Master Plan – The Warship
"Seems like Actor Ma is the most new-generation guy here."
"Ah, come on."
Maseok Do fired up the live stream and turned to Yeon-woo.
"Yeon-woo, I usually just grill the meat and don't say much, so you handle the chatting."
"Haha. Got it."
Seok-do's lives — quiet streams of him grilling and eating with barely a word — had their own dedicated mukbang following. Tonight, more than five times the usual number of viewers flooded his SNS live.
"Uh, hello, everyone."
Yeon-woo greeted the camera a little awkwardly, still getting used to it. The chat was scrolling so fast it was nearly impossible to read.
"Ah, yes. Hello. Nice to meet you."
New viewers kept pouring in, flooding the screen with messages and hearts, and Yeon-woo kept answering the greetings one after another.
"I feel like I've turned into a YouTuber or streamer. Haha."
"And this is the host of the live, Senior Maseok Do. Yes, I haven't tried it yet myself."
From whether he'd tasted the meat Seok-do was grilling to a barrage of questions so dense they made his eyes hurt, Yeon-woo started answering them as carefully and in order as he could.
"Talking to yourself nonstop is harder than I expected."
As far as he knew, Summer's Closet still hadn't locked down any overseas distribution deals — yet far more international fans had shown up than expected. Nearly half the chat was rolling in English.
"We've got a lot of fans cheering us on from overseas, too. Hello, everyone. I'm Ryu Yeon-woo."
With flawless pronunciation that rolled out as naturally as breathing, Yeon-woo started chatting with the foreign fans as well.
"Whoa, you're good at English too? I already thought it was wild when you spoke Italian."
Maseok Do, who had been silently grilling the whole time, finally opened his mouth.
"Aaah, that's still a secret. You'll be seeing it in the articles soon enough."
Somehow reading the chat while still grilling, Maseok Do answered right away. Filming was already in its final stretch, so articles were about to drop anyway — and everyone in the industry already knew. It wasn't much of a secret to begin with.
After that, Yeon-woo answered every question that came in as sincerely as he could. It was only about a twenty-minute live, but talking directly with the fans felt genuinely fun.
"Yeon-woo, we should eat properly now. Say goodbye to the fans."
"Ah, right. Then I'll see you all again if I get the chance. Have a good night, everyone!"
Seok-do and Yeon-woo waved. The chat exploded with goodbyes of its own, messages and hearts racing up the screen at a blistering pace.
Click.
Seok-do ended the live and pulled his phone off the tripod.
"Must've been hard sitting there without saying a word the whole live."
Yeon-woo turned to Su-yeon and Min-su, who had been quietly eating beside them.
"The hardest part was not being able to say how good this meat is while eating it."
"That so? Hahaha. Eat plenty."
Min-su's easy, good-natured answer stretched Seok-do's grin from ear to ear.
"Actor Ryu, please try some already. It's seriously incredible."
"Yeon-woo, hurry up and eat. Senior's meat is the best."
Min-su and Su-yeon both held up thumbs and pushed more meat his way.
"Then, Seok-do hyung — I'll eat gratefully."
Yeon-woo picked up a piece and put it in his mouth. The taste hit him immediately — no empty compliment needed.
"Wow. What cut is this? It's really amazing."
"Beef galbi."
Expensive meat really did taste better. Eating something this good, Yeon-woo naturally thought of his family. They had grilled beef together when he went down to Daejeon this time, but the moment something delicious hit his tongue, he wanted to feed it to them all over again.
I've really become part of a family.
He glanced sideways. Su-yeon was chewing away with pure contentment.
I have friends who confide their worries in me.
Min-su was pushing dried radish and a little of everything else toward Yeon-woo's plate, telling him to eat that too.
And precious people who genuinely care for me have come into my life.
"I'm happy."
At Yeon-woo's words, everyone smiled. And so the night at the campsite grew deep.
Yeon-woo rose at dawn, jogged a full loop around the campsite, then washed up at a public bathhouse in the neighborhood and came back.
He'd already gotten word that after dinner last night, Manager Kim Min-su had driven Jeong Su-yeon safely home.
At the sound of movement outside, the tent zipper came down, and Maseok Do emerged scratching the back of his head.
"Hwaaahm. Where'd you go."
"Good morning. I went for a dawn workout and washed up roughly at the place just up ahead."
"Ah, Geumseong Bathhouse right out front? If you were gonna wash up, you should've woken me so we could go together."
At Seok-do's words, Yeon-woo scratched the back of his own head.
"Well… I did try to wake you. For about twenty minutes…"
Seok-do gave an awkward little cough.
"Ahem. That so. Once I'm out, I really don't get up easily."
That was no exaggeration. Yeon-woo had shaken him, tried everything short of slapping his cheeks, and the man still hadn't budged.
"Shall we head out?"
"You've still got plenty of time if you want to go wash up first."
Seok-do snorted a laugh and waved him off.
"Washed or not, nobody ever recognizes me either way. And I'm in a mask the whole day today anyway."
Yeon-woo nodded, recalling today's shooting schedule.
"Still, for manners' sake, I'll just go splash my face at the place up front."
Seok-do ambled off, and while he was gone Yeon-woo packed the camping gear neatly and loaded it into Seok-do's car. In his previous life, securing gear safely in a Humvee racing across the desert had been the most basic of basics — so the moment Yeon-woo rolled up his sleeves, the camping equipment stacked itself into Seok-do's trunk in perfect, razor-sharp angles.
Seok-do came back from washing his face, saw the tent and gear that had vanished in an instant, and walked over in astonishment.
"Aigoo, you already loaded everything? Why'd you do it alone — that must've been heavy."
"It's fine. You fed me so much delicious food, I've got to earn my keep."
Looking at the gear stacked so neatly in the trunk, Seok-do whistled in admiration.
"Whoa, this is way more organized than when we came. Absolute knife-edge packing. You sure you never did military service?"
"Ahaha…"
Yeon-woo laughed awkwardly.
"Hmm, about an hour left. The set's right up ahead. Nothing else to do — want to head over early?"
"Yes, let's go."
Yeon-woo and Seok-do got in the car and drove toward the filming location.
"Finally shooting it. Our movie's ending."
"Right? You know this is the single biggest chunk of the production budget."
It was the scene where Park Kang-woo — who had scraped together every last won he could, soul and all, to seize control of the domestic drug trade — made the deal with Pierre Choi's crew. For this late-stage shoot, the maximum number of stunt performers had been brought in, and there was a fairly complex action sequence with intricate blocking. Fortunately the action the lead actors themselves had to perform was simple enough that coaching from the martial arts director between takes would cover it.
Reading the scenario, Yeon-woo had felt the itch to handle the action himself — but story-wise that was impossible, so he found himself thinking he'd like his next project to have a little more action in it.
They drove the rural roads on the outskirts of Incheon toward the harbor that was their set. The presence of it was visible from a long way off.
"…So this is Director Park Chan-hong's scale."
"It really is something."
They had briefly borrowed an aging passenger ferry that was about to be decommissioned and dismantled. He'd heard the special sets team had painted and modified only the sides and part of the bridge needed for filming. Seeing the result in person was something else entirely. What filled Yeon-woo and Seok-do's eyes was a massive military warship floating on the sea.
They pulled up in front of the harbor and got out. Crews were still hauling endless amounts of filming equipment into the ship, preparations still in full swing. Yeon-woo and Seok-do walked over to Director Park Chan-hong, who was busy barking instructions.
"Director."
At Seok-do's voice, Park Chan-hong turned around.
"You two are early."
"That ship is incredible."
Director Park clapped Seok-do on the shoulder.
"Only the visible side looks like that. What we put even more work into is over here."
He led Yeon-woo and Seok-do over to a container structure tucked in a corner of the set.
"Go on in."
Looking as proud as a parent introducing a star student, Director Park opened the door.
"Whoa — I've never been on a military vessel, but this is perfect."
"It really is."
Yeon-woo, who had seen plenty of military ships in his previous life, hadn't been particularly moved by the vessel floating out on the water. This, though — this surprised him. The interior of a military warship, right down to what looked like electronic equipment, had been realized with absolute perfection.
Hearing Maseok Do's voice, a man walked out from deeper inside.
"Actors. We poured our souls into building this, so please take good care of it."
"Ah — this is Representative Lee of the special sets company."
At Director Park's introduction, Maseok Do and Yeon-woo both greeted him.
"As I said before, this scene is going to be hard to reshoot."
When they filmed the final sequence, this meticulously built interior was scheduled to be wrecked beyond recognition — reshoots would be nearly impossible.
"Still, doing it practically is more real than CG, and it actually costs less."
Director Park nodded at Representative Lee's words.
Soon the rest of the cast and the stunt team arrived on set, and they ran through the final blocking rehearsals. Today's shoot was split in two: the action filmed inside the bridge set, and the shooting done out on the actual ship floating on the water. While Seok-do and Yeon-woo worked out their blocking on the set, other actors were already filming hard up on the ship.
"Action!"
At Director Park Chan-hong's cue, the cameras rolled on deck. Actor Han Ji-sang, playing the informant "Junk Dealer," was in paint-stained work clothes.
"Gotta slap this paint on fast. We finish inside four hours."
"Aigoo, Team Leader, my arm's about to fall off. Why does Pierre always make us do this the same day?"
The Junk Dealer's crew was painting the white sections of the passenger ferry gray to look like a military vessel.
"Nothing we can do about it — today's the only window we've got."
"Gwang-sik, hit it with more thinner. It's gotta dry right away."
It was both a detail of the film's setting and the real story of the production team. In the movie, it was the day Park Kang-woo answered Pierre's summons to make the drug deal. And in reality, it was this very moment of filming that scene. Both had only half a day — a brutally tight schedule.
"Hey — be careful with that crate. One wrong move and we're all dead."
"Yes, Team Leader."
As the men carrying crates stepped out of frame, Director Park called out.
"Okay. Cut. Deck filming wrapped."
At his words, the staff cheered.
"Aigoo, we made it. That whole deck is steel plate — I thought I was getting roasted alive."
"Alright, alright, let's get down."
Past noon, with the sun high overhead, the blazing heat hammered down and baked crew and actors alike. And it wasn't only the ship team that was heating up. Actor Jeong Ha-gyun, playing Park Kang-woo, had arrived and joined them — and the container team, locking in their blocking chemistry, was running just as hot.