Chapter 47

The moment I heard Park Jaeyoung had collapsed, exactly one thing crossed my mind.

'Is this that bastard's doing?'

The unidentifiable red System window. Was it calling this — Park Jaeyoung getting sick and collapsing — a chance? Or wait — did it actually make a perfectly healthy kid sick just to test me?

Is now really the time to be nitpicking about that? Probably not.

"Hyung, just — hurry! The PD's looking for you!"

Before I could parse anything else about this sudden situation, the trainees pulling me along dragged me off. We ended up in front of a fifth-floor practice room.

"Ah, Hajin-ssi."

"Hajin's here?"

"Yes. Jaeyoung — why? What happened?"

The second I spotted Ji Suho standing beside Voluntary-Resignation, I asked — and Ji Suho held up a hand toward me, calm down. But no way was I calming down.

"Just a seasonal cold and body aches. Nothing serious, but the fever spiked pretty high…. He's on an IV at the ER, resting."

"Ah…"

"More to the point — the mentor evaluation. Looks like we'll have to go on without Jaeyoung-gun."

No wonder a camera was rolling. My brain kicked into overdrive. Inside my head, a preview clip edited from our current predicament was already playing on loop.

〈Miro Maze's underdogs, all rounded up on Team B! The midpoint check that shattered expectations and drew rave reviews. But on the day of the mentor evaluation — a shocking turn of events!? Redistribute parts in three hours! Just how will Team B claw their way out of this crisis?!〉

Oh, you write well.

After quitting as an AD, I'd picked up some caption-writing gigs on the side. No — that wasn't the point right now.

"We need you to quickly reorganize things, Jaeyoung-gun's parts included. Even if the performance video ends up going with the version he's in, for today…"

"…Yes, understood. Would it be alright if I gathered the guys, we talked it out, sorted things, and I got back to you?"

"Yes, yes, of course. We've got this practice room set up, so if you want to run through anything extra, do that, and once the parts are revised, just let the writer know."

"Yes."

Too much churning in my head to keep my expression in check. Where was Park Jaeyoung's part again. Where were his choreo cues, his positions. Who could sub for him — our team's practice video, which I'd replayed dozens of times, auto-looped in my head.

"Hyung, what do we do. There's less than three hours left…"

"When are we changing all the positions."

"Hey. Keep it down."

But there was no time to just stand there dazed.

"Call the guys. Every one of them, all in. Fast."

---

The one small mercy was that Park Jaeyoung was sub-vocal 3, so the volume of parts that needed covering wasn't huge.

'Guess I should be grateful he wasn't a core member like Seok-hyung.'

Cross-checking the part-lyric sheet and the position-reading sheet over and over, I got pissed off all over again. Sure, narrative might matter in a survival show — but a surprise-twist narrative like this, I didn't need and didn't want.

Plus.

'There's no one else fit to take it on.'

Rebalance around positions and some of them would end up with too many parts to manage their breath control; rebalance around skill and the position rework was a massive overhaul.

"First…. we've got to make a choice."

"……"

"Between doing a big overhaul on positions and taking on the extra parts — which is faster. From where I'm standing, positions is the better call."

The Team B guys, gathered in a ring around me, visibly flinched at that. But my call had reasons.

"The positions all have to get redone anyway. We're going from an odd- to an even-numbered formation."

Going from a nine-member setup to an eight-member setup is harder than going from nine to seven. Because the whole structure of the formation has to shift. That alone would blow these guys' heads open — piling more parts on top of that? No way.

'Not even sure they can all memorize the lyrics anyway.'

"So first, if we redo the formations, staying out of the way of the choreo direction as much as we can—"

"Uh, Hajin-ah."

"Yeah. What's up, Seok-hyung? Say it fast."

"What if… you just did it?"

Just as I was about to lay out the plan I'd been grinding my brain over, Gong Seok cut in and my next words went dead. Silence hung in the practice room. The guy who'd spoken used that pause to add a few more words.

"You… you already know all the lyrics. You sang them out loud in every practice while you were correcting us. And you've got the fewest parts right now. You taking on all of Jaeyoung's parts — that seems like the fastest way. What do you think?"

Nothing to say came to mind. And as if to hurry me along, the goddamn System window blocked my view again.

title: Su?dden Que?st! I gave you a chance. Take it. penalty: Mental Care System destruction −1000000000000000000000000000000%

This little—

"Yeah, better if Hajin-hyung just takes them."

"Hajin-hyung, you take it. Honestly, if not you, who else?"

Whether they trusted me or were shoving responsibility off onto me, my teammates' voices came at me one after another. I looked at the System window in front of me, and the guys sitting in front of me.

"Hajin-ah. Please."

"Hyung, please. We seriously don't have time to change positions."

"Hajin-gun, parts not settled yet? Time's running out!"

Pressure was coming in from every side. My head throbbed.

"…We've settled them just now."

"Yes, yes. If you'd hand over the revised part sheet, then—"

"No need."

"Huh?"

"I'll be taking them. All of Park Jaeyoung's parts."

Once this is over — I'm smashing everything. For real.

---

The Miro Maze mentors arrived one after another for the mentor evaluation. Miro's training staff, along with MC Seo Taeil and the star-power guest mentors he'd pulled in through his connections for the first mission, gathered on set for the script read.

"Yo, Seo Taeil~ you're basically great-great-grandpa now."

"Great-great-grandpa? Please. My babies call me hyung."

"Bit shameless, aren't we, Mr. Thirteen-Years-In?"

"Coming from the godmother of the girl-group scene? Kids these days don't even know you're in Themis, right?"

"Yeah. There was a post recently. 'Wait, you guys knew Ria was in a girl group?'"

Ria, main vocalist of Rene's girl group Themis, was one of those guest mentors. Her group had debuted after Taeil's Upia, but as one of the few remaining industry peers his exact age, they went back a long way.

"Anyway, thanks. For saying yes right away."

"Please, us? I was bored anyway, worked out great. Bit bittersweet, though — realizing I'm at the tier where I get cast as a mentor on shows like this."

"The kids are solid. Not just because they're mine — they really are. Today'll be fun."

At Taeil's confident line, Ria nodded. Ah, actually, I read through the evaluation sheet on the way here.

"By the way, there's a kid who auditioned at our place, right? Seoyun-unnie brought him over?"

"Ah, Hajin."

"On the way here, Seoyun-unnie kept — kept — hammering on how I should watch him closely. He that good?"

At Ria's question, Taeil paused a beat, like he was thinking.

"He is good… just, how do I put it…."

"Why? Come on, don't leave me hanging."

"You'll see for yourself. He took the fewest parts again this round, so I said something. Wonder if he revised it."

Thinking back to the midpoint check the other day, Taeil shrugged. Ria didn't know the details, but she could plainly see this was a hoobae Taeil clearly cared about — which struck her as pretty surprising. Then, to check out the trainee in question, she rifled through the evaluation sheet on her desk.

"Yeah? Hope he does well. I heard he sang one of my songs at his audition."

"One of yours?"

"Yeah. Seoyun-unnie said there's a fan of mine over in New Talent Development too, and she was really pushing me to watch him carefully today. So I was a little curious…. Hm?"

Ria, who'd been chattering with anticipation at Taeil's words, cut herself off. Reading through the revised part-lyric sheet and the evaluation sheet on the desk, she tilted her head and turned to Taeil.

"Did you just say his name was Hajin?"

"Yeah. Kang Hajin."

"He's got the most parts, though."

"……? What are you talking about."

Confused by Ria's out-of-nowhere line, Taeil rifled back through the paper in front of him. And confirmed it. Hajin's name, scattered across the entire lyric sheet.

"Huh?"

"Right? Ah… someone got sick and dropped. Wow — if he's swallowing all those parts on his own, he'd better be seriously good."

"Yeah. So Jaeyoung's the one who's out…"

Now clocking the situation, Taeil furrowed his brow. Play this wrong and viewers would peg him as a power-abusing leader who overreached, got greedy, and tanked the team mission.

'Do well and it's break-even, mess up and it's a total wipeout. This has time bomb written all over it.'

Taeil — quietly (actually, openly) rooting for Hajin's debut — let out a worried sigh and looked over at the trainees just walking onto the set. Practice must have been brutal — face had noticeably slimmed down, not a trace of puffiness left. He'd probably been skipping meals under all that stress!

'Well, thanks to losing some weight, though — his clothes hang better than before.'

Not knowing that said physique and build had been built out of the tear-soaked parade-ground sprints of a Kang Hajin who, in his third life, had been furious about having to re-enlist, Taeil nodded and kept observing Hajin.

'Does the hair down look suit him better? Today, oddly…'

He looked better-looking than usual, somehow. As the last of the puffiness drained away, the sharpness of his monolid eyes hit its peak. He didn't look like he'd taken heavy makeup, but compared to the other trainees around him, the eye definitely gravitated to him.

"Wait, that him? Kang Hajin?"

"Yeah. Third one over."

"Visuals aren't bad. But I can see why your agency didn't sign him."

"And you can see why our agency was killing itself trying to sign him, right?"

"Yeah, you guys really… love that kind of face."

"Taeil-ssi, we're about to start recording… please head to your starting position."

"Ah, yes."

At the staffer's word, Taeil picked up his cue card, stood, and headed for his MC spot. Which was just the center of the mentors' bench, granted. Soon the surroundings quieted and the lighting was set. On the prompter's cue, Taeil launched into the opening.

"You who would touch the sun — fly high. Your journey to become Miro's Icarus! The first mentor evaluation begins now. Trainees, are you ready to show us your first Daylight?"

"Yes!"

"Too quiet — are you ready?"

"Yes—!"

At the roaring response, Taeil finally nodded, satisfied, and moved on to the next line. As it happened, the next question was aimed at Hajin.

"Team B leader trainee Kang Hajin. You closed out the first month-end evaluation at tenth place, just short of Wings class. How's practice been, as Team B leader?"

"……"

Watching Hajin struggle to answer, Taeil sighed internally. Production really was ruthless. He'd done broadcasts plenty of times himself, and every time he had to ask a question like this, it made him cringe.

In this kind of setup, the trainee would say something like — he'd narrowly missed Wings class, but he'd met great guys in Feather class, been able to practice well, and would show them what he had, and there really wasn't anything else to—

"Uhck."

Huh? Uhck?