Breaking the Rules
Neoul, who had boldly declared that he would win by skill alone, ran headlong into trouble from the very start.
There were two major problems. The first was Neoul’s unusual tone of voice. Until now, he had been praised for his voice, even told that it could bewitch a person’s ears, and he had received plenty of compliments for it.
But in a song grounded in real worries and the resolve to face them, Neoul’s tone and presence felt a little out of place.
It was the kind of song where you brushed off everyone’s concern and said, “I’m fine,” yet somehow the feeling was just a little off.
According to Lee Gal-chae’s analogy, offered after he could no longer sit quietly and watch, it was like this:
“Neoul-hyeong, um... it’s like the second prince, who has no ambition for the throne and has an easygoing personality, leaves to become a wandering knight, telling his retainers, ‘I’m fine, so don’t worry. Worry is a kind of illness, you know,’ and rides off.”
Neoul flinched.
He wasn’t a knight and was trying to become a dance singer, of course, but it was a surprisingly sharp comparison.
The second problem, as always, was dancing.
During the first team mission, Woo Cheong had relieved Neoul’s burden by repeatedly hiding him and then bringing him back out at just the right moments. He had given him relatively easy moves, while the rest of the team filled in the flashy parts around him.
Of course, even that had been a difficult enough level for Neoul that he had to sweat through it and barely manage with Baek Namu’s help.
But this time there was no time to catch his breath. He had no choice but to perform the same choreography as the rest of the team from beginning to end.
Worse, there was even a section in the middle where all five of them danced differently, which made everything even more confusing.
Baek Namu was busy this time and hadn’t come since the first day, so Neoul did his best to ask the team members questions and correct his mistakes as he went.
Lee Gal-chae and Baek Yuri were a huge help when it came to learning how to sing by tossing out emotions as if they were spoken words.
Baek Yuri, especially, was as ruthless a teacher as anyone could ask for, as though it were only natural for the twin brother of Baek Namu to be so.
Baek Namu’s Spartan training had been intense and merciless, but Baek Yuri was no less severe—in fact, if anything, he was worse.
“Neoul-ssi. During the ten-minute break, keep running the choreography through in your head and reviewing it.”
“……”
“Your throat hurts? Then should we pause vocal practice for a moment and check the formations again?”
That ruthlessness did not apply only to Neoul. When Lee Gal-chae, after dancing for a long time, said his limbs were starting to tremble, Baek Yuri smiled and told him they would switch back to vocals.
Throughout practice, Baek Yuri never lost his smile, never let his gentle voice falter, and yet somehow managed to work the members so hard they never got a moment’s rest.
He more than handled his own part while making everyone else keep up with him, so nobody dared complain and all of them worked themselves to the bone.
Park Dahan, who was experiencing this for the second time, went blank during practice and moved like a machine. Thankfully, he didn’t grumble, but every so often he seemed to lose his grip on reality.
“Heeheeheehee! I really should change careers! I can’t pour my joints and my youth into this hellll...!”
Neoul also learned that Baek Yuri was a man who told quite a few lies.
“Shall we really, truly do it just three more times for the very last time?”
“Didn’t you say that was the last time already? And the time before that as well?”
“If we just go a little further, I think it could be perfect, but it feels a little unfinished. This time is really the last time! Just three times!”
What was unfortunate for the team was that Neoul, in moments like this, was the kind of mermaid who would add to the problem rather than stop it.
“Since it is the last time, let us make it five.”
“Sounds great!”
Thanks to perfectionist Baek Yuri, who couldn’t let even the smallest thing slide, and Neoul, who clapped and told them to keep going, the rest of the team swallowed down pleas for mercy and kept practicing.
By the time practice ended and they returned to the dorm, everyone had collapsed face-down on their beds, too exhausted even to wash up. In truth, Neoul had no memory of how he had gotten back to the dorm at all.
Only Baek Yuri, still fully sane, had washed himself thoroughly, changed into neat clothes, set an alarm, and then climbed into bed lying straight as a board, like the Princess in the Sleeping Forest.
◇◇◇◆◇◇◇
In the middle of the night, Neoul woke when he sensed someone nearby. When he got up and looked around, one of the beds was empty. Counting heads, he found that Lee Gal-chae, the short child actor, was missing.
Did a tiger carry him off?
Neoul went outside to check.
From the emergency stairwell, where the door was left slightly open, he heard the murmur of a voice. When he got closer, he found Lee Gal-chae crouched there with a smartphone in hand, talking on the phone.
“Chan-song’s asleep?”
— Yeah. It was late, so she fell asleep earlier. Grandma’s asleep too.
A small voice, presumably the person on the other end, drifted out of the phone.
“She didn’t throw too many tantrums, did she? Nothing happened at kindergarten?”
— Not really.
“Did she eat well? Did she take her cold medicine on time? And you’ve been eating properly too, right?”
— She ate fine, and I gave her the medicine. More importantly, how are you, hyung? Are you managing?
“Hmm.... My body’s tired, but honestly, this is fun.”
Lee Gal-chae smiled, resting his head against the railing.
“It’s the first time I’ve danced this much without holding anything back and sung until my throat hurt. My heart’s beating fast, so it feels like I’ve become younger.”
— What are you talking about? You’re only eighteen. You sound like an old man.
At the other person’s exasperated voice, Lee Gal-chae chuckled softly.
“As if you’re one to talk.”
— Anyway. If you’re having fun, that’s what matters. I’m hanging up.
“All right. You should grow up quickly too, Yeong-gwang.”
Just as Lee Gal-chae was about to end the call, a child’s cry suddenly came through.
— I want to talk toooo! Oppa! Oppa!
“Ah, ah. Chan-song.”
— Why didn’t you answer my call during the dayyyyy!
“I told you I could only call at night. Sorry.”
— Hnghh. Why aren’t you coming homeeee!
Lee Gal-chae soothed and reassured the whining child with practiced patience.
“Listen to Grandma and your little brother, all right? What did I say I’d buy you if you behaved yourself?”
— Toysss!
“Yes. So go to sleep, eat well, and stay good. Okay?”
— Hngh....
— Hyung, I’ll calm her down and put her to sleep. Hang up.
Click.
The call ended. Lee Gal-chae rose from his seat with a face full of worry, then looked up and met Neoul’s eyes squarely.
“Ah!”
Lee Gal-chae let out a startled cry, then hurriedly covered his mouth. In the dead quiet of the night, he checked nervously to see if anyone else had heard him, and lowered his voice.
“…Why are you out here? What are you doing?”
His tone came out a little sharp.
He stared warily at Neoul, as though he suspected he had been eavesdropping on the call.
Neoul replied as if it were nothing.
“It is well if you were not carried off by a tiger.”
“…A tiger?”
What kind of lunatic was this?
Lee Gal-chae, drained of his tension by Neoul’s talk of tigers in the middle of the city in the twenty-first century, let the rest of his guard down.
Neoul’s gaze shifted to the smartphone in Lee Gal-chae’s hand.
Before filming began, all participants had been required to turn in their smartphones. To prevent information leaks, possession and use of phones had been forbidden until the second round of filming was over.
Lee Gal-chae quickly hid the phone in his pocket.
“Please pretend you didn’t see that.”
Neoul nodded obediently. Then Lee Gal-chae asked with a vague expression. In situations like this, wouldn’t people normally ask why he hadn’t turned it in?
“You won’t ask?”
“Do you wish me to ask?”
“No.”
“……”
Neoul felt one way about it, and Lee Gal-chae felt another; neither of them could make sense of the other’s behavior.
“Then I shall not ask.”
“…Yes. Thank you.”
Lee Gal-chae gave a rather awkward thank-you. If Neoul had asked, he absolutely would have hated explaining it, but because nothing was asked, he found his own mouth strangely itching to speak, like a perverse child.
It wasn’t even that big a secret, and everyone who knew him already knew the story, so why hide it at all?
“It’s just a very ordinary circumstance. I’m the family’s sole breadwinner, you see.”
“……”
Weren’t you the one who said not to ask?
Neoul narrowed his eyes, utterly baffled. Truthfully, he wasn’t especially curious, but he listened quietly anyway.
“I left my grandmother and younger siblings behind, so I was anxious. While I’m away, something could happen.”
“……”
“My youngest is only six, and she’s often sick with small ailments. I need to be able to contact them if anything happens, so I turned in a dummy phone and hid the one I actually use.”
“I see.”
“So... there was no helping it. I wasn’t trying to break the rules on purpose.”
As he spoke, Lee Gal-chae realized something. He had wanted to make an excuse.
He simply didn’t want to look like some thoughtless, immature person who broke rules on a whim just because he didn’t want to hand over his phone.
I’m honest and upright, but this really was unavoidable.
He wanted to explain himself to someone, anyone, and be understood. Once people learned he was the family’s breadwinner, their reactions always split into one of two kinds.
They either looked down on him for being poor, or pitied him because they felt sorry for him.
“I also have family who are ill,” Neoul said.
“They are too far away for me to contact, but if there were a way, I would certainly have done the same.”
Neoul said it plainly, without looking down on him or pitying him. Then he turned as if to go back to sleep.
Lee Gal-chae stared after him for a moment, then trotted along at a slight distance and spoke up again. His voice was still quiet, but now it carried a little more energy than before.
“Neoul-hyeong. But how long are you planning to keep talking that way? There are plenty of people who just call others ‘hey’ and that sort of thing.”
“Is that so?”
“Yuri-hyeong even calls me ‘Gal-chae-nim.’ It’s nice, in a way, like being treated with adult respect, but it’s also awkward.... Just speak casually.”
Neoul shook his head firmly.
Humans truly were strange. Even when one went to the trouble of treating them properly, they insisted, insisted, on hearing casual speech.
The only people Neoul ever spoke down to were seven-year-old little brothers, and babies like Sangsangi and Byeoldtongi. They weren’t even babies, and yet fully grown humans kept clamoring for him to speak casually.
Still, after experiencing the same thing over and over again, Neoul had decided this must simply be human culture.
“Since you have asked, then go to sleep.”
“…I’ve been wondering about this for a while, but isn’t that less ‘casual’ and more just talking down to me?”
“It is comfortable for me.”
“If you say so....”
Lee Gal-chae didn’t press the matter any further and slipped back into his bed.
◇◇◇◆◇◇◇
Midterm evaluation day.
Woo Yong-dam, the main vocalist and judge from Donkiss, had come to give feedback, but after saying there was nothing left for him to say because this team was already doing so well on its own, he applauded and left.
“Heeheeheehee. This is fun.”
On the fourth day, Yeo Do-bin finally cracked.
“Heeheeheeheehee.”
“Eek! Why are you laughing like that—it’s terrifying!”
During a short break, Park Dahan stared at Yeo Do-bin lying on his back and laughing like a madman at the ceiling, and retreated in alarm.
Neoul gulped down water. Because his arms were trembling, nearly a third of it spilled.
Yeo Do-bin stared blankly at the water droplets falling onto Neoul’s clothes and leaving round stains behind. The plain practice wear, dotted with marks, looked as if he were wearing a completely different outfit.
Water marks... water.... paint....?
Yeo Do-bin jerked upright and shouted, “Paint!”
“……”
“Huh?”
“I, I thought of something...! Focusing on the basics... No. Loyalty? No, devotion! A way to make it faithful to the song while still matching it....”
As he started speaking, Yeo Do-bin watched the others’ faces carefully.
During the first round of the competition, every idea he had offered had been ignored. “What kind of thought is that?” “Why are you saying something so useless when we’re already short on time?” and so on.
Because of that, even now he regretted opening his mouth almost as soon as he had.
“What is it?” Neoul asked. There was no hint of reproach or criticism in his voice. The others also looked at Yeo Do-bin attentively, waiting.
“Can I say it...?”
“Of course.”
“Yes, of course!”
Yeo Do-bin felt a little reassured and slowly unpacked the bundle of ideas in his head. The team members listening to him all had bright eyes.
After he finished, Yeo Do-bin asked cautiously, “Wha... What do you reckon...?”
“I like it.”
“…I think people will like it too.”
“I’m in favor as well!”
Contrary to Yeo Do-bin’s fears, the response was positive. His eyes and the team members’ all shifted to Neoul. He was the only one who hadn’t answered yet.
Neoul wanted to say, “Very good,” but “very good” felt too bland.
So he recalled a scene from a drama that Won Hasin had been binge-watching lately. It was the sort of scene the internet called a meme, and humans seemed to love it.
He lifted the empty water bottle in his hand and placed it against Yeo Do-bin’s head.
“A toast to your idea.”
It was unanimous.