothesis flashed into view. A benchmark that would actually make sense with percentages.

"It's showing how much of it has been actualized. Out of the ability they have, what percentage they're actually putting on display."

And as if it had been waiting for exactly those words, a hologram — fanfare and glittering gold coins raining down — popped up in front of me.

(≧∇≦)/Correct—! Skill 〈Behold with the Dragon's Eye〉 (LV.1)'s comprehension increases. Skill 〈Behold with the Dragon's Eye〉 (LV.1) ▶ (LV.2) levels up! A penalty is incurred from the creation of Skill 〈Behold with the Dragon's Eye〉. Replace the penalty for Skill 〈Behold with the Dragon's Eye〉 with cash? Existing penalty — Mental Care System 5% reduction / Replacement cash: 300 cash

"Prices keep going up, huh?"

The System shakes its head, insisting it's already running this at a loss. Guaranteed you won't find another System giving deals this good!

"The reality patches keep coming out strange too…"

For a second I got the illusion of running into a fruit-stand ajusshi at a traditional market and my whole body shuddered.

Three hundred cash. Steep, but not so steep I'd break down bawling like last time — I paid up, grimacing. Soon a cheerful transaction chime rang out.

I went back to looking at the stat window spread out in front of me. Now then—

'…these bastards really are actual monsters.'

Once I had the proper benchmark, the whole angle of the analysis shifted. New facts started to surface accordingly, and I—

'How am I supposed to beat these bastards?'

I lost every ounce of motivation. God fucking damn it.