Chapter 186: Reappraisal
Chapter 186: Reappraisal
—Doh, doh, doh—
The rhythm burst out together with the scatted intro.
Flower Deer rode that rhythm and glided across the stage.
It was not a sharply precise dance break like that of a professional dancer.
Rather, it was body movement with all the tension released, swaying lightly.
But it was full of groove.
“Wow...”
Olivia at the panel desk stared with her mouth open in admiration.
That was not something you could achieve through practice alone.
It was the kind of innate groove and flexibility that made it seem as though each individual joint had been entrusted to the music.
And what about the singing?
It was a funky dance song, but by no means one with a low vocal range.
Even so, Flower Deer produced a strong, stable sound without the slightest hint of strain.
Then again, for that person, something like this must be child’s play.
Had they not already shown a monstrous vocal range capable of handling even a female soprano register?
There was no way a pitch like this could leave them short of breath.
If anything, the more excited they became, the more refreshingly the high notes stretched out.
...At this level of skill, it has to be someone I know.
She quickly ran through the list of famous pop singers in her head.
But she simply could not picture the face beneath the mask.
Since the voice changed so freely, she could not even tell which one was the real voice.
—Come on!
Flower Deer gestured forward.
At that, audience members started rising from their seats one by one.
With the boundary between the stage and the audience completely broken down, everyone became one, jumping, shouting, and dancing.
The panel desk was no different.
They rose as well and started swaying their shoulders.
“Ah, whatever! Who cares who it is!”
Right now, the only answer was to just enjoy it.
“Whooo!!”
“Hahaha!”
“Yeeeeeah!”
Even after the stage ended, the heat did not die down easily.
People still had not come down from the excitement.
One after another, they were bouncing in place or grabbing the person next to them and shouting.
“Whoa! Whoa! Calm down, everyone! Please!”
The host broke into a cold sweat as he barely managed to calm them down and call for the vote.
The panel desk was a mess as well.
Catching their breath, they looked at one another’s faces.
“That was seriously insane...!”
“No, who on earth is that...?”
“Does anybody have any guesses?”
“None at all. I’ve never seen anyone like this, and I don’t even know which voice is the real one.”
There was no real gain in guessing.
With the existing database, there simply was no one who matched.
Instead, they grabbed the microphones and kept the afterglow going by sharing their impressions of the performance.
“Wow, I never expected that kind of song choice for the finale. Honestly, my ears were starting to feel overloaded by then. But even the pacing of intensity was absolutely perfect.”
“The Round 3 stage just felt like an encore performance. Like the winner had already been decided, and they were giving us a celebratory stage.”
“The shocking entrance, the overwhelming skill, and even the joy at the end. The stages you showed today felt like watching a complete film with a perfect rise, climax, turn, and conclusion. You’re a wonderful leading actor.”
When Hollywood actress Jenny said that last part with an enraptured expression, Ryu Sunho inside the mask felt a little awkward for no reason.
Then James Rogers, who had held back his thoughts until the very end, picked up the microphone.
Everyone’s eyes naturally turned to him.
What would a world-famous composer say after seeing this stage?
Just as that expectation built, James Rogers gazed at Flower Deer for a long while before opening his mouth in a serious voice.
“I feel like giving you half the songs I’ve written up to now.”
“......What?!”
At that, the other panelists lost their minds.
Olivia in particular covered her mouth.
For James Rogers, who was notoriously hard to please, to say something like this, it was absurdly high praise.
“Of course, that’s impossible. It’s just a figure of speech. I can’t take songs that already have owners and give them to you.”
Light laughter broke out at James Rogers’s joke.
But he lowered his voice into seriousness again.
Looking at Flower Deer with eyes burning with desire, he continued, “Instead, I’d like to give you the songs that still don’t have owners.”
“Oh my God, are you serious? You told me you didn’t have any songs to give me!”
Olivia shouted playfully.
James Rogers shrugged.
“Watching that stage filled me with inspiration all over again. The songs to give Flower Deer have only just been born.”
“Hahaha!”
The audience burst into laughter.
“But there’s a problem.”
“What problem?”
“I need to know who you are to give you the songs, and I honestly have no idea. I can’t believe there’s a singer this good that I don’t know, but...”
Leaning forward, James Rogers asked, “Who on earth are you?”
One flood of praise after another poured in.
And at last, the moment of fate arrived.
The studio lights turned red, heightening the tension.
The two finalists, Pineapple and Flower Deer.
The two lightly bumped fists together in respect toward one another.
They had not exchanged a single word, but there was a sense of comradeship between them, as though they had connected through music.
“The voting has closed!”
With the host’s shout, the numbers on the giant electronic board spun rapidly.
Dudududududududu—
The sound of drums rolled out, heightening the tension.
And the moment the winner’s name appeared on the screen—
Bang! Bang!
Golden fireworks rained down above Flower Deer’s head.
An overwhelming margin of votes.
It was a perfect victory with no room for disagreement.
“The third King has been born!”
With the host’s cry, the trophy was handed over.
But people’s attention was not on the trophy.
They were waiting only for the identity reveal.
First, the defeated Pineapple revealed who they were.
A fairly famous R&B star.
Ordinarily, that face would have drawn explosive cheers, but right now, everyone’s mind was elsewhere.
“And now, we will reveal the identity of the winner, Flower Deer!”
Thump-thump-thump—
The sound of a heartbeat played as an effect.
The panelists stood and leaned forward, and the audience craned their necks toward the stage.
Flower Deer slowly brought a hand to the jaw of the mask.
He pulled it off, then swept back his sweat-damp hair and lifted his head.
A face shining under the stage lights filled the screen.
In that instant, silence fell over the studio.
“......Huh?!”
Everyone wore blank expressions.
They had naturally expected a famous pop star.
So seeing an unfamiliar young Asian man there—on top of that, a handsome one—was enough to make their brains freeze.
But Ryu Sunho did not panic.
If anything, he smiled slightly and adjusted his grip on the microphone.
“Hello.”
A soft low voice rang out.
“I’m actor Ryu Sunho from Korea.”
Then the host’s explanation was added.
At that, the Hollywood actress Jenny let out a scream.
“Wait! What did you say? You mean that person from the film Vacuum State? You’re Gu Sunwoo?”
When Ryu Sunho nodded as though to say yes, Jenny stammered in excitement.
“My God! He’s an incredible actor! He’s the actor who won Best Actor at Cannes! But in the film, he didn’t say a single line. He played a mute role!”
Jenny raised her voice and explained to the panelists.
“He didn’t show any of this insane voice in the movie? Isn’t that director negligence?!”
“Haha, the whole concept of the film was silence. If anything, the director was the one who drew out all of my potential.”
At Ryu Sunho’s composed answer, a buzz spread through the studio.
The reactions split into two groups.
One was people like Jenny, who remembered the character from the movie and were horrified by the contrast between the two images.
The other was people shocked by the unexpected profession.
“An actor? Not a singer?”
“That’s his side job?”
“Yeah. His face definitely looks like an actor’s. He’s glowing. He’s handsome.”
“He’s pretty tall too. His proportions are model-level.”
“But if he’s doing acting while having singing skills this insane, then just how good is his acting?”
Now the fact that he was Asian did not even register anymore.
The shock of the reversal.
And with Ryu Sunho’s aura added on top of it, it created explosive chemistry.
【Aura Activated: LV.6 Aura That Cannot Be Hidden】
【LV.3 Aura That Stirs Emotions is layered on top.】
【The emotional density of your intended words and actions is amplified twofold.】
The curiosity that had been building until now was converted into explosive impact, and a massive catharsis swept through the studio.
After the recording ended, James Rogers hurried back to the waiting room and immediately searched for videos of Ryu Sunho.
They were only short film clips uploaded on YouTube, but even that was enough to explain how good an actor Ryu Sunho was.
“So I can get one of those songs after all?”
Olivia asked, having somehow come over.
“I’m in a good mood, so hell, I’ll make you two.”
“Nice! Really? No taking it back!”
Olivia clenched her fist and cheered.
Then, spotting something, she pointed down the hallway.
“I think you should go right now. There’s your main character.”
Following her gaze, James Rogers saw Ryu Sunho coming out dressed in comfortable casual clothes.
He was exchanging greetings with the staff around him.
“Ah, so he’s finally out. Thanks. I’ll contact you later when the songs are finished.”
“Good luck!”
James Rogers immediately strode straight toward Ryu Sunho.
At his appearance, the surrounding staff stepped aside.
He introduced himself politely.
“I’m James Rogers. A composer.”
“I know who you are. It’s an honor to meet you.”
Ryu Sunho politely thanked him for speaking so favorably about him earlier.
“No, no. If anything, I’m the one who should be grateful. It’s been a very long time since anything has stimulated my musical life like this.”
They exchanged pleasantries in a warm atmosphere.
Without dragging it out, James Rogers went straight to the point.
“What I said earlier wasn’t just empty flattery. I truly have a pile of songs I’d like to give you. I want to work with you.”
It was a love call from a world-renowned master.
Any singer would have welcomed such an offer with both arms open.
But Ryu Sunho hesitated briefly, then declined politely.
“Thank you very much for the offer. But right now, I want to focus on acting rather than musical activities.”
Any more musical activity than this could become poison to the goal.
If his image as a singer grew larger than his image as an actor, it would only move him farther from achieving that goal.
Music had to remain a means of making his face known.
“No, no! I think you misunderstood. What I meant was that I want to work with you as an actor.”
When Ryu Sunho tilted his head, James Rogers began pouring out his explanation as though he had been waiting for it.
“I’m currently involved as the overall music director on a musical film. Its title is And I...”
He eagerly explained the film’s plot and characters, and how long he had been wandering in search of the right person.
As he listened and nodded, Ryu Sunho felt a strange sense of déjà vu the more he heard about the work.
...Wait a minute, this film. I think I know it.
The memory was faint, but it was there.
I think it’s the musical film I watched before I regressed.
As he recalled it, the script had been good, the direction excellent, and the music had received quite a lot of praise.
It had done reasonably well at the box office too.
But there had been one thing both critics and audiences had all said with one voice.
[The music was perfect, but the vessel containing it was cracked.]
The actor who had taken the lead role back then.
His acting had been good, but his singing ability had been lacking.
In the end, they had chosen lip-syncing, layering a professional singer’s voice over the crucial musical numbers.
But that created a sense of dissonance, and because it floated apart from the screen, it shattered the audience’s immersion to pieces.
Eventually, people had even said this:
[The material was so strong it still succeeded, but if they had only thought a little harder about the lead actor, it could have become a masterpiece of a musical film.]
But that movie is being produced now?
The timeline felt slightly off.
From what he remembered, it had come out around the time he regressed.
If that was the case, was it not supposed to be a film from about ten years later than now?
“...So, what do you think? I’m certain that if it were you, you could play this role perfectly.”
James Rogers’s question pulled him back to reality.
When he glanced to the side, Team Leader Jo Sehun was already nodding with a pleased smile.
Meaning he thought it was a good opportunity.
I agreed.
This was an opportunity I could not let slip away.
A moment later, he held out his hand to James Rogers.
“Sounds good.”
The start of filming for Quentin’s film Check Mate was just around the corner.
The production office and set built in Los Angeles were filled with tension.
The staff moved by schedules divided down to the second, and the art team was staying up through the night building sets that would visualize Alex Han’s inner world.
As the scale of the capital was different, the scale itself was exceptional too.
The actors were also fighting their own wars.
As though they had all made a promise, they were doing nothing at home but digging into the script.
It was unusual for prideful Hollywood actors to be this tense.
The reason was simple.
Because Ryu Sunho’s overwhelming acting at the last workshop, and Townsend’s miserable figure being driven out, had both been seared into their minds.
If you do this halfheartedly, you die.
Hearing that murderous atmosphere had spread among them, Quentin cackled in satisfaction.
“Kekeke, good. The divine star of Cannes has properly stirred the stagnant Hollywood pond.”
Meanwhile, Ryu Sunho, the eye of the storm, was having his patience tested somewhere completely different.
“......”
His hair was slathered with harsh bleaching chemicals, wrapped all over in foil.
His scalp stung as though it were on fire.
“Hang in there a little longer. The color’s lifting really well.”
It had been a special order from Director Quentin.
For the Alex Han character he had in mind, he wanted the hair bleached silver.
Something about wanting the protagonist, who had lost his sense of self, to feel slightly detached from reality.
Since it was for the character, there was no excuse to refuse.
No, refusing would have been strange.
For the sake of the work, I was prepared even to shave my head.
Had I not already spent a long time in that beggar-like overgrown hairstyle?
But seeing myself in the mirror looking like some kind of alien, worry rose first.
Is this really going to be okay...?
Silver hair was not easy for an Asian person to pull off.
It could clash horribly with the skin tone and create the worst kind of tonal mismatch.
It might even become the hardest face in my filmography to handle.
“All right, now we’ll shampoo it.”
Three rounds of bleaching.
A full five-hour ordeal came to an end.
He sat in the chair with his hair washed, a wet towel draped around him.
Whiiiiiing—
Warm air began drying the wet strands, and little by little, the color began to reveal itself.
At last, the sound of the dryer stopped.
Then—
“Uh...”
The head stylist stared blankly into the mirror.
The other staff also stopped what they were doing and fixed their eyes on Ryu Sunho.
“Wow...”
“This is insane...”
“Isn’t he an elf...?”
Gasps burst out from every direction.
Ryu Sunho, who had had his eyes closed, finally looked into the mirror.
...Not bad.
The silver hair was shining mysteriously under the lights.
A cold, dreamlike atmosphere.
Contrary to his worries, his pale skin made his features stand out even more clearly.
Thanks to that, he was giving off an unreal aura.
At the same time, a change appeared in Ryu Sunho’s status window.
【Appearance Stat is being reevaluated】
【Appearance: A+ → S-】