The End of Rap Lessons and a Request for Fa Jin
My rap lessons with Tasha had reached their end before I knew it. It hadn't even been a full month, but there wasn't much left to teach, and Roadkill's schedule had gotten tangled, so we decided to wrap things up a little early. Since he promised to keep giving lyric feedback whenever I wanted even after the lessons ended, it wasn't really a problem.
Right now Tasha was standing in the Hammer Shock studio with a mic in her hand, delivering singing rap. Roadkill and I listened, nodding our heads to the beat. Her voice—soft and utterly unlike her rigid tone—gently tickled my ears. It really does seem like a lot of people have voices that don't match their actual personalities. Just look at me. My voice is husky and deep, yet I'm the one with the most normal mindset in the team. On the other hand, our Yu Hana possesses a beautiful voice that makes everyone sigh in admiration, but her heart is pitch-black and cunning. Even so, Tasha's stiff way of speaking and that gentle voice are so mismatched that it's hard to reconcile them. For the sake of preserving the fans' fantasies, I should probably ask her to avoid solo interviews altogether.
“Tasha definitely seems better suited to singing rap. It might feel a little ambiguous in the hip-hop scene, but for an idol, this could actually be the smarter choice.”
“I agree. She sings in such a weird way, yet this somehow fits her perfectly. Like Kill said, singing rap suits her much better than straight rap.”
What’s truly impressive about Tasha is that even after causing all that chaos in the middle of the night, she always approaches her lessons with military seriousness, and her skills have shot up dramatically. The real shock is her singing rap. Her regular rap has improved but is still only average. Singing rap, however, sticks to her like it was made for her mouth. It’s like she was born for it.
Honestly, it’s ridiculous. If you can’t sing, you normally shouldn’t be able to pull that off either. Yet this girl somehow transforms completely when she starts singing rap. These days she even gives off the scent of a real professional. As expected of our team—nothing about any of us is normal, and that fact never stops being impressive.
“But Kill, you really are consistent until the very end.”
“What do you mean?”
“The way you teach seriously, the way you give feedback—everything.”
“Haha, I’m getting paid for it.”
“You got paid for the lessons, sure. But you’re saying you’ll keep giving feedback even after they’re over.”
“Ah, that?”
Roadkill had offered to continue providing feedback after the lessons if we wanted. The lessons themselves were one thing, but the after-service was a little unexpected. When I asked why, his answer was pretty amusing.
“Later, when Yeri and Tasha succeed, I’m going to brag loudly that I taught you rap. For that to work, I need to have actually done something, right? That’s why.”
“I see.”
“And once you’ve made a connection, you have to hold onto it. Who knows? You might need me for a featuring later. This industry is small. The more people you know, the better.”
“That makes sense.”
“So Yeri, you should get to know as many people as possible too. It all becomes blood and flesh for you someday.”
In other words, once he knows someone, he treats them well so the relationship lasts. It was a worldly way of thinking, but it also made sense. As Roadkill said, you never know what life will throw at you.
Still, I didn’t feel bad about it. Even if he had an agenda, he had always treated me sincerely, so if Roadkill ever asked for a collaboration or mentioned me in an interview, I could accept it with a smile. Our company really does have a good eye for people. In an industry overflowing with trash, they somehow managed to pick a decent human being as our rap instructor.
Of course, they seemed to have tripped pretty hard when it came to selecting the debut members, but idol success has nothing to do with personality anyway. The fact that every single one of our members is a walking disaster doesn’t necessarily mean we’ll fail. Whether we become Car Enter’s saviors or its destroyers… only time would tell.
Who knows? We might actually become an incredibly suc—
“I have a favor to ask of you. Do you have time?”
“I do, but why? Is it ‘that side’ of things?”
“Similar.”
“Well, okay. Got it.”
…There was no way.
When half the team cares more about “that side” than debut, becoming a huge idol was obviously never going to happen. Sigh. I don’t even know anymore. It’ll work out somehow.
After the rap lesson ended, Tasha and I stopped by a coffee shop near the company. It wasn’t a famous franchise—just a privately run café—but Tasha had strongly recommended it and dragged me here. Was there some menu I absolutely had to try?
“Ginger latte for me. What will you have?”
“…Just an Americano.”
“Understood. Wait here.”
The moment we arrived, Tasha ordered a ginger latte without hesitation. The name was so unfamiliar that I had to think about it for a second. Ginger meant ginger, so it had to be coffee with ginger in it. Ginger. In coffee. What kind of unholy hybrid was this?
When she first visited the dorm and immediately asked for sujeonggwa, I knew she was unusual, but even her taste buds operated on a different level. Of course, the café owner who actually put ginger lattes on the menu didn’t seem particularly sane either.
“It’s better than I expected…”
“Right? Seong Jiyeong recommended this place. Of course, this is the only café that serves ginger latte, so there wasn’t much choice.”
“How did she even know about a place like this?”
“Seong Jiyeong knows more than you would think. She has a few clumsy sides, but there is no doubt she is competent.”
“Really?”
Despite serving bizarre hybrid drinks like ginger latte, the coffee here was genuinely high quality. A hidden gem, as people say. It felt strange that Seong Jiyeong was the one who recommended it. She looked like the type who would only drink hand-dripped Luwak coffee or something equally pretentious.
Learning that Seong Jiyeong had clumsy sides was a new perspective. She always gave off such a stiff, blade-like impression. Or maybe my memories from the first round had made me view her as too special.
“So how is working with Seong Jiyeong?”
“Not bad. If there is one problem…”
“Yes?”
“She keeps forcing her kimchi on me. Even though half my body is Korean, continuously eating kimchi is somewhat difficult.”
“…I see.”
I was right. I had been evaluating Seong Jiyeong too highly. She was more childish than I thought. She was probably planning to convert Tasha with her family’s kimchi and win the second Kimchi War. Given her age, being a little childish was normal, but that level of obsession with victory meant she still had some growing up to do.
Still, Tasha was funny in her own way. She happily drank ginger latte—a beverage that would make most Koreans shake their heads—yet complained about kimchi. Did that mean garlic was a harder ingredient for her than ginger? Talking with these people often made me feel like my own sense of normalcy was slowly crumbling. The concepts of “normal” and “common sense” I once knew seemed to be quietly collapsing.
Anyone could see that preferring ginger latte over kimchi was strange. Ah, whatever. No point dwelling on it now. I should just ask why she called me out.
“So what’s the favor?”
“Ah, it is nothing major. It is about the ‘thing’ you showed me last time.”
“What thing?”
“The one that exploded with a bang even though I clearly dodged it.”
“Ah, Fa Jin. What about it?”
“Can I learn it as well?”
So that was why she called me out separately. She wanted to learn Fa Jin. Well, she had held back for a whole week, which was a lot of patience for someone like her. Given her personality, it wouldn’t have been strange if she had shown up the very next day.
But did this girl even have time to learn Fa Jin?
“Is the other work okay? You seemed pretty busy.”
“Ah, roughly. There is nothing more I can do now anyway.”
“Really? You wrapped things up with Storm as well?”
“That was already settled on ‘that day.’ The reason I was busy for the past few days was to search Yeongdeungpo. There were things I needed to confirm.”
“I see.”
Just as I suspected, the reason Tasha had gone on a rampage in Yeongdeungpo was because her mother had been murdered there. And on the dawn of the day I was dispatched to Yeongdeungpo, with Seong Jiyeong’s help, Tasha had infiltrated Storm’s safe house, successfully kidnapped their boss, and quietly interrogated him. She confirmed that the culprit had a “snake tattoo biting its own tail.”
I had refused Tasha’s request for information that day because several of Storm’s members had died or been injured while trying to stop the rampaging culprit. I simply hadn’t wanted to get involved. From Storm’s perspective, they had only been beaten and suffered losses, so the whole incident was rather pitiful.
But there had been no progress since then. According to Storm, the culprit hadn’t originally operated in Yeongdeungpo, so searching the area turned up nothing.
“Therefore, until Seong Jiyeong decides on a new target, I have some free time. I must increase my strength while I can, so that I will be able to use it when it is truly needed. I should learn what I can learn.”
With the information trail completely cut off, Tasha had been in a state of temporary suspension lately. This was actually normal. What Phantom dealt with were not obvious local offenders but wanted criminals and those in hiding. Wanted criminals aren’t the kind of people you can find just by walking around. Their identities are only confirmed after thorough investigation and verification.
So right now we were in the stage of searching for targets and confirming them. In this phase there was nothing to do but gather information and make inquiries. No collisions meant no incidents, which was only natural. Since nothing major was happening, this might actually be the perfect time to learn new techniques.
“Well, sure. Once you know the trick, it’s not that difficult. Besides, you need to master this before moving on to the next stage.”
“Oh, there is a next stage?”
“Of course. The stages after this are actually more important. If you want to hunt villains safely, Bulletproof is pretty much essential.”
“Good. I would like to begin tomorrow.”
Tasha burned with enthusiasm at the idea of starting tomorrow. Yet I felt a strange sense of unease. A “snake biting its own tail” was basically Ouroboros, right? And Ouroboros was the kind of secret organization that always showed up in K-web novels. In the first round I experienced, that group had never done anything particularly big, so I hadn’t worried about it. But now I had the feeling that the protagonist’s party might become deeply entangled with them.
If that happened, would Tasha be able to sit still and get her revenge? A secret society could never defeat the protagonist. I hoped it would all be resolved cleanly so that our Tasha wouldn’t go on another rampage.