A Family Discount That Isn't
A pristine white three-story building in Cheongdam-dong. A single, understated name was engraved above the entrance: Go Gyeol. There was no further explanation of what kind of place it was — unfriendly, perhaps, but it could afford to be.
This was the makeup shop frequented by celebrities so famous that their names alone told you everything you needed to know in this country.
"Hello, this is Go Gyeol. Do you have a reservation?"
"Nope. But if you tell the director that Min is here, we're good."
"Ah… forgive me, but your relation would be?"
"Family."
With that single word, the two of them were ushered straight inside.
As they climbed the stairs, Yeo-reum's eyes went wide as saucers.
Whoa… it's a celebrity field day in here….
Even from behind, the customers carried themselves differently. She spotted a few genuinely famous faces, too.
Wait — isn't that Eun Baek-hap?
Her eyes felt like they were on a treadmill the whole way to the private room they'd been shown into.
I never even dreamed of getting this far.
The results had exceeded her imagination, and Yeo-reum felt a flicker of nerves.
"Unnie, are you seriously related to the director here?"
"My name gives it away, doesn't it."
"…The director's name is Gyeol. It wasn't a single-syllable name?"
"Hey. 'Dokgo Gyeol' is a single-syllable name too. And it's just about time for her to show up."
Click-clack! Click-clack!
Just as Dokgo Min had predicted, the sound of confident footsteps echoed from far down the hall. The mistress of this establishment, Dokgo Gyeol, had arrived.
"Hellooo, everyone~? Min, you seriously need to learn to call ahead. Lucky for you my schedule's light today — what if it hadn't been?"
"It's been a while, unnie. I just had a good feeling, so I came."
"And who's this next to you? A friend of yours, Min? Lovely to meet you. Dokgo Gyeol, director of the salon."
Yeo-reum sprang up from her seat and bowed.
"Hello. I'm Han Yeo-reum, a first-year acting major at the Korea National University of Arts. Senior Dokgo Min and I have a wonderful senior-junior relationship."
At her introduction, Dokgo Gyeol arched an eyebrow, then swept her gaze over Yeo-reum with eyes remarkably like her cousin's, taking in every detail.
"Acting major… I can pretty much guess why you're here… Oh! The one who did the photo shoot with Min last time? The blue lighting?"
"Yes. That's me."
"That was pretty. Good. I enjoyed it. Well then, babe. Mind turning around for me?"
Dokgo Gyeol extended her index finger and traced a slow circle in the air. Yeo-reum obediently spun in place, once around.
"She's decent, isn't she? Give her a discount for the web drama. Even better if it's free."
"Absolutely NOT!!! This salon has never once had a free customer! Not even if Eun Baek-hap herself walked in!"
The money-obsessed Dokgo Gyeol's expression turned vicious in an instant.
"Min. In this world, you understand, everything comes down to what you pay for it. Something cheap AND good? Never. Ever!!! Doesn't exist. As a rule, price equals value."
Behind Dokgo Gyeol, one could almost see the blazing apparition of King Sejong the Great himself.
"Money. That, and that alone, is the measure of all things."
Yeo-reum ducked behind Dokgo Min. In the presence of a genuine money-worshipper, the counterfeit one, Han Yeo-reum, had no choice but to shrink….
"Now then — what is the value of hair and makeup, the finest weapon on the battlefield we call the entertainment industry? And within that, what of Go Gyeol, the number one salon in all of Cheongdam???"
"Unnie. I haven't deleted a single one of her photos."
At Dokgo Min's words, the glittering light in Dokgo Gyeol's eyes shifted.
"…What?"
"I get the feeling I'll be looking at her pictures a lot more."
The reason Dokgo Gyeol had become the director of a Cheongdam-dong salon at such a young age was due entirely to her younger cousin, Dokgo Min.
"I think she'll make it."
Dokgo Min's eye for stars had been dead-on since she was a child.
"I dunno… Hmm hmm~. That's just the feeling I get."
It wasn't that Go Gyeol created top stars.
"Not this one — this one. This person catches my eye way more?"
It was that she'd meticulously selected only the ones with real potential among thousands of hopefuls, locked them in with audacious exclusive contracts as VIPs, and that was what had built the salon's legendary image. Every single one had succeeded.
"You said Han Yeo-reum, right? This web drama… how many episodes?"
And if Dokgo Min wanted to look at someone's face again and again —
"Eight episodes."
— it meant that person possessed once-in-a-generation star quality.
"In that case… I'll decide after episode one airs. For now, it goes on the tab. Post-payment only. We can discuss the DC campaign after that. Deal?"
Dokgo Gyeol fetched a calendar and held it out to Yeo-reum.
"So, babe. You're confident you'll make it big?"
Yeo-reum, marking up her schedule, broke into a radiant smile.
"Of course."
Click. Click. Click.
This was the PR team of JC ENM — the place where the real magic of illusion got layered on: monitoring coverage, drafting and distributing press releases, planning SNS content, prepping press conferences, handling reporters.
"Haaah…."
And there was a mountain of work to do.
Enough to warrant coming in on the weekend.
"Rookie Shin, quit the sighing. If you keep that up, I — your team leader — am going to want to cry too, you know?"
Not that the entertainment industry had anything so quaint as a clearly defined weekend — but today's assignment was a genuinely thorny one.
"Still, isn't this too much? It's an actual outrage. There's nothing usable for a press release."
"Heh, fair point."
"If you leave out Ju Jun-seo, the other two are complete nobodies — we don't even have photos to run. Han Yeo-reum's profile shots are insane, at least, so she's… genuinely! She's genuinely the best option we have!"
"Heh… yeah. Fair point."
Dramas and movies usually had a whole arsenal of "bait" to scatter before the articles started dropping.
Official poster shoots, character intro sheets released in every variety, viewership-rating pledges, and so on.
"I don't care that we're a brand-new team — isn't the promo budget way too stingy?"
But a web drama was, at the end of the day, a web drama.
The poster had to be grabbed from a single photo taken on set, with the title slapped on afterward.
"How exactly are we supposed to build a press release out of one script reading video?"
The character intro sheets would have to be cobbled together the same way.
The only promotional ammunition Pachehi currently had was the script reading making-of footage. That was it.
"Word is the rough cut just came in — let's watch it and write from that."
"Honestly, I don't get why you put this much care into it, Team Leader Hong. I could crank this out in five, ten minutes. Just grab a few script reading screenshots."
"You little punk…. You act so sensitive, and then your brain doesn't turn over at all."
"Huh? What did I do?"
It was no surprise that JC ENM had created a dedicated web content team.
These were the days when the video platform InTube was growing terrifyingly powerful.
"You didn't know? Our company's Project 111."
Project 111.
The national audition program JC ENM had invested in, which had achieved a smashing success just recently.
"Obviously I know that. Why do you ask?"
"Heh. That was just the toe in the water, see. We were debating whether to even build an agency, decided to test the concept with other companies' trainees first. Dip the toe in, or don't."
"Right. Rookies cost a fortune to develop."
Out of a thousand trainees, maybe ten would successfully debut — and of those ten, only one would ever become a star.
"If a trainee gives up halfway, all the money you sank into them evaporates, and even the ones who do debut — plenty of them end up in the red all the way to the finish line. Right?"
"Right. A single album release alone burns through hundreds of millions of won like it's pocket change."
"Exactly. So we cultivate a trendy image! Discover rookies! Collect PPL deals while we're at it! And slurp up those view counts like honey."
Team Leader Hong smiled and pointed at his monitor.
"And if we spot a promising rookie in the mix, we raise them ourselves. Best of both worlds, no? Heh."
At his explanation, Rookie Shin wore an expression of even deeper confusion.
"Huh… then why is the whole structure such a tangled mess?"
"That's from the top. You know Jegal Rok, right? The one who launched our MCN team too."
"Yes. The one who said that soon influencers would want to become celebrities, and celebrities would want to become influencers — the guy who says some honestly crazy things."
Rookie Shin snorted, as if to say that couldn't possibly make sense.
"The way Jegal Rok puts it — a true star will shine even in a fog-covered sky."
"Huh? What's that supposed to mean?"
"We put them in a web drama, see which ones show a spark, and push only those properly. The ones that don't — cut. The middle tier signs with our MCN and earns branded content money as influencers."
Rookie Shin's jaw dropped at the plan. It was a spiderweb structure engineered to extract maximum profit from minimum investment.
"We raise them as influencers, watch how the market shifts, then ease them into a variety debut. Once that happens, the PPL money, the branded content money, the InTube video rates — they all jump."
"…So they've already made an impression through the web drama, and they've got a solid subscriber base. Then a variety show gig would be easy. And down the line, kids will be lining up to join even without us developing them."
"Exactly. So you finally understand, do you? Our little rookie."
Team Leader Hong logged into the cloud drive.
There it was — the short script reading video, uploaded with nothing but a rough cut edit.
"Take a look at that. Your ears are the sharpest in this office."
Click.
Rookie Shin clicked the mouse, and the rough cut began to play.
"That thing from earlier—"
"So you were just sitting there watching?"
"Not my job."
"…Can't argue with that."
It was a scene between Ju Jun-seo and Han Yeo-reum — a short exchange, just over ten seconds, inserted to showcase the characters' personalities.
"Huh…."
Rookie Shin tilted his head to one side. The audio quality of one voice seemed distinctly different, as if a different mic had been used.
"Well? Now you understand why I'm trying to do something with these scraps."
Only then did the furrow between Rookie Shin's brows ease.
"This kid… can actually act?"
"Rookie Shin. How is it that the most sensitive guy in this office is this dense about the things that matter?"
Team Leader Hong raised his eyebrows.
"Actually?"
Then he waggled the phone that had just buzzed with a new message.
"Word from the set is — she's eating that whole production alive."
