Chapter 59
Chapter 59
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Translator: uly
Chapter: 59
Chapter Title: My Body Is Only One!
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"My body is only one!"
"Kids, let's get out."
It was none other than a large sashimi restaurant.
What? Why did we come to a sashimi restaurant?
Full of questions, we climbed out of the van, and two people standing in front waved us over.
"Kids!"
"Mom! Dad!"
It was Jae-oh's parents.
We dashed across the parking lot paved with gray stones and hurried over to them.
Jae-oh's mom patted each of our shoulders, offering words of encouragement.
"You all worked hard today. You were amazing."
"Did we do well, Mom?"
"Of course~! I saw Teddy doing that backflip. How does he spin like that so perfectly?"
"Hehe. Basics! Want me to do it again?"
"Oh my, can you?"
"Of course! Watch this!"
Teddy confidently did a backflip right there on the spot.
The takeoff, mid-air twist, and landing were flawless. However...
"Ouch! My foot!"
"Oh dear. Are you okay?"
Unfortunately, Teddy had overlooked the fact that the ground was covered in sharp stones. Idiot.
I helped Teddy up from where he'd collapsed on the ground and turned my gaze to Jae-oh's dad, who was chatting away.
"But do y'all just eat and practice? How are you all so good? I was shocked half to death."
"Yeah, these days it really feels like all we do is eat and practice."
"Right."
Tae-hee and Eun-young nodded in agreement.
Their cheeky response brought smiles blooming across the parents' faces.
In the warm atmosphere, I cautiously spoke up.
"But... why did you call us here...?"
"Oh. Before you head back to Seoul, we wanted to treat you to something delicious at least once. It wouldn't sit right with us otherwise."
"So...?"
"We reserved ahead. Eat as much as you want."
Wow. What a generous spread.
I couldn't help but fight back the grin creeping up my face.
"Whoa. Thank you!"
"Thank you so much, ma'am, sir!"
"Alright. Let's head in and eat."
Thanks to their kindness, we finally got to devour sashimi to our hearts' content in Busan.
Those who performed hard deserve to eat well!
I dove into my plate with gusto, devouring flounder, salmon, shrimp... everything without discrimination.
After all, when someone's treating you, the polite thing is to eat heartily and enjoy it.
* * *
After the meal, we said our goodbyes to Jae-oh's parents.
"Take care, ma'am, sir! See you next time! We'll look after Jae-oh!"
"Thank you. Stay healthy. Don't worry about Jae-oh hyung."
"We owe you big time. Thank you."
"Mom, Dad! We'll meet again!"
"The sashimi was amazing! See you later."
"We'll keep in touch."
The van set off, laden with reluctance. Jae-oh's parents waved us off for a long time.
'They were such good people.'
Like they say, you can tell a lot about a child from their parents. It made sense why Jae-oh had grown into such a kind-hearted, upright young man.
On the road back to Seoul after wrapping up the schedule.
The members were exhausted and soon fell into a quiet sleep.
'I should catch some shut-eye too.'
I was just as tired, so I leaned back against the seat, shifting to get comfortable for a nap.
That's when, glancing sideways for a moment, my eyes landed on Jae-oh's face.
'Jae-oh...'
His gaze out the window. It seemed more wistful than usual.
Was he sad to leave his hometown behind and head back to the big city? Or bummed about parting from his parents again?
I couldn't pinpoint the exact reason.
Staring at his face, I called out to him.
"Jae-oh hyung."
"Yeah."
Jae-oh turned to look at me.
I patted his shoulder gently and said,
"Next time we come, let's show up even more famous."
At my words, Jae-oh nodded.
"...Yeah."
Then he turned back to the window.
In the reflection of the night scenery on the car window, a faint smile graced Jae-oh's face.
And just like that, our first out-of-town event—the Busan Summer Sea Festival—came to an end.
* * *
Back in Seoul, back to everyday life.
We were right back to our routine: dorm to practice room, practice room to dorm.
The passionate performance in Busan felt like a fleeting dream.
I wasn't the only one thinking that. During choreography practice, Tae-hee sighed and muttered,
"Man. We were busting our asses in Busan just the other day, but now it's all practice again. Feels like a dream."
Eun-young, who was sneaking a sip of his drink from the side, nodded in agreement.
"Tell me about it. We did go to Busan, right?"
"The sashimi was so good. Hehe."
"Oh, yeah, that I can't deny. It melted in your mouth."
As I listened to them, I caught my breath. Two hours into dance practice, my stamina was waning.
'Lately, I've been running out of steam.'
It couldn't be helped. My strength stat was lacking.
I'd invested skill points from level-ups, so it had improved a bit, but it was still stuck at C.
'To boost strength, I need to exercise more, but exercising drains my energy—this vicious cycle.'
I'd at least done some light workouts for weight control before, but ever since starting composition lessons with Kwang-myeong, even that was tough.
Studying in his studio, doing the assignments he gave me.
'No real rest after practice these days.'
Outside of sleep, I barely had time to recharge.
A good night's sleep restored some stamina and passion, and I still had a few vials of Tiger Vitality left, so I was scraping by...
'But if this keeps up, I might actually hit a debuff.'
These days, I was feeling the need for strength more acutely than ever.
I let out a sigh and reached for my water...
No, tried to.
'Out of water at a time like this.'
Ugh. I hauled myself up with effort, grabbed my bottle, and headed to the water dispenser.
Somehow... my legs felt a bit shaky.
That's when I ran into Jae-oh coming from afar. Looked like he'd been to the bathroom.
"Jae-oh hyung..."
"Jae. Why are your legs shaking like that?"
"I'm tired..."
As I mumbled weakly while filling my bottle, Jae-oh's expression turned serious.
Jae-oh crouched down. It looked like he was scanning my body.
What? As I wondered, Jae-oh's hand gripped my leg.
In that instant, my leg buckled, and I nearly collapsed.
Then, Jae-oh said in a grave tone,
"This won't do, Jae."
"Yeah."
"From today on, let's work out together."
"Huh?"
What did he say?
"Let's work out together starting today. How can you have such poor stamina? You need it for activities ahead. Can't have you wheezing like this."
"..."
"Starting today. For the future."
"W-Wait a sec, hyung."
I hurriedly stopped him. This suddenly? Pushing it through?
It threw me off. Sure, I needed to exercise... but I wasn't mentally prepared yet...
"Th-These days, I'm learning composition from Kwang-myeong too. Not sure if I'll have time for workouts."
"Oh, I'll handle that."
"Huh?"
With that meaningful reply, Jae-oh quickly headed back to the practice room.
An ominous feeling washed over me as I capped my full bottle and followed.
Back in the practice room, I saw Jae-oh talking to Kwang-myeong.
"What's up?"
"Learning composition is great, but Jae's stamina is really lacking lately. I think he needs some exercise."
"Hmm..."
"You need stamina to even do composition properly."
"That's true."
"He says he has no time for workouts because of the composition lessons."
"Hoo. High Jae... I mean, Jae hyung said that?"
Kwang-myeong's eyes flicked to me. I averted my gaze.
Then Kwang-myeong grinned and readily agreed.
"Okay. I'll cut the composition time in half. Use the other half, Jae-oh hyung."
"Got it."
"N-No, wait."
What about my opinion?
It was about my spare time, but my say wasn't considered at all.
I stared at them in disbelief. But nothing changed.
"Stamina is national power, right, Jae hyung? Composition can wait—we'll take it slow."
"Then I'll train you starting tomorrow. Just follow along, and your stamina will skyrocket. Let's do this."
"Whoa, Jae's in deep now."
"Yeah, tough break."
Absolutely nothing. It pissed me off.
Especially since I knew resistance was futile.
* * *
From that day on, every other day after practice, Jae-oh would grab me by the scruff.
No escaping. Obviously. The opponent's Jae-oh.
If I didn't want a clean finish from the guy who benches 500 easy, I had to follow quietly.
'The world runs on strength after all...'
Under his supervision, lifting weights, I laughed bitterly.
...Not that it was funny.
And it wasn't just Jae-oh tormenting me, which made it worse.
Tomorrow it'd be Kwang-myeong dragging me for composition.
'My body is only one. Only one...!'
Of course, it wasn't all bad.
Composition was fun, and Jae-oh's training... well, afterward, my body did feel better.
However... having both of them piling on, working me over every other day like this, was too much.
That's when Jae-oh, spotting the opening like a ghost, stood up.
"Still got energy, huh? Saw you smiling."
"N-No, hyung. Jae-oh hyung."
"I'll up the weight, Jae."
"Jae-oh hyung! I'll really die!"
"It's fine. You won't. I guarantee it. No dying."
"How do you know, hyung?"
"No one's died yet."
Yet?
"Wh-What if I'm the first?"
"I'll stop before you do."
His gentle expression, practically saying 'I've done all this myself, so just keep up,' left me pouting.
'This demon!'
Cancel everything good I said about Jae-oh!
Jae-oh's a bad guy. A total bad guy!
Like the saying goes, once a good person does something bad, they turn rotten for good. Groaning, I moved my body.
My exhausted body from intense dance practice screamed under the added workout.
"Ugh, argh! Jae-oh hyung!"
"Hang in there. You can do it. I did."
"You were an athlete, hyung! Me! I! Argh!"
...And screams kept bursting from my mouth too.
I'm dying. For real. Seriously.
System, isn't this... something you should block?
If I die, main quest's toast, right?
That's when, as I futilely prodded the system,
[Intense exercise! Muscles are growing. Strength +1]
The system pinged with a strength stat increase.
Pulling this now leaves me speechless, damn it.
For days now, every training session netted at least +1 strength.
Higher strength improves stamina efficiency.
Thanks to that, I had no choice but to grudgingly keep up.
'F***! Save me...!'
Grinding my teeth through Jae-oh's training, that's when Su-rim burst into the dorm at a brisk pace.
She shouted in an urgent voice.
"Kids! Everyone to the living room!"
"What's up?"
"What happened?"
The members, who'd fled to their rooms fearing trouble, crawled out one by one at Su-rim's call.
Jae-oh paused his coaching to look at her. Catching my breath, I thought,
'She said she was heading to the company. Wonder what's up?'
Once everyone gathered, Su-rim delivered the news she'd brought in a serious tone.
"Kids. They've decided on our fan club name."